Reunion in the Guest Courtyard
The sun was already slanting west, and the wind over the lake had softened from the sharper breath of afternoon.
Though the contest at the waterside pavilion on Juyi Isle had ended, and most of the crowd that had gathered by the flowered causeway had long since dispersed, low voices still lingered everywhere. Before today, the names Bai Yuchuan and Xuanyuan Xi had certainly been heard in the martial world, but only in the ordinary way: promising juniors in the mouths of their elders, rising talents praised over wine. After the clash by Taihu Lake, however—white robe and black sword, cold edge and clear palm, before the eyes of Shaolin, Wudang, Emei, Kunlun, Kongtong, the Beggars' Sect, and guests from every quarter—they had truly fought their way into the reputation of twin edges beneath the same sky.
For Zheng Chong, however, none of that mattered nearly as much as the two children who had run away from Mount Hua.
Mount Hua's guest courtyard stood on the eastern side of Juyi Isle, beside a half-curving covered passage that overlooked the lake. The courtyard was not large, but it was arranged with quiet elegance: several old bamboo clumps, a trellis of climbing flowers, and beneath the eaves two white silk lanterns still unlit. Zheng Chong led them in without a word. Only after they had passed through the gate did his face truly darken.
"Inside."
The word was not loud, yet Fang Yingjie and Xi Qian both knew trouble had come.
The two of them went in one after the other, neither daring to speak first. Xuanyuan Xi followed behind them, his expression still calm. Yet as he stepped through the door, his gaze flicked lightly over them both—there were still bits of grass and dried mud clinging to the hem of Fang Yingjie's robe, and Xi Qian's jade hairpin sat crooked in her hair by half an inch. Plainly, neither of them had had an easy time keeping up.
Zheng Chong shut the door behind them, turned back, and looked first at Fang Yingjie, then at Xi Qian.
"You two really do have nerve."
Fang Yingjie's ears flushed red. Lowering his head, he muttered, "Senior Brother Zheng, I…"
"You what?" Zheng Chong barked, half furious and half incredulous. "Do you have any idea where you are? This is Taihu Lake, not the back slopes of Mount Hua. This is the main stronghold of the Four Seas Gang, not that stand of pines outside the Chess Pavilion. Did you think sneaking down the mountain meant coming to a temple fair? Or to watch lanterns?"
Xi Qian was usually the sharpest tongue among them, yet now even she had nothing ready. At length she said in a small voice, "We were only worried…"
"Worried?" Zheng Chong's brows drew tight. "If anything had happened to either of you, who exactly was supposed to explain it to the Sect Leader? Who was supposed to explain it to Madam Fang? One of you is the Sect Leader's daughter, and the other is Martial Uncle Fang's only son. Do you think the road outside is something you can simply run along because your legs feel like it?"
That line dropped heavily into the room.
Until then Fang Yingjie had felt mostly guilty. But hearing the words Martial Uncle Fang's only son, something in him was touched all at once. He had grown up on Mount Hua, and everyone knew he was Fang Tieshan's son. Yet knowing it and saying it aloud were not the same thing. No one usually laid that fact squarely across his shoulders. Now that it had come out of Zheng Chong's mouth, its weight felt suddenly much greater.
Xi Qian bit her lip. After a moment she muttered, "But we… we didn't really hold anyone back."
That nearly made Zheng Chong laugh again from sheer frustration. "Didn't hold anyone back? If it hadn't been—"
He broke off in the middle of the sentence. His eyes flicked toward the window, as though he had just remembered something, and in the end he swallowed the rest of the words.
"If your luck hadn't held out this far, who knows what road you'd be crying on right now."
Xuanyuan Xi had not spoken until now. At that point, he said quietly, "Senior Brother Zheng, let them change first."
Zheng Chong looked at him, then grimly admitted the point. They were already on Juyi Isle, where eyes were everywhere. If Xi Qian and Fang Yingjie kept wearing the shabby, rough clothes they had changed into for sneaking down the mountain, they would only stand out more.
He waved a hand. "Go. Change."
At last Xi Qian let out a breath she had been holding and hurried inside with her bundle. Fang Yingjie turned to follow, then paused after two steps and looked back at Zheng Chong. There was still a trace of something almost plaintive in his eyes, as though he feared Senior Brother Zheng might truly be angry enough to stop caring what happened to him.
Zheng Chong had still meant to lecture him again. But seeing that look, he relented despite himself and only said with a stern face, "What are you staring at? Go on."
Fang Yingjie mumbled an "oh" and scurried inside.
Only once the two of them had disappeared behind the inner curtain did Zheng Chong let out a slow breath and turn to Xuanyuan Xi.
"You knew, didn't you?"
Xuanyuan Xi nodded.
Zheng Chong gave a bitter little smile. "I thought as much. The pigeon-message from Mount Hua reached me saying the two of them had disappeared, and I guessed there was a good chance they'd followed us. Later, when I saw how little urgency you showed on the road, I knew I'd guessed right."
Xuanyuan Xi lowered his gaze. "Once they were already off the mountain, rushing to drive them back at once would only have created greater confusion. It was better to get them into hand first."
Zheng Chong nodded, then frowned again. "But after today, with the guest courtyards, the banquet, and all the eyes from every direction… I'm afraid this won't stay hidden any longer."
Xuanyuan Xi was silent a moment before answering, "It was never going to stay hidden for long."
The line was spoken evenly, but it still made something sink in Zheng Chong's chest.
It was true. It had never been likely to stay hidden.
Xi Qian was one thing. As the Sect Leader's daughter, there were already people on and off the mountain who knew her face. But Fang Yingjie was different. He had grown up on Mount Hua and rarely appeared before the wider martial world. Now that he had come to a place like Juyi Isle and shown himself there as Fang Tieshan's son, people would naturally know.
That carried weight. Serious weight.
At that moment, there came a light tap on the window from outside.
Once. Twice.
The rhythm was so quick and jaunty it sounded as though whoever stood outside was doing it to amuse himself.
A pulse beat at Zheng Chong's temple. He was just about to go to the window when the man outside had already leaned halfway in on his own.
"Well? Still not done scolding them?"
Feng Feiyun wore his usual grin, his hair half loose, one elbow draped over the sill as though he were hanging there boneless.
At the sight of him, Zheng Chong nearly felt his temper surge up again. "You still have the nerve to come here?"
Feng Feiyun raised a brow. "Why shouldn't I? If I hadn't been watching over the two little ones all the way, there's no telling whether they'd still be standing in front of you in one piece."
That, unfortunately, was not untrue.
The words caught Zheng Chong in the throat. In the end he only asked, "What did you come for?"
Feng Feiyun grinned. "To let you know that at tonight's pre-birthday banquet, the Beggars' Sect is short of someone entertaining, so I'm going to lend them my talents. You people from Mount Hua can sit at your own table. Don't expect me to help you eat in solemn silence."
Zheng Chong frowned. "You're not sitting with Mount Hua?"
