(Day 6, LM) Living on the Edge (Expecting)

[Tonbo Misa]

Misa just smiled and leaned back against him. "It was never unwelcome," was all she said, for now.

[Moto Butaj]

That turns Butaj contemplative and he stops rushing Huludai. They keep the speed for a while before they start to slow down. He blows some of her hair from his face and looks across the steppe, to the noon sun, then holds her close and kisses the side of her face. "It feels like Butaj has abducted Misa and should now set up the tent to make love to her. If not for this miai, this is how it would end if Misa consented now."

[Tonbo Misa]

Misa laughed softly at that. "I think the other samurai around would still have a say, but the thought is sweet Butaj-kun."

[Moto Butaj]

"We're deeper in the plain so there aren't many around, like none. Unless those pesky eavesdroppers crouch in tall grass here somewhere." He smiles wistfully. "But Butaj knows Ide Dabo wouldn't recognise Butaj's claim to Misa afterwards. We are meant to play by the rules, any and all."

[Tonbo Misa]

Misa nodded. "Especially with the position I hold. If I were just born a simple samurai, with no high family ties... perhaps life would have been simpler, and you could have stolen me away..." She smirked faintly as she enjoyed where they were, and all that entailed.

[Moto Butaj]

"Simple or not simple, it's really good to have Misa this close. It feels like finding a part of Butaj he was missing but didn't know about it, like something that slipped from the saddlebags in the gallop of life and now was found again, after a full circle around the desert. A strange feeling." He kisses her face again.

[Tonbo Misa]

Misa nodded a bit, turning her face up a bit at the kiss to speak more directly toward him. "Is that so? Butaj never had any lovers in the sands before coming here?"

[Moto Butaj]

"Butaj had some sexual relations, and loved a girl or two at a distance without much hope of that becoming serious. But our long ride here was not good for romance." He says honestly, gazing tenderly into her unseeing eyes, unable to not kiss them. "This feels different."

[Tonbo Misa]

Misa gave soft giggles at the tickled kisses to her eyelids. "Well, I suppose that is a part of the reason for a miai. Perhaps Butaj is taken by exotic Rokugani women."

[Moto Butaj]

"Smitten, smitten, Butaj tells you!" He chuckles, stealing a light kiss on the lips. "Misa is just too beautiful for a desert barbarian to hold back. Maybe those rumors are true, Butaj loses his mind when he has Misa's scent in his nostrils and her breath on his skin."

[Tonbo Misa]

She just smiled at that, leaned back against him. "Perhaps so. Maybe I should have Sanmi not comb my hair or straighten my clothing in the morning, so I am less bewitching."

[Moto Butaj]

"Butaj thinks it won't work because it's more than soft and great-looking hair. It may be Misa's serenity that Butaj finds so beautiful. Or something else. It's hard to tell exactly, it's hard to name." Butaj turns Huludai into a gentle arch. "Misa is a mystery to Butaj like the enlightenment itself."

[Tonbo Misa]

Misa's smile softened at that, her tone quieter, warm. "Perhaps. I could try to be angry then, sad, jealous, pouty, all sorts of things I am not. I think my serenity sometimes makes people like you feel a distance from me. I think sometimes my cousin feels the same way,"

[Moto Butaj]

"If anything, Butaj wants to close the distance, to find a way to do it. Though..." He realises how close she is, how she leans into him. "...maybe there is none at all, it's just the kind of peace so rarely met than when people see it in Misa they can't believe it at first."

[Tonbo Misa]

"I am not certain as many see it as you believe Butaj-san... but thank you for seeing such a quality in me. It gladdens me to know I've found the peace that my brother never could, that I wish my father could have known." She just relaxed, smiling softly.