For the second time in the day, Chang-li froze in a doorway. Min was sitting in the crowded common room of the inn, a mug in front of her at an otherwise empty table. Since the other booths and tables were packed, he guessed that she had used her position in the Brotherhood to keep her table open.

Her eyes fixed on him, and she crooked a finger. She had been waiting for him.

For an instant, Chang-li considered going back out into the street and leaving, spending the night in an alley or literally anywhere. But that was stupid. The rest of his belongings were here. He needed to return to the Hall of Records tomorrow to finish his business there, and she could just follow him out onto the street if she wanted. He straightened his shoulders and pushed through the crowd to join her.

One of the barmaids brought him a steaming cup of tea. "Anything else you'll be wanting?"

"Dinner," he growled. "And a bottle of rice wine."

"Two cups," Min said, lifting a pair of fingers.

The girl hurried off and returned a moment later with the bottle of wine, two tiny cups, and a plate full of rice balls wrapped in seaweed, a particular delicacy of the region, or so Chang-li had been told on his first arriving here at Golden Moon City for the Tower Cull.

Min poured the wine. Chang-li bit into one of the rice balls. It was filled with flaky white fish, perfectly cooked, and in the middle of the fish, a pitted plum. The flavor combination was delicious after the long day he'd just had.

Min watched as he finished the ball. She picked up her glass, raised it in a sardonic toast, and then sipped the wine. An awkward expression crossed her face. She threw back the rest of it and coughed.

Chang-li found himself struggling to contain himself. He lost the fight and burst out laughing. "Your face! You thought it was going to be smoother than that, didn't you?"

"I didn't realize it would be so rough," she admitted. "I think Brother Stone has been giving orders to have me served the quality wine at our headquarters at the Tower Cull.”

Chang-li tossed back his own. It burned going down and went to work at once on his sore muscles. He ate another of the rice balls as Min shifted in her seat. Clearly, she wanted him to ask why she was here, so he didn't. Instead, he poured another tiny cup of the wine and tossed it back.

"Did you have a productive day?" she asked, her eyes traveling to the satchel he had set down beside their table.

"It was a busy one. I don't know if I'd say productive."

"And what were you up to?"

"Bureaucracy."

Min leaned forward. "Listen," she hissed. "I need to know. Is it true you can't cultivate past the Peak of Bodily Refinement without secret techniques and knowledge that the sects guard?"

For a second time tonight, he was overcome with the urge to laugh. She hadn't known. The self-assured, seemingly competent and capable Brotherhood woman hadn't known how cultivation really worked. She’d gotten herself in deep without understanding what she was doing. "That's right.”

Now she was scowling. She crossed her arms. He found her much less intimidating suddenly. When she wasn’t being scary, Min was downright gorgeous.

“So, what I've bought back at the Tower Climb is a couple of passes to the Peak of Bodily Refinement."

“Pretty much anyone can get there," Chang-li agreed, "so long as they are able to cycle enough lux. Your people should make it, now that they have access to the Tower. Joshi will teach them a decent cycling pattern or two and they’ll make it.”

"That's not enough," she said. "I need them to go higher. A lot higher."

"Why? Why do you need cultivators beholden to your Brotherhood?"

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"We need to be able to protect our people. Cultivators will get us a leg up on that. More than that you don’t need to know.” She fixed him with a penetrating look. “But you and your friend, you must have a plan. You’re a cultivator yourself now. You're telling me you're happy to stop at Bodily Refinement?"

"I'm not," he replied honestly. "I thought of joining Moon Whispers, despite your advice.”

“And they sent you here, to Fai-Lan City?” She looked him over, and her eyes widened. "You're wearing Morning Mist robes," she hissed. "Now I know you're up to something. What is it?"

Chang-li hesitated, but after the day he'd just had, using up most of his resources, perhaps telling her what he needed could refill his pockets. "I'm looking for information in the Hall of Records. There’s a cultivation library there. I've filled out the application to be allowed entrance, and I expect it to be processed tomorrow."

