On the third day of their departure from Itirun Fortress, one of the men of the company found a glowing stone in the bottom of a ration sack on the mules.

It was right after they took a break past noon, and thus, being an unofficial member of the auxiliary with Embodiment, Xie’e was closer to the man who alerted those around him.

‘’Who put this here?’’ he said and raised it up high for those near to see.

There was the gleam of the sun on the gray-ish round surface of the rock, and on top of that gleam winked an aquamarine light. Xie’e sensed a disturbance at its center; waves of invisible Qi moved to gather and disperse around the stone.

‘’Anyone?’’ One of the elderly men in the auxiliary swept his gaze around the group, now a dozen big, and at the lack of reaction he turned his head away.

The same motion repeated itself two more times, then an elderly woman among them acted. ‘’Take out the accounts of the past week, we’ll take a look at what he have and not.’’

With her words the auxiliary members spread through the ranks of the mules and horses- Xie’e included. He leaped down from Embodiment’s shoulders and joined the other hurrying elders on taking off the straps on the mules. In a few seconds they had taken off forty-eight baggages of cloth and laid them on the sand.

Xie’e grabbed one of the sacks, but a shriveled hand reached out to his arm to stop him.

‘’Let’s wait for the prince to start counting,’’ The old man said, then shouted at those around them now crowding the place. ‘’You hear me worms!? Do not take a single step!’’

‘’Your throat will go sore again,’’ Xie’e said and let go of the sack, still squatting under the shade of the horses and the men and women around it. The old man scratched his throat and peeked at him with annoyance.

‘’What happened here?’’ A moment later Ali and Kazad came to the back of the line, and so the man who found the stone presented it to them. Ali took it in his palm, raised high up with two of his fingers pressuring from the sides.

‘’We have no record of such thing at the moment, my prince,’’ One elderly woman said, ‘’And if you’ll excuse us, we shall conduct our revision on our supplies right now.’’

‘’No need,’’ Ali said and passed the stone to Kazad. ‘’Do we have a spare carpet?’’

‘’Only yours,’’ Xie’e said, Ali nodded.

‘’Lay it down here and pour the contents of bags one at a time. We will search every one of them for these.’’

Xie’e tapped his ears twice to make sure he heard him correct, then moved with others to the back. He called Embodiment over, who opened up the spatial pouch by his side and took out Ali’s tent’s carpet. Xie’e flapped it twice, then laid it down.

Following after him, one by one they took the sacks and opened their lids, then let their contents flow over the carpet. They opened three at a time and, with one of the auxiliary noting everything counted down, they re-organized their rations and supplies.

Half-a-minute later, another stone popped out of a sack, and when presented with it Ali shook his head and told the man who found it to stay at the side. Xie’e had an inkling sense of what these were, and Ali being the knowledgeable prince he was, he should have had a better understanding of such things. Then it was the most natural to not gather these rocks and pack them up near.

Else, if their suspicions were true, this would alert whoever put those to track them.

Within eleven minutes the auxiliary found six more of such stones, yet unlike the first five none of the last three glowed. Ali showed a frown at that and called Kazad over again, who had been informing Nehkar at the front.

Kazad came before them whilst spurring his Ritou forward, with a shade darker than red absorbing the sun’s lights. For some reason, Xie’e felt himself unwilling to look away from the mount and its small beady eyes.

‘’My prince, the Imperial Companion has left the decision to you,’’ Kazad said right after stepping off his horse’s saddle. ‘’But he also cautions that one of those must be available in our hands at any possible time- always, for short.’’

‘’What is his reasoning?’’ Ali asked, then shook his head before giving Kazad a chance to speak. Xie’e wondered the same thing, though, but Ali seemed to understand the decision.

‘’Then...let’s split it up between the extra mules, old ones if possible, and scatter them in our path,’’ Ali turned to look at the fellow men of the company, and his gaze fell on those holding the stones rather than not. ‘’We’ll keep one of the bleak ones,’’ he said and clutched the nearest one from the hand of a man in the vanguard; Kazad took it from him and gave the glowing one back to the auxiliary.

‘’Select those that can go farthest with no supervision, if there are many with the same age,’’ He added as the auxiliary started discussing and glanced at Xie’e, standing two steps away from them. He, whilst considered a member of the auxiliary, had not the knowledge of the mounts’ specific details and their state at any current point of time. He was of the service type, as Quan would call the seasonal workers in Yadratafos. Manual work, in short.

‘’Benefactor, may I ask of a favor?’’

Xie’e raised his brows in surprise and looked towards Ali, and the man himself turned away from his gaze.

‘’Would it be possible to entrust one of these to the spirit?’’

It sounded like a question, and it was even phrased like a question. But Xie’e knew this was not it, but a simple gauging to see his willingness to part with Embodiment. Kazad had tried the same thing...or a similar thing, and the details Xie’e hid away in the back of his mind, but unlike that time, Xie’e didn’t mind this.

For he knew: Ali took him more into consideration than any other member of the company, the reason being obvious and ambiguous at the same time. But him not caring about the question didn’t mean he didn’t consider what it meant.

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For, if his suspicions aligned with those Ali and others had, these stones were probably tools with a purpose to track them. How they couldn’t find it until now was easy to answer, as if the stones were what they thought of, then they would have been placed in a time more current; last week at the earliest. Thinking of the Regional Guards was, then, the most obvious conclusion, and if so that meant whoever sought to even dare kill the prince knew their exact route.

In that case, they could be placed earlier than that, and that possibility indicated a traitor.

Whom? How? Why? Xie’e could answer none of these; he was close and friendly with the others in the company, indeed, but he was not someone too indulged in the...controversial aspects of a group like this, with a prince in danger as its head figure. Thus, he could justify his lack of a response.