"I'm not from Mount Hua. Why would I sit there?" Feng Feiyun laughed. "Your whole table sits too straight from top to bottom. If I actually squeezed in among you, I'd choke to death before I got through three bites. Hu Xiaosheng's side is livelier. That mad girl Jiang Hui'er curses people with real style. I'm going over there to boast and drink."
Xuanyuan Xi looked at him and said, "Brother Feng, thank you for today."
Feng Feiyun stared, then clicked his tongue as though such straightforward thanks made him uncomfortable. Turning his head aside, he muttered, "What for? The two little ones followed me around all the way down here, eating and drinking off me. I couldn't exactly let them be carried off and sold."
The words were rough, but the laughter in his eyes softened very slightly.
Just then the curtain to the inner room stirred.
Xi Qian came out first, already changed. She was no longer dressed as a little Daoist novice, but in a light yellow spring robe, the same green silk sash tied at her waist. At once, the dust and road-weariness seemed to have been washed off her, and she once more looked like the Sect Leader's daughter of Mount Hua. Still, there was a trace of red around her eyes from being scolded, and her expression remained faintly aggrieved.
Fang Yingjie emerged a moment later. Blue robe, short boots, hair tied back. Once changed, most of the gray dust that had clung to him along the road was gone. He still looked a little too thin, but there was suddenly no missing the three or four parts of Fang Tieshan in his face.
Feng Feiyun gave them both a look and let out a soft whistle. "Well, now. Changed properly, you really do look a bit more like Mount Hua people."
Xi Qian glared at him. "Why are you still here?"
Feng Feiyun laughed, drew back from the window in one easy motion, and tossed back one last line over his shoulder.
"I'll go ahead and scout what sorts of demons and monsters are sitting at the banquet. If anyone keeps staring too long at your Mount Hua table, I'll come back and tell you."
Before the last word had finished echoing, he was gone.
Zheng Chong looked at the empty window and shook his head. Then at last he said, "Enough. Since you've changed back, tonight you'll enter the banquet with us. Remember this: from this moment on, you are no longer two children who sneaked down the mountain. You are Mount Hua people."
That single line made all their expressions shift, if only slightly.
Most of all Fang Yingjie's.
Until then, he had still felt like a boy who had run away from Mount Hua and been caught, scolded, and dragged about by the scruff of the neck. But hearing the words You are Mount Hua people, something hot suddenly rose in his chest, and he straightened his back without even meaning to.
Flying Snow's Side Courtyard
At the same time, in the western guest courtyard where Flying Snow Manor was lodged, things had settled into place as well.
Their courtyard was quieter than Mount Hua's. The window paper was white, the brick floor clean, even the two unlit lanterns beneath the corridor hung straighter than anywhere else. Along the lakeside wall one window stood half open, and the breeze that came in brought both the scent of water and the faintest trace of cold.
Shangguan Lü sat beneath the window in his snow-colored robe and gray fur mantle, a single cup of clear tea still at his hand. Zhuge Hui lounged in the chair opposite, lazily turning his long, slender brush between his fingers, the tip sometimes tapping the table as though sketching the outline of some distant mountain.
Bai Yuchuan sat between them, still in white. Compared with the white-robed figure at the pavilion earlier, however, he looked even more restrained now. In the eyes of the crowd, he had already won enough face for Flying Snow Manor that day. Yet now that he sat here in silence, not even his sleeves or collar seemed disturbed, as though the least trace of unsettled air left over from the fight had already been pressed back down by his own will.
It was Zhuge Hui who finally broke the stillness first.
"Well," he said with a smile, "Taihu Lake certainly gave us our share of spectacle today. First Miss Qin calling out 'Cousin,' then that bout between the young marquis and Young Master Xuanyuan. I imagine half the martial world is already repeating, In the east there is Bai Yuchuan, and Flying Snow seals the sky; in the west there is Xuanyuan Xi, and Mount Hua cleaves the peaks."
Bai Yuchuan did not answer. He only lifted his teacup and drank.
Shangguan Lü looked at him and said evenly, "A name carried outward is not a bad thing. Only from today onward, when others look at Flying Snow Manor, they will not look only at the weight of the marquisate. They will also look at the young marquis himself."
Bai Yuchuan said quietly, "I should not have entered the ring at all."
Zhuge Hui twirled the brush once, and there were two parts helplessness in his smile. "The man who should not have entered the ring did so in the end. The man who should have remained quiet got himself called out before everyone. But then again, if Miss Qin had not forced the matter with that one cry, would the young marquis really have hidden himself all the way until after tomorrow's birthday feast?"
Bai Yuchuan was silent for a moment before replying in a low voice, "If I had not come out, the Bai family would have truly failed in courtesy today."
At that, the smile in Zhuge Hui's eyes dimmed a little.
More than most, he understood the youth before him. Outsiders all said Bai Yuchuan was cold, as though he had been born incapable of holding anyone in his heart. Yet those who truly knew him understood that beneath that coldness lay a heavy sense of order, and an even heavier sense of measure. Had Qin Xin and the Qin family meant nothing at all to him, he would not necessarily have stepped out today. The fact that he had done so was proof enough that they were not people he could simply push aside with the word outsider.
Shangguan Lü set down his teacup. "On Gang Leader Qin's side, I imagine most of the anger has now dispersed. But the Qin family will also think far more seriously of that Young Master Xuanyuan from Mount Hua from this day on."
Bai Yuchuan lifted his eyes.
Shangguan Lü's expression did not change. "You crossed hands with him today. What do you think of him?"
Bai Yuchuan considered, then answered in only four words.
"Very strong. Very steady."
At that, even Zhuge Hui smiled faintly.
Bai Yuchuan was not a man who praised others lightly. To win from him even a very strong already carried weight. To add very steady made it heavier still.
Shangguan Lü nodded. "Mount Hua is still Mount Hua. However badly this generation has been wounded, its luck has not yet run dry. That Young Master Xuanyuan will likely become one of the most troublesome opponents you will ever face."
Bai Yuchuan did not deny it.
The wind off the lake passed the railing and stirred the white gauze curtain faintly. Through the half-open window, the lights at the main hall in the distance were growing brighter, and shadows of stewards passed to and fro. Plainly, the pre-birthday banquet would soon begin.
At that moment, a light knock sounded outside the door.
"Young Marquis, Miss Qin has come." Xiaoluan's voice came softly from the other side.
The smile in Zhuge Hui's eyes deepened. He spread one hand toward Bai Yuchuan. "There. It seems the things that come calling tonight are not limited to the birthday wine."
The faintest line appeared between Bai Yuchuan's brows, but in the end he rose.
When the door opened, Qin Xin was already standing outside. Tonight she wore a pale apricot spring robe, her white jade hairpin gleaming faintly in her hair. The urgency and irritation from earlier had not yet entirely left her eyes.
"You should both leave," she said at once.
Zhuge Hui coughed, rose smiling, and said, "Young Marquis, I shall go ahead and fend people off for you."
