The western flats stretched white to the world's rim, a table of wind-scoured snow so hard it rang under hoof like porcelain.
Shen's column advanced in a black seam across it—three thousand horse, two thousand foot, thirty wagons—each breath a needle, each shadow a blue razor.
They had left Black Candle Gorge at dusk the day before and marched through wolf-hour; now the sun hung a handsbreadth above the horizon, a dull coin refusing to warm the dead.
Lan rode ahead as always, but the flats gave no vantage: no tree, no ridge, only the faint fold of the buried river far left.
So when the scouts saw the circle they almost rode past, mistaking it for a mirage.
It was not.
A ring of salt, thirty paces across, drawn perfect on the snow.
Inside stood a single wagon—unhitched, canvas torn away—loaded with barrels stamped Imperial granary seal.
Beside the wagon a row of bodies: nine men, kneeling, heads bowed as if asleep, throats opened ear-to-ear.
Blood had frozen in ropes down their cuirasses, pooling black between boots.
White cloaks, White Banner badges—Wei Lian's foragers.
All dead, yet none had been allowed to fall; stakes of willow pinned their wrists to their thighs, kept them kneeling.
A warning, or an offering.
Around the salt circle footprints overlapped—many boots, but none entering or leaving the ring.
The snow inside was unmarked except for one line of characters brushed in blood:
"Grain for the hungry, blood for the debtor. Step within, pay the price."
Korin spat. "Witch-work."
Lan knelt, gloved finger touching salt.
Coarse, sea-smelling, still unfrozen despite the cold.
Someone had scattered it moments before the wind arrived.
She studied the barrels—one had been broached; inside, yellow rice spilled, already glazed with rime.
Real grain.
Enough to feed Shen's column for five days, maybe six.
Long enough to reach Ice-Ridge Ford, long enough to starve if refused.
She whistled the halt.
Shen came forward with his escort, visor up, eyes the colour of storm-ice.
He read the blood-characters, walked the circumference, tested the air as if it might cut his hand.
Finally: "Opinion?"
Lan answered low. "If we burn it, we lose food we haven't carried. If we take it, we owe whoever wrote this—owe in blood, not coin. If we leave it, Wei Lian's men died for nothing and we march hungry."
Shen's thumb rubbed the scar. "A tri-fold trap: stomach, honour, superstition."
He turned to the column.
Men's faces gaunt, ration-bags flat.
She saw the calculation pass through him like a blade—how many miles left, how many dead if bellies stayed empty.
He drew a breath that smoked, stepped to the salt edge.
"I pay," he said, voice carrying. "But the debt is mine, not theirs."
He drew his dagger, black iron, cut left palm.
Blood welled, fell in bright drops on the salt.
"Shen of the House of Ravens, blood for grain. Open the circle."
The wind answered—gust that scattered salt outward, breaking the ring.
Inside nothing moved; the nine corpses kept their frozen vigil.
Shen gestured; pioneers rushed, rolled barrels out, counted: thirty full, two empty, one half—enough.
They worked fast, eyes averted from the kneeling dead.
When the last barrel crossed the broken salt Shen pressed his bleeding hand to the snow, leaving a red print the size of a heart.
"Debt marked," he said. "Ledger closed."
Lan felt the air shift—pressure lifting, like a gate slammed shut.
She helped bind his palm with linen, whispered: "You believe?"
He met her gaze. "I believe hunger kills faster than ghosts. And promises written in blood are harder to break."
They marched on, grain wagons heavier, men quieter.
Behind them the salt circle dissolved under wind, taking the blood-characters with it.
The nine bodies remained, kneeling, eyes open to the sky—watchmen for a bargain none yet understood.
Night fell early.
They camped on the flats under a moon like a cracked mirror.
Lan sat fireless, sharpening arrows.
Shen walked the perimeter alone, hand wrapped fresh, eyes scanning dark that gave nothing back.
At each barrel his pioneers had stencilled a tiny raven—his mark, his debt, carried forward.
She joined him at the last wagon.
"Who were they?" she asked.
"Wei's foragers. Someone wanted them found, wanted us to find them. Someone who knew I'd pay."
"Not Wei himself?"
He shook his head. "Wei kills clean. This—" he lifted the bandaged palm—"this is older. A ledger from the gorge, maybe. Or deeper."
He looked west, where the flats merged into night.
"Tomorrow we reach the Ford's twin ridge. If the candle burns there too, we'll see who holds the other end."
Lan felt the grain's weight in the wagon's creak, felt the salt's absence in the wind.
She thought of the woman who fell from the cliff, of the black cord with seven knots, of parchment lists.
Threads, tightening.
Before she left he spoke again, so low only frost could hear:
"If the price rises beyond my palm, you will not pay it. Swear."
She hesitated, then answered: "I swear to bring you back whole. The river still owes interest."
He almost smiled—crack in the iron.
"Then let the ledger tally. We march at wolf-hour."
Behind them the flats kept their secrets, the salt already indistinguishable from snow.
Ahead, Ice-Ridge Ford waited—a river, a ridge, and a candle burning at both ends.
And somewhere in the dark, a hand still held the account book, inked in blood and grain, waiting to call the debt.