I stood in the court of the Emperor of all Rokugan, and I was afraid.

Not for myself, but for the Empire. The court seemed strangely aloof, withdrawn from its usual lighthearted politic, and I listened to the conversations around me with awe and concern. Rather than the standard bickering over trade rights or favors, I heard whispers of war.

My name is Doji Shizue, and I am the storyteller to the Empire. Crane by birth, my mother was Scorpion, and some say that I have the wits of both. I can only hope that the Fortunes have blessed me as well, that I may understand our troubles and elude them.

The Emperor, Hantei the 39th, rested upon his Emerald Throne, his heavy robes encasing his body like the cocoon of some strange caterpillar. Resplendent in silver, gold and jade, he listened with half an ear to the advisors on the dais beside him.

Before him, the Crane and the Lion argued incessantly over the right to rule the Osari plains, the richest land in the Empire. Both clans hold some small title to them, though the Crane have ruled them for several hundred years. The Emperor seemed uninterested in their careful arguments and their flattery.

To the side, the Unicorn pranced in their violet robes, their watchful eyes guarded and reserved. I have heard tales that they fear for the Emperor's health - as do we all, fear that he will die of this plague that sweeps the Imperial City, The Unicorn sent their own doctor - a strange, primitive shaman, I fear - to assist the Emperor. It has done nothing.

The Phoenix, always our allies, stood alone in the corner of the chamber, speaking to none but themselves. They looked around at the rest of the Empire with eyes touched by fear, and I did not know what troubled them. All I could gather was that some strange magic was at work, something that they could not yet comprehend. Their Elemental Masters were strangely absent, mysteriously meeting in solitude atop their grand palaces to the north. I did not ask their reasons; they offered none.

Even the Dragon seemed strangely quiet, their whisperings and riddles fallen to the side of the court. Without their steady quips, the court seemed a far more somber place, devoid of the banter and ready witticisms of that enlightened clan.

Something troubled us all, and we knew not what it was.

I bowed to Ishikawa as he passed by. The Emperor's most famous guardsman, captain of his legions, Ishikawa was seen as a bastion of honor - and I wished I knew his thoughts as he paced the floor like a captured wildcat.

The doors flew open, and dozens of guards stood ready to protect the young Emperor. Standing in the doorway, a gray smoke oozing from his skin, a Seppun samurai knelt, his eyes wide. "My Lord," he said as he bowed, and the boy on the Emerald Throne raised his eyebrows at the intrusion.

"The Crab raise an army," he panted, holding one arm where blood had heavily stained his brown and gold gi. "I have seen them, heading north from the Wall."

Seppun Ishikawa stepped forward, his gait hesitant. When he saw the man bore Taint and plague, his step hastened. He would protect the Son of Heaven at any cost.

The samurai lowered his head once more, green blood trickling from beneath his robe. Ishikawa paused a few steps away, his hand trembling.

"Don't touch him!" Shiba Ujimitsu called out, stepping between the Emperor and the Seppun messenger. "He has the Taint!"

"The Crab have brought it north," the messenger whispered, barely heard over the frightened rustling of the courtiers. "Their armies are not samurai. They bring great machines, maho-casters, and worse."

"No…" Ishikawa refused to believe, even as the proof stained the mahogany floor of Otosan Uchi's great palace.

"Oni, my lord. Demons of the Shadowlands, and their minions. Kisada has gone mad."

At the Emperor's side, Ujimitsu stepped forward. Remembering another tainted messenger, another court, he asked. "Did you see a great darkness among them - signs of a magic that spread black shadow across the land?"

"No," the messenger sighed. "Only maho and blood."

"Still," Ujimitsu pondered softly, whispering to his yojimbo. "I have felt this coming for some time. Kisada is only the first step."

Not hearing the Phoenix's quiet words, the Seppun guardsman spoke again. "I saw Kisada's son, among the others. Fighting beside a massive oni… of blood and bone." The Seppun choked on the words, coughing as Taint clutched at his throat and seized his voice.

"Yakamo?" The Emperor said, startled.

"Hai. Fighting with the others, surrounded by his Hida guard."

"Yakamo has but one hand - how can he come to battle?" called Doji Yosai, an older courtier with graying hair and a weathered face.

