David

A pill furnace turned out to be a piece of cut jade. David couldn't quite work out how it would be used or why it was considered a furnace at all. The first batch of models looked more like bongs with too many holes in it than anything else.

Wen was upset that the pill furnaces that Eight Earthly Treasures Pavilion carried were only large enough to fit into the palm of his hand. He was also upset at the purported quality of the products so the woman quickly brought out an ornate wooden tray with four of the pill furnaces of various shapes.

He immediately zeroed in on the one that looked the most expensive - a piece of well carved artwork formed into the shape of a dragon. As he held it, David heard the sound of his Song - steady and light and bright like the clashing of swords at high noon.

The dragon's eyes glowed red and smoke came out of its nostrils.

"How much?" Wen asked.

"Eighteen taels. No negotiations," said the lady. She was quivering again at the display of Wen's qi, surprised by what the pill furnace was doing in his hands.

"Eight," said Wen. "This doesn't burn hot enough to be worth more than ten." He tapped the dragon's belly with the nail of his pinky.

The woman forgot her fear. "Gentleman, I have an old father to feed. If you think I'm parting with a piece of art like that for anything less than fifteen taels, you've got another thing coming."

Wen stared at her flatly and the sound of the Song rose - little sounds of clanking and the keen, shrill whine of swords being drawn. A little flame sprouted in the dragon's belly, lighting up the pavilion like an emerald lantern. Smoke began coming through the other holes of the pill furnace.

"If you bought this for more than five taels, you and your old father got scammed," he said. "As your magnanimous donor, I'll pay you twice that, but nothing more."

"Twelve, honored Daoist. That way I'll have enough for a cup of wine after you've robbed me blind."

"Deal," said Wen, smiling again. Wen slipped his hand into his robe.

He turned to Alice expectantly. "My dear Path Friend, I appear to have misplaced my wallet!"

Alice sneered at him until Wen 'discovered' it in another pocket.

"Nice try, idiot," said Alice, as he counted out twelve taels. Wen's coinpurse was deeper than the one Mayor Lin had given them - as deep as his elbow. There was the scattered sound of crashing and tinkling as he dug for taels.

Wen didn't even pretend to look apologetic in the slightest. As he slipped his new pill furnace into the wallet, he all but skipped out of Eight Earthly Treasures, grabbing them both by the sleeve.

They pushed open the double doors of the pavilion with one of their number in high spirits. It was still early in the morning, even though Wen had spent what felt like hours negotiating with the woman.

Before they were even out of the building, Wen was already chattering about his good luck at a breakneck pace. "With this, I'll be able to recover easily. You can't find a pill furnace of this quality in most sects - in True Sutra, it would have cost at least several spirit stones or a month's worth of merits."

"Merits?" asked Alice.

Wen shrugged, looking embarrassed. "True Sutra functions a lot like the less..." he struggled with his words, playing with his hands, "the less good sects," he admitted.

"It's a fun system," he finished, looking defensive all of a sudden. "You get to pick up missions for merits. And sell scriptures you've earned, or pills you've made, or artifacts you've smithed," he said. "Spirit stones would be more useful, sure, but-" Wen sighed.

"They're in short supply as is. I'm sure a sect like yours just hands them from master to disciple without a care in the world," he said, in between mutiny and jealousy.

David still had no idea what a spirit stone was, but he wasn't going to tell Wen that.

"Now, my dearest Path Friends, I am running incredibly low on funds. Would you do me the favor of-"

"No," said David. "Absolutely not."

Wen didn't really expect them to lend him money, so he moved on easily as they walked back towards the inn. When they stood at the entrance, he held both of their hands and gave them a deep bow.

"I regret I am too wounded to accompany you to this Core Formation ceremony, where you must retrieve your saber." He smiled at Alice. "I wish you the best of luck."

The glance turned into something more contemplative. "I must find a cave amongst the hills and barrows to the northwest - a crypt of a cultivator to replenish my lost Yin energy."

The stare turned into the sort of smile that David very heavily misliked as he looked Alice up and down, still holding her hand. "Unless..."

Alice jerked away from his grip and reached for her saber, even though it was missing. Wen understood that as rejection.

"Unless my Path Friends have a better idea of what to do!" Wen corrected abruptly. "If not, I'll be taking my leave," he said, with a bit of a pained grin.

Stolen story; please report.

He bowed again quickly and began jogging up the cobblestone avenue. When Wen felt he was safely out of range of Alice's sudden fury, he gave them a jaunty wave, disappearing from their lives as quickly as he had come.

"I don't hate him," said David carefully.

Alice smiled fondly. "He's kind of like a weird cousin." It was a judgment David agreed with. She pulled the door open and made a half-wave, so he walked into the inn.

The innkeeper did not look happy to see them. "Are you staying for another night?" he asked.

Alice wordlessly placed three taels onto the wooden counter and the innkeeper fished out the same little bronze key, meeting neither of their eyes.

