The spectacle fell upon Qu Fongning like a physical blow, curdling the exhaustion of recent days into a foul taste of blood—a bitterness he could not purge, but was forced to swallow in silence. He stood as a captive audience to the commander of the Chienheaven Division, whose words were a frantic spray of pride. The man recounted, with a feverish eloquence that rivaled even Oyghrmuki, how their mere four thousand had trampled the dying embers of the Western Liang’s imperial dream. He spoke of the General—a god of war—wielding Flowing Fire to ignite the golden tents until blood overflowed from boots and mail like a spring. The assembly hung upon his every syllable, entranced. But for Qu Fongning, the words were a grating intrusion. Before the column had even reached the gates of the garrison, he turned Wind Chaser’s head and left.

He rode without destination, drifting along the Lii Waters. The original market of Oghuz had been devoured by the fires of war; what stood now, stretching for ten Li along the banks, was a phoenix of commerce, five times larger than its predecessor. Here, the currents of people collided: the Chienye garrisons, the Khilan administrators, the merchants of Bi’ro, and the ghosts of the Western Liang. Amidst the scorched ruins, the living had already set out fresh jars of goat’s milk and bundles of blossoms. At the westernmost edge loomed the Chienye garrison, its black walls rising zhang feet into the air—a fortress of bastions and watchtowers where the national colors snapped in the wind and the rhythmic thud of boots spoke of a cold, mechanical order. It sat beside the vibrant, exciting market like a beast guarding a lady.

The winter sun short, the earth had long sunk to the darkness, yet the market remained busy. Tallow lamps cast a shimmering net across the river’s surface, and the scent of roast meat rose in a thick, iridescent haze. Qu Fongning led Wind Chaser through the throng, where the road was narrowed to a needle’s eye by the encroachment of stalls. People moved in a sea of shoulders; a man of slight stature risked being swept away, and the passage of wagons was a logistical impossibility.

The goods on display were a testament to human audacity, but it was the word “Southern” that carried the weight of gold. Silks and porcelains were expected, but even the vendors of bamboo baskets cried out exorbitant prices, claiming their wares were fashioned from the bamboo of Huainan, marked with the spotted tears of a grieving royal concubine. To lower the price, they argued, would be to mock the lady’s sorrow. Others boasted of fish from Zhejiang or meats from Fujian, though once cured in smoke, all flesh tastes of the same salt and fire. Only the vendor of flower-cakes held a monopoly on truth; when he drew back the felt cloth of his steamer, he revealed a translucent treasury of sweets—yellow for osmanthus, red for camellia, white for jasmine. These were the true spoils of the South, for such blossoms could never survive the bite of the Steppes.

Driven by a sudden hunger, Qu Fongning bought a rose cake. It was a disappointment—the texture as coarse and resilient as ox-hide. After a few bites, he surrendered the remainder to Wind Chaser. The market neared its end, and the sentries were descending from their posts to seek the comfort of hot skewers. He knew there were ledgers awaiting him at the Bureau, yet he felt a profound aversion to returning. The lights of the Chienye camp flickered in the distance, accompanied by the faint, rhythmic pulse of dance and music—a celebration of victory. Despite the biting chill of the river, he preferred the company of the wind to the presence of the man within those walls.

He turned back, retracing his steps in a state of restlessness. Beneath a canvas-covered shed, he observed a curious display: rows of clay spheres, each the size of a human head, pierced by a single, narrow aperture. A group of girls, their faces veiled in silk, peered through these holes with cries of delight. Curious, he drew closer, feeling the wave of heat from the braziers within. One girl in a green tunic reached out a hand as pale as jade to offer a gold ingot—a fortune of seven or eight taels, enough to purchase a string of fine horses. He wondered what rarity could be hidden within a ball of mud to command such a price.

Before he could investigate, the shadows at the edge shifted. Seven or eight men in blue livery materialized, and the air was instantly punctured by screams. Two of them moved as swift as lightning, reaching for one of the girls. She was wrapped in a cloak of silver-grey, her face hidden by a heavy veil. Terrified, she stumbled backward. The men were resolute. As the other girls scattered, the one in the green tunic attempted to hurl a clay sphere to obstruct them, but her aim was wide. One assailant cast her aside with a curse; the other lunged forward, his hand caught the silver-cloaked girl’s hair.