"One-handed no more, Doji-sama." The Seppun messenger wiped away the blood that trailed between his lips. They had turned grey with exertion, and the blood seemed almost black against his darkened skin. "Yakamo fights with a hand made of iron, steel, and flesh - a giant claw cut from Fu Leng's own hide, I believe."

A scream came from one of the younger courtiers, swiftly cut off as her Unicorn master silenced her. Ide Tadaji stepped into the ring that had formed around the kneeling Seppun.

"Does Yakamo fight alone? Perhaps he has gone renegade… or perhaps he is mad."

"Iye. No. He has a hundred Hida Guards, a thousand of Tsuru's men, and Kuni - Hiruma - many of the Crab join him. This is no renegade, my lord. This is war."

The Emperor frowned again, and it was as if thunder broke above the palace, hiding the palace from the light of the sun.

"Bah." One of the Lion raised a hand arrogantly. "This is some ruse performed by the Crane, to draw attention from the true war - the Osari plains. The Crane must give them to us, or…"

"Or what, Lion?" Kakita Yoshi smiled. "Or you, too, will march upon us with the Shadowlands at your side?"

The court descended into arguing and chaos, and the Emperor stood from his throne. He was small, no older than twenty but with the frail appearance of a boy much younger. At his side, the Empress Kachiko caught at his elbow to help steady his pace, and he smiled trustingly at her.

Her own smile was laced with poison, but the Hantei did not seem to notice. "Thank you, wife."

"By your leave, Master," she bowed, grateful for his kind words.

Because I stood near them, I heard more than the rest of the bickering and weeping courtiers behind me in the hall. I listened as Ishikawa knelt before his cousin, not touching the Tainted man. "Do you know their purpose?" he whispered as the courtiers began their squawking noise once more.

"They plan…" the Seppun's voice was choked, his body shuddering, "…to seize… Beiden Pass." The answer was low, hidden from the prying ears of the others. Ishikawa's face turned purple, then he quickly recovered his peace.

From the Emperor's dais, one of the high-ranking courtiers pointed a stern finger at the wounded Seppun who knelt at their door. "That man," Seppun Bake curled his lip and fluttered his ornate lace fan, "must be destroyed."

The Seppun on the doorstep smiled one last time, gasping with sickness with each breath he drew. "I beg the Emperor's permission to commit seppuku, now that my duty has been fulfilled."

"It is yours," Hantei the 39th said somberly.

Before the samurai could reach for his sword, his body shook, unable even to complete his bow of thanks. He tried to lift himself from the ground, but a trickle of dark blood drained from his mouth and nose, and the Seppun messenger fell forward, his last energy spent.

Ishikawa stood, drawing his sword as the light left his cousin's eyes. Before the Taint could completely take control of the Seppun's flesh, Ishikawa cut the head from the samurai's shoulders with a clean stroke, and the body ceased shaking. As the blood spread across the Emperor's throne chamber, the body at last lay quiet on the ground, still and motionless.

Silence filled the hall. The only sound that reached us was the soft, rhythmic sound of Ishikawa's tense breathing. No one moved.

Then, finally, Ishikawa turned to bow to his master on the Emerald Throne. "The body must be blessed. Then burned."

The Emperor nodded, steepling his hands to hide his quivering mouth. The Taint had already begun to spread through Rokugan, and plague seized the lands of the Crane. Soon, the other clans would feel it too - a dark poison that rotted the Empire from within.

On the dais at the Emperor's side, Kachiko, Mistress of Lies, smiled behind her silken mask.

Thus began the first true battles of the Clan War, a time of trouble and of trial. As the Crab marched northwards through the lands of the dishonored and defeated Scorpion, the Lion and the Crane battled over riches and pride.

The Unicorn, ever watchful, returned to their solitary ways, content to allow the Empire to burn around them, and the Dragon retreated to their mountains, claiming that some great mystery was about to begin. The Phoenix, ever allies of the Crane and of the Emerald Throne, had only fearful prophecy to tell, whispering of great dark magics that were spreading from the southland. As we watched for the world to right itself, a great shudder shook the land, and plague spread through the Imperial City, catching even the Son of Heaven in its grasp.

The Emerald Empire would never be the same again.