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The Scorpion and the Crane
The Scorpion and the Crane
What is it about the Scorpion and the Crane? No matter how much other Clans profess to hate the Scorpion it always seems that the Crane hate them more. If any Clan is likely to come to blows in court it will be these two, and yet, underneath the surface they share so many similarities that they could almost be the same Clan. This article is dedicated to a few of these.
The way of the Courtier
Picture a Crane courtier, the soul of honour and courtesy. Resplendent in beautiful blue cloth, always ready with a poem and a carefully waved fan. This is quite different from the Scorpion courtier, hiding behind a mask, lurking in shadows in evil looking robes and dropping poison in a cup. Yet the two are very similar. The Scorpion and Crane Clans together created the court system of Rokugan and have more courtiers than any other two clans put together. Both clans have techniques that emphasise using secrets, embaressing your opponent in front of friends and enemies, and using poetry (kakita poets and shosuro jesters) or the intrecaies of gift giving, to force their enemies into undoing themselves. Both clans use the art of the duel to back up their ploys and are adept at making the system work for them.
Appreciation of Beauty
The Crane Clan have always emphasised the importance of beauty. Their fantastic gardens brighten the land, their artisans craft swords, fans and statues and their poets have shaped the culture of generations. At first glance the Scorpion could not be more different. Their palaces hide in dark mountains, their gardens are for the hanging of traitors and their most famous writings are hidden in secret. Nevertheless here once again there is more than seems obvious at first. Who else but the Scorpion take delight in the night, in the beauty of dark colours, red silks, black velvet, and macarbe humour. Their actors are seen in every noble court performing the most famous works in Rokugan and without the Scorpion there would not be a tea garden or a geisha house in every town, complete with song, painting and fine food. The Crane and the Scorpion are opposite sides of a coin when it comes to the arts and comforts of the mind and body, though the two cannot meet.
The way of the Trickster
And what of the deciet and trickery of the Scorpion? A stout Lion samurai will roar in anger over the ways of the Scorpion, feints, ambushes and traps, poison, murder and spying, these are the ways that have had the Scorpion Clan revieled almost since the first days of Bayushi. Yet ask the same Lion about the Crane and he will tell you of caves filled with Gaijin pepper, Samurai hiding in rice paddys, Daidoji ambushes and tricks. Ask a Scorpion and he will tell you that his clan is not the only one with a spy in every house, and that the Crane is not also sometimes above murder. Beyond this the Crane have their own dark secrets that hide in the corners of every single Black Market and in the murky politics of the silent war with the Yasuki that has probably claimed as many rich men's lives as have the daggers of the Scorpion.
Similar...
So close are the ways of the two clans that they often overlap. In the card game many Scorpion decks are filled with Cranes, Kakita Yogoso the slanderer, Shizue the tale teller, while Bayushi Goshiu could find his way into Crane decks. Ambushes may sometimes be seen in Scorpion military deck, but just as often in the Daidoji, while so many Scorpion and Crane decks share their portion of challenges, shames, breaches, suspicions and more. Are the Cranes just Scorpions without masks or the Scorpions just Cranes in black and red? It would almost seem so except that the voices of each clan raises itself so loudly saying otherwise.
... yet Different
Perhaps the key to this dilemma comes from the fact that the two Clans simply are so similar. Each treads on almost the same territory, and uses almost the same methods. So close are they that they must work twice as hard to differentiate themselves from each other. Thus the Crane cling to the thought that they are more honourable, the Scorpion to the belief that they are more loyal. The Crane insist that they do everything the honourable way, the Scorpion that they have sacrificed honour for the good of the Empire (which is in itself most honourable of course). The closer the two Clans become the more violently they must search for every little thing that makes them different, so that the broad similarities are ignored in favour of the minor differences. It cannot be any other way, or the two Clans and the tradition of a thousand years would fall apart. In essence the Scorpion and the Crane are simply too similar ever to be able to accept the other.
