Lu Yuxin's nod was sharp enough to cut the air. He ran down the stairs, his steps quiet even in his haste. No sooner than the night’s cold wind touched his face, he fled for the northern meadows where he st struck the beast.

  Past dipidated fences and tufts of soft grass they ran, until a faint, putrid stench reached them, a scent of blood and sheep’s innards. Lu Yuxin caught the stench and halted, his breaths rough.

  “Curse that boy,” he spat. “Can you see him?”

  At his heels, Huijin had been a quiet presence, his steps like a moth’s batted wings. And though his breath was likewise harsh, his endurance prevailed beyond expectation. He had not fallen behind the martial artist.

  His earlier unease had left him; the terror which had addled him when the boy had been in imminent peril was a mere shadow now. He had drawn his sword anew, but it was the boy his eyes and ears strained for. And all the while were his thoughts mired in confusion. If Yin Yue had run away, he would not have left them provisions. What could this mean?

  In the end, he could do little more than scout for him on the meadows. Where else could he have fled? Not back to the road — he would not have — Yin Zhaoyang’s brother was not such a coward, was he.

  “The Elder Ban’s wife mentioned a ntern,” said he, “do you see any light?”

  “None,” came from the swordmaster. “Is there no end to the misfortune he brings? If he had not neglected his martial arts, at least he could be trusted with this!”

  A soft rustle arose behind them, followed by a pale light on silvered grass, as Yin Yue raised the farmstead’s ntern over his head.

  “You’re quick,” he gasped. “What is it we look for here here?” If he had heard a word of his shifu’s scorn, his face did not reveal it.

  Huijin whipped around, his bde raised. The swordmaster thrust out his arm to block his attack.

  “You,” sneered Lu Yuxin. Had his wrath been a fire, the boy would have been reduced to charcoal.

  Yin Yue raised his eyes, eyes innocent on a face of ignorance. He too was short of breath, as if he had chased them all the way.

  “Who else?” asked he. “Are you unwell, shifu?”

  Huijin lowered his sword when the other struck the ft of his bde. His face softened with empty bewilderment.

  “Do not py with me, boy,” barked the tiger. “How dare you sneak out here alone in the dead of the night? Is your heart as empty as your head?”

  The rebuke brought no change to the boy’s face but a small quiver of his shes. He willed himself to speak up, the affront in his voice as affected as his ignorance.

  “Mind your tongue, Lu Yuxin. Shifu you might be, but that is no way to speak to your cn zongzhu.” His words leaped and bounded over each other, “I have not come here alone, I followed you here. You ran and I pursued you with all I could muster. I would ask if you think me stupid to seek the pastures in the dead of the night, but I fear a man is liable to see kinship where no such can be found.”

  Huijin arched his brows as if he had been speared. A mischief and a plot had this been, and they had swallowed the hook. The boy had left them provisions and lured them out on a wild chase so he could follow, then absolve himself of all reproach.

  He turned to hide his face.

  Lu Yuxin did not know his disciple that well. “Make yourself clear,” demanded he. “This instant.”

  “I have done so, Lu Yuxin,” retorted the boy, wearied. “I will not repeat myself. It does not befit a guardian of Cn Ming to listen with half an ear. Remember what the wise Elder Ya tells the disciples; “you were born with two ears, but only one mouth.”

  “You— ,” began the swordmaster, teeth bared.

  Ming-zongzhu ughed, an aloof smile on his mouth. Light were his words, as gossamer as his false mirth. Frail and frayed as morning mist. “Enough of this farce,” he chided. “What is it we look for here?”

  Huijin looked over his shoulder. The look he bestowed the boy’s back was bck; a barb of resentment coated in sheer hatred. Then, he raised his eyes to the skies and sheathed his sword. He smothered his own thoughts, as he smothered that which brewed in his own heart, as he smothered himself under the heel of duty. His hand unclenched, his breaths fell light, his voice softened to that of rice water. These quarrels did not avail them; not with a spirit woven of agony and resentment near the vilge. Not under these vast, dark skies.

  Lu Yuxin’s coarser face burned with warmer ire. When the boy walked ahead, he did not follow, but watched his back as a tiger will watch the hunter who had wounded him.

  “You will regret this mischief, Yin Yue,” said he to the night.

  “We are here now,” murmured Huijin. You got what you wanted, he thought as he stared at the loathsome man.

  “And it is te,” he said rather. “Let us sit and rest. There is a tree ahead.”

  Ahead of them, Yin Yue walked like corpse brought back from the dead. He did not apologize to his shifu for words unworthy of a disciple, for what was regret to him? His head hung low, as if he meant to watch his steps, but in truth had he no strength to raise it. A chill rooted in his soul, so deep that he wondered if he would soon die from it, for this must have been the cold of the old and decrepit.

  His foot froze as he came across a stain of blood in the grass.

  “It is just where the sheep was attacked,” remarked Lu Yuxin when he saw him halt. “The spirit beast bit it in half. I struck the ghost, and it fled with its piece.”