His supporting documentation was entirely false and paper-thin, consisting of his license and another piece of paper bearing the seal of the Morning Mist guild that Joshi had helped him with, stating that he was both sect scribe and cultivator at the rank of Bodily Refinement. A more established cultivator would have these records and more, containing all of the endorsements he had gained from tower culls and other challenges, bound together into a booklet smaller than the cultivator journals that Chang-li carried. Such books were often protected with a leather wrap.

"What do you think you'll find?"

He decided not to speak of the records of the Morning Mist sect. Instead, he spoke about his secondary objective. One of the forms he had filed today requested admittance to the records library, which, according to the helpful scribe, was open to any sect cultivator in good standing, but there would be a fee charged for every record or technique he acquired.

"The Hall of Records maintains a cultivation library. Every sect in the Empire is required to deposit copies of their sect records and basic technique scrolls in a regional library every ten years. It's to prevent anything from being lost."

She looked skeptical. “And that’s going to be useful enough to us?”

He doubted there’d be anything worth examining in the public archives, but the Morning Mists secret papers were something else entirely. “I’ll figure it out,” he said airily.

"So you mean to get in and find techniques we can use?"

Chang-li nodded. "There's a fee, and I've already used up most of my coin so far. I've promised Joshi copies of everything I find. If you're able to help me pay for the records..."

She shook her head. "I can't call on any more of the Brotherhood's resources. All I've got is my pocket change."

Chang-li groaned to himself as she pulled out a small silk pouch from inside her robes and opened it. His eyes widened at the glint of gold coins, octagons with a hole in the center. He choked. "Pocket change?"

She looked up, eyes widening. "Well, yes, my grandfathers both gave me presents before I left for the Court of Gems, and I've had little chance to spend it up on the mountain."

He couldn't help himself. He reached out and took one of the gold coins between his fingers.

"This is a five hundred kwam coin."

"How much do we need?" Min asked, frowning.

She held out the pouch to him. He hesitated before taking two more of her six coins and slipping them inside his own pouch. The weight felt like a heavy burden, and he hoped no one else in the tavern had seen the glint of gold. But everyone here was wearing a Brotherhood rosette, so he was probably safe, wasn't he?

"That's settled, then," Min said briskly. "I'll meet you at the Hall of Records tomorrow at dawn, and we'll go in together. Two heads are better than one."

"You're not a cultivator.”

"I am a member of the Court of Gems, and the granddaughter of the governor of Riceflower province. They will not refuse me."

"They might. You didn't meet these clerks today. They have forms and regulations for everything."

"Then I'll tell them I am betrothed to a cultivator in the Morning Mist Sect." She nodded, looking pleased with herself, and rubbed her hands together. "Yes, yes, of course. That makes sense. The Young Master of the Morning Mist Sect. Not Joshi.” She gave a delicate shudder. "Not even for a ruse. I don't think he'd like it if word got back to him."

Chang-li laughed. The bald barbarian could be rather intense. "I think it's a terrible idea," he said after he settled down.

Min poured them another cup of the rice wine. She tossed back hers and shook her head. "No, it's brilliant. We can search twice as many records this way. I can read anything in standard dialect, and I'll let you worry about sacred cultivating languages and that kind of nonsense."

"And you won't be missed by your grandfather?"

Her face clouded. "He's not here. He's sick at home. I will tell my maids I'm feeling ill and not going to rise until the afternoon. My brother will be happy that I'm remaining quietly in my room. Yes, I'll tell them I'm meditating on my future choices."

She seemed a little too glib, and Chang-li worried that her ruse was not particularly well thought out. But that was Min's lookout. Maybe she'd get caught trying to sneak out. "If you're not there when I go in, I'm not waiting for you."

"I'll be there," she assured him. Then she shook herself. "It's late. I've got to get back. I can't risk being missed twice in a row. See you in the morning, Chang-li."

She rose, and as she passed him, reached out and squeezed his shoulder, her fingers warm against the silk of his robes. He turned to watch her go. No one else in the room took any notice of her. It was rather pointed how little they looked in her direction. Chang-li downed the rest of his cup of wine and scrambled for the stairs before Min's protective aura wore off and anyone here thought to question him.