Chapter 262 — Under the Seal

CHAPTER 262

Under the Seal

“The winner writes the terms,” Lin Langtian said, “and the loser seals them. Lesson nine, Junior Brother. Watch the wax.”

They were sitting in the mine office, a low stone room that smelled of lamp oil and wet slate. Lin Langtian lay on a long bench with a miner's pillow under his head, and he wrote on a board across his knees. He was injured. He said so every few lines.

Tuoba Hong stood at the other end of the table, grey in the face. His robe was still white with dust. Dai Mu had been sent away to bandage his pride, and a Martial Palace clerk was sweating in the corner with an inkpot.

“Three years of Wujin ore,” Lin Langtian read aloud, dipping his brush. “Delivered to the gate of Artificer Hall. No tolls. No inspection. No protection fee. The twelve wagons at the border to be released within the day.”

“I know the terms,” Tuoba Hong said through his teeth. “Hurry up.”

“I'm writing as fast as my ribs allow,” Lin Langtian said. “Ah. Ah! A cramp!”

Zhu Liu stood beside the bench and moved an abacus bead for every line. Behind him, Shi Feng held his left side. The clean bandage Zhu Liu had wrapped around his ribs was tight. Each breath still hurt.

Lin Langtian finished the page. He blew on it, folded it once across the middle, and slid it across the table.

“Seal it,” Lin Langtian said.

“I can read, you know,” Tuoba Hong said.

“Please do,” Lin Langtian said. “It's all on the front.”

Tuoba Hong read the visible terms. They matched the wager, which only made him angrier; he’d hoped to find something he could object to. He left the fold shut while the sweating clerk offered him the hot wax.

Tuoba Hong pressed his seal across the fold, hard enough to crack the wax.

“Done,” Tuoba Hong said. “Now release the wagons.”

“Immediately,” Lin Langtian said, and waved the paper. “Zhu Liu, record the time.”

Tuoba Hong stalked out, and the clerk hurried after him. The door banged shut. For a moment nobody said a word.

Then Lin Langtian sat up. He didn't look injured at all.

“Come here,” Lin Langtian said. “Look.”

He picked at the corner of the fold with a thumbnail and opened it a finger's width. Underneath the seal, on the inside of the paper, was a second block of tiny writing. It was cramped and neat, and the wax had hidden every character of it.

Shi Feng bent and read.

Any inspection, detention or examination of goods belonging to Artificer Hall, carried out by Martial Palace or any party acting in its name, shall be paid for by the inspecting party at eighty spirit stones per wagon per day, from the date of this agreement. Disputes over ore grade shall be settled by Artificer Hall's own assay.

Shi Feng read it twice.

“It's their own rate,” Shi Feng said.

“Their own rate,” Lin Langtian said happily. “From their own clerk. They invented it, and now they get to enjoy it. A silkworm spins its own cocoon, as the saying goes.”

“And they sealed it without reading?” Shi Feng said.

“He read what I showed him,” Lin Langtian said. “He’d lost before two hundred people, the wax was ready, and he wanted out of this room. He never thought to open the fold. The outside looked correct, and that was enough for him to stop checking. Lesson nine, Junior Brother: the best clause is the one under the seal.”

“Is it legal?” Shi Feng asked.

“It's signed,” Lin Langtian said. “Black ink on white paper, as they say. Legal is what's signed.”

Zhu Liu was writing furiously. “Contract, one sheet, hidden clause, the opposite party's own price. Senior Brother Lin, should I put 'hidden'?”

“Put 'prudent',” Lin Langtian said.

That night the mine gave them a hut with three beds and a broken lamp.

Shi Feng lay on his back with pain along three ribs. The Ledger had absorbed the force of the blows, but the cracked bones still needed to mend. He tried a careful breath and decided sleep would have to wait.

The door opened without a knock.

“Junior Brother!” Lin Langtian said, coming in sideways with a clay pot in both hands. “How is the patient?”

“You said I could sleep,” Shi Feng said.

“You can rest while you eat,” Lin Langtian said, setting down the pot. Golden steam filled the room. “Beyond-grade, naturally. I didn’t come all this way to feed you ordinary roots. There’s a nine-leaf one in there. Don’t ask me for its grade.”

Shi Feng sat up carefully and looked into the pot. Something at the bottom looked back at him.

“Does it need cooking?” Shi Feng asked.

“Never,” Lin Langtian said. “Herbs are too honest to cook. I only boiled the water.”

He held out a wooden spoon. Shi Feng took it, and ate.

[Devoured: unlabelled root, boiled | Gain: very large | Note: sit down. You are sitting. Sit down more.]

Warmth rolled through his side like a hand pressing out a crease. The three cracks ached, then hummed, then stopped. He let out a long breath, and for the first time in a day his ribs felt like part of him.

Lin Langtian watched with his hands behind his back.

“Better?” Lin Langtian asked.

“Better,” Shi Feng said.

“Good.” Lin Langtian picked up the empty pot and tucked it under his arm. His grin was back. “Because tomorrow, the ore. The contract says Artificer Hall assays it, and Zhu Liu's assay stone broke on the road.”

“Then how do we assay it?” Shi Feng said.

“Junior Brother,” Lin Langtian said, “you have a stomach.”