Shangguan Lü said nothing. He only inclined his head and left together with Zhuge Hui, drawing the door closed behind them.
The room fell quiet.
Bai Yuchuan looked at her. Only after a moment did he say, "Cousin Xin."
Qin Xin had come with a whole flood of words in her heart. Yet now that he had actually spoken, those words caught in her throat first. After a long pause, she bit her lip and said, "So you did know how to come out after all."
Bai Yuchuan was silent a moment. "You should not have called me out like that in public today."
"If I hadn't called you, would you ever have come out at all?" Qin Xin's eyes stung slightly, though her voice remained hard. "Yesterday I dressed myself as Young Master Bai, and you still did not show yourself. Today, with all those people watching, you were still hiding in the back. If my brother had not pushed the matter to that point, were you really going to keep letting Uncle Shangguan and Fourth Uncle Zhuge stand in front for you?"
There was another short silence before Bai Yuchuan answered, "My father has only recently died. I should not have contended in public over such things."
At the words my father has only recently died, the fire in Qin Xin's heart lost three parts of its strength at once. Yet she was still unwilling to yield easily. "And yet in the end you still came out, didn't you?"
Bai Yuchuan looked at her. His voice was quiet as water, but more serious than before.
"Because it was you who called."
Qin Xin froze.
All the grievances she had come carrying were stopped short by that one soft line. After a long moment, she finally gave a faint snort and turned her face aside. "As if I care."
But the brightness in her eyes would not be pressed down.
Bai Yuchuan looked at her and said once more, "Three years."
Her fingers tightened slightly. At once she understood.
He had shown himself today. He had restored all the face the Bai family needed restored. Yet his father's mourning was not over, and he could not speak openly of marriage yet. Those three years were both the observance of mourning and a promise.
After a moment of silence, she gave the smallest nod.
Then, however, something else occurred to her, and she looked up again. "What about Xuanyuan Xi?"
The line between Bai Yuchuan's brows moved. "What about him?"
Qin Xin said, with deliberate innocence, "I'm asking what you think. That Young Master Xuanyuan from Mount Hua looks well enough, fights well enough, and even my father praised him. If you really had refused to come out just now, everyone would have taken him for the better match for the Qin family."
Bai Yuchuan looked at her. His gaze darkened ever so slightly.
She continued, though she knew exactly what she was doing. "Well? What do you think of him?"
Bai Yuchuan was silent for a moment before answering, "Very strong."
"And?"
"...Very steady."
That made Qin Xin's lips curve before she quickly smoothed the expression away again. "Oh? So you do know how to praise people."
Bai Yuchuan did not answer that. He only said quietly, "The banquet is about to begin. You should go."
Qin Xin did not move. She only looked at him. After a long moment she said softly, "Cousin, don't always be like this in the future."
"Like what?"
"Hiding everything." Her voice dropped lower. "If you keep hiding everything, other people will fear you. So will I."
Bai Yuchuan looked at her. Something very slight moved in his eyes, but he still said no more than, "Go on."
Only then did Qin Xin turn and leave. At the door, she glanced back at him once. Most of the grievance had faded from her eyes, leaving only a small trace of reluctant happiness she refused to speak aloud.
The Pre-Birthday Banquet
Qin Gang's true birthday feast would be held the next day, but the pre-birthday banquet was already laid that night.
It was called a small banquet only because it lacked some of the fullest public spectacle reserved for the main feast. In truth, every guest of standing, every sect and gang, and every old friend close to the Qin family had already been invited into the East Great Hall and the side chambers to either hand. Outside, colored lanterns still burned bright. Inside, the scent of wine had already risen. The whole Four Seas stronghold swarmed with figures, and even at the docks late boats were still drawing in under the lanternlight, oars mixing with reflected fire until the night over Taihu seemed to sway and shine with life.
Mount Hua's table stood at a secondary place on the eastern side.
It was not the foremost seat, but it was by no means low. Zheng Chong sat at the right side of the head position, Xuanyuan Xi beside him, with Xi Qian and Fang Yingjie seated in turn below. Once the four of them sat together, Mount Hua's bearing revealed itself at once. It was not a matter of numbers. It was that they knew how to hold their seats.
Most of all, there was Xuanyuan Xi. Clad in blue, with the Heaven-Radiance Sword hanging dark and steady at his waist, he sat in silence—and yet the eyes from several neighboring tables had already drifted their way more than once. The bout at the waterside pavilion had only just ended. The name of twin unmatched edges had only just been struck out. How could people not look?
Flying Snow Manor, by contrast, sat at a table somewhat nearer the principal seats.
Shangguan Lü and Zhuge Hui sat to either side, with Bai Yuchuan in the center. In his white robe, he seemed almost stiller than the lanternlight and wine around him. Earlier, at the pavilion, people had looked at him for the sharp brilliance of his clash with Xuanyuan Xi. Now, at the banquet, what they saw in him was not brilliance alone, but the true weight and pressure of Flying Snow Manor's young master.
Qin Xin sat not far from Qin Gang and Qin Yaozong. For once, tonight she was properly dressed as a young lady. The instant she took her seat, many of the younger men around the hall could no longer quite keep their eyes in order. She seemed not to notice at all. Yet from time to time, when she raised her gaze idly, it would drift across the blaze of the hall and settle briefly in Bai Yuchuan's direction.
Dishes came like flowing water.
Cold silver-threaded appetizers, white fish steamed clear, bamboo shoots braised with ham, lotus-leaf rice flour parcels, fresh Taihu shrimp, crisp pastry filled with crab roe, sweet rice dumplings in fermented wine… Jiangnan banquets prized refinement. The spread did not overwhelm in the blunt northern way. Instead it was meticulous, layered, and complete.
Fang Yingjie had been hungry long before they even sat down. The smell alone made his stomach give a soft, utterly ill-timed growl, and at once his face flamed red.
Xi Qian had still been harboring some resentment from earlier. Hearing it, however, she nearly laughed aloud. Leaning slightly toward him, she whispered, "Couldn't you at least try to hold out?"
Fang Yingjie's ears burned. "I didn't mean to…"
Xuanyuan Xi looked over and gently nudged the bowl of hot soup nearest him half an inch in Fang Yingjie's direction. "Have a little first. Don't sit on an empty stomach."
The movement was small and natural enough that others might not have noticed it, but Xi Qian did. Something in her chest softened despite herself.
At the other end of the hall, Qin Gang had already risen with his cup in hand and begun personally making the rounds of the tables.
Tonight he wore a long robe of black patterned cloth. It was not especially ostentatious, but the instant he stood, the entire hall seemed to settle under the weight of his presence. At his age and in his position, the boldness of youth was still there, but what dominated now was something heavier and more tempered. To Shaolin and Wudang, he offered the formal cup due to great sects. To Flying Snow Manor and Mount Hua, he gave face. To the Beggars' Sect and the guests from every province, he gave the warmth of martial-world loyalty.