The man had taken but a single step when a dark blur bisected the air. He felt a phantom breeze across his wrist. When he looked down, his soul nearly fled his body: the hand that had held the girl had been severed cleanly at the joint. It remained tangled in her hair, while the stump poured a crimson tribute onto the earth.

Cold with shock, the man looked up to find a youth in the black uniform standing before him. The blade in his hand radiated a lethal frost. “This is Chienye territory,” he said, his voice as frigid as his gaze. “Who gave you leave to act with such impudence?”

The remaining blue-clad men shouted in a foreign tongue and closed in. Qu Fongning seized the nearest by the throat and shouted for the onlookers to clear a path, but the crowd was a knot of panic. Left with no choice, he swung the captive, hurling him onto the felt roof of a nearby stall. The structure groaned but held; the man rolled down the slope and hit the ground with the sickening crack of breaking bone. Seeing the efficacy of the method, he dispatched the others in kind—kicking, throwing, and breaking them until they lay in a tangled heap of groans and bruised flesh amidst the stalls of pickled vegetables and stinking fish.

The leader, sensing the shift in fortune, vaulted over the heads of the crowd with surprising agility. In a heartbeat, he had reached the far end of the market, unseated a groom, and spurred a stolen horse into a frantic gallop. The guards, finally abandoning their skewers, shouted for a pursuit that was already futile.

As the criminal neared his escape, Qu Fongning let out a cold sneer. He ascended the wooden frame of the shed in a series of bounds, launched himself into the air, and a frost-white longbow appeared in his hand. Without the need for aim, he loosed a white shadow. The arrow transfixed the man’s back; he lurched upright in the stirrups for a fleeting second before crashing into the dust.

The guards secured the prisoners, who were revealed to be remnants of the Western Liang. Having learned of their army’s annihilation at the Hill of the Falling Goose, they had sought a desperate vengeance, hoping to seize the high-born women as hostages. “If you sought to avenge your nation in honorable combat,” Qu Fongning remarked coldly, “you might have earned respect. But to prey upon women is the mark of a coward.” He exchanged a few gestures with the sentries and ordered them to be sent to the station camps.

The violence had purged the market of its crowds. He reclaimed his horse, bow tossed to be back, and noticed a shattered object at his feet—one of the clay spheres, its casing broken to reveal a ceramic pot. He kicked the mud away and was arrested by the sight. Within the debris lay a peony sprout of the palest pink, its petals disheveled but exquisite.

He had been born in Luoyang, though he had departed his home while still a child; he had not seen such a flower in the long years since. Its presence here was a miracle of merchant artifice, a bloom forced to defy the seasons. A peony away from its native soil, he thought, is a creature marked for death. He gathered the scattered earth into a scrap of felt and offered the bundle to the girl in the silver cloak.

She was not exceptionally tall, but she possessed a natural, commanding poise that even the recent chaos had failed to diminish. She accepted the flower in silence, her eyes moving behind the veil with a subtle, unreadable light. “The night grows deep,” he said, noting her lack of gratitude, for she must be used men going to the depth of hell for her. “You should return. Do you have horses? Does your household know of your whereabouts?”

She lowered her head without a word. The girl in green interjected, “We have a carriage at the post station. Our… Mistress heard the market held everything under the sun and wished to see for herself. This must not reach the ears of the Master. Sir, you must keep our secret.”

“I have no desire to meet your Master,” he replied, amused. “I am at your service.” He turned to lead Wind Chaser away.

“Wait, young Sir,” the green-clad girl called out. “One of our horses has lost a shoe. Your mount seems sturdy—perhaps you could lend it to us for the carriage?”

He paused, struck by the audacity of the request. “This horse was a gift from a friend,” he said. “I cannot part with it so easily.”

Her eyes flickered to the worn cloak upon his shoulders. “Then we shall not deprive you of your prize. But the wind is so cold, and our Mistress is so thinly clad. Have you no heart, Sir?”

“The cloak is not mine to give,” he said.

The girl’s veil was thin enough to reveal a playful eye and a small mole that lent her a mischievous air. She pouted. “Is there nothing upon your person that belongs truly to you?”

He wondered at their persistence. “What do they want my things for?” Hearing the approach of more patrols, he understood. He reached behind his waist and detached a small, golden skull, handing it to her.

The green-clad girl received and examined back and forth with surprise. “What is this? How frightful.”

“This is my mark. Show it at the checkpoints, and you will pass.” Before she could ask for more, he spurred Wind Chaser toward the camp.

