Chương 43: Lìchūn: Connection 7

"—not green," Xie Lianqiu says, with great seriousness, as if this is cultivation instruction and not an argument over hair ribbons.

"Green makes your eyes look stranger." Liu Yinhua pauses with her teacup halfway to her mouth, one eyebrow raised.

"Stranger?"

"Not bad strange, expensive strange."

"That is not better."

"It is much better. People forgive expensive things for being odd." The tea room attached to Xie Lianqiu's quarters is small, but much warmer than Liu Yinhua expected. Not hot, not even truly heated, only lived in. There is a low table set between two cushions, a chest against the wall with travel scratches along one corner, a bow rack hung carefully out of reach of the steam from the bath towels, and a woven mat of red and dun thread laid over the floorboards.

Someone has placed a little clay horse on the windowsill beside a dish of dried flowers. It is truly ugly in the face, and very lovingly made. Liu Yinhua has been trying not to stare at it. She has also been trying not to touch the robe too much. The robe is not sect grey, and casual in a way Liu Yinhua does not often allow herself to be. Soft cream cloth, loose through the sleeves, with a pale red lining that only shows when she moves.

It does not pinch, does not sit stiffly, does not announce itself as expensive, and yet the weave is fine enough that her fingers keep finding it without permission. Xie Lianqiu had given it to her after the hot springs with a flushed, triumphant expression and the careless explanation that she had three others close enough in size, and this one suited Liu Yinhua better anyway. Liu Yinhua had tried to refuse.

Xie Lianqiu had looked at her, looked at the robe, and said, "Liu Yinhua, if you make me carry it back after I already imagined how nice it would look, I will be unbearable for the rest of the day." So now Liu Yinhua is wearing it, and Xie Lianqiu keeps humming. Not constantly, but every so often, while poking at the plate of sweet rice cakes or pouring more tea or leaning back to inspect Liu Yinhua's sleeves with bright-eyed satisfaction, Xie Lianqiu hums under her breath.

It is very difficult to be wary of someone who is that pleased about cloth.

"I think blue would be safer," Liu Yinhua says. Xie Lianqiu makes a face.

"Blue is safe because everyone does blue. You are too pale for dull blue."

"I am too pale for most things, apparently."

"You said it, not me." Liu Yinhua gives her a look, and Xie Lianqiu bites into a sugared plum and smiles around it.

"Fine. If you want safe, dark red, but not Crimson Wastes red. You would look like you were trying too hard, and then Shen Yuanzhou would say something stupid, and then Chi Yanluo would look pained, and then Duan Xueheng would look amused, and I hate that."

"That is a great deal of consequence for one ribbon."

"Ribbons are dangerous." Xie Lianqiu points the half-eaten plum at her.

"One wrong colour and suddenly everyone thinks you have declared yourself for a house, insulted an aunt, seduced someone's cousin, or challenged a dead grandmother."

"I have never challenged a dead grandmother."

"Not yet. You are new." Liu Yinhua laughs before she thinks to stop herself. Xie Lianqiu's smile goes quick and delighted, as if she has won something. It makes Liu Yinhua lower her eyes to her tea. The cup is warm. The tea is a little oversteeped, but good. There are roasted seeds in a shallow bowl, candied plums, small sesame cakes, and thin slices of dried fruit dusted with sugar. Xie Lianqiu eats with the appetite of someone who has never learned to make hunger look delicate.

Liu Yinhua likes that too, despite herself. There are too many things she likes now. She sets the cup down carefully.

"I may have found someone useful," she says after a moment. Xie Lianqiu's hand pauses above the sesame cakes.

"For the trial?" This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

"Possibly."

"Who?"

"Xu Qinghe, from the medical halls." Xie Lianqiu hums, different this time. Thoughtful. The sweet-bright mood does not vanish, exactly, but it shifts aside enough for Liu Yinhua to see the martial disciple underneath it.

"I know the name. Quiet, easily bully-able?"

"That seems accurate."

"Can they run?"

"I do not know."

"Can they keep calm?"

"Around blood, Pan Qiu says yes. Around people, less certain." Xie Lianqiu reaches for a cake, then breaks it in half instead of eating it.

"That can be worked with. People are worse than blood." Liu Yinhua looks down into her tea.

"They are worried about being taken only to patch up reckless disciples."

"Smart."

"And about who keeps them alive if something reaches the back."

"Also smart." Xie Lianqiu eats half the cake, thinks for a moment, and then pushes the other half toward Liu Yinhua with two fingers.

"Chi Yanluo will like that." Liu Yinhua takes the half cake because refusing feels stranger than accepting now. That is dangerous too. Small acceptances become ordinary if one is not careful. A robe. A cake. A cup of tea. A place by the table where her wet hair is drying in a towel Xie Lianqiu had thrown at her face because she was dripping on the floor. Friendship, perhaps, happens through such small indignities. She is not sure when Xie Lianqiu became a friend. That is the worst of it.