When he reached Mount Hua's table, however, he paused for the briefest moment.
Zheng Chong immediately rose and saluted. "Gang Leader Qin."
Xuanyuan Xi and the others stood as well.
Qin Gang first inclined his head to Zheng Chong. Then his gaze shifted to Xuanyuan Xi. The appreciation already visible in his eyes earlier that day had not diminished. If anything, it was clearer now.
"I watched your bout today with real pleasure, Young Master Xuanyuan."
Xuanyuan Xi lowered his head slightly. "This junior was fortunate. I do not dare accept such praise from the Gang Leader."
Qin Gang smiled faintly. Then his eyes moved again—this time to Fang Yingjie.
The moment his gaze landed there, something in his expression paused.
Fang Yingjie's heart jumped. Instinctively, he straightened his back.
Qin Gang did not speak at once. He only looked at him for a moment, and in his face there passed the faintest trace of some shadow from long ago.
At length he said slowly, "This young man is unfamiliar to me. Yet there is something in his brows and eyes… that greatly resembles an old acquaintance."
A faint weight passed through Zheng Chong's chest. This point, after all, had never really been avoidable.
He bowed and said, "This is Martial Uncle Fang's only son—Fang Yingjie."
The moment the words Martial Uncle Fang were spoken, the several people nearest their table all quieted by a shade.
The shadow in Qin Gang's eyes finally surfaced in full. Lowering his cup slightly, he looked again at Fang Yingjie. This time, what had been the gaze of a host looking at a younger guest softened by two degrees.
"So that is it," he said quietly. "No wonder."
Whether no wonder referred to the resemblance or to the old image it called back, no one could have said.
Fang Yingjie, being looked at in such a way, no longer knew what to do with himself. He could only rise rather stiffly and offer a salute. "Greetings, Gang Leader Qin."
Qin Gang looked at him as though he meant to say something more, but in the end only nodded and said, "Sit. Your father was a true man."
It was not a long sentence. Yet it landed with tremendous weight.
All around the table, the guests who had previously only been glancing in Mount Hua's direction now looked with greater focus.
So this youth in blue was Fang Tieshan's son.
At some point, Jiang Datao had also drawn near.
Tonight he wore a dark blue-brown robe, his expression as proper and steady as ever. Standing beside Qin Gang, he neither stole the host's place nor seemed insubstantial beside him. He had settled himself at exactly the right line between the two. Hearing Zheng Chong say Martial Uncle Fang's only son, he too let his gaze fall on Fang Yingjie.
The glance lasted only an instant—so brief it might have been no different from any elder measuring some younger man.
And yet for reasons she could not have explained, Xi Qian, sitting beside Fang Yingjie, felt an extremely faint discomfort at once. It was like stepping on a slightly damp leaf at night—nothing enough to make one slip, yet enough to make the foot instinctively draw back.
Jiang Datao's expression had already changed again. A perfectly measured warmth came into his face as he turned to Zheng Chong and said, "So this is Great Hero Fang's son. No wonder the Gang Leader saw only one glance and looked as though he had found an old face again. Great Hero Fang had a measure of friendship with our gang back in the day. If he were still here to see his son grown to this age, I think his heart would be easier."
Every line was impeccably chosen.
He raised Mount Hua, raised Qin Gang, and at the same time rethreaded the old tie between Fang Tieshan and the Four Seas Gang. Anyone hearing him would only have thought: Deputy Gang Leader Jiang is exactly as his reputation says—upright in speech, proper in conduct.
Only Xuanyuan Xi, hearing the words, let his eyes shift by the faintest degree. He said nothing.
Qin Gang nodded as well. "Indeed."
After that, he did not linger. With a lift of his cup, he moved on to the next table.
Flying Snow Manor's table, meanwhile, was hardly free of attention itself.
Zhuge Hui, pleasantly warmed by wine, smiled and maneuvered through talk with several Jiangnan magnates nearby. In a few sentences he could steer a subject away and back again, never too frivolous, never too blunt. Shangguan Lü, by contrast, remained steady and still, raising his cup only occasionally to acknowledge Qin Gang from afar, every measure exactly right.
Bai Yuchuan, however, spoke very little.
Yet precisely because he spoke so little, no one present dared take him lightly. Earlier that day, he had fought Xuanyuan Xi to a draw. Beyond that, he was the young master of Flying Snow Manor—and the hidden bearer of the Jianwen line, though no one there knew that last truth. The first fact alone was enough to hold a field down.
Qin Xin looked at him twice across the blaze of the hall. On the third time, Bai Yuchuan at last lifted his eyes very slightly in return.
The corner of Qin Xin's mouth curved upward at once, as though she had somehow won an advantage. Only then did she condescend to lower her gaze and eat.
Zhuge Hui saw the whole exchange clearly. A faint smile passed through his eyes, but he did not speak of it.
The wine in the hall slowly deepened. So did the tangle of human figures moving through it.
Shadows Among the Banquet Tables
The hall was bright with lanternlight, and thick with people.
Servants came and went topping off wine. Maids carried soups and changed cups. Stewards moved between tables with seating cards and invitations. Guards made their rounds through the room.
From afar, all of them looked equally busy. Up close, however, they were not the same.
Some had heavy steps, the steps of men used only to rough labor. Some moved too lightly—lightly enough that they looked less like tray-bearers and more like men accustomed to hiding their footsteps in dark places. Some, when coming to Mount Hua's table, let their gaze slide first toward Zheng Chong and Xuanyuan Xi as naturally as breathing. Others kept their heads down, but the corners of their eyes always twitched, just once, in Fang Yingjie's direction.
At first Xi Qian had been too busy listening to the talk around the hall to notice much. But by the third time someone came to refill wine and paused half a heartbeat longer than needed at their table, the faint discomfort from before surfaced again.
She tugged lightly at Xuanyuan Xi's sleeve and whispered, "Brother Xi."
He turned his head slightly.
Xi Qian did not dare say it plainly. "The people here… they seem far too interested in Yingjie."
Xuanyuan Xi's gaze grew still. "I know."
She blinked in surprise. Before she could ask more, a servant in a gray-blue short jacket came up carrying hot soup. Just as he reached the Mount Hua table, his foot seemed to slip. His body tipped forward slightly, and the bowl in his hands lurched with him.
Fang Yingjie instinctively drew back.
The servant hurriedly recovered himself, his face full of flustered panic as he stammered apologies. His movements looked exactly like those of a clumsy attendant.
Yet as he retreated, his sleeve brushed the edge of the table.
The touch was extremely light.
Light enough that there was almost no sound.
Zheng Chong, who had been speaking to an elder from a neighboring table, caught the motion from the corner of his eye. His expression did not change, but one hand had already settled soundlessly against the table.
Xuanyuan Xi moved even faster.
As if he had seen nothing at all, he reached back and shifted the winecup before him a little farther toward Fang Yingjie—just enough to block the pair of silver chopsticks that the servant's sleeve had brushed a moment earlier.
