The sun sagged low behind a quilt of clouds, its light diffused into something soft, almost apologetic tones. The town wore the evening gently, as though afraid that too much brightness might tempt fate.
Victoria and I were returning from the manor. After some persuasion—more persistence than grace—we had convinced Dōngzhí to allow us to stay there for the night, if only to oversee the repairs. The manor itself felt unfamiliar in its own skin. Walls once scorched now stood clean, beams reinforced, windows replaced. Even survival, it seemed, had acquired a new aesthetic.
"Why do you think Miss Li Hua wants the building finished so quickly?" Victoria asked, nudging a loose stone along the road with the tip of her sandal.
"I don't know," I replied, watching the flow of people moving through the street, purposeful but subdued. "But it wouldn't surprise me if the capital were involved. Political friction has a habit of dressing itself up as urgency."
She hummed softly at that.
The dead had already been buried. Properly this time. The cemetery had been expanded and renovated—new markers, cleared paths, even fresh lanterns. A kindness, certainly. But also a reminder of how many names had been added. As we passed, I bowed my head slightly, more out of habit than belief.
"Extra! Extra!" a voice cried suddenly, sharp against the calm. A boy sprinted past us, papers tucked beneath his arm. "The Duke of Draken gives his speech of surrender!"
Victoria slowed. "A speech?" she said. "Then that means terms were agreed upon."
"Or at least presented," I replied. Speeches were not peace. They were performance.
The breeze moved alongside us, cool and even, brushing past without urgency. It felt rehearsed—like everything else lately.
"I wonder what the church is doing now," Victoria said, her gaze sweeping the street.
That caught my attention. She was right. The white-and-gold figures that had once been so visible were now strangely absent. No clerics distributing food. No hymns murmured at street corners.
We stopped a passerby to ask. The man shrugged, explaining that most of the church personnel had withdrawn inland, though a contingent had established themselves near the coast. Permanent structures, he said—quietly.
"We should go see," Victoria said immediately, eyes bright with curiosity.
I glanced at the sky, then at the road ahead. "If we do, we'll be late for lunch."
She paused, then sighed, long and exaggerated. "Hmm. Yes. That does complicate things."
We resumed walking.
Not far ahead, raised voices cut through the evening.
"I've been waiting fifteen minutes!" a man shouted, his accent unmistakably not from here. He gestured wildly at a flustered shopkeeper. "And not a single glass of wine!"
A small crowd began to gather—not hostile, but attentive. Curious in the way people are when tension might bloom into spectacle.
"Why isn't that foreigner being served?" Victoria asked, frowning.
Before I could answer, soldiers appeared. Not rushing. Just… arriving. Uniforms immaculate. Hands resting near their belts. The crowd's murmur softened immediately.
"We should go," I said, gripping Victoria's wrist gently but firmly.
She hesitated, brows drawn together, but nodded. "Alright."
As we walked away, she glanced back more than once. I didn't blame her.
Behind us, I heard foreign workers muttering to one another in a language I didn't understand. Their eyes followed the soldiers, not with fear exactly—but with calculation.
The town wasn't loud. It didn't celebrate. It simply existed, holding itself together carefully, like a glass vessel carried too far, too fast.
An armistice, I thought, was not the end of war.
It was the moment everyone agreed to breathe—and see who reached for the next advantage first.