They returned to the same room that they had stayed in the previous night. Alice took off her guqin and laid it on the table as they walked in.

When the door closed and the little runic arrays activated, cutting off all noise from the outside world, Alice took another running into the bed, pushed her face into a pillow and screamed as loudly as she could.

David winced, even though he expected something like this would happen.

"Is it all out of your system?" English.

Alice screamed again, but less long and not quite as loudly. She kept her face in the pillow.

David took a seat on the bed beside her with his flute tucked under an armpit and began playing with her hair. "Did you mean to kill Jing?"

Alice nodded into the pillow. "No," she denied with no heat.

So she did.

"So what exactly was the promise that you made?" David suddenly noticed how glossy and straight and perfect her hair was, despite drinking and sleeping, despite the spray of the river, despite the fighting.

Alice turned herself over and pulled the hairpin out of her hair and started flicking it. Her nails hit it with little clacks.

"When I took the saber from the wall, I said I'd avenge whoever killed the people in the temple."

David looked at her sharply, then leaned back against the headboard, looking into the ceiling. "Don't you think that might have been a bad idea?"

Alice sighed. "I was trying to be funny," she said, her cheeks burning suddenly. "I started-"

She cut herself off, flipping over again and burying her face in the pillow. She stuck the hairpin back into her hair.

"I started talking to the skeletons like they were people. And I started making a little story for them. And I got a little carried away because the jade on the pommel was really, really pretty."

David couldn't help it, he chuckled. "Like one-ring-to-rule-them-all pretty?"

Alice shook her head. Her hair whipped about, settling into something attractive. "It was just a really great story okay. Two young adventures get sent to a realm unknown from their homeworld to a sect ruled by the dead. There's a magical sword in the stone. The girl draws the sword and conquers the world."

There was something feverish in her voice now, giving David a strange chill. "Conquers the world?"

"Beats the game. Gets the highest score. Whatever," said Alice.

"Alice," David said heavily. "This might seem like a pretty good story, but it's not actually a story. We're stuck here, in a real place, with real people."

"Can't prove it," she snapped.

David stared at her, alarmed.

"If this was the real world, they'd know who Mozart was. If this were another dimension or something like that they wouldn't be speaking Chinese - what are the odds? They wouldn't react like npcs in a particularly well made roleplaying game."

"As far as I'm concerned," said Alice, turning over to look at him with that beguiling rapture, "you're the only person here who's real."

She placed a hand over his heart, feeling for his heartbeat, looking him in the eye.

"What if we're the only people here who aren't real?" David challenged, because he didn't quite know what to say to that.

Alice sat up. "Cogito, ergo sum."

David rolled his eyes at her. "Surely you can think of something better than that."

Alice pushed her hand on his chest past his shoulder and slid up his body slowly. Her lips found his earlobe. "I love, therefore I am," she whispered, her voice husky and demanding.

But David pushed her off of him because in her voice he heard the sound of silkworms. "Don't you think we're moving a little bit quickly? You killed someone today."

The Song faded away as quickly as it had appeared and to his horror, Alice began crying, her face in his chest.

With how everyone seemed to treat them it was a little easy to forget. They weren't, in fact, immortals. They weren't, in fact, cultivators with gifts from the stars beyond or whatever Wen had gone on about.

They weren't even adults. And as surely as Alice had let something in when she lay dying under the mulberry trees, David had experienced something strange and spiritual from pictures carved on a wall that had changed him - changed the way he saw the world.

So instead of letting Alice hang in misery, David drew closer to her and pulled her into a deep embrace. But he didn't miss how quickly her sobbing stopped or the little, satisfied smile on her lips.

“Tomorrow,” Alice said, after a little while, “we’ll take one of those boats to the Inner City. And we’ll get the saber back. Everyone assumes we’re the guests of the Jiang family. So we’ll go as guests of the Jiang family.”

She turned in David’s arms, resting her back against him to look at the guqin. “Though I would love to go as a musician,” she said.

“Alice,” David warned.

She huffed. “Alright, fine! We’re less likely to be noticed as guests than as musicians,” Alice said, trying to convince herself that it was a bad idea.

She pushed herself out of his arms and all but floated gracefully over to the cloth case and removed her instrument from it. It was as beaten as David remembered, but Alice still looked at it as lovingly as a child.

She got back into bed and balanced it on her lap and his, then started to play something David almost recognized.

“During the Spring and Autumn period, there were a pair of friends, likely lovers - Boya and Ziqi,” said Alice as her fingers flew. “Boya composed this song in honor of their friendship, Liushui.” Flowing Water.

“When Ziqi died, Boya played Flowing Water a final time, then snapped the strings of his guqin and never played again because Ziqi was the only person who understood him. This too, is a love song.”

As the sound of the guqin echoed in the sealed room, David closed his eyes and put his head on Alice’s shoulder.

He listened to the sound of his Song - and hers.