By then, the servant was already gone.
Not long after, a burst of laughter erupted from the Beggars' Sect's side of the hall, loud enough to ring through half the eastern chamber. Feng Feiyun had apparently said something outrageous, because Hu Xiaosheng, Mo Sanniang, and Jiang Hui'er were all laughing and cursing at once, while Cai Baozi nearly sprayed wine from his mouth.
The sudden noise swept through the room like a wave. For a moment, the faint strange tension that had been pressing invisibly over the hall loosened by a degree.
Without changing expression, Zheng Chong replaced the touched chopsticks with another pair and slipped the first set into his sleeve.
His face still wore the easy composure he had shown in speaking with the elder beside him. Inside, however, his thoughts had turned cold by half.
So the road was indeed dangerous.
The moment Fang Yingjie showed himself, someone had already come to test him.
Not necessarily to harm him. Not to strike at once.
Only to test first.
To test which person at this table was the most alert. To test what sort of weight Fang Tieshan's son now carried. To test whether Mount Hua's table was loose outside and tight within, or tight outside and hollow within.
It was precisely this kind of testing that chilled the spine.
Because it meant the other side was in no hurry at all.
They had time. Time to look at him, to recognize him, to remember him—and then to choose the right moment later.
Zheng Chong thought of that, then lifted his cup and drank, pressing down the cold that had risen in his chest.
When he glanced up again, Feng Feiyun was over at the Beggars' Sect's table, laughing with no care in the world, as though he had truly come only to drink and enjoy himself.
Yet when their eyes met, the thing hidden beneath Feng Feiyun's loose, lazy smile was perfectly clear.
He had seen it too.
Laughter Hiding the Blade
Feng Feiyun truly had kept away from the formal tables that night.
The Beggars' Sect's side did not trouble itself with so much ceremony to begin with. Hu Xiaosheng sat with smiling eyes, Li Gou'er with his lids half lowered, Mo Sanniang spoke sharply, Cai Baozi ate with deep concentration, and with Jiang Hui'er added in, the whole table made more noise than the three neighboring tables put together.
Feng Feiyun had only been there half an hour, yet he already looked as though he had belonged to that table for three years.
"I say, little Mad Monkey," Jiang Hui'er said at one point, a piece of braised meat in her hand and one eye slanted at him, "you sure you didn't crawl out of the Beggars' Sect? That mouth of yours sounds exactly like half the shameless louts in our gang."
Feng Feiyun tipped wine into his mouth and grinned. "More likely they learned it from me. For all you know, I'm the ancestor."
Jiang Hui'er slapped the table at once. "You're full of it!"
Hu Xiaosheng laughed and shook his head. "Enough, enough. You've exchanged what, three lines? Must you overturn the table already? If you two really start fighting, what's to become of the banquet?"
Cai Baozi chuckled, patting his belly. "If they overturn it, I'm taking the braised meat with me first."
Mo Sanniang rolled her eyes and called them all useless, though she, too, was smiling.
For all his laughter and banter, however, Feng Feiyun's attention never truly left Mount Hua's table.
That was why he had gone to the Beggars' Sect in the first place: from the noisiest and least suspicious corner, he could see the whole hall more clearly than anyone.
And what he saw confirmed his suspicions.
There was the servant in the gray-blue jacket. When he slipped with the soup, his shoulders and elbows had remained too steady, and he recovered too fast for genuine clumsiness.
Then there was the out-of-town guest seated two tables away. He had been laughing with those at his own table, but the instant Qin Gang recognized Fang Yingjie, the laughter in his eyes vanished, and he quietly lowered his cup as though filing something more important away in memory.
And at the last table nearest the door sat a perfectly ordinary-looking guard. During the shift change, he ought to have gone out at once, yet he deliberately slowed for half a beat—just long enough to take a full look at Mount Hua's table.
Jiang Hui'er had been poking at the peanuts in her winecup with her chopsticks. Noticing that Feng Feiyun had suddenly fallen silent in the middle of laughing, she nudged him with an elbow. "What now? Don't tell me you've spotted some girl you like."
Feng Feiyun came back to himself at once and flashed a grin. "Sure. You."
Jiang Hui'er nearly choked on her drink and swung at him immediately.
Feng Feiyun ducked behind Hu Xiaosheng's chair before her hand even landed and still had breath left to laugh. "Look at you. You swing fists every other word. No wonder you don't look the least bit like a girl."
Jiang Hui'er rolled her eyes so hard they nearly seemed to turn over. "And you do? You look like a monkey."
"That works out perfectly," Feng Feiyun said cheerfully. "Monkey and brother. A match made by heaven."
At last Mo Sanniang lost patience and smacked the table between them with her chopsticks. "Both of you shut up and eat."
That sharp rap broke the chill Feng Feiyun had been keeping coiled inside him. He raised his bowl, leaned toward Jiang Hui'er, and deliberately clinked it against hers. "All right then, brother. Eat."
Jiang Hui'er glared at him for a moment longer. Then even she could not help laughing. She knocked her bowl against his and muttered, "Get lost."
The noise at their table rolled outward and scattered the curious glances from several neighboring tables.
Feng Feiyun laughed and drank—but in doing so he only became certain of one thing:
The real danger tonight was not that someone would make a move on the spot.
It was that Fang Yingjie had already been seen.
And not by one set of eyes alone.
Once that look had been cast, it would not be cast in vain.
When the Banquet Breaks and the Lamps Burn Deep
By the time the pre-birthday banquet ended, the night had already deepened considerably.
A thin mist had risen over Taihu Lake, though the lights around Juyi Isle had not yet gone dark. In the great hall, guests were still drinking and exchanging formal words. The docks, however, had quieted, leaving only patrolmen of the Four Seas Gang making their rounds with lanterns in hand. The wind passed over the lake and made the flames beneath the corridors rise and fall, so that even the flower-shadows trembled uncertainly.
Mount Hua's table rose fairly early.
Using the excuse that the main birthday feast would be held the next day and they ought to preserve their strength, Zheng Chong declined several more parties who wished to stop them for talk. Then he led Xuanyuan Xi, Xi Qian, and Fang Yingjie back to their guest courtyard. All the way there, his expression stayed normal, and his speech as steady as ever. To any outside eye, Mount Hua only looked disciplined and proper. No one would have noticed anything amiss.
Only after they had passed through the courtyard gate did Zheng Chong personally turn and close it behind them.
The courtyard was very still. Beneath the white silk lanterns, bamboo shadows slanted across the flagstones. The lake wind brushed softly around the corridor corners, stirring the window paper with a faint rustling. Zheng Chong stood by the gate for a moment, listening. Only then did he turn back and look from face to face.
Xi Qian had already felt something tautening inside her since the banquet. Seeing him like this, she felt it pull tight and asked quietly, "Senior Brother Zheng?"
He did not answer immediately. Instead he said, "You two, go back into the inner room first."
Fang Yingjie blinked. "What?"