  Yin Yue raised his ntern. The slick of blood led north, towards the mountains. But westwards, he could see a thicker trail of blood; a broad, dark gash in the grass, as if a giant had painted the pastures with a wet brush. A sudden silence fell upon the three.

  “And this?” breathed the ashen servant.

  “This was not here then,” answered Lu Yuxin, severe. “The sheep fell here, where I stand.”

  The boy raised his ntern above his head. The blood stains did not lead far. Not far did A few paces ahead could they see the shape of a fallen sheep.

  “It moved?” wondered he.

  Lu Yuxin’s hand fell on his sword hilt. “That cannot be. It should have been dead. The spirit escaped with its entire hind part.”

  The earlier trepidation at the roots of the ashen one’s heart swelled. Forgotten were the boy’s slights and mischief. He drew closer to him until their elbows near touched and clutched his sword in his hand.

  Yin Yue’s voice was faint as he stared at the sheep’s shrouded remains.

  “It is not a ghost-sheep, shifu. And look, there are marks here. Sheep’s trotters made them. One here, and one here—”

  A mere year and some moons ago, the pale servant would have id his arm over the boy’s shoulders. Now did he bend towards him as if to shield him, but never once did they touch. His voice thinned in a plea. “Lu Yuxin, I beseech you,” began he, “see reason. Let us return to the farmstead.”

  “Hold.” Lu Yuxin took the lead, his hand firm upon his sword. Once he reached the carcass, he bent down to examine it. After a brief silence, his verdict was pin. “It is safe. The sheep is dead. It must have crawled here, that is all.”

  “Why sheep?” asked the ashen one.

  “And why here,” chimed the boy, tense. “Here on Qian-gongzi’s nds?” As he dared to walk closer, his ntern revealed a gruesome sight, and he recoiled. After it had been cut in half, the sheep had yet crawled, and blood and innards it left in its wake.

  “It cannot be a coincidence,” answered Lu Yuxin.

  Huijin hid his mouth in his sleeve sleeve and found that he had enough. He wrenched the boy around to shroud him from the horror before them.

  Lu Yuxin paid them no heed. “You mentioned some hermit?” he asked. “Never trust a man who lives alone in the wilds, says I. Some addled man with too few fingers? He might have steeped himself in his own resentment until he became this spirit beast. Perhaps is this his vengeance?”

  Yin Yue retched into his hand, his skin green. Between wet breaths, he shuddered forth a question of his own. “Huijin — Huijin, what is in the sheep’s mouth?”

  Huijin towed him away from the carcass and held his own sleeve to the boy’s mouth and nose. With his other hand, he forced the boy’s head down to his shoulder; forced him to hide his eyes.

  “Mouth?” he tried, distracted, but Yin Yue shoved at him and tore away from his rough touch. With his back turned to the carcass, he sat down, his arms folded around his knees as he strove to calm his breath.

  Huijin’s hands fell. He turned to look over his shoulder.

  His voice shook. “What is in the sheep’s mouth?”

  Lu Yuxin’s gaze held silent judgment as he eyed him. Why shield the boy, asked his hard mouth. Why shield him from this when his future will hold greater perils by far? These were not even the innards of a man. He shook his head in disbelief.

  No grace was there in his voice as he bent down to look into the sheep’s maw. “Neither of you belong here. You should have stayed in the court with your scrolls and your gardens.” Then, he looked down, and frown stole over his brow. “Clover?”

  The sheep’s head was buried in a lone patch of dark, verdant clover.

  “What is this supposed to mean?”

  “What?” asked Huijin, voice papered. It was not an insult, he told himself. The swordmaster’s remark had been far from a true insult. It was not meant to cut as deep as it had. You are tired, he reminded himself. That was all. Tired. In his past years, he had heard far worse spoken to him with far more unconcern.

  “What did you find?” he repeated.

  “Clover,” came the curt answer. “Half-chewed. Chewed here,” Lu Yuxin added. “Absurd. It crept here to chew clover?”

  “It must have starved,” said the boy.

  “It was dead, is what it was,” barked the swordmaster. “Torn in half, and yet it still dragged itself here to eat!”

  Huijin hid his mouth in his sleeve again. He found himself faint, his thoughts frayed and scattered, but the echo of the swordmaster’s earlier judgment forced his feet closer to the carcass. Yet, the stench to spite, his brow betrayed no distress, and no dread or grief smote his pale face.

  “No, it could not have,” he tried.

  “But it did. It is as Yin Yue says. Look here, the dent of a trotter in the soil. Here is another. And here.”

  There was little wit in sheep, knew Huijin. Like some men of the road, all they knew was to eat, sleep and breed. But not even a sheep would chew grass when it had been torn asunder. While Yin Yue sat folded over his own knees, Huijin took the ntern and held it closer to the carcass. But look as he might, he could find no other expnation. The grass and damp soil hid no signs of men. And when Lu Yuxin pried the sheep’s mouth wider, he found fresh clover all the way down the sheep’s throat.

