This is a bit more casual than the previous contest winner, but it's a concept of a different direction that utlizes the entire sword for you to consider.
Well, no matter what I tried to do with a full handle, it just never worked: looked tribal or looked like male parts. Here is a very very simple concept that I can do revisions from to 'beef up' using just a 'taste' of a wrapped handle.
#3 is exactly where I think we should be going with this. Play around with the handle as is but to the left of the Kensei Parnters and maybe use a bit sharper of a font style.
#19 is the favorite so far (pending the correct spelling of Kensei). could you make the coloring of the diamonds all blue with dark blue on the top fading to lighter blue on the bottom. also, take a stab at using the image as the vertical line on the K.
no worries on the spelling, i know how it is with the late nights. #24 is the favorite now. use the font of #18 and make the Kensei the same size as the Partners.
another idea i had was to take the sword handle and put the letters of P.A.R.T.N.E.R.S in the triangles (one letter per triangle) fading from darker blue on the left to lighter blue on the right. Then put Kensei above it as the same length.