The door to Zhang Lifen’s home banged open, accompanied by a wave of heat and the scent of smoke. She didn’t need to turn her attention away from the painting she was working on to know who’d just arrived. Nobody else would be visiting her at this hour, and certainly not without first announcing their presence.

“I’d been wondering when you were going to stop by,” she said, adding some final details to the work before setting her brush aside. “Sit down and I’ll make us tea.”

Ren Huang grunted as he seated himself. He’d always been a man of few words, and over the years she’d gotten rather good at deciphering his various non-verbal methods of communication. It meant he was a good listener, and she appreciated that about him. Not many of her peers enjoyed her penchant for verbal meandering and gossip.

“Is this about that little slap-fight earlier this week?” She’d been on one of the inner sect mountains tending to her own cultivation when Li Heng and Sha Xiang had come to blows, so hadn’t heard about it until the next day. “Or perhaps that sparring session between the two disciples I brought to the sect?” Were she of a similar temper to Huang, she would have confronted him that day about how he’d dealt with that particular incident. He’d gone too far, in her opinion. But she wasn’t about to impress upon their long friendship for something so trivial. As a Fifth Realm core disciple, he outranked her and was in charge of the physical development of the outer disciples this year, besides. It was his right to do as he saw fit.

“What do you think?” he asked as he finished settling in. She gave him a moment to decide whether or not he’d anything else to say while she put away her brushes and ink. It could be hard to tell with him sometimes.

At length, he did speak. “That girl you brought with him is trouble. She carries demons in her heart.”

“Sha Xiang,” she said, mostly to herself, as she set herself to preparing the promised tea.

Huang grunted an affirmative.

“Do you think I was wrong to bring her?” she asked.

Silence. Zhang Lifen schooled her features before she turned. She found Huang’s gaze boring into her. It was answer enough.

“I don’t,” she said.

“I didn’t expect you would. You never do think much past what you want.” Some of the tension drained from his posture, however—a good sign. So she wasn’t going to make a fuss about his accusation. It was obvious he wasn’t here to have that fight again, and she wasn’t about to provoke him to it.

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“So what do you think of the boy?” she asked, allowing a smile to flicker across her lips. This was what he’d come about, after all. As much as they enjoyed the other’s company, he rarely stopped by without reason these days. The responsibilities of rank, and all that.

“He’s weak.” It was nothing more than a statement of fact, and they both knew as much. It wasn’t what she was interested in, however.

“He is,” she agreed.

“Each day he’s the first to falter during the run.”

Zhang Lifen let the matter hang while she finished the tea. “Junior Brother He simply needs the proper opportunities and incentives,” she said once she took her seat across from Huang and began pouring the tea.

“I’ve seen the girl talking to Xiao Jun.”

Zhang Lifen’s brows creased ever so slightly. “That could pose some difficulties,” she said. Xiao Jun had come to the sect two years ago, and Zhang Lifen had marked him as a potential problem from the beginning. She hadn’t been wrong.

“He’s been collecting allies among the outer sect. No doubt he’ll gain entrance to the inner sect with the next tournament,” Huang said.

Her fingernail clinked against the side of her teacup. She’d expected as much from Xiao Jun. Someone with his talent didn’t often stay in the outer sect for long. It was only ill fortune and his low status that had seen him eliminated so early the previous year. The sect elders wouldn’t easily allow that to happen to him a second time. As his power grew, he would be easier to watch—and manage—once he joined the inner sect. It was no wonder he and Sha Xiang had found one another so easily.

“We’ll just have to make sure that Junior Brother He is adequately motivated.”

“Tell me why you picked him, of all people. Couldn’t you have just brought the girl?”

“Master Cai said to bring back two,” she reminded him. “He didn’t say both needed to be adequate for our purposes, so I formed a plan once I had a grasp on the situation.”

Ren Huang scowled at her. “Lifen,” he began.

“None of that,” she said, cutting off whatever objection he was about to voice. “The boy, as you would call him. You know he’s self-taught?”

He hadn’t—his silence said as much.

“Furthermore, they’re from the southern forest. The little village with that Dong Wei character, to be precise. You’ve been there, I’m sure. Weak as the boy is, consider the circumstances.”

Huang’s expression grew thoughtful. He knew well the place she spoke of, and he was a talented cultivator himself. The fact that He Yu had managed to awaken himself at all was practically a miracle. She’d watched while He Yu went to the manual pavilion on his first day to obtain his copy of the sect’s basic cultivation technique, so she knew that Huang hadn’t witnessed the wholly inadequate technique He Yu had been using. She didn’t need to mention it though. The facts she’d already presented made her case well enough.

Nor did she need to mention the drive she’d seen in He Yu during his short time at the sect. Less than a week, and he’d already advanced. Which was good, if Sha Xiang had already been pulled into Xiao Jun’s orbit. She also didn’t mention that Master Cai had taken an interest in him. That her teacher had even noticed the boy at all was more a confirmation of her hunch about him than anything else.

“I’m not going to baby him,” Huang said, standing.

“No, of course not,” she said. “Just keep Sha Xiang away from him for the time being. And if she falls under Xiao Jun’s sway…” Zhang Lifen shrugged and left it at that. If Sha Xiang was fated to give in to her demons, then who was Zhang Lifen to stand in her way?