Chapter 707 — The Wrong Queue

CHAPTER 707

The Wrong Queue

The Vermilion Avenue was so crowded that Shi Feng could see the Phoenix Tail Pavilion long before he could reach it.

It stood at the avenue’s north end, five storeys of red lacquer and gold tile, with a great gate carved in the shape of a phoenix’s spread tail. Banners hung down its whole front, gold dragons on vermilion silk. They were the banners of the Long family, and nobody else in the Empire was allowed to fly them.

Guards in gold scale armour stood on either side of the gate, twelve of them, as still as statues.

“Every one of those guards is Shattering Void,” a young man near Shi Feng said under his breath. “Every one!”

“Gate guards,” his friend said. “Shattering Void gate guards. What does she keep inside?”

“Men like us, if we’re lucky.”

“A good bird chooses the tree it perches on. Who wouldn’t choose hers?”

The whole avenue was full of candidates. There must have been a thousand of them, young men in sect robes and family silks, with attendants holding their swords and servants holding their parasols. They had come from every corner of the Empire, and every one of them was talking about the same woman.

“They say she hasn’t lost a fight since she was fourteen.”

“They say she reads a ledger faster than the Situ ministers do.”

“I heard the Cangming heir proposed to her last spring, and she turned him down in three words.”

“What were the three words?”

“Nobody knows. He won’t say.”

Shi Feng listened without taking every rumour seriously. First on the Tianxing and the Second Star of the Empire were enough to explain the crowd. He had no reason to argue about an unnamed suitor’s humiliation. His business was with the Buying Hall.

He wasn’t here for her, anyway. He was here for a lotus.

He showed Liu Su’s slip at the phoenix gate. The guard looked at the red stamp, nodded once and let him through.

Two red-cord queues crossed the stone courtyard. They entered from opposite sides and bent together toward the desks. Shi Feng searched for a board naming the halls.

Both cords were red. Both queues were full of young men. Nobody had put up a board.

The left queue was very long. Shi Feng recognised half a dozen alchemists in it from the Pavilion lobby, all holding slips like his, and two of them saw him and scowled. Xiong Qiyun had been right. Half the alchemists in the capital had heard about the lotus.

The right queue was short. It ended at a single desk, close to the front, with one clerk behind it.

Shi Feng looked at the long queue. He looked at the short one.

He had told Xiong Qiyun he would get there before the other half. He stepped over to the short queue.

The queue moved quickly. Within a quarter of an hour, Shi Feng was at the desk.

The clerk was a young woman in red Pavilion silk, with her hair pinned up neatly and a brush in her hand. A tall stack of papers sat at her elbow. She rose and bowed to him.

“Welcome to the Phoenix Tail Pavilion, honoured guest,” Tong Ruyu said. “This is Tong Ruyu. May I have your name?”

“Shi Feng,” Shi Feng said.

Tong Ruyu wrote it.

“Your Mark, if you hold one?” Tong Ruyu asked.

They’ll want to know who can refine it, Shi Feng thought. A three-hundred-year Quiet Soul Lotus was a 4 Mark-grade herb. He took the question as a sensible check before the pavilion let him enter the sale.

“4 Mark,” Shi Feng said.

Tong Ruyu’s brush paused for a moment. Then it went on writing.

“Your realm?” Tong Ruyu asked.

“Deity Transformation,” Shi Feng said.

“And your sponsor, honoured guest?” Tong Ruyu asked. “Which house or sect sent you?”

Shi Feng thought of Liu Su, who had sold him the slip, and Xiong Qiyun, who had sold him the sentence. Neither of them had exactly sent him.

“Nobody sent me,” Shi Feng said. “I came by myself.” He laid Liu Su’s slip on the desk. “This is my slip.”

Tong Ruyu glanced at it, nodded and placed it on top of the tall stack at her elbow without reading it. The stack was full of letters and stamped papers. She had clearly seen a great many of them today.

“Thank you, honoured guest,” Tong Ruyu said. “The fee is five hundred thousand.”

Shi Feng assumed the fee secured a buyer’s place. Only one man would get the lotus; a large deposit would keep men without the price from crowding the sale. He checked that Tong Ruyu was making a receipt before reaching for his ring.

It was steep, but it was cheaper than another summer of looking.

He counted it out of his ring onto the desk, in Pavilion notes. Tong Ruyu counted it again, very fast and very exactly, and wrote a receipt.

Then she took a jade tally from a lacquered box and set it on the desk with both hands. It was the size of his palm, white jade carved with a phoenix tail, and a number had been cut into it and filled with gold.

One thousand one hundred and seven.

“Your tally, honoured guest,” Tong Ruyu said. “Please keep it on your person at all times. The inner gate opens at the second bell. Please proceed there when it rings.”

“Thank you,” Shi Feng said, and meant it.

He tucked the tally into his sleeve and stepped aside. The young man behind him stepped up to the desk. He was a broad young man in grey with a heavy jaw, and when Tong Ruyu handed him his own tally, he read it aloud with great satisfaction.

“One thousand one hundred and eight,” the young man in grey said. He looked over at Shi Feng and grinned. “Good luck in there, brother.”

“Thank you,” Shi Feng said politely. “I hope there’s enough for both of us.”

The stranger looked puzzled by the answer. Shi Feng didn’t stop to explain. He’d paid for his place and wanted to be waiting when the inner gate opened, not lose time discussing how many herbs the sale might offer.

The second bell began to ring.

[Cash: about 6.5M | Note: a lotus deposit, presumably.]