The carriage climbed up a winding rocky path. As they went higher the trees got thicker, bigger, their leaves narrower and narrower, until they looked like thousands of needles hanging off branches thick as human trunks. It rained much less up here, but Ruyi had read the roots went far deeper. Unlike in Jade Dragon City, the soil here hadn’t been leached dry by hundreds of years of farming spirit crop. If Ruyi closed her eyes, she could sense the motes of qi were brighter here—in the air, but especially in the ground. The ground was alive with qi.
Night was falling but Ruyi’s eyes were more sensitive now and she could make out shapes shifting in the dark, speeding by, sometimes keeping pace with the carriage, other times fading out, see moonlight catching what could be eyes or wet teeth in soft white flashes. More than once she saw the burning trail of a flame hawk overhead. The peaceful chittering of insects rose up, a natural lullaby. Once they had to stop for a royal stag—so named for its antlers which looked like crowns—to pad across the road.
And all the while, Sen kept talking.
Once Ruyi had got her talking the girl went through a metamorphosis.
“Then Weng goes to Blackwater Town, and meets Caz—Caz is a white lamia. She runs the town bar and listens to all the adventurers talk about their wonderful journeys, and hopes one day she could go on one of her own, but she’s got an old ailing mother to take care of—”
“Uh huh,” said Ruyi.
After the twelfth character the names were all kind of blending together in her head. And Sen seemed intent on describing every single character in excruciating detail.
At one point the party went to fight a dragon, and Ruyi was rooting desperately for the dragon to eat them. But alas, the tale kept going. She was pretty sure it wasn’t that Sen didn’t care Ruyi was bored out of her mind. Sen probably just couldn’t tell. And she seemed so into her telling Ruyi didn’t have the heart to stop her.
Instead Ruyi just admired Sen’s face, how it moved. Her eyes were shining, and her hands were gesturing, and her cheeks were flush. What a face it was… Ruyi really could stare at it for hours… she began to smile a dazed smile.
***
Sen had judged Ruyi wrong. She’d thought the girl just another noble brat at first, but Ruyi was turning out to be one of the nice ones. Sen had known it to happen every once in a while.
Ruyi was smiling, and she had a very pretty smile, Sen noticed. Sen wished she had a pretty smile. She used to smile when she was quite young, but the Li clan children said she looked like a demon when she did, so she stopped. Some folk were smilers and some weren’t, she decided. Ruyi was definitely a smiler.
Sen had never been the best judge of these things but even she knew smiling was good. It meant they were liking what you were saying—though sometimes it meant they were mocking her, which was an easy way to anger her the few times she realized. She hoped Ruyi wasn’t the mocking type.
“…and the ice dragon said, ‘would you like to come in for popsicles?’ And they lived happily ever after. The end.”
Ruyi was still smiling at her; she looked a little dreamy, like she’d been as lost in the Chronicles of Weng as Sen was the first time she read it as a youth. When Mother and Father screamed at each other and broke things on each other Sen would retreat to the world of Weng, where everyone made friends and was kind to each other, even to weirdos like her, and no-one had to hurt if they didn’t want to.
“So… what do you think?” said Sen.
“What?” Ruyi seemed to jerk awake—she reddened. “Oh! Ah—yes! It was really awesome. I enjoyed it a lot. Mhm.”
Sen was quiet. There was a hot feeling in her chest, rising to her face—it happened whenever Mistress Li said something nice about her, too. She never knew what to say. “There’s three more volumes of lore,” she blurted.
Ruyi stopped smiling. “There… are?”
“Mhm.” Sen sat up eagerly. “Want to hear them?”
“Uh… are they… very important?”
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“Extremely,” said Sen. “If you knew where Weng’s family came from, you would understand them on a totally different level.”
“Oh… uh…” Sen kept staring at her, waiting, but Ruyi seemed hesitant—what could it be? Ah!
“It’s no trouble at all,” said Sen, seizing her by the hands. “I liked telling it to you. I can keep going.”
“Eh heh heh,” said Ruyi.
“Pardon?”
“Uh—sure! Sure. Yeah…”
Sen had thousands of years to get through, and only two hours of ride left. She’d have to go fast.
***
They arrived at the Alchemist’s Guild at Kunshan late in the evening. It was situated in the middle of a cluster of greenhouses—a stately manor that was more vine than brick. Green hugged the building all over; windows and doors poked out here and there.
It was probably the only time in Ruyi’s life she was desperate to get away from a beautiful girl. Her brain felt like it had been wrung dry. She got her room, flopped onto the cot, and passed out.
