day 2

The Lagoon

He ran along the path on his toes, gait loose and springy. The cool, moist air felt good against his skin and his breaths came slow and easy.

He did not run carelessly. Each footfall landed where it would leave the least tale of his passing, as quiet as he could manage. He varied the cadence of his strides, so as to not give off a predictable sound.

He did not glance at the ground as he ran, but kept his head up, watching, but not searching for anything in particular. The attack would come, or it would not. He’d learned a long time ago that anticipating an attack by his master invariably left him too tense when the attack finally came.

So now, he ran. And he breathed, felt exhilaration in the power of his stride, at the way he flowed across the terrain. Not even his hands clasped around the hilts of the ironwood bokens held any sort of tension. They gripped the weapons, and they weapons moved as extensions of his arms, another part of his body.

He ran long enough to forget how long he had been running. He ran long enough that when he crested the last hill and looked down on the temple and the lagoon, at the waves of mist rolling off the waterfall, he felt surprised.

And so he stopped.

The attack had not come. He moved down from the ridge’s edge, crouched and surveyed the temple grounds, but saw nothing out of place. He moved down the hill slowly, alert and vary, the serenity of his run fleeing his body. When he rounded the edge of the white stone building, he looked down the wooden walkway and across the lagoon.

His master stood out on the water atop the center-most platform, his black baggy pants billowing in the mist and wind from the waterfall. Surrounding his master were perhaps a dozen more platforms bobbing in the water, each varying in size and shape from the next. All were anchored to the bottom and sides of the lagoon by ropes that had to be replaced after each winter. Each platform came from a slice of one of the thousand-year trees from the island’s forest. Some were cut geometrically. Some retained the vaguely circular, organic shape of the source tree. Some were thick, some thin. The thick ones tended to offer more stability on the water, while the thin ones, even anchored, provided only unsure footing.

He walked to the water’s edge and then shrugged out of his tunic. He flexed his grip on his bokens, and then began to work them through a fluid series of attacks, feints and deflections, seeing in his mind’s eye the attacks of many. He moved in, around and through is imaginary adversaries, feet shifting, arms flashing. As he finished the last, he faced toward his master across the water, presented his blades out before him and paid his respects.

The master inclined his head.

He stepped off the shore and onto the nearest platform. It was thin, and it shifted wildly beneath him, but he was already flowing past it, placing each step carefully, using the pitch and roll of the surface to propel him on his way. Four strides, four separate platforms, and the fight had begun.