Chapter 1071 — The Red Commission

CHAPTER 1071

The Red Commission

Hanyuan City sat on the last river before the frozen waste, and it was built for war.

Its walls were black stone, three times a man’s height. Its roofs were weighted down with rocks against the wind. The people in its streets wore furs to the eyes, and the river under its northern gate had frozen so hard that carts drove across it instead of using the bridge. The Pavilion’s northern tower stood at the centre of it all, seven storeys of grey stone with the Pavilion’s banner frozen stiff on its roof.

Steward Wenren Shu met them at the tower door. He was a plump man of middle age with a fox-fur collar, and he bowed before he’d even reached them.

“Honoured guest elder!” Wenren Shu said, bowing again. “The Hanyuan tower is honoured beyond words. A guest from afar brings good fortune, and a 6 Mark brings ten times as much! Please, please, this way. The fire’s lit. The tea’s hot.”

He bowed them up three flights of stairs to a warm room, bowed as he poured the tea, and then knelt across the table and broke the red seal in front of Shi Feng’s eyes.

“The commission, honoured guest,” Wenren Shu said, unfolding it with both hands. “From the Wanyan house, who hold the lands on the edge of the frozen waste, two days north-east of this city. Patriarch Wanyan Bo, late Profound Heaven. His inner heaven has been cracked for most of a year. The house asks a 6 Mark to mend it, on site. The fee is three million six hundred thousand. Half on arrival, half on success.”

Shi Feng held out his hand, and Wenren Shu put the paper into it.

He read it through once silently. Then he read every clause aloud, slowly, while Wenren Shu sat and listened and Qin Wuyan stood by the door.

“One patient, Wanyan Bo, late Profound Heaven,” Shi Feng read. “Condition, a crack in the inner heaven. Treatment on the Wanyan estate. Herbs from the house vault, at the house’s cost. Fee, three million six hundred thousand, paid through the Pavilion, eighteen hundred thousand when the alchemist arrives and eighteen hundred thousand when the patient stands. If the alchemist judges the case beyond him, the first half is returned less the cost of the road. The house guarantees the alchemist’s safety on its lands and its roads, and an escort from Hanyuan.”

He put the paper down.

“And the Pavilion seal,” Shi Feng said.

He took his guest elder token from his sleeve and laid it against the red seal at the foot of the page. The wax and the jade glowed together for a breath, faint and warm, and went dark again. The seal was the tower’s own, and the commission had been filed in the tower’s book on the day it was dated.

“All in order, honoured guest,” Wenren Shu said happily. “All in order. The Wanyan house is old and honest. Their word is gold in the north.”

“How long has the crack been open?” Shi Feng asked.

“Ten months, honoured guest,” Wenren Shu said. “Perhaps eleven.”

Shi Feng nodded. He’d guessed as much.

“A cracked inner heaven leaks,” Shi Feng said. “Everything the patient has stored in it, qi, will and the law he wrote into it, runs out through the crack. When it’s empty, the heaven falls in, and the man goes with it. Late Profound Heaven holds a great deal, but a man with a cracked heaven has a year at most. This one has a month or two left.”

Wenren Shu’s round face went pale.

“Then the honoured guest will go?” Wenren Shu asked anxiously.

“I’ll go,” Shi Feng said. “Send word to the house that I’ve accepted. I’ll leave in the morning.”

Wenren Shu bowed so low his forehead touched the table, and hurried out to send the word.

Qin Wuyan stayed by the door. He hadn’t touched the tea. When the steward’s steps had gone down the stairs, he crossed the room, looked down at the paper on the table, and then out of the narrow window toward the north.

“The north road,” Qin Wuyan said. “Watch.”

“The commission’s real,” Shi Feng said. “The seal is the tower’s own.”

“The commission is real,” Qin Wuyan agreed. “That doesn’t make the road safe.”

Shi Feng didn’t press him. Qin Wuyan had been counted once already, at Nine-Bend Gorge, by a Profound Heaven presence that hadn’t struck. He had a right to watch roads.

The next morning, the escort was waiting at the city’s northern gate.

There were thirty riders on tall northern horses, all in white fox coats with the Wanyan mark, a black pine, stitched on the breast. At their head sat a man of about forty, broad-shouldered and clean-shaven, with his father’s grey eyes and a peak Shattering Void aura held very correctly. He swung down from his saddle the moment he saw them and bowed with both hands together.

“Wanyan Che, eldest son of the Wanyan house,” Wanyan Che said, bowing deeply. “My father thanks the 6 Mark for coming so far. The whole house thanks you. I’ve come to see you safely to our gate.”

“Master Wanyan,” Shi Feng said, and returned the bow. “How far is it?”

“Two days by horse, Master Shi,” Wanyan Che said at once. “Black Ice Ford first, sixty li. Then Three Wells post, ninety li, where the water’s sweet. Then Frost Willow, eighty li, where we’ll sleep. Grey Hawk post, a hundred and ten li, and the estate by dusk the second day. Time waits for no one, and my father has little of it.”

He hadn’t looked at a map. He hadn’t needed to.

“And if the road’s closed?” Shi Feng asked.

“Then there’s the basin road, Master Shi,” Wanyan Che said, just as smoothly. “Shorter, through the pines. But we won’t need it.”

Shi Feng thanked him and mounted. Wanyan Che rode ahead to lead the column, courteous and attentive, turning in his saddle every li to ask whether the honoured guest was warm enough.

A son should know the road home. Still, Shi Feng was uneasy. Wanyan Che had recited every post and distance without hesitation, even the route he insisted they wouldn’t use. The answer sounded carefully prepared.

He said nothing. Behind him, Qin Wuyan said nothing either, and watched the road.