***
She woke to a swishing sound, like a high note on a flute. Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she drifted to the window.
Outside, in the predawn mist, Sen was practicing her swordplay.
Her sword, a thin strip of pale steel, drew perfect lines in the air—ruler-straight. She wore nothing but a leather vest and trousers, letting her twirl unobstructed from one stance to the next. More interesting to Ruyi was it left her arms bare. Her… toned… muscley arms… warrior’s arms… she could probably toss Ruyi around so easily, if she really wanted to…
Ruyi crouched low, so that only her eyes could be seen over the window’s edge. Safely hidden, she let herself enjoy the way Sen’s body moved. Not in a weird way! Just… admiring.
… what did Sen have to wear such baggy trousers for? She felt robbed.
Sen’s every move looked like it could slice a head clean off. Yet still she made it look smooth, like she was dancing. There was something hypnotic about the way about it—a chain of energy, running head to toe. The sword was just another link—and when one end flexed the other end moved too, always in balance. She moved the way her body was made to.
It was beautiful.
So beautiful it even made Ruyi forget to be horny, which was quite a feat.
It became art to her; she felt awed. She felt lucky to witness it.
Could she, someday, move like that? She really hoped so.
Sen stopped, whipped around. Her eyes found Ruyi’s instantly.
Ruyi flinched, looked away, pretended to be squinting at the hazy outlines of the distant mountains. She could feel Sen looking at her, could feel the heat rising in her face, but it was too late to drop the act.
But Sen just kept staring. So at last, hoping she wasn’t blushing too hard, Ruyi met her eyes.
“Oh! Sen! Fancy… seeing you there.”
Sen wiped her head with a sweaty toned arm.
Ruyi was not doing okay.
“I know you were watching me,” said Sen. It was like her face was only capable of subtle variants of the same deadpan expression; it was impossible to tell how mad she was. Ruyi cringed.
“…Maybe.”
In the pause that followed, Ruyi wished a lightning bolt would fall from the sky and strike her dead.
Then Sen said, “It’s okay. You can watch.”
Ruyi was really, really, not doing okay.
***
The Guild threw a breakfast for her—all the Masters in residence attended, as well as a few of the high-paying patrons. A huddle of gray-haired men and women, all smiling at her, lavishing praise on her—which she liked—and peppering her with inane questions—which she liked decidedly less. They sat around a long table spilling over with legs of fowl, pots of birds nest soups, dumplings and stuffed lotus roots, with grape wines and teas for drink. The thing about feasts in your honor was you couldn’t excuse yourself from them without folk noticing.
It was nearing noon when she managed to disentangle herself.
Sen greeted her at the carriage in a sleeveless vest. Ruyi swore she was doing it on purpose.
***
By the time they rolled up to Zhilei Zhen’s house, Ruyi felt too fried to function. It was too much to handle in just one morning. She hoped the Grandmaster wouldn’t ask her anything too complex; she might just dissolve into a blubbering mess.
She’d expected a secret hideout—maybe carved into a mountain, running tens of floors deep. Or maybe a giant mansion with staircases leading to nowhere? Zhen was a legend in Alchemy, equally for his few brilliant papers and his utter refusal to discuss them. He made no public appearances, gave no comments, and was impossible to track down—the Guild had tried on many occasions. When Ruyi got his address it felt like she’d been given the map to some secret treasure.
Rumor had it he spent most of his time meditating under a waterfall, waiting for the spirits of the world to gift him an insight.
When they stopped before a random log cabin in a quaint little mountain village—truly it was random; Ruyi couldn’t tell it apart from its ten neighbors in the square—Ruyi thought there was some mistake.
As they stepped out, an old man came to greet them. He wore his age well. His hair was close-cropped, combed perfectly. It matched a mustache streaked with white hairs. He moved with a quiet dignity, and though his robe was plain Ruyi could tell it was of quality stitching. It was spotless too. Everything about him was spotless.
“Welcome!” he said. He had an easy smile. “You must be Ruyi—my name is Zhilei Zhen.”
“You… are?”
“Were you expecting someone else?” There was a playful glint in his eyes. “A wild-haired monk, perhaps? Or an imp with an affinity for mushrooms? They do tell wild tales about me, don’t they?”
“Ah!” said Ruyi. “I meant no offense.”
“None taken, truly. So often the person we meet is not the person we expect. Ah—and you must be Miss Sen Li. Such a pleasure.”
He held out a hand, and Sen stared at it. “You know me?”
“Of course. I’m well retired. I’ve nothing to do but read—I know everyone.” Zhen smiled enigmatically. “One could say I am in the business of knowing. Please, come in.”