The southern market of Muyun was still a racket toward late afternoon. Steam from cookpots mingled with sweat, hanging in the awninged alleys.
Qingshui slipped through the crowd. She was no longer the ragged, unkempt waif of a month ago—clean, brisk, walking like the wind. Only her eyes were the same: bright and cutting.
She wasn't out to scrounge a meal today, nor to loiter. She was going to meet someone.
He'd tailed her for a month. She'd walked half the town this morning. She wasn't in a hurry to greet him; a snake that thinks itself unseen will show its fangs. She only needed the right corner to yank this thirty-day tail out of the shade.
She stopped at a street corner, bent over a stall as if comparing kettles.
Down the lane, a man in ash-gray chatted idly with a sugar-seller, eyes sweeping her three times, breath lighter than the breeze.
Qingshui's mouth hooked.
She lifted a copper kettle. "You want thirty coppers for this dented thing?"
The hawker glanced up, saw no one, scratched his head—must've misheard.
But the graycoat's gaze cinched tight.
Something had moved close.
"Been looking at me?" a voice murmured right at his shoulder. "Like what you see?"
He whipped around, hand diving into his sleeve.
"Don't." She was already at his flank, two fingers light on his wrist. "Twitch and I'll shake your meridians to mush. I don't bluff."
A woman: loose hair, skewed collar, a grass stem at her lips, eyes smiling and not.
"You've watched me for a month," Qingshui tipped her head. "No hello? Need me to introduce myself? Gods, I'm a woman—do you peek when I bathe?"
"You—" His brow pinched.
"You're Qingzhou," she tapped the fine-woven knot at his belt. "Inner Guard network. Xuanhu's line. Errand grade? Or…"
She leaned to his ear; her breath tickled; her words raised his hackles.
"…one of Xuanhu's six personal attendants?"
"Who are you?"
"Water Luminary's line. Callsign Water-Li." Seeing every muscle go taut told her enough. She straightened.
The air went bowstring-tight and silent. Onlookers smirked at what they took for a lover's spat—the woman holding the man's hand, the man all nerves. The sugar-seller edged away: if the lovers brawled, let it be somewhere else.
He didn't answer. His gaze checked her feet—she stood balanced, every exit boxed.
"You're not local," he said.
"Neither are you." Qingshui smiled. "I won't ask how many notes you've kept on our little courtyard, how many times you timed her groceries and his punches."
"I'll ask one thing—are you here for me, or for the mother and child?"
His throat bobbed. No reply.
"Got it." She blinked, stepped in, and murmured at his ear: "Tell Xuanhu this—your target isn't being watched by only you."
"For now, let's not trip each other."
She turned away, swinging her arms, muttering, "Boring. I thought you were about to confess."
The graycoat stood staring after her, then drew a dark-bronze token from his sleeve and rubbed its edge in thought.
—
Willow Lane. Bihua was hanging laundry. Layne ran drills in the yard, sweat streaming, stubbornly silent.
"Ma, can I run 'circles-and-stone-dodge' today?"
"You skinned your knees yesterday."
"That's because Qingshui throws too fast!"
"If you could outrun her, she wouldn't make you practice it." She pegged the last shirt and watched her boy with a gaze both soft and wary.
That morning Qingshui had only said, "Meeting someone at the south market."
She hadn't said who. It scraped Bihua's nerves—this month the woman had undeniably helped them, even if she ate like a bottomless pit without gaining an ounce.
Bihua shook off the clutter of thoughts.
Toward dusk, mother and son took North Street to pick up oil, salt, and firewood from a shop they'd begun to favor. Qingshui had not returned all day.
Layne hopped ahead with two sticks of kindling, humming. The meat on his cheeks had come back; Bihua's face warmed to see it.
The warmth broke at the corner of a lane, cut by furtive whispers.
"Heard Sanghe Village has it too… Master took fever at night, raving, coughing blood—"
"Real?"
"My cousin cooks there—this morning they pasted yellow slips on the gates. Said 'possessed,' but we all know it's—"
"Shh! If the constables hear you, you'll lose your head!"
Bihua slowed, eyes sliding over the gossipers—market wives with basket-arms, fear behind their avid faces.
"Is it a sickness?" Layne whispered.
"Don't pry." She tightened her grip and hurried on. Out in the street people's voices carried a new caution; hawkers hastened to pack their trays.
They turned into a back alley and found a knot of onlookers. A middle-aged man lay flushed on the stones, sweating, babbling.
"Don't come near!" someone cried. "He's got the fever and the raving!"
The crowd recoiled; even the neighbor who'd stepped up to help stumbled back.
Layne pressed behind Bihua, spooked.
She had just turned to leave when a dry laugh cut the air.
"Not demon-pox. Don't scare yourselves."
Qingshui shouldered through with a kettle, squatted, lifted an eyelid, checked the breath, felt the pulse. From her sash she found a small pouch, pinched out powder, levered the jaw, and tipped it in.
He gulped on reflex. After a moment his breathing eased.
She dusted her hands. "Not a curse. Damp-heat spike. Take him home and brew ginger. Stop quivering."
It was Qingshui. Layne slipped free and latched on to her arm with a gush of "Auntie! Auntie!"
She never said the word plague. Light tone, common sense—the knot loosened.
Someone muttered, "Right, right—autumn fevers. We spooked ourselves that year too. Hot broth and it passed…"
The crowd dissolved, the subject turned.
With Layne in tow, Qingshui came over. "What're you doing out?"
"Errands," Bihua said coolly.
"Dragging a kid around at dusk?" Qingshui glanced to the corner. "Rumors are thick. Don't wade into them."
"This is our way home."
"Right, right." She wasted no more words. "Move."
They walked. A chill bled into the breeze.
"Was he just overheated?" Layne whispered.
Qingshui chewed a fresh grass stem and didn't answer. (Layne sometimes wondered what she'd gnaw in winter. Roof tiles?)
After a while she said, "You're too small for the rest. Remember this: illnesses can be treated. What can't be treated is the human heart."
Bihua looked over. She said nothing. The sentence felt like it had blown in from another world.
—
Night fell early in Muyun. Only teahouses and taverns kept lamps at the crossroads. On Willow Lane a paper lantern swayed under the eaves. Inside, Qingshui had not yet slept.
At the desk, a messenger pigeon on its stand, she spread a thin cipher sheet and sharpened her brush. The dispatch to the Water Luminary was short:
"Sanghe Village warding pylon damaged. Array eye was sealed a month ago; structure unstable; disaster likely.
Rumor spreads; no official response; epidemic imminent.
Confirmed Xuanhu has planted a watcher; contact made; likely targeting the two.
Whether joint investigation or other intent unknown.
Request coordination to repair pylon, or authorization to act at discretion."
The brush stalled on "act at discretion."
She knew what that meant—sanction to remove all adverse factors. The problem: an answer probably wouldn't come. A month ago, it hadn't.
She rolled, sealed, slid the note into the tiny tube and loosed the bird, then snuffed the lamp and lay down.
Something about all this was off.
—
A hundred li away in Qingzhou, Xuanhu scanned a spy's report without a flicker.
"The woman lodging with Bihua and her boy calls herself Qingshui—claims to be Water Luminary's, callsign 'Water-Li.'"
"Water Luminary?" his voice was low. "So the Seven Luminaries are meddling too?"
"Or else they're not players, but pieces."
He closed the report. "Shadow her. Don't spook her. If she truly belongs to the Seven—let them move first."
"Yes."
"And…" He paused. "Whisper to those 'observers' from the royal capital. Plenty want in on this board."