Liu Yinhua had guarded against favours, against contracts, against kindness with teeth. She had watched for hooks. She had expected Xie Lianqiu's warmth to ask something eventually and braced herself for the request. Instead, Xie Lianqiu had taught her to hold a bow properly, argued about sleeve colours, complained about Shen Yuanzhou stealing fried buns from someone's plate, and became familiar with repetition. No declaration.

No moment Liu Yinhua could point to and say, there, that is when I should have stepped back. Only this: Xie Lianqiu sitting across from her in a tea room, hair loose from the springs, cheeks still warm, looking pleased that Liu Yinhua is wearing a robe she chose. A friend. How troublesome. Xie Lianqiu wipes sugar from her thumb.

"And you?" Liu Yinhua glances up.

"Me?"

"You went looking for a healer. You are wearing my robe, you are eating my snacks, and you are doing the thing where you look calm enough that I know something is happening in your head." Xie Lianqiu leans her elbow on the table.

"Are you going to work the trial with us, or are we still pretending you have not started building the team from the outside?" Liu Yinhua should have expected it. Xie Lianqiu is direct when she is not trying to be gentle, and sometimes when she is trying. Still, the question lands warm and low in her stomach.

"For the trial," Liu Yinhua says slowly, "yes. I think so." Xie Lianqiu does not quite sit up straighter, but her eyes brighten anyway.

"Good," she says, too quickly, and then reaches for the tea like she can hide in it. Liu Yinhua's mouth nearly curves.

"That was very composed," she compliments.

"I am famous for my composure," comes the reply, complete with haughty sniff.

"You are not."

"I could be. Somewhere very far away, where no one knows me."

"For the trial," Liu Yinhua says again, before the warmth can carry her too far.

"Not… everything after." Xie Lianqiu nods, and this time the brightness settles into something quieter.

"I know."

"Do you?"

"I can be excited, and know what you're getting on about."

"That is not always true of people."

"That is because people are often stupid." Xie Lianqiu pokes at the roasted seeds and flicks one toward the bowl rather than at Liu Yinhua, which is probably restraint.

"Trial first. After can be whatever after will be. I want you with us, but I do not want you looking like you have swallowed a fishbone every time someone says faction."

"I do not look like that."

"You do, but beautifully." Liu Yinhua gives her another look. Xie Lianqiu grins and eats another plum. It should be easier now. The thing has been said. Liu Yinhua will work the Lower Valley Trial with them, or near enough that the distinction may not survive contact with the rest of the sect. She has asked Xu Qinghe. She will have to speak with Chi Yanluo.

She will have to tell Tang Mingxia and Wu Cailan properly, and Wu Cailan will say something sharp about martial disciples dragging everyone else into trouble because their skulls are too thick to notice walls. All simple problems. The other thing sits under her tongue. Liu Yinhua wraps both hands around her teacup. The robe sleeve slips down her wrist, soft and pale and too easy against her skin.

"What do you know about qinglou?" she asks. Xie Lianqiu's hand stills in the snack bowl, only for a moment. Then Xie Lianqiu picks out a roasted seed, puts it on the table, and looks at it rather than at Liu Yinhua. That, more than anything, makes Liu Yinhua's breath feel narrow.

"A little," Xie Lianqiu says.

"Not from inside, mostly from soldiers talking too loudly. From traders. From aunties telling girls where not to walk when caravans come in. Why?" It is a gentle why. Liu Yinhua could still step away from it. She knows how. A joke. A rumour. A question about politics. A pretty tilt of the head and a careful smile. Xie Lianqiu would let her, Liu Yinhua thinks. Perhaps not forever, but for now. That is the problem.

"I wanted to know what people say," Liu Yinhua says. Xie Lianqiu looks up then. Her expression is not blank, because Xie Lianqiu is not good at blankness. There is curiosity there, and caution, and the first shadow of anger, though not pointed at Liu Yinhua.

"People say a lot of things when they think no one will make them repeat it properly," she says.

"If you mean what respectable people say, then mostly they lie. Or they say ugly things and call it concern." Xie Lianqiu pushes the bowl of seeds away with one finger, no appetite in the movement now.

"If you mean what boys say, then I know enough to want to kick some of them into a ditch."

"How very Crimson Wastes of you."

"It is a good ditch." Liu Yinhua's laugh catches once and does not quite become laughter. Xie Lianqiu looks at Liu Yinhua's hands around the cup, then at her face, then deliberately back to the table, giving her somewhere to hide.

"Are you asking because of someone here?" Xie Lianqiu asks.

"Or because of before?" Liu Yinhua's fingers tighten, and the tea cup is no longer hot enough to burn.

"Both, perhaps."