Dusk was their ally, painting the world in shades of indigo and charcoal. The three of them separated at the base of the bluff, their plans laid, their roles accepted. There were no more words of encouragement, only the silent, grim understanding of a shared purpose. Failure meant death, or worse, capture.
Li moved north, his body a low silhouette against the darkening forest. He carried only his spear, his senses sharpened to a razor's edge. The memory of his first kill on the mountain was a cold stone in his gut, but the frantic horror was gone, replaced by a focused, surgical intent. This was different. This was not survival; it was a tactical strike. The guard was not a man to him in that moment; he was a cog in the Azure Cloud machine, an obstacle to be removed with efficiency.
He reached the tree line north of the village. The lone guard was exactly where Lao had predicted, leaning on his spear near the blackened skeleton of a hut, his attention divided between the quiet forest and the main activity in the village center. He was bored, complacent.
Li became the forest. He used the cover of the smoldering ruins, the scent of ash masking his own. He moved with a patience he had learned from watching Lao, each footfall placed with deliberate care. He was ten paces away, then five, hidden in the deep shadow of a collapsed wall.
He could hear the guard humming a tuneless ditty, shuffling his feet. Li's heart was a steady, slow drumbeat. Find the center. He was not a boy avenging his village. He was a tool of retribution, an extension of the valley's will.
He took one last, silent breath. Then he moved.
It was not a charge. It was an eruption from the shadows. Two long, swift strides brought him within range. The guard's eyes widened, his mouth opening to sound an alarm. It was too late.
Li's spear, guided by weeks of brutal repetition, found the gap between the man's breastplate and his helmet. The sharp flint point punched through leather and flesh with a sickening, wet thud. The sound was muffled, absorbed by the body. The guard's hum cut off into a gurgle. His eyes met Li's for a split second, filled with shock, then went blank.
Li didn't watch him fall. He was already moving, yanking his spear free and melting back into the deeper shadows of the forest. He didn't look back. He didn't feel the surge of nausea or the cold horror. There was only the next step of the plan. He had been the sting. It was done
On the southern side of the village, where the reeds grew thick along the riverbank, Mei was becoming water. She had smeared her face and arms with cool mud, and woven reeds into her hair and tunic. Lying flat in the shallow, icy water at the river's edge, she was virtually invisible.
She had seen Li's strike from a distance, a fleeting, brutal shadow-play. The moment the guard crumpled, a shout of alarm went up from the northern perimeter. Chaos, controlled but palpable, rippled through the soldier's ranks. Officer Jiao's head snapped up, barking orders. Soldiers who had been watching the prisoners now turned their attention to the tree line, their weapons raised.
This was her moment.
Using a hollow reed as a breathing tube, she submerged completely and pushed off from the bank, letting the slow current carry her. She moved underwater, a silent otter, until she was directly behind the huddled mass of prisoners. She surfaced with agonizing slowness, only her eyes and the top of her head breaking the water, hidden by the tall reeds.
The villagers were terrified, their attention fixed on the agitated soldiers. An old woman, kneeling at the water's edge to fill a waterskin under the watchful eye of a guard, was the closest.
Mei took a chance. She made a soft, clicking sound, the call of a water beetle she had learned from Lao.
The old woman's head twitched. Her eyes, rheumy with age and fear, scanned the reeds. They locked onto Mei's.
Mei held her gaze and mouthed two words, shaping them with exaggerated care. The river.
Confusion, then a flicker of understanding. The old woman gave an almost imperceptible nod. She finished filling her skin, her hands trembling, and shuffled back to the group. Mei saw her lean in and whisper to a younger man, who then turned and whispered to another. The message, a silent spark of hope, began to spread through the prisoners like a secret fire.
In the growing chaos, Lao moved. He was a wisp of smoke, a fragment of the deepening night. While the soldiers' attention was fixed on the northern tree line, he slipped into the village from the west, using the labyrinth of narrow paths between huts.
His target was Brother Shen, tied to the post near the central fire. The officer, Jiao, was striding towards the commotion, his back turned.
Lao reached the post in seconds. A small, sharp flint blade, cousin to the one on Li's spear, appeared in his hand. Two swift cuts and the ropes fell away. Brother Shen sagged, but Lao caught him, his strength belying his age.
"Can you walk?" Lao murmured.
Shen nodded, his eyes wide with a mixture of pain and shock. "Lao? How—"
"No time. To the river. Now."
Supporting the injured fisherman, Lao half-dragged, half-carried him into the shadows between two huts, just as Officer Jiao turned around, his sharp eyes scanning the clearing.
"The prisoner!" Jiao roared. "Where is he?"
The game was up. The distraction had worked, the message had been delivered, and the prize had been taken. But now they were in the most dangerous phase: the escape.
A soldier pointed towards the fleeing figures. "There! Heading for the river!"
"After them!" Jiao screamed, his face contorted with rage. "Sound the alarm! I want them alive!"
But as his soldiers surged towards the riverbank, a new sound rose from the reeds. Not a shout, but a splash. Then another, and another. Dozens of splashes.
The villagers, armed with the whispered message, were seizing their chance. They were diving into the river, vanishing into the dark, churning water they knew intimately. They were scattering, becoming impossible to track in the night.
The soldiers reached the bank, peering uselessly into the murky water, shouting in frustration. The organized search had dissolved into chaos.
On the far bank, Lao and Shen emerged from the water, where Li was waiting, spear ready. A moment later, Mei surfaced nearby, gasping for air, her mission complete.
They didn't pause. They hauled Shen into the cover of the trees and fled, leaving the sounds of the confused and furious Azure Cloud Clan behind them.
They had not won a battle. They had not defeated the army. But they had stolen their prisoner. They had sown chaos among their ranks. And they had given a village a chance to flee.
Back in the safety of the deep forest, leaning against a tree to catch his breath, Li looked at his hands. They were clean, but he could still feel the impact of the spear, the shudder of a life ending. He had done it again. He had killed. But this time, the cold satisfaction of a successful hunt warred with the grim understanding that this was his life now. He was a weapon, and weapons were meant to be used.
He looked at Mei, at Lao, at the grateful but pained Brother Shen. They were a pack now. A small, desperate pack with teeth. And they had just drawn first blood.