Chapter 475 — Page One

CHAPTER 475

Page One

Clerk Du stood at the gate in his white Pavilion robe, holding a scroll with a very large seal, and looked as if he'd rather be anywhere else.

“Summons,” Clerk Du said. “Under the Pavilion's law of neutral tower arbitration. I'm told to read it at the gate, in front of witnesses.”

The witnesses had gathered already. Elder Tian Luo stood stiffly on the left. Elder Qian Mo stood on the right, with an abacus he had not been asked to bring. Behind them, half the outer court crowded the lane, each pretending to be on an errand. At the foot of the steps, an old man in a patched brown robe was sweeping, very slowly, with his back to everyone.

Shi Feng stood at the end of the line beside Zhu Liu. Sima Lan insisted on walking down beside him. She leaned on his arm but refused to admit she needed it.

“‘By order of the Duanyang tower of the Sky Pavilion,’” Clerk Du read, “‘Martial Palace and Artificer Hall are summoned to the tower hall of Qingyun City, in twelve days, to present their cases on the matter of the late Wei Renshan of Yunze, and on certain acts of war that followed. No blood may be shed within the tower. No weapons will be carried into the hall. Each party will bring a statement.’”

He paused.

“‘Each party will bring a statement,’” Clerk Du repeated, with a glance at Shi Feng, “‘in writing.’”

“Why are you looking at me?” Shi Feng asked.

“I'm not,” Clerk Du said quickly. “It's the wording.”

“Who pays for the road?” Qian Mo said.

“Each party pays its own,” Clerk Du replied cautiously.

“Then we'll walk,” Li Changyuan said, without turning around. “Slowly. With a cart. Stopping to look at things.”

Clerk Du shut his eyes.

“There's also the stamp fee,” Clerk Du said. “Thirty stones, payable by the summoned.”

“Which summoned?” Qian Mo asked, sharply.

“Both,” Clerk Du answered, already dreading the argument.

“Then it's fifteen each,” Qian Mo said at once.

“It is thirty each,” Clerk Du said. “Under a lenient reading. I took this post to avoid arguments about fees.”

“Then you chose the wrong post,” Li Changyuan said, still sweeping.

Whispers rose from the lane. Arbitration. In Qingyun City. The formation made them go to the Pavilion. Somebody said the Palace was afraid, and somebody else said it was the Palace Master, who was never afraid, and a third voice said it didn't matter, because the sect had a formation now, and wasn't that wonderful? A fourth voice sighed, “Crouching tiger, hidden dragon, and we never knew.”

Tian Luo coughed into his fist. Shi Feng didn't look at him.

“Any questions?” Clerk Du said.

“Yes,” Shi Feng said. “Does the statement need to be itemised?”

Clerk Du looked at him for a long moment.

“The Pavilion has no rule against it,” Clerk Du said, already regretting his answer.

“Paper,” Shi Feng said.

Zhu Liu was already pulling it from his sleeve. It was good Pavilion paper, and Zhu Liu smoothed it across the stool in hut nine carefully so the ink wouldn't run into a crease.

“Page one,” Sima Lan said. “I'll dictate. You write. Your handwriting is a disgrace and I won't use my own.”

“You're injured,” Shi Feng said.

“I am dictating,” Sima Lan said. “It is not a strenuous activity.”

She sat against the wall with the slate in her lap, her chin up. He wrote.

Item one. Lamp oil, 300 night candles, for the formation. 41 stones.

Item two. Hinges, replaced, nine iron cases. 18 stones.

Item three. One iron case, interior, reconditioned after habitation by Zhu Liu. 4 stones.

“I'd prefer that wasn't there,” Zhu Liu said.

“It's true,” Sima Lan said. “Item four. Puppets, sixty, rented for one night at a ledger discount.”

“Royalties,” Gongsun Ce said from the doorway, where he'd appeared with a puppet under each arm.

“Added under ‘goodwill’,” Sima Lan said. “At zero.”

Shi Feng kept writing. Item five. Doors, three. Roof tiles, forty. Fire damage by Old Soot, to Martial Palace property, voluntarily inflicted. Billed to Martial Palace. He added a short line about Old Soot's footprint and moved on to the raiders: rings, rent, the cost of burying a rumour.

He reached the item for the medicine and stopped.

“Dictate,” Shi Feng said.

Sima Lan's chalk stopped on the slate.

“Item twelve,” Sima Lan said stiffly. “Medicine and bandages. Three nights' sickbed.”

“And the wound,” Shi Feng said.

“Do not itemise me,” Sima Lan snapped, embarrassed by his insistence.

“It's the injury they caused,” Shi Feng replied firmly. “It belongs on the page.”

For a moment she said nothing. Zhu Liu looked at the floor. Gongsun Ce quietly turned one of his puppets to face the wall.

“Put it last,” Sima Lan said, very low. “And charge it high.”

“How high?” Shi Feng asked, waiting with his brush.

“As high as a Nascent Soul cultivator's left arm,” Sima Lan answered without looking at him.

Shi Feng dipped his brush and wrote the figure. It was a number that would make the arbiters pause. He drew a line beneath it, neat and straight.

Then he went on. Wu Qiang's knee. The broom: three bristles at four coppers each, sent in advance to the Palace. The bruised dignity of two hundred and eleven disciples on their knees, billed per knee. A sum for the sky, since the sky had been disturbed.

Zhu Liu held up a lamp. The first page ended. The second began. By the third, Sima Lan was no longer dictating, only reading over his shoulder and murmuring corrections. By the fourth, the lamp had burned low, and the pile of finished pages had grown beside his elbow.

Shi Feng filled the fourth sheet. He still hadn't written one word about the war.

Behind him, Sima Lan had gone quite still.

“Four pages,” Sima Lan said quietly. “And you haven't reached the war.”

“I'm getting to it,” Shi Feng said.

He dipped his brush and started a fifth.