Six Harmonies

The deity that handles joining, and the mildest-tempered of the eight. Its entire trade is bringing two sides to the same table — talking a match into existence, closing a gap that was not going to close on its own. Whether a deal gets struck, or two parties end up together at all, is read here.

• Partnership — joint ventures, alliances, and scattered strength gathered into one body.
• Marriage and matchmaking — the introduction, the pairing, the setting up of a household.
• The go-between — brokers, agents, witnesses and corroborating evidence, and media in its role of carrying a message across.
• In mood it leans festive; in quantity it leans towards many rather than few.

The layer most often dropped is partnership. Six Harmonies is not a marriage deity with a business footnote — a joint venture, an alliance and a working collaboration sit under it exactly as squarely as a match does. Reading it as romance alone throws away half of what it covers, and in a business question that half is usually the answer.

Nature

The person involved reads a room on the way into it and knows within a minute who is not speaking to whom. Open conflict holds no appeal; the first move in any dispute is to hunt for the point both sides can nod at. A promise given is taken seriously, whether a relationship will still be there in ten years gets weighed early, and underneath the easy-going surface a balance is being calculated the whole time.

Style

Talk first, move second. The person involved is good at locating the overlap between two positions and negotiating a thing into existence rather than forcing it through; the lead role holds little attraction next to being the one who got everybody into the same room. When the mood stiffens, they are first out to smooth it over.

Strength

Connecting people. Building trust, getting a collaboration off the ground, and pulling resources that were each doing their own thing into a single arrangement. Negotiation, management, community and outside relations all suit the person involved, and the more the whole benefits, the more clearly they are worth having.

Impression

Easy company, dependable, soft in presence — people drift towards the person involved without deciding to. No sharp edges, and yet a strong hold: usually the one keeping the friction out of a team. Warm at first meeting, and only much later obvious how much was being held together.

Pitfall

Swallowing the honest answer to keep the peace. Accommodate for long enough and the person involved no longer has a position of their own; when something finally has to be given up they cannot bring themselves to choose, the relationship gets put ahead of the goal, and the one left tired and short-changed is always them.

In a home, Six Harmonies is wherever people come together in the same place.

• Indoors: the living room, the meeting table, the area kept for talking terms, the marital bedroom, and wherever contracts are stored.
• Outdoors: commercial centres, trading companies, marriage registries and bridges.
• Objects: contracts, agreements and marriage certificates — anything that stands as proof of a relationship.
• At the level of the whole property: it reads as a place that holds its energy in rather than letting it blow through, with a well-kept entrance and a settled household.

The same room carries a gate, a star and a deity all at once. Three layers, three separate symbols, sitting side by side without cancelling each other out.

Primary indicator for: Deals / Contracts, Love / Marriage.