On the other hand, though, he could answer a question much different in nature: Why Ali would want to use Embodiment as a bait.

Using Embodiment as a bait would have better effects, for unlike other mounts- Xie’e didn’t think of him as a mount anyway- Embodiment had a will of his own that he came to like these past two years. While will was a complex matter, the crux of the matter was that Embodiment had the ability to judge and act according to the well-being of the company unlike mere animals that would lose focus in a few hours.

To add on that, he had no way of communicating; be it sound or transmissions, he could speak with no one except Xie’e with their natural link. If he got captured, he could be force-summoned back, and likewise if he fell dead from a chase, they could call for him again. Even though their mental link wouldn’t let them communicate over long distances, they could still feel and know of where the other party was.

And that, perhaps what Ali wished to see the most, could prove to be a mean to take out the imaginary-for-now gap in the company: the traitor.

Even though he didn’t have a good head for such things, the constant discussions he bore between Kazad and Nehkar forced him to think along their rationality- not that they were the same kind, but of similar nature.

Xie’e let out a sigh at that and patted the Embodiment at his side. He phrased the wish of Ali without adding his opinion on it- or tried, at least. For a few seconds he waited for an answer, and when none came raised his head to look at the Embodiment’s outlined eyes.

Embodiment tilted his head, fell to the ground with a thud to kneel, and put his right hand over Xie’e’s shoulder.

Alright. He said, and patted him, I’ll go.

Those three words, or the single intent packed behind, sent a fuzzy chill through Xie’e.

‘’’L’ll try to summon you as fast as I can,’’ Xie’e said and raised Embodiment up. He felt somewhat guilty when he sensed no weight from those hands.

‘’Ah Li,’’ He called, and ‘Ali’ turned his gaze towards them.

Xie’e put one hand over his left chest, and Ali showed a smile at his agreement.

‘’Thank you, benefactor benefactor,’’

Xie’e chose not to comment on that joke.

*********

‘’That...doesn’t sound like something Nehkar would come up with,’’ Xie’e said at the time of their departure, which came to be six minutes after the inspection.

‘’Imperial Companion is no brute, brother Xie,’’ Tanto said behind him; they rode together on a dark red Ritou, of course, as Embodiment had left them with six old mules, each assigned to some drawn out paths to the region border of Bashkend.

‘’Those merchants from the centre seem to have a big influence on you,’’ Tanto added a second after; Kazad and Nehkar were getting everyone into their positions again to pick up the pace. It seemed they would have no more breaks the following day.

‘’I know that you people criticized my speech,’’ Xie’e said, ‘’But what you imply sounds different here, doesn’t it?’’

‘’I mean in behavior-’’

‘’Ah Li had said the same,’’ Xie’e said right after.

‘’It is a bad habit to interrupt, brother Xie.’’ Tanto spurred his horse forward to increase his speed; the horse seemed lively enough to let out a series of neighs with others at its side. ‘’And what my prince talked about was a compliment- a compliment! I’m berating you here.’’

‘’I’m sorry,’’ Xie’e said, ‘’Go on, Tanto.’’

‘’What would happen if you called me brother too...’’ Tanto let out an exasperated sigh, then coughed twice from the sand slipping inside his mouth.

‘’You know, brother Xie: Those merchants from the central regions are quite high in number, even though most businesses here are handled by a few men and women at the top.’’

‘’Like those pilgrims we met?’’

‘’If you call them a pilgrim, then no, but think of them as more wealthier people.’’

‘’I’m thinking.’’

‘’Ugh,’’ Tanto coughed again after his sigh, it seemed like he had no time to fix up his robe over the scale armor. ‘’They don’t know much about our customs, though we know about theirs, right?’’

‘’Yes, what is the main point though?’’

‘’It is that they are too...stuck up with physiques. Bodies. They always imply that bigger the shoulders, lighter the head on them weighs. You seem to have the same thoughts about Imperial Companion as well.’’

‘’My...reasons are a little different from that, but I won’t lie that I didn’t think of it before. When we first met he seemed like a joyous bear.’’

‘’Oh, those fur-covered giants?’’ Tanto exclaimed and let go of the reins with his left hand to pat his mustache.

‘’...did I call Imperial Companion a beast right now?’’

‘’No you didn’t,’’ Xie’e let out a chuckle. Tanto breathed out a sigh of relief, got into a coughing fit again, then took a hold of the reins once more. The clouds of sand coming from the vanguard at their front thickened by a large margin, so Tanto focused more on riding.

‘’...then was I right?’’

‘’About the influence?’’ Xie’e asked.

‘’About the influence,’’ Tanto nodded.

Xie’e stood silent for a moment to think. He stayed two years in the sect, a few months in Yadratafos, then spent another two years in the forest. In sect, most disciples were either orphans or children from the Cindersnow city. Masters and Combat Masters, on the other hand, never told of their origin. Quan could be the best example, for Xie’e still didn’t know whether he had a family or a home outside the sect.

They wouldn’t last, though, Xie’e narrowed his eyes, then set his sights to the sky. The sun was about to get into its fall mode; that meant they were past the second hour of the third quarter.

I am getting distracted- Xie’e shook his head and recounted what he knew.

In the sect, he thought, the education of the most disciples came from a young age, so the atmosphere and speech there was also unique to it unlike Yadratafos. The soft part of my speech probably comes from there- Xie’e nodded to himself, But...slippery, was it? The merchants and people of the Yadratafos all came from different nations and communities; so diversity was abundant there, too.

So it wouldn’t make sense to call them all from the Central Continent...would it?

‘’Brother Xie?’’

‘’Probably right,’’ Xie’e said at last. ‘’Even I don’t know myself.’’

‘’That is what we call evading- answer it with honesty!’’

‘’I am honest in not knowing, aren’t I?’’

‘’How can I know that?’’