  “Why sheep?” asked the boy as he hid his face on his knees. “Why clover?”

  This was a mistake, decided Huijin. They should never have come here. The boy was two decades too young to be a capable cultivator. With him was a servant who was neither a cultivator nor warrior; whose arts had been taught him too little, too te. And the one true swordmaster here was also a true imbecile, with no mind for prudence and no care for that which did not concern his own hunt for thrill and triumph.

  He closed his eyes. They burned so. He was so tired that his hand shook as he held the ntern, and so did the light shiver upon blood-soaked grass.

  Waste of thought and waste of breath. When had he ever earned the privilege to despair? Look at what is, rather than what ought be, told he himself, now as before. And this was what he saw; that the three of them were far from the shelter of fire and wooden doors. They were too few, too wearied, too fraught with distress and resentment. Had the boy eaten at all this night? Would he have the strength to run if the spirit returned? Lu Yuxin refused to escort them back; that man would seek to force his will at any cost. If left unchecked, he would run the boy to his death this night.

  There was no use to plead with him, and there was no use to scold.

  “Master Lu,” he began thus, “I should request that you examine this man Qian Xuegang. He is a former cultivator. If any of us can make sense of him, it is you.”

  Lu Yuxin stood up from his crouch. It was not the praise which roused him, but the path ahead. He bowed his head in assent and sought the boy, whom he hoisted up by the shoulder.

  “As you wish,” he agreed. “There was a hermit mentioned. Shang Hansheng? I shall see what I can learn of him as well.”

  “It is not the hermit which concerns me,” Huijin told him. “We met Qian Xuegang earlier, while you — “

  — shirked your duty, you half-bred dog —

  “— while you hunted the spirit beast. This man approached Ming-zongzhu with a token of favor from Cn Ming; a porcein crane. It had been damaged. But I do not think this ndowner was honest with us.”

  “So be it,” answered the swordmaster, grim-faced. “It will be done. Until then, see that this impudent young master eats his dinner and sleeps.”

  The ashen one stood silent. You shall not even ask? wondered he. Is violence and martial arts all you know, Lu Yuxin?

  “Escort us back to the farmstead,” he entreated. “I will tell you more on the way.”

  Escort you? Again did Lu Yuxin eye the servant’s battered sword with disapproval. But in the end, he bowed his head with some reluctance and signed for the gray one to lead.

  Yin Yue tore shook off his guardian and sought the shelter of his servant. What offense he felt was dulled under his own revulsion, though whether he felt it toward the sheep’s carcass, or Qian Xuegang, or himself, he could not say.

  But now was it the Huijin’s turn to shy away from him, as if the boy’s presence had been no better than the sheep’s innards. He made no show of it, but eased away and hid his hands behind his back, three paces kept between them. “This way,” he beckoned. He chose to walk closer to the swordmaster, and as they braved the shroud of the night, his quiet and hoarse voice murmured to their guardian as if the two had been martial brothers who had worked in harmonious cadence for many a long year.

  “This Qian Xuegang cims the spirit took his hermit friend the day before we arrived. He seemed aggrieved. And in that fight, he cimed to have been injured. I tended the wound on his arm,” he frowned, “but it seemed old.”

  There was more to it, he thought, but he could not say what. The ndowner’s grief had appeared shallow. Farcical? It seemed unkind to judge him so, and yet had there been some ill taste in this man’s grief.

  “I do not understand why he would force the broken token on us either,” he mused. “It seemed important to him to,— ” he halted, “to assert his association with the former Ming-zongzhu.”

  I hate you, he thought as he shared his specutions with a light and considerate voice. Some tight and foul knot unraveled in his chest. I hate you, Lu Yuxin. The chant eased his breath and cleared his head. This was a sentiment he could allow; a hatred he could nourish with no consequences and no self-reproach. The man never needed to know; would never learn of this hidden hatred. But he could nourish it; could indulge himself for a while.

  It soothed him so much that his eyes watered, and his voice scraped a little more as he spoke.

  “He seemed apprehensive,” said Yin Yue, his face pained. He had been quiet until then, his sleeves trapped between his nervous fingers.

  “I see,” said Lu Yuxin, unaware. “A good find, Huijin. You have an unexpected eye for such. What you learned will be useful to us.” His approval was mild as the first days of spring, and yet did he let himself wonder if there might be some use in this gray Huijin after all. In the end, Yin Zhaoyang had favored him.

  He had never understood why. Might be, he wondered as he eyed the skies, he would come to know it one day.

  Huijin’s breaths deepened. His next words tasted of sand and silt.

  “Yin Yue perceived it before I did,” he admitted. “He took ill to this man at once.”

  He felt a light pull at his sleeve at this. The boy was quiet, his plea for silence carried in the small touch alone.

  “He is his brother’s brother, I suppose,” said the shifu. “His gege had a most keen eye for friends and foes alike. He saw— he saw a man’s worth. Even those qualities most buried and hidden.”