"You've made enough commotion for one day," Zheng Chong replied, his voice low but impossible to argue with. "Tomorrow is the true birthday feast. Tonight you will sleep early. Bolt the inner door behind you. Don't wander about again, and don't come out to add your own questions."
Hearing that, Xi Qian felt even more strongly that something was wrong. If Zheng Chong truly only meant to send them to rest, why close the courtyard gate first and lower his voice like that?
Instinctively, she looked at Xuanyuan Xi.
Xuanyuan Xi's face remained calm. "Go. Back into the inner room first."
At once Xi Qian understood. The two senior brothers had matters to discuss away from her and Yingjie. She did not ask further. She only nodded and turned to tug Fang Yingjie's sleeve. "Come on."
Fang Yingjie, however, still stood where he was, brow furrowed as though he had guessed something without quite being able to grasp it. "Is it because of… at the banquet…"
"Go." This time Zheng Chong gave him only a single word.
Fang Yingjie did not dare ask more. Obediently, he followed Xi Qian behind the curtain.
Once the hanging cloth had fallen, inside and outside were separated by a single layer.
Only then did the calm on Zheng Chong's face begin to peel away.
He slowly drew a pair of silver chopsticks from his sleeve and set them on the table.
Under the lamplight, the tips showed the faintest film of gray.
Xuanyuan Xi, standing nearby, let his gaze darken as well.
Zheng Chong said in a low voice, "That was no accident."
Xuanyuan Xi nodded. "I know."
For a moment the room was still. Outside, the wind over the lake had sharpened, and the bamboo shadows shifted lightly over the window paper, as though someone beyond the night were silently watching the light in this courtyard.
Zheng Chong pushed the chopsticks toward the corner of the table and lowered his voice further. "We can't alarm the two of them tonight. Yingjie's heart is unsteady enough already. If we tell him now that someone at the banquet has already begun recognizing him, testing him, and feeling him out, then there will be no having a proper conversation after that."
Xuanyuan Xi said, "Junior Sister Xi as well. If she knows tonight that the game has already deepened this far, her expression will change tomorrow before she even realizes it."
Zheng Chong gave a rueful smile. "Exactly. It is not that I fear they are stupid. I fear they are too quick to react."
The words had only just fallen when a light tapping came once more at the window outside.
Once. Twice.
The rhythm was so brisk and faintly teasing that it seemed the person outside knew perfectly well the gravity within the room and had chosen those two taps specifically to crack it.
Zheng Chong's brow jumped, and the inner force in his palm rose without a sound.
Xuanyuan Xi, however, had already gone to the window. One hand touched the latch, and after listening for half a breath, he pushed the flowered lattice open just a sliver.
Sure enough, the face leaning in from outside wore the same irrepressible grin as ever.
"Well now," said Feng Feiyun, one elbow on the sill, his hair half loose, his eyes still bright with the remnants of wine, "you people from Mount Hua do close a door fast. I thought I might have to climb across the corridor roof before I got in."
Zheng Chong looked at him and had to resist the urge to slam the window shut in his face.
Feng Feiyun, of course, ignored that completely. He opened his palm.
Resting there was a tiny copper button.
"That gray-blue servant dropped it when he changed clothes afterward," he said with a grin. "I happened to pick it up."
Zheng Chong took it. On the underside, so faintly worn it could almost have been mistaken for ordinary abrasion, was the shallow outline of a flame.
His fingers tightened.
Xuanyuan Xi's eyes went still.
The two of them exchanged a look. The same name flashed through both their minds.
The smile on Feng Feiyun's face had faded by three parts. Leaning against the outside of the window, he said quietly, "Like I told you—this banquet was never as peaceful as it looked."
Zheng Chong cast a glance into the darkness beyond, then said under his breath, "Come in."
Feng Feiyun raised a brow, then put one hand on the sill and slipped through the window without a sound. When he landed, the hem of his robe gave only the slightest stir, and not even the flame on the table wavered.
From behind the curtain to the inner room came the faintest trace of movement, as though Xi Qian and Fang Yingjie had heard the disturbance and looked at one another, but still did not dare come out.
Zheng Chong ignored it. He lowered one hand. "The two of them are inside. Don't alarm them yet."
Feng Feiyun nodded, and the playfulness in his eyes receded.
"Then let's speak plainly," he said.
Night Talk Beneath the Window
The lamp flame was turned low, and the window paper stirred in the wind.
Only three people remained in the outer room.
Zheng Chong stood by the table, still holding the little copper button. Xuanyuan Xi stood by the window, one side of his face lit by the lamp, his expression quiet as ever. Feng Feiyun leaned against the frame, tapping the wood idly with one finger. The careless laughter he usually wore had mostly vanished.
Zheng Chong spoke first. "Those chopsticks were a test. Not an attempt to kill."
Feng Feiyun nodded. "Exactly. If they had meant to kill, the poison would not have been spread so lightly, and they wouldn't have chosen to move when the hall was full of guests and Gang Leader Qin had only just recognized the sickly one. That servant only wanted to test how tight your Mount Hua table truly was."
Zheng Chong said softly, "To test me. To test Junior Brother Xi. And to test Yingjie."
"And one more thing besides," Feng Feiyun said.
"What?"
"To test whether Fang Tieshan's son is really valuable."
The words dropped into silence.
Zheng Chong's fingers tightened around the copper button, but he did not answer at once.
Feng Feiyun's gaze moved from one face to the other. "There was more than that one servant watching your table tonight. At least two other sets of eyes. One belonged to that out-of-town guest playing the courteous drinking companion by the door. The other belonged to that guard who deliberately slowed by half a beat during the shift. The three of them may not know one another. But they all had the same look. First recognize the man. Then remember him."
Xuanyuan Xi said, "They are not Four Seas Gang people."
Feng Feiyun tilted his head. "You think so too?"
"If the Four Seas Gang truly meant to move," Xuanyuan Xi replied evenly, "they would not use so light a method, and not inside their own stronghold. If they truly wanted Yingjie, the banquet would have been cleaner, not dirtier."
Zheng Chong nodded slowly. "So someone has made use of Juyi Isle's shell and slipped a hand inside it."
Feng Feiyun gave a quiet sound of agreement. "And not amateurs either. They didn't decide this on a whim. They'd already been watching. The instant the sickly one showed his identity at the banquet, they tested the line straightaway—whether he truly was Fang Tieshan's son, and whether he was worth special attention later."
Zheng Chong was silent for a time. Then he asked quietly, "What else did you see from the Beggars' Sect's side?"
Feng Feiyun rested the back of his head against the window frame and answered slowly, "Nothing grand. Just a few small things. That servant in gray-blue kept his shoulders and elbows too steady when he nearly spilled the soup, and recovered too fast. That out-of-town guest was laughing with his companions, but the instant Qin Gang recognized Yingjie, the laughter in his eyes disappeared. And that guard at the end of the hall slowed on purpose, just long enough to get a proper look at your whole table."
