Du's eyes narrowed. "You," he said. "Shuye. Lin Chang. Chen Rui. Anyone who signed those first tablets. Hand them over, and this doesn't have to be a… large correction."
A murmur rose. Faces turned toward the four named. Lin Chang snorted.
"You'll have to carry my stove out too," she said. "It's seen more law than some magistrate's halls."
Shuye set his brush down, carefully. His hand trembled once, then stilled.
Sun Wei raised his voice, not to challenge but to carry.
"You all heard the decree," he said to the room. "He wants ringleaders. Those who carved, who weighed, who told you no soldier could take rice without record."
A fisherman shifted, eyes burning. "Then they'll take you," he muttered.
"No," a boatman said hoarsely. "They'll take all of us. The tablets don't work if no one reads them."
Sun Wei looked at Du.
"Captain," he said. "The Regent's words came here. So did the Road's. Both of them say 'ringleaders'." He spread his hands. "Take them."
A ripple of confusion.
Chen's eyes lit. "You admit it?" he demanded. "You confess?"
Sun Wei shook his head. "I say take them," he repeated. He turned to the room. "Raise your hands if you've stood under these tablets and shouted 'witness'."
Hands went up. A fishwife. A boy from the dice corner. Aunt Cao's grandson. Lin Chang. Chen Rui. Half the room.
"Raise them if you ever weighed goods on this scale and demanded the numbers be written," Sun Wei said.
More hands. Some soldiers, grudging, shifted. They, too, had used the scale.
"Raise them," Shuye added, voice shaking but loud, "if you've ever told a man 'lies pay double' in this hall, and made him pay."
Almost every hand now.
Sun Wei turned back to Du.
"These are your ringleaders," he said. "All of them. The law here doesn't stand because four people carved words on a plank. It stands because everyone decided to walk under it."
The room held its breath.
Du's gaze moved over the raised hands. Over faces he knew: the old boatwoman who had fed his men when the river iced over; the boy he'd once pulled out of a ditch; the fishwife who had shouted at him about a broken barrel for three days.
"The Regent doesn't want all of them," Chen muttered uneasily. "Does he?"
Du's jaw flexed. "The decree is not specific," he said. "It says 'ringleaders.'"
"You don't have enough rope," Lin Chang said. Her tone was practical. "And if you try, you'll have to hang yourself at the end. You've sat under those tiles too, Captain. I've seen you read them when you thought no one was looking."
A flicker. Gone.
Du looked at the tablets. At the sparrow. At the decree in his hand.
He could punish no one and be condemned as soft. He could punish everyone and drown his post in blood he would taste every night after.
Or he could count differently.
He took a breath, choosing the words as if they were steps in a minefield.
"The Regent commands that visible symbols of sedition be removed," he said. "He commands that ringleaders be punished, so that others may see and learn."
He turned and held out the decree to Chen. "Read me the first line," he ordered.
Chen swallowed, unrolled it clumsily.
"'Any hall displaying the sparrow-mark or obeying their so-called tablets is warned: you are misled. Tear down these marks, renounce their lies—'"
"Stop," Du said. He faced the room again.
"You have heard the offer revoked," he said. "No more grain. Only punishment. You have also heard this: he speaks of marks and lies. He does not speak of words carved into hearts."
He stepped to the wall.
Without asking permission, he reached up and tugged the nail holding the smallest tile—the little piece Shuye had carved for himself as practice: NO BEATING WITHOUT WITNESS in uneven strokes. The wood creaked, then came free.
He held it up.
"Here is your ringleader," he said.
A startled, almost hysterical laugh burst from someone.
Chen stared. "Sir, that's—"
"A tile," Du said. "The decree speaks of marks. Let the mark answer. We will punish it."
He set the tile on the floor.
Every eye followed.
Du drew his sword.
The whisper of steel sounded wrong in this hall. Too sharp. Too final.
He raised the blade and brought it down.
The tile split cleanly in two.
Gasps. A child cried out.
"There," Du said into the stunned air. "The visible symbol has been removed. You have seen me do it. You can tell any officer that the captain came and cut the sparrow's tongue."
He looked at Sun Wei.
"As for ringleaders," he went on, voice hardening, "I have a list. Names of men who used the old decree to line their purses with false confessions. Patrolmen who told farmers they'd be 'reported as Road' unless they paid extra. I will punish them. Publicly. That will be my example."
Chen went pale. "Sir—those are our own—"
"Our own," Du said, eyes ice. "Exactly. The Regent asked me to correct twisted subjects. I'll start with those who twist his words."
He turned back to the room.
"You will keep your law inside this hall," he said. "You will not take up arms against the garrison. You will not hide bandits behind the sparrow. If you do, I will not cut wood next time."
His gaze caught Sun Wei's. Something unspoken passed between them: a warning, a promise, an admission of shared rope.
"Raise your tablets higher if you like," Du said. "The decree does not say how tall walls can be."
He sheathed his sword.
"Squad," he barked. "Out. We have punishments to arrange."