Year of the Boar, Second Month, Day 24.

My eyelids are swollen from the tears I have been shedding since night fell... My eyes sparkle with the weight of those I have yet to weep. Since sundown I have been berating myself for my own stupidity. Had I but thought any of this would happen, I would have forfeited a hundred thousand portraits rather than enrage his Lordship thus. Had I but refused the price of the portrait... had I but never asked for it... Still, the Heavens are lined with wishes, I have made my bed and I shall have to lie in it. Such was the beauty of the artist's work... her skill at bringing those she drew to life; I was entranced, smitten by the idea of having one of myself... a gift for the love of my life... I had imagined the artist's owner might ask for a fortune which I would gladly have given... I was mistaken... his price was too high and yet I chose to pay it, such was my blindness. What price could be so high, you ask? Nought but the silk from my back. None too high, you say. Indeed not, except that the silk was to be given where I stood posing for the portrait, in the common room of the Tavern where I broke my travel that evening. And it was as I stood in my shift waiting for another set of silks as the artist's owner cast his eyes over my figure, that his Lordship did arrive at the Tavern.Upon being re-dressed in another piece of magnificent silk, I did suggest a walk around the lake to the Tea house. We talked awhile - I did murmur that I was ashamed and sorry that I had hurt him by my actions. He appeared mollified and stupidly I flitted to another discussion. I proposed a formal alliance between our Houses, a marriage. He seemed not to understand what I was asking, we quarrelled and he refused my proposal. Thus, in accordance with the traditions of the House of Silent Thunder, a rule created centuries ago to stop flighty girls from proposing marriage without truly thinking over the consequences, the entire House is enslaved. I never imagined that I would be one such flighty girl. And as I sit here, contemplating my fate and my guilt, I weep bitter tears over my own folly. Lord Kenta did say to me that when I had redeemed myself in his eyes, I may be reinstated but... how can I ever expect to redeem myself when each time he asks something of me, I cannot do it to his satisfaction? I am helpless, unskilled in anything but falconry, entrapped by my own station in life. I sob in humiliation this night, his Lordship sought to teach me a lesson, and such a lesson, I can hardly bear to think about it. I forgot my new status as we sat in the Tavern talking and drinking with friends and I was disrespectful. How could I have known that he would drag me out to the stables and take his riding crop to my backside...? My cheeks burn with shame and I cannot remove the memory of being strung up and stripped like a common slave from my mind. And all the while his eyes were cold, as he took my face in his hand and asked if I had further disrespectful comments to make. I do not believe I shall ever be able to stop weeping...