He paused, then added, "None of those things, by themselves, can convict anyone. But on roads like ours, people rarely wait until they understand a thing fully before they act. By the time everything is clear, they are usually already too late."
Zheng Chong let out a quiet breath. "Yes. First the suspicion comes. Only afterward do the threads begin to show."
Feng Feiyun looked at him. "So what now? Do we keep digging, or not?"
The question was asked lightly, yet it seemed to make even the lamp tremble.
Zheng Chong did not answer at once.
This journey down from Mount Hua had never been about a birthday feast alone. That note—An old acquaintance is not dead. His trail follows the water. If you would know the truth, search Jiangnan with great care—had drawn Mount Hua's attention to the waterways of Jiangnan from the beginning. Now they had barely shown themselves at Taihu, and already a hand had reached for Fang Yingjie. What did that mean? It meant they had not guessed wrongly. It might even mean they had already stepped onto some truly important shadow.
And precisely for that reason, the danger was now far closer.
At last Zheng Chong said, "We keep digging. But not in the same way as before."
Feng Feiyun nodded. "Good. At least that isn't a stupid answer."
Zheng Chong shot him a glance and continued, "But at this point, the things we can actually seize are still too few. Four Seas Gang men, boats, waterways, back wharves, the men behind the main office who know the water and the hidden routes—those things can raise suspicion, but they don't let us bite down on anything solid."
"Exactly," Feng Feiyun said. "None of that proves the Four Seas Gang itself is doing anything wrong. They're the greatest gang on Taihu Lake. Of course they have many men, many boats, and tight control over the back docks. If you begin suspecting them solely because of that, your suspicion is too shallow."
He paused, and his expression deepened by a shade.
"But Taihu is only one layer."
Zheng Chong raised his head. "There's more?"
Feng Feiyun nodded. "There is. It's just that Mount Hua didn't know this part of the line before now."
The room fell still.
"My master has been tracing the Four Seas Gang, the water routes, and the southbound boats for years," Feng Feiyun said quietly. "Later, that line led him as far as Poyang Lake, where he ran into a lakeside manor."
Zheng Chong's brow tightened. "What manor?"
"Biyue Manor."
Zheng Chong repeated the name under his breath. "Biyue Manor?"
"Yes," said Feng Feiyun. "Its name isn't bad in the outside world. The manor itself looks clean, and its lady, Wen Rubi, is a widow. The people who come and go there are mixed, but all of them seem tied, at least on the surface, to proper trade or ordinary dealings in the martial world. Look only at that, and no one could say the place is wrong. But the farther my master followed the water routes, the more often the shadows ended there."
Zheng Chong said quietly, "That still doesn't give us anything we can hold."
"Of course it doesn't," Feng Feiyun replied. "Even if you traced the line there for real, you'd only end up with the same result every time: the man gone, the boat gone, the goods gone. You see the shadow and follow it, and the shadow breaks off. That's how old foxes work. They let you know something is wrong, but never let you catch where the wrongness truly lies."
The room was silent again.
The wind from the lake slipped through the window and bent the lamplight slightly to one side.
Yet Feng Feiyun did not stop. Instead, he went on in an even lower voice. "And beyond Biyue Manor, there's another shadow."
Zheng Chong's expression shifted. "What shadow?"
Feng Feiyun lifted his eyes and spoke one word at a time.
"The Prince of Ning's Manor."
The effect of those words was like a stone dropped into the bottom of the room.
Zheng Chong's face changed at once. Even in Xuanyuan Xi's eyes there came the faintest visible disturbance.
"Until now," Feng Feiyun said quietly, "you knew only that the note drew the line toward Jiangnan's waterways. You didn't yet know that those waterways may run deeper still—straight into Jiangxi. My master has traced Great Hero Fang's disappearance for years. Twice he found the same shadow. Once, it pointed toward Biyue Manor. The other time, it pointed toward the Prince of Ning's Manor."
Zheng Chong slowly drew in a breath. "You mean Martial Uncle Fang's line may ultimately reach as far as the Prince of Ning?"
"May," Feng Feiyun answered. "Only may. Because it's still the same problem. Suspecting something and being able to prove it are not the same. If you asked me to place a hand on anything real enough to strike at, I still have nothing."
Xuanyuan Xi said at last, "If Biyue Manor and the Prince of Ning's Manor are both only shadows, then between them there ought to be another hand."
Feng Feiyun looked at him for a long moment. "Your mind really does turn fast."
Xuanyuan Xi answered calmly, "It does not dare turn slowly when it concerns Martial Uncle Fang."
Feng Feiyun fell silent briefly. When he spoke again, his voice was lower still.
"The Prince of Ning's line is worse to touch than the other," he said. "It isn't that anyone has seen anything solid there. It's that the place is too deep. This whole case of Great Hero Fang's has twisted through too many open roads and hidden paths over the years. But some of those lines, once followed far enough, always seem to bend that way in the end. My master has traced the old case for years and never found more than broken shadows. Press farther, and the people vanish, the boats vanish, and the roads vanish too."
Zheng Chong said, "If all of that is put together, then at least it means—"
"It means the power behind this is not following ordinary martial-world methods," Feng Feiyun finished. "But only that. If you try to probe the Prince of Ning's Manor on the strength of those suspicions alone, you will learn nothing—and disappear all the faster."
Zheng Chong's expression tightened. "Then if Martial Uncle Fang is still alive now—"
"He most likely is." Feng Feiyun answered so quickly it was clear he had already thought the question through a thousand times. "If he had died long ago, there would have been no reason to keep smothering the trail all these years. The more often the line breaks, the more it means someone does not want it to surface."
As he said it, something cold flickered openly in his eyes.
"And that," he added, "is exactly why the instant the sickly one showed himself tonight, someone came to test him."
Zheng Chong let out a slow breath. "Because they've noticed him too."
"Right," said Feng Feiyun. "Because he is Great Hero Fang's son."
He paused. His voice dropped still lower.
"If Great Hero Fang really is alive, then the boy can be used as bait. So what happened tonight was not an attempt to kill him. It was only to confirm him first—whether he really is Fang Tieshan's son, and whether he's worth special effort later."
"And besides, this is Juyi Isle, the Four Seas Gang's own stronghold, with the eyes of every sect and magnate in the hall. If anyone means to take him, they won't do it here."
Xuanyuan Xi said, "Then it will be after the birthday feast."
Feng Feiyun looked at him and nodded. "After the feast. Or on the road once you've left Taihu. In any case, not in the open. It will happen at a turn, at a bend, at the moment you all think, There should be no trouble left tonight."
Zheng Chong slowly set the copper button down on the table. "Then we can do nothing except be more careful."
"Not just more careful." Feng Feiyun shook his head. "You need a different method now."
"What method?"
