Chapter 404 — The Price of a Captain

CHAPTER 404

The Price of a Captain

“Fire on the east terraces!”

The shout was still ringing across the guest court when Shi Feng stepped through the door. He had been sleeping on the floor again, so he was awake before the second bell. Sima Lan was already waiting under the eaves, fully dressed, with her hair tied and her slate under one arm.

“Attendant,” Sima Lan said, before he could ask. “Booted and ready. The Valley's gong is a poor one. It took them a full minute to find the rope.”

“Where's Lin Langtian?” Shi Feng asked.

“Asleep,” Sima Lan said. “He said, and I quote, ‘Wake me if it's interesting.’”

They ran.

Fire covered the east terraces below the Heart Garden wall. Green-sashed disciples ran along the forty-odd steps with buckets, shouting conflicting orders. Shi Feng looked past the flames. Someone had started this while the Valley was struggling to guard the Garden.

Then Shi Feng saw the raiders.

There were about twenty of them, in crimson robes with red cloth tied over their faces. A black lotus was stitched on every mask. They moved down the beds in a line, and each one carried a clay jar. They weren't throwing torches. They were scattering a grey powder over the soil.

“Blood Lotus!” a young disciple screamed. “They're Blood Lotus Sect!”

“Hold the paths!” Bai Chenxi's voice cut through the noise. She stood at the top step with her frost sword drawn, the blade white in the firelight. “Do not break formation! Do not touch the powder!”

“Now they listen,” Sima Lan murmured.

On the stone retaining wall above the beds, a tall man in a blood-red robe watched his men work. He held a hooked saber across his shoulders, and his laughter carried over the whole slope.

“Hundred Flower Valley!” Xue Mang shouted. “Your famous gardens burn nicely! This Captain Xue Mang of the Blood Lotus Sect thanks you for the light!”

“Mid Golden Core,” Shi Feng said quietly. “Qi's thick. He's not hiding it.”

“He wants you to hear it,” Sima Lan said.

“I did,” Shi Feng said.

Shi Feng stepped off the path and into the smoke.

Drifting Ash Step carried him through the smoke. It was only at Minor Success, and he stumbled, but the raiders couldn’t see the awkward movement. He passed within an arm’s length of three men and reached the retaining wall with the Sword drawn.

Xue Mang turned a breath too late.

“Who—” Xue Mang began.

The saber came around in a red arc. Shi Feng met it with the flat of the Sword and let the qi slide off the dull steel. Ember Rain flickered along the blade. Three sparks went into the captain's sleeve and one into his beard.

“You little—!” Xue Mang roared, slapping at his chin. “You're courting death!”

Shi Feng pulled the Slag Weight from his sleeve and threw it low.

The grey ingot struck the captain's right knee with a flat, ugly sound. Xue Mang's leg folded. He went down on the wall with a howl, the saber skidded away, and the Sword's tip came to rest against his throat.

The terraces went quiet. Even the fire seemed to wait.

“The captain's down! Heaven has eyes!” a Valley disciple gasped.

“Who is that?”

“That's the champion! The Hall's alchemist, the one who came for his wife! The Blood Lotus has kicked an iron plate!”

“He's a cripple, isn't he? I heard he was a cripple!”

“…”

The raiders stopped scattering powder. Half watched their captain beneath Shi Feng’s blade. The others searched for a path out. The threat of losing Xue Mang had disrupted them faster than the Valley’s buckets.

“Kill him!” Bai Chenxi said, striding down the steps. Her frost sword came up. “Alchemist Shi, he burned forty beds. Kill him, and the rest will run.”

“Your Valley law?” Shi Feng asked.

“A raider dies on the field,” Bai Chenxi said.

“And then you pay to repair the terraces yourselves,” Shi Feng said. “Wait before you kill someone who can pay for the damage.”

Bai Chenxi stopped.

“A dead captain is a funeral,” Shi Feng said. “Nobody pays for a funeral. A living captain is a price.”

“A what?” Xue Mang said hoarsely.

Shi Feng glanced over his shoulder. “Attendant.”

Sima Lan was already beside him, slate raised. She had a way of arriving at exactly the moment she was needed, and then acting as though she'd been there all night.

“Captain Xue Mang of the Blood Lotus,” Sima Lan read aloud. “Ransom, two thousand stones. Forty-one beds burned, sixteen stones each, six hundred and fifty-six. Night work, one hundred. Attendant's time, one hundred. Rope, four. Total two thousand eight hundred and sixty.”

“Rounded up,” Shi Feng said. “Handling. Three thousand. Three days. Delivered to the outer gate.”

Nobody spoke.

“You… you…” Xue Mang's whole face had gone red under his beard. “The Blood Lotus does not pay ransoms! We have never paid a ransom! We will burn this valley to the roots and drink from your skulls!”

“Then he stays,” Shi Feng said. “Three meals a day, billed to your sect. Plus lodging.”

Xue Mang opened his mouth, closed it, and looked at the Sword.

Sima Lan wrote the terms on a strip Shi Feng tore from Xue Mang’s sleeve. They chose a limping raider to carry it. He hurried into the dark without arguing, desperate to get away from the Sword at his captain’s throat.

Bai Chenxi lowered her frost sword. She looked at the Sword, then at Shi Feng, and then at the ground, where a spilled jar had left a grey stain.

Shi Feng crouched beside it.

He rubbed the powder between two fingers, and he knew the smell. It was the smell of the soil in the Heart Garden.

“They didn't come to burn the beds,” Shi Feng said. “They came to feed them.”