Chương 57: Interlude: Chi Yanluo

Interlude: Distance"You came because you are bored," Chi Yanluo says.

"I came because you are suspiciously charitable," Shen Yuanzhao replies, standing with one shoulder against the practice courtyard gate and his arms folded over his chest.

"That is different."

"It is not."

"It is. Boredom is idle. Suspicion is civic duty." A'Ying sits on the gatepost between them, small claws pricking at the wood. The young bird spirit puffs his chest against the afternoon wind and turns his sharp head towards Shen Yuanzhao. Loud. Chi Yanluo strokes one finger down the bird's breast, smoothing ruffled feathers.

"He agrees with me."

"He always agrees with you." Wrong.

"He does not," Chi Yanluo says. Shen Yuanzhao points at the bird.

"That is favouritism." Bite?

"No biting," Chi Yanluo says, before Shen Yuanzhao can invite his own suffering. The courtyard is open enough to be proper and public enough to be safe. That is part of why Chi Yanluo chose it. There are disciples crossing the intersection every few breaths, some from the female residences, some from the male, some still flushed and limping from Elder Huan's lesson. No one comes too close. Chi Yanluo has long since learned to stop pretending not to notice such things.

Space forms around him without his asking for it, and the reason for it has little to do with anything he has done. The Crimson Wastes arrive before he does. They arrive in whispers, old lessons, family grudges, and the names of battles that children in the Blueglass Isles have never needed to learn properly. They arrive in stories about blood-mad clans and carrion birds over red earth, in jokes made too quietly to challenge and loudly enough to wound.

There are disciples here who know nothing of the western forts, nothing of the border shrines, nothing of the civil war except the parts that make good insults. Still, they look at Chi Yanluo and see violence with a silk sash tied over it. His clan sent him here to change that. Or perhaps they sent him here because they did not know what else to do with the weight of their own ambition. The distinction matters less each day.

Chi Yanluo is seventeen, far from home, and carrying enough expectation that even A'Ying sometimes goes quiet beneath it. He is meant to make friends, earn respect, avoid scandal, cultivate quickly, cultivate correctly, restore old honour, soften the reputation of the Wastes without making himself look weak, and prove that their lands can give more to the Empire than soldiers and old fires. Shen Yuanzhao looks across the courtyard and says, "So, is she really that pretty?" Chi Yanluo turns his head slowly.

Shen Yuanzhao holds his gaze for a moment, then falters.

"What? People are saying things."

"People always say things."

"Yes, and sometimes I like hearing them." Fool. Chi Yanluo does not disagree.

"Do not be strange."

"I am never strange."

"You once challenged a boy to a duel because he called your boots provincial."

"They were good boots."

"You were twelve."

"And he was rude." Chi Yanluo exhales through his nose, which is the closest he will come to laughing where Shen Yuanzhao can see it. His cousin has always had a talent for walking directly towards contempt and making it regret standing still. It is useful. It is also exhausting. Shen Yuanzhao likes making noble disciples uncomfortable because they despise him anyway, and if they mean to look down on him, he prefers to give them neck pain. Then Liu Yinhua appears on the path.

Chi Yanluo sees the exact moment Shen Yuanzhao notices her. It is almost worth every complication that may come from this. Shen Yuanzhao's grin stalls. His shoulders straighten without permission. The colour rises in his face so fast that Chi Yanluo has to look away before the amusement reaches his mouth. He knows better than to fight it openly. If he teases Shen Yuanzhao now, Shen Yuanzhao will recover badly, speak worse, and somehow make all of it Chi Yanluo's fault. A'Ying's head tilts. Pretty fire.

Chi Yanluo keeps his face still. Liu Yinhua comes towards them with her hair pinned again and her robe clean, though no amount of care hides how hard Elder Huan's class has marked her. She walks well despite it. Slower than yesterday, perhaps, but with pride stitched into every step. There is sweat-damp exhaustion beneath the surface, soreness in the measured fall of her feet, and something newly awake in the way her attention touches the world. She is beautiful. That is the first and least useful truth about her.

The second is that she knows exactly what her beauty does to people and has no intention of letting that knowledge make her careless.

"Liu Yinhua," Chi Yanluo says, inclining his head.

"You came."

"I said I would."

"People say many things after Elder Huan is finished with them."

"That is fair," she says, stepping into the courtyard.

"For a while, I considered pretending to have died." Shen Yuanzhao laughs too loudly. Then Liu Yinhua looks at him, and he turns red enough that A'Ying makes a small, delighted sound in the back of his throat. Fool. Fool. Chi Yanluo does not look at the bird. He will not survive this if he looks at the bird.

"This is my cousin, Shen Yuanzhao, of Red Knife Garrison," he says.

"Shen Yuanzhao, Liu Yinhua of Suzhou." Shen Yuanzhao bows with the force of a man trying to turn embarrassment into discipline.