"Outwardly, nothing changes," Feng Feiyun said. "Tomorrow, for the main birthday feast, you attend as before. You congratulate the Gang Leader as before. Whatever you planned to keep investigating, you do not stop. At a time like this, you absolutely cannot let people feel Mount Hua is the first to lose its nerve. But underneath that, the sickly one cannot appear alone again. Nor can the little Daoist girl. If you still want to keep feeling out the back wharves, the hidden routes, and the boats outside the main office, then don't keep those two children tied to your side."
Zheng Chong nodded. "That much is obvious."
Xuanyuan Xi, however, said, "Not enough."
Feng Feiyun lifted a brow. "Oh?"
Xuanyuan Xi's eyes rested on the gray-tipped chopsticks and the copper button on the table. "If someone tests us again tomorrow, we let them."
Zheng Chong turned slightly. "You mean—"
"They are in the dark," Xuanyuan Xi replied. "We cannot only shrink away. If we clamp down too tightly, then we are effectively admitting Yingjie is the key point. Tomorrow at the feast, Yingjie remains before our eyes as before. His expression does not change. His seat does not change. His movements do not change. If anyone wishes to test him again, let him expose more of his own hand."
Feng Feiyun stared at him. Then suddenly he smiled.
"Good," he said. "That sounds more like Mount Hua."
Zheng Chong too understood after a moment. He nodded slowly. "That can work. But one thing more. If the moment comes, we do not drag the fight out, and we certainly do not indulge our pride. What we want is to see the hand. Not to seize the ghost on the spot."
Feng Feiyun grinned. "Now that sounds like an old hand speaking."
Then, glancing toward the inner curtain, he asked in a lower voice, "So the two little ones really aren't being told?"
Zheng Chong shook his head. "Not tonight."
Xuanyuan Xi added, "If we tell them now, neither of them will sleep at all."
Feng Feiyun considered that, then gave a short breath through his nose. "Fine. Let them sleep one more night as innocent little ones. Once we're out on the road where the blades really turn, they'll know soon enough."
He straightened as if to slip out through the window again. Then he paused and looked back over one shoulder.
"There's one more thing you should both keep in mind."
Zheng Chong asked, "What?"
By now the last of the flippancy was gone from Feng Feiyun's eyes, leaving only a thin layer of cold.
"This time, it may not be only one faction watching you," he said quietly. "The Crimson Flame Palace has hands in the dark, and other places may not be clean either. No one can tell where those hands are buried—what gang, what boat, what manor. The man you take for orthodox today may be passing messages tomorrow. The man you take for loyalty itself may wear another face behind it. Those who truly strike are usually more proper than the most proper-looking men at the banquet, and speak more smoothly than the smoothest flatterers."
Zheng Chong said nothing.
After a moment, Xuanyuan Xi gave the smallest nod.
Seeing that the words had all been spoken, Feng Feiyun did not linger further. One hand touched the window frame, his body turned, and he slipped lightly out into the night. Before vanishing, he left behind one last line.
"I'll still be mixed in with the Beggars' Sect tomorrow. If there's any stir on your side, I'll see it first."
Then the darkness outside swallowed him. His blue figure vanished between corridor-shadow and bamboo-shadow like a wind that had never cared for rules in arriving and cared even less for leaving a trace.
The room fell silent again.
Zheng Chong stood by the table, staring at the gray-tipped chopsticks and the copper button with the flame mark, and for a long while he did not speak.
Behind the curtain, the inner room was silent too.
Only now that silence held another layer, something all of them understood without saying it aloud—
The two younger ones had been sent away.
But after this talk beneath the window, the real game had finally been set upon the table.
One More Watching Eye
Many on Juyi Isle slept poorly that night.
Some were thinking of the display to come at the main birthday feast. Some were wondering whether the marriage between the Bai family and the Qin family would truly be settled this time. Some were imagining how far the names of Xuanyuan Xi and Bai Yuchuan would stir the martial world from here on out. Others cared only about tomorrow's seating, whom to toast, and what line might best raise the standing of their own house.
But in a small side courtyard at the westernmost edge of the Four Seas stronghold, someone's thoughts were on none of those things.
It was an unremarkable courtyard. No plaque hung outside. Only a single wind lantern burned there, half bright and half dim. Beneath it stood a man in a gray-blue short jacket, hands lowered, his earlier flustered servant's expression entirely gone. What remained was only a flat shadow across his face.
Inside the room sat another man.
He had his back to the light, and his face could not be seen clearly. Only his hand was visible, holding a small copper button between two fingers. The surface was dull with wear, and on the back was a faint flame-shaped mark—the exact twin of the piece once hanging from the servant's clothes at the banquet.
At length, the seated man spoke.
"You saw clearly?"
The man in the short jacket lowered his voice. "Clearly. Still young. The brows and eyes look very much like Fang Tieshan. At the banquet Qin Gang recognized him himself. Said he was Fang Tieshan's only son. The name matched too."
The seated man was silent for a while. Then his fingers tightened, and the little copper button gave a tiny metallic click.
"Good," he said.
His voice was quiet, almost level. Yet the very lack of emotion in it was what made the skin prickle.
The man in gray-blue continued, "Mount Hua's side was tightly guarded. We only got as far as the chopsticks tonight. Didn't make contact with the boy. If we go farther—"
"Farther will not be here." The other man cut him off mildly. "It is Qin Gang's fiftieth birthday. Juyi Isle is crowded with mixed guests. If Mount Hua's people are taken inside the main stronghold itself, it will be too obvious."
The servant lowered his head. "Then…"
The seated man set the copper button back on the table.
"Identify him first," he said evenly. "Once he leaves Taihu, we move farther down the line."
After that, silence reclaimed the room.
Outside, the night wind set the lantern swinging. Its shadow stretched across the wall, long and thin, like the shape of some beast that had not yet pounced but had never stopped crouching.
Farther away, the lamp in Mount Hua's guest courtyard had not yet gone out.
Beneath that lamp, Fang Yingjie sat with his knees drawn up at the edge of his bed, still unable to sleep.
Tonight had been the first time he had sat before others openly as Fang Tieshan's son. The first time he had seen so many men and women of the martial world with his own eyes. And the first time he had truly understood that sometimes people did not look at you because of who you were, but only because you happened to be someone else's son.
It was not a pleasant feeling.
And yet, beneath that discomfort, something else had begun to glow very faintly inside him.
It was as though, somewhere far away, a road he had never truly stepped onto before had finally shown him its first stretch.
It was not a smooth road. Nor a warm one.
But it was a road all the same.
Outside, the wind over Taihu was fine and light. The lamplight trembled.
That night, the wine on Juyi Isle had not yet fully cooled.
But beneath the water, the silent current had already begun to turn.
Poetic Coda
The birthday wine was warming, yet already carried chill;
before the lamps, each shadow kept its secret still.
At table, the old hero's son was named at last;
beyond the feast, a darker snare had long been cast.
By day, two young names stunned the gathered hall;
by night, the wind fell quiet by the side corridor wall.
Taihu holds not only broad spring waves that shine—
deep water hides scaled things awaiting their own time.
(End of Chapter Ten)