The first cart loomed as a shape that thought itself clever. Dark flags snapped without color in the fog; the drivers hunched, men who had trained themselves to ignore guilt. Behind, more shadows: a slow centipede of wood, iron, and intent.
Ziyan let them pass her breath and then stepped into the road with her hood thrown back.
"Road works ahead," she called, voice pitched to authority. "Turn your wheels to the left or lose a hub."
The lead driver swore and pulled; the oxen obeyed. The wheel found Shuye's buried jar with the eagerness of men who believe coincidence is on their side.
The pitch took, the earth flamed. In the same heartbeat, Feiyan's rope snapped taut across the lane and dragged the second cart sideways; Wei's spear pinned a guard to the thought that he should have been somewhere else. Li Qiang's shout cut the night and men obeyed it without needing to know why.
Chaos loves skill more than numbers. Pitch splashed, then glowed; oxen bellowed, then bolted; a driver leapt, then forgot that knees prefer old ground. Shuye's larger jar went last, a soft-bellied thunder that flipped two wagons on their backs like beetles. Feiyan moved without excess, cutting harness where it strangled and throats where they lied. Ziyan took one guard at the knee and left him learning a new relationship to the word vertical; then she was at the back of a cart, ripping canvas to reveal sacks stamped with the seal of men who wanted to be respected even when stealing.
"Grain," she said, unnecessary and holy.
"Burn what you cannot take," Feiyan said, already tossing a torch where it would do arithmetic no one could argue with.
When the shouting broke into panic and then into running, Ziyan let her voice go flat and large.
"Leave two alive," she said. "Lord Han prefers witnesses who can count."
They rode hard out of the smoke, moon above them, river refusing to be impressed. Behind, the fire did the math; ahead, the ridge waited to be told what story to hold. By the time the fortress lamps showed like patient stars along the wall, the pitch had burned to opinion and the night had learned to smell of bread denied.
Lord Han stood in the courtyard when they clattered in, a man who did not sleep because sleep did not suit the hour. The sergeant threw down a wheel hoop bent into submission. Shuye upended a half-burned sack, grain spilling like a coined argument onto the stones.
"There were twelve wagons," Ziyan said, breath steady. "There are none now."
For the first time, something like warmth reached Han's eyes. It refused to grow into a smile, but it fed itself enough to stand.
"You will have your night under my eaves," he said. "And my riders at dawn." His voice shifted, an admission without surrender. "You may find that my gates are heavier to open than to close. But they will open for you."
A bell clanged on the south wall: three slow strokes, then two quick. A runner pelted in, knees forgetting courtesy.
"Message from the river towns," he gasped. "Xia banners at East Crossing. The capital's lanterns can see their fires."
The courtyard held itself still the way a blade does after it has done what it was built to do. Ziyan closed her hand over the jade ring until its character pressed into her skin like a seal.
"One more gate," she said quietly. "One more wall."
Feiyan's mouth curved, winter finding a reason to be kind. "Sleep while the fire eats," she advised. "Tomorrow we teach Zhang which bridges are his, and which ones belong to the river."
The night above Yong'an did not bless them. But it did not curse them, either. It listened, and that was enough.