"Liu Yinhua."

"Shen Yuanzhao," she replies, returning the bow.

"It is an honour."

"It is mine," Shen Yuanzhao says quickly.

"I mean, the honour is mine. Not that yours is not. Obviously. I only mean that Chi Yanluo said you were joining us, and I was curious, since he does not usually collect strays this early." The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. There is a pause. Chi Yanluo looks at him. He does not sigh. He deserves some credit for that.

Shen Yuanzhao can survive a battlefield insult, a noble's sneer, a senior disciple's provocation, and his own grandfather's temper without flinching. Place one beautiful girl in front of him, apparently, and he loses all higher cultivation of the tongue. Liu Yinhua gives no sign that the word has struck anything tender. She stands with her hands folded in her sleeves and her posture arranged into something flawless, though not stiff enough to seem brittle.

Her hair is pinned neatly again after Elder Huan's lesson, dark enough to catch blue where the sun touches it, and the loose strands at her cheek make the paleness of her skin seem even clearer. Her eyes are the strangest part of her, a pale jade-green that should look soft and instead makes Chi Yanluo think of a blade seen through water. She is beautiful in a way that explains Shen Yuanzhao's immediate ruin. That is obvious enough. Less obvious is the rest of her.

The care with which she stands at a proper distance. The way her gaze moves once over Shen Yuanzhao's hands, sash, shoulders, face, and then returns to his eyes without lingering anywhere rude. The way she hears every word and weighs more than the words themselves. Chi Yanluo has watched noble daughters raised in guarded halls do the same sort of measuring, but theirs usually comes with certainty beneath it.

Liu Yinhua watches like someone who has survived by reading the weather in other people's faces before the storm breaks. Stray, Shen Yuanzhao had said, and he is not sure his cousin is wrong. Liu Yinhua lowers her eyes for the sake of courtesy. It is politely done, and it fails to hide the small movement at the corner of her mouth.

"I have been called worse than a stray." That answer is more mercy than Shen Yuanzhao deserves.

"That does not improve it," Chi Yanluo says. Shen Yuanzhao looks briefly pained.

"No. It does not. My apologies, Liu Yinhua."

"Accepted," she says. Chi Yanluo watches the exchange and keeps the rest of his thoughts behind his teeth. Liu Yinhua stands before them without retreating into meekness or pressing forward into charm. She offers just enough warmth to ease the moment and no more than she chooses. Shen Yuanzhao, who can laugh in the face of boys with better names and worse manners, looks like he has been struck by a very small, very elegant hammer. A'Ying clicks his beak. Hit him again.

"No," Chi Yanluo murmurs. Shen Yuanzhao squints at him.

"What did he say?"

"Nothing useful."

"He insulted me."

"Likely." That, at least, makes Liu Yinhua smile properly. Shen Yuanzhao sees it and immediately looks at the path, the trees, the gatepost, anywhere else. Chi Yanluo gives him the mercy of pretending not to notice. It is a hard-won mercy, and he expects repayment later. They start down towards the lower practice ground soon after.

Shen Yuanzhao walks a little ahead at first, talking too much about Red Knife Garrison, the northern edge of the Crimson Wastes, the old border forts, and his grandfather, who survived disgrace with such stubbornness that half his enemies outlived their patience before outliving him. Chi Yanluo corrects him where necessary and lets him exaggerate where harmless. Liu Yinhua listens with the steady attention of someone gathering more than names.

When she says that a reputation can be a leash, Shen Yuanzhao falls briefly quiet. Chi Yanluo looks at her then and finds her already looking away. That is when he begins to wonder whether this was unwise. Not because she is lowborn. Not because she is beautiful. Not because she is new enough to need help and cautious enough to measure the cost of receiving it. Those things matter, but they are not the shape of the problem. The problem is that Liu Yinhua clearly understands danger and comes anyway.

Later, when she sits on the warmed stone with two fingers resting lightly on the red spirit stone, Shen Yuanzhao takes his place on the low rock near the wall and pretends he is only lounging there. Chi Yanluo lets him. The rock gives him a clear view of the path, the older disciples at the far edge, and the girls by the wall with their waterskins. It is a guard's position, even if Shen Yuanzhao has one knee drawn up and a lazy expression arranged across his face. Liu Yinhua closes her eyes.

Her breathing settles by degrees. Not well, not perfectly, but better than Chi Yanluo expected from someone who spent the morning being educated by Elder Huan's cruelty. She is too controlled at first, too aware of the line of her own posture, too practised in looking composed. Elder Yun must have seen the same flaw. Anyone with eyes would, if they knew what discipline looked like when it had been trained into display.

"She is very pretty," Shen Yuanzhao says under his breath. Chi Yanluo does not look away from Liu Yinhua's face.

"You noticed."

"I am observant."

"You nearly walked into a step."

"I recovered."

"You blushed."

