Sisterhood of Smoke (D6, Early Eve, Black Elephant)

[Rixy]

Jada nodded. "Yes. For father, mother's dowry. For mother...love of my father. Took his trade and his caste. My brother, he learns the sword, too. Different temple than I, but still same...same type?"

[Bayushi Hoshi]

"Different dojo but still a warrior then?" Hoshi offered in an attempt to clarify on her terms,

[Rixy]

"Building different, but is same." She picked up her cup, then pointed at Hoshi's. "These, same type of cup. Different potters, different kiln maybe, but still same. Is like that."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

"Oh, then maybe different teachers too." Hoshi murmured, almost phrasing it like a question but she thought that she might have grasped the gist of it.

[Rixy]

The girl nodded firmly. "Yes. I learned not in Lanka. My brother, does."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

"You were from somewhere else?" Hoshi asked, interested to hear where her friend's origin began. It would also be nice to hear of another place as the only exposure she had to the Ivory Kingdoms so far was this over-stressed city with a looming doom.

[Rixy]

Smiling, Jada nodded, even as the pipe she'd summoned finally arrived. There was a pause as the pipe was filled with a fragrant tobacco blend and more drinks were brought forth. Only after she'd taken her first pull and blown a few rings of smoke did Jada speak on. "Born in a place called Carera, three days sail from here. Came when Dada called us, finished training with Father as I was not quite done."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

Hoshi fiddled with the hookah apparatus before she found her way with how it was used after watching Jada. She first took a modest pull, tasting the first time herself how the vase object filtered the smoke. the smoke was slowly release before she spoke again. "Is Carera also a harbour city like Lanka?"

[Rixy]

"Was. Bigger, good for trade with other places. End of a big river so much came down river to us to go other places." Jada's smile was wistful. "Wanted a husband of the House of sailors, House Suresh, as a girl."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

"You wanted a sailor as a husband? -Ah...The sailors there must have been far smoother than the ones we have in our lands for you to think of such a thing. Even as a girl." She giggled.

[Rixy]

"Why not? Always gone, if I didn't like him, or I could go too if I did." Giggling, Jada leaned a little closer. "Very good swimmer, you know."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

Hoshi took a pull from the hookah and muted a small cough that came afterwards. "-Ah, then you did think much on it. Clever girl. Gomen, a sailor could be a fit husband too."

[Rixy]

"With a good chest." The girl giggled a bit more. "Much muscle, is fine to see, yes? Have not bedded any yet but I hear it is nice, a lover who is strong."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

She took on an amused look at the talk of bedding a lover, not something common in samurai. Proper samurai. "Hai, very easy on the eyes and useful in more ways that one but...Muscle can only do so much, so long that his ego doesn't get in the way of his attentiveness of course." Hoshi took on a rare grin.

[Rixy]

Jada giggled all the more. "Muscle is good to hold for some of the harder positions, though you are right, wind is very good to have, too. 'Attentiveness' is a word I do not know, or 'ego'. Is it to do with how well they know the lore?"

[Bayushi Hoshi]

Hoshi had to speak through a hand as she suppressed signs of a giggle. "...I think muscle can be well compensated with some good imagination, even sometimes when you have to get technical...Wind, is truly harder to find though." She lowered her hand again with a few sound nods on her question, then there was a pause as she got the feeling she might have stumbled into a mine of information befitting a Scorpion...

"...How is the lore here?"

[Rixy]

"The Kama Sutra." Jada mentioned it the way people mentioned things like "Leadership" in Rokugan, as if it was a work everyone should have heard of. "One of my friends got an illustrated copy, very useful."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

She breathed out some smoke after taking from the hookah. "The Kama Sutra? Since I don't know the language, an illustrated copy would be most helpful if I could procure one."

[Rixy]

"Mmm. It would, yes, and the words, almost like code. Very over pretty for what it actually means." The girl smiled and shook her head. "So it can be spoken in mixed company, I think."

[Bayushi Hoshi]

Hoshi smirked at that. "Smart. It sounds like something we've done at home actually. The ones who usually are most curious of such things are usually the courtiers. There's something inescapable about court romance for them."