When he was gone, the girl in the silver cloak remained, cradling the flowers and gazing toward the west. Her companion laughed. “My Lady, was the first look not enough? Must you have a second?”

The girl reached out to cuff her, then ran a finger over her blood-stained hair. She took the golden skull and placed it tenderly beside the peony. With a hand as white as snow, she traced the fine cracks upon the gold.

“Do not fret, My Lady,” the companion whispered. “When we return and speak with the… with the Master, you shall have your fill of him.”

The girl cast a sharp look at her, then turned back to the west. The wind caught her veil, revealing eyes that shone with the brilliance of stars.

~

Qu Fongning returned to the garrison, for there was nowhere else to go. The camp was a wave of revelry, thick with the scent of wine and the roar of soldiers. Guo Wuliang saw him and beckoned him to his side, pouring a cup with his own hand. In his peripheral vision, Qu Fongning saw Yujien in the seat of honor. The General’s gaze seemed fixed upon him, and a fresh wave of turmoil rose in his chest. He declined the drink, “This foot solider has a weak constitution, I fear of misbehavior after drinks.”

The Garrison Commander approached to toast the “Wind Chaser Thousand Slain.” He carried a bowl the size of a basin, brimming with wine. As Qu Fongning rose to greet him, he smelled the familiar fragrance of Fen-jiu—the very scent that had haunted his nights in Yujien’s ger. In the past, the mere taste of it from Yujien’s lips had been enough to intoxicate him. Now, under the Garrison Commander’s relentless toasts, he down the drink. By the final draught, his throat felt as though it had been flayed, his stomach burning, a spicy flare shooting to his nostrils, and his vision began to fracture.

He felt himself slip, and Guo Wuliang caught him, calling for food. Qu Fongning smelled hot pepper soup, attempted to lift the spoon, but his hand no longer heeded his command. Through the haze, he heard Guo Wuliang speaking to Yujien. “Tian-ge, you returned in silence, leaving us to our anxieties. There is one here who did not sleep for nights, pouring his very soul into this.” He presented the Moon-Star Law.

Yujien sat with his torso bare, his chest wrapped in linen through which a faint red stain was beginning to bloom. He looked at Qu Fongning. “The paths of the Falling Goose are a labyrinth,” he said. “Even the birds lose their way.” Then, his eyes locked onto the youth’s. “You have labored hard. My thanks.”

“Your safety,” Qu Fongning muttered, his voice flat, “is my duty.”

Guo Wuliang, sensing the tension, quickly turned the conversation. “Haha, this reminded of an old matter. Teen or so years ago, Tian-ge also went and flatten Balon and Ulun tribe lands on single command. I should have known better than to doubt, but seeing your broken bow upon the field… I could not find peace.”

“That bow served me for four years, its time had come. “ Yujien replied. “As for the ambush—I merely played the part they wrote for me. Had I not allowed them to believe me dead, the victory would not have been so absolute.”

Despite the delirium, a cold fury ignited in Qu Fongning’s heart. He seized several jars of wine, emptied them into the great basin, and stumbled toward the Yujien, and slammed it before him. “I offer this toast,” he snarled, the wine slopping over the rim, “to the General. May he trample his enemies and march ever closer to his grand empire.”

The Garrison Commander tried to intervene, citing Yujien’s wounds, but Guo Wuliang silenced him with a look. Yujien watched Qu Fongning for a moment, then took the basin in a single hand. He drained it to the last drop. He shuddered; the crimson stain upon his bandages spread with a new, slow heat.

He felt a surge of triumph as he returned to his seat. The world became a swarm of white wool. He tried to carve a piece of lamb, but the knife slipped from his grasp. He felt hands steadying him, voices calling his name, and then the darkness claimed him.

He awoke to a flood of morning light. His eyelids swollen while he attempted to open a slit, his throat a desert of bitterness, and his head felt as though it were filled with leaden cream. He groaned and tried to move his arm, only to realize he was entirely naked. He was not alone. A heavy, muscular arm was draped across his waist, and his back was pressed against the coarse fabric of another’s tunic. As he struggled, the figure behind him tightened his grip, pulling him against the waking heat of his body.

Qu Fongning’s heart sank. Before he could even turn within the felt blankets, a voice—raspy, deep, and unmistakable—spoke into the silence.

“You are awake?”

The voice belonged no other than the man he had sought so desperately to flee: Yujien Tianhung.