flemmings: (Default)
flemmings ([personal profile] flemmings) wrote2007-09-05 07:43 pm
Entry tags:

Dragon drabbles for rasetsunyo


Can't write any more:
Fics freeze and refuse to move.
Still, there are drabbles
.
 "Grief fills the room up of my absent child"

1.
       Father of four sons, Older to many youths, Gouen is at last learning to lie below. It's an... educational experience. Not what it was before for him, not what he thought it was like for others. He sweats and grunts as the solid thing moves inside him, not painful but not-- not-- 'Why am I doing this?' though of course he knows. The King wishes it. This isn't for his own purposes and pleasure. How could it be?
Goukou kisses him. "Endure, little brother. Some day you'll be able to do this with Goujun when he returns."  
Well, then again...

2.
 Goushou was never close to his Younger. Goujun followed his instruction obediently enough but whatever there was of warmth and eagerness in him, like a banked fire, he saved for when Goukou was with them. Which was natural. Not all Youngers are in sympathy with their Olders; not all fathers love their children, and not all Dances result in sons. So Goushou doesn't much mind if Goujun disappears for a while. But now, annoyingly, he finds himself misplacing things- a book, a glove, his seal- for the unaccountable pleasure of finding them again, and he just can't stop doing it.

3. 
         Goukou walked the ramparts of his palace, and the susurrus of the waves was a tapestry of sound backgrounding his thoughts. This invitation from the Third Princess of the Southern Continent- yes, he'd accept. She'd given him little Kaimyou, his silver son. He owed her some return. Both policy and personal feeling agreed on that.
And if the child was again a boy, well, so much the better. There was good blood in the South. And the Southern Ruler's old Strategist was a warrior of experience and penetrating intelligence: it would be entertaining- and good training- to partner her again in games of go.
He turned his steps back to his chambers. The waves roared behind him, low and soothing; the salt smell of them was in his nostrils; and a sudden pang struck his heart so that he stopped still, amid the discreet consternation of his attendants.
Goujun-- this I owe to you. That I may live at last like a dragon of the dragons and not the lackey of Heaven is because of your death. He took a deep breath. And so I will live like a dragon indeed, as thanks for the gift you've given to me, brother.
incandescens: (Default)

[personal profile] incandescens 2007-09-06 12:52 am (UTC)(link)
Very nice. I believe the 2nd is my favourite, but I like all three.

[identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 12:59 am (UTC)(link)
The second of course is the one written from personal experience. ^_^
incandescens: (Default)

[personal profile] incandescens 2007-09-06 01:02 am (UTC)(link)
Writers are cannibals that feed on our own flesh. Addiction, loss, absence . . . :)

[identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 01:14 am (UTC)(link)
'Des économies, des économies, faut toujours faire des économies,' as the hospital orderly in Arles said to me while carefully (and with my permission) detaching the unfranked stamp from my cousins' Get Well Soon letter.* I mean, you might as well do something useful with addiction, loss and etc if you must have them in the first place.

*It's become one of my favourite phrases in consequence.
incandescens: (Default)

[personal profile] incandescens 2007-09-06 01:05 pm (UTC)(link)
Good point, very good point.

[identity profile] rasetsunyo.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 01:02 am (UTC)(link)
Yaaaay these are wonderful. Thank you!

[identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 01:15 am (UTC)(link)
Not at all. Thank you.

[identity profile] i-am-zan.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 04:04 am (UTC)(link)
I like them all but I find the 2nd one somehow endearing. and the third one is oh - oh so melancholic.

*loves*

[identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 03:12 pm (UTC)(link)
Poor Goushou, looking *again* for his reading glasses and wishing he could stop doing this.

[identity profile] i-am-zan.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 05:09 pm (UTC)(link)
^___^.

...mmm...

may I ask a question totally unrelated to this! Sorry to spam your space...but:

Can you - or anyone - tell me if Rasetsunyo is a title, name or title and name. And if it is only a title...what does it translate to. I don't have the manga where it mentions her in the Japanese so I'm not sure where to start.

Thank you. It is for research purposes by the way!

[identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com 2007-09-06 11:43 pm (UTC)(link)
Rasetsunyo in Buddhist scripture is a category.

See here (http://www.aisf.or.jp/~jaanus/deta/r/rasetsu.htm) for info on rasetsu and rasetsunyo.

3 Fearful demons and ogres who go about at night, haunt cemeteries and devour humans. In Buddhism rasetsu are also believed to act as wardens under *Enmaou 閻魔王 the Lord of Hell, punishing the damned. Their female counterparts are called rasetsunyo 羅刹女 or rasetsushi 羅刹斯 (Sk: raksasi), and ten of them are mentioned as tutelary spirits of the Lotus Sutra.

Raksha women, essentially. But I think Minekura uses it as a proper name.

The kanji for rasetsunyo I believe are ateji- kanji chosen for sound not meaning- in order to write 'raksasi' in Japanese. Ra is usually used for phonic purposes IME, though technically I believe it's a net. Setsu means 'a moment in time', nyo is woman.

[identity profile] i-am-zan.livejournal.com 2007-09-07 12:52 am (UTC)(link)
Thank you, both for the links and info...and I am silly! Because I don't need to look further than the f-list for the kanji! Aaarrgh! the brain, the brain it does not work! *is sheepish*

[identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com 2007-09-07 12:54 am (UTC)(link)
Err well, there *is* that little detail. But I forgot it too, so don't sweat it.