"I was warm from training."

"You are still blushing." Shen Yuanzhao makes a wounded sound.

"You are enjoying this too much."

"I am enjoying it exactly enough." A'Ying, perched on the wall now, ruffles himself and turns one eye on Shen Yuanzhao. Red face. Shen Yuanzhao points at him.

"Traitor." Red face.

"Your spirit is a menace."

"He is accurate," Chi Yanluo says. Liu Yinhua does not react. Her attention has lowered enough that the conversation slides past her. Good. Her dantian is newly sensed, and any distraction may break the contact before it forms. Chi Yanluo watches the small changes in her face: the faint strain around the eyes, the softening of her jaw, the moment her breath catches when she first feels the stone properly. Shen Yuanzhao's humour thins.

"She has it?"

"Yes."

"That quick?"

"She had already touched it before today."

"Still quick."

"Yes." The word is quiet, but it carries more than he means it to. Shen Yuanzhao hears it. He always does when it matters.

"You found someone interesting fast," Shen Yuanzhao says. Then, after a beat, with a faintly aggrieved tone, "Someone pretty and interesting. That seems excessive." Chi Yanluo's mouth twitches.

"Are you jealous?"

"No."

"You sound jealous."

"I am concerned for your judgement."

"You are sulking."

"I am not sulking." A'Ying chirps. Sulking. Shen Yuanzhao looks betrayed.

"I fed you dried fish this morning." Small fish.

"It was what we had." Small loyalty. Chi Yanluo nearly laughs then and has to steady himself before Liu Yinhua reaches for the stone. He gives the instruction softly, careful not to let amusement cling to his voice.

"Draw once. Barely. Less than you think." Liu Yinhua obeys. That is interesting too. She does not like obeying. Chi Yanluo has known her for barely two days and can see that much. She obeys because she knows ignorance is more dangerous than pride, and because she has the sense to stop when told. The thread of qi slips from stone to hand, clumsy and thin, but it does not scatter badly. Her dantian flares bright enough that even Shen Yuanzhao leans forward.

"Enough," Chi Yanluo says. She releases the stone. For a moment, none of them speaks. Liu Yinhua's fingers tremble once before she stills them. She looks at her hand with an expression Chi Yanluo knows well: the first astonishment of realising that the world has always been larger than one's senses allowed. It is a dangerous expression. It can turn into hunger. It can turn into awe. Sometimes, in the worst disciples, it turns into entitlement. In Liu Yinhua, it becomes calculation almost at once.

"How much did I take?" she asks.

"Almost nothing," Chi Yanluo says. She does not look disappointed. That interests him most of all. Shen Yuanzhao slips down from the rock, humour returning now that the moment has passed safely.

"That was clean." Liu Yinhua looks at him, and Shen Yuanzhao colours again, less violently this time but still enough that Chi Yanluo has to press his tongue against the back of his teeth.

"I mean," Shen Yuanzhao says, trying to recover, "for a first draw."

"High praise," Chi Yanluo says.

"From Shen Yuanzhao, that is almost a poem."

"Do not start." A'Ying opens his beak.

"No," Shen Yuanzhao says.

"Not you either." Poem. Chi Yanluo finally allows himself a small laugh. Liu Yinhua smiles at that, slight and real, and Shen Yuanzhao looks towards the trees with great dedication. The sight should only be funny. It is funny. It is also something else, something Chi Yanluo is careful about. Liu Yinhua keeps coming back. She knows people watch him. She has seen the space around him.

She has heard enough now to understand that any friendship with him can stain a new disciple before she has enough standing to defend herself. She is cautious enough to know better, proud enough to dislike needing help, and clever enough to hear future debt in the smallest kindness. Yet she returns. Chi Yanluo looks at the red stone resting in its cloth, then at the girl sitting before him with a little more fire in her dantian than she had a moment ago. She had been mortal only days ago.

Untrained, unguided, without clan arts or family elders or a childhood spent being taught the shape of qi. Still, she reaches for it. Carefully, stubbornly, with all her fear held behind her teeth, she reaches. His clan wants him to build bridges. His elders want allies, soft power, better rumours, proof that the Crimson Wastes can produce something other than useful violence. He has spent years being told to close distance without surrendering advantage.

Watching her, Chi Yanluo finds that the task feels a little less impossible. If Liu Yinhua can sit on warmed stone with pain in her body and no certainty beneath her feet, yet still reach towards the power above her, then perhaps his clan can do the same. Perhaps the Wastes can. Perhaps old blood and old shame do not have to be the last true things said of them. Across from him, Liu Yinhua folds the red stone back into its cloth with careful fingers.

"Again?" he asks. Her eyes lift to his. There is exhaustion there, and caution, and the first bright edge of hunger, voracious.

"Yes," Liu Yinhua says, and he thinks he can see something far more deadly that a jade beauty in them.

"Again."