Chapter 9: Unraveling the Mystery

Fan Qiongzhi cried for a long time. Outside, the sounds of the carriage faded — he had finally gone. Her voice was hoarse when she said: "Huahua."

Xu Hua, who had only finished half her cultivation practice, threw on an outer robe and went to sit beside her on the floor. Fan Qiongzhi held her and said, "Mother only has you. From beginning to end, Mother only has you."

Xu Hua leaned on her shoulder. It's cruel, and I'm sorry, but you don't even have me. She said nothing. When Fan Qiongzhi's crying grew heavier and more disoriented, Xu Hua slipped out through the door. Fan Qiongzhi didn't notice. Tian Quzi, watching from a distance, did.

She found a small beggar at the village entrance and pressed a piece of silver into his hand. "Go to town and find Master Zhou. Tell him Ji Hanzhang covets my mother's embroidery skills and has sent men here to smash the house and rob us. Ask him to come and help — I'll reward you well." She held up a second piece of silver. "When Master Zhou's men arrive, this one is yours."

The boy had never seen so much silver. He agreed immediately and ran.

Tian Quzi's expression was unreadable. A devoted woman, sixteen years of waiting, had finally seen the thing she'd been waiting for — only to have desire tear straight through the surface and show what was underneath.

---

At midnight, a dog barked at the village entrance.

Carriages and footsteps. Fan Qiongzhi dressed quickly, and before she had properly opened the door, several people pushed their way in. She went pale. Old Madam Ji entered slowly behind them, and behind her, Ji Hanzhang.

Fan Qiongzhi stood frozen.

Old Madam Ji settled herself at the table without hurry. "What are you standing there for? Have you forgotten your manners after being away so long?"

She wants tea. A cold shadow moved through Fan Qiongzhi's chest. She steadied herself. "Mother. Hanzhang. What is this?"

Old Madam Ji's hand came down on the table. "You still call me Mother!"

Ji Hanzhang was displeased, but Fan Qiongzhi's figure — thin, her clothes rough, her hair undone — softened something in his expression toward something he might have called tenderness if the servants hadn't been standing behind him. "Since Mother has come herself, don't say anything more. Pack your things, wake your daughter. It's improper to make your elders run about in the middle of the night."

Fan Qiongzhi wanted to believe him. She looked at the servants.

In the middle of the night. With these men. To invite her home.

The cold moved through her fully now. She thought of Xu Hua. A mother's particular terror steadied her hands even as they trembled. "What if I don't go?"

Old Madam Ji's hand struck the table again. "You are the lawfully wedded daughter-in-law of the Ji family. Where else do you think you'll go? Guards—" Her face twitched. "Tie her up and take her back." Then a look at her son.

Ji Hanzhang understood. He had been to this house before and knew the layout. "I'll help Qiongzhi pack her things," he said, and walked directly into the bedroom.

---

Xu Hua was already up. She had been up since the first sound. She stood in the doorway in her outer robe, leaning against the frame, watching.

Fan Qiongzhi had spent years absorbing the strange looks of people who pitied her or despised her, raising a child everyone called damaged, and she was not the naive girl she had been. Her voice shook with tears but the words were clear: "Hanzhang, you want those few thousand taels of silver, don't you."

His body stiffened. He was a scholar; he had a scholar's relationship with his own dignity. He held on to it. "Fan Qiongzhi, you are my wife. In your eyes, am I worth so little? I only want to bring you and your daughter home — the child should be recognized by her family."

"Is that so." Her tears ran quietly. "For sixteen years I carried her and raised her alone. Only today should Huahua be recognized."

He said nothing more. He went to the inner room, found the silver notes in the trunk, gave Old Madam Ji a look, and the servants took hold of Fan Qiongzhi and moved her toward the door.

At the threshold, Fan Qiongzhi looked back at the man. She heard her daughter's words from before: He is just a shadow you love. The moonlit haze dissolved. What stood in the lamplight was an ordinary man in a situation that was making him sweat.

As she was pushed toward the carriage, a servant moved to grab Xu Hua — a young girl, simple-minded, easily managed. No one was paying her particular attention.

From outside: "Where did this audacious thief come from?! Breaking into a private residence and robbing people?!"

Ji Hanzhang and his mother went still. The yard was suddenly full of people, and a moment's look confirmed: yamen runners.

Ji Hanzhang found his voice quickly. "My lords, there's been a misunderstanding. I am Ji Hanzhang, a private tutor of Xiancha Town, here to take my wife and daughter home. I am not a villain."

The lead constable looked at Fan Qiongzhi being restrained by servants. "This is how you take your family home? Down!"

Fan Qiongzhi turned to look at Xu Hua, who looked back at her quietly. She understood. Her voice came out clear: "Sir! They broke into my house in the dead of night and robbed my money and tried to kidnap me and my daughter! Sir, save us!"

The choice was made.

The constable, acting on Master Zhou's instructions, drew his blade. The flash of it made Ji Hanzhang's legs go soft. Xu Hua, already being held by two servants, kicked one of them hard in the stomach and pulled herself free. "He still has the banknotes on him — the ones Master Zhou gave my mother. Master Zhou can testify."

The kick nearly made Ji Hanzhang fold in half.

Fan Qiongzhi, standing behind the constable, drew her daughter back and looked at the man crouching in the dirt clutching his stomach. For the first time in her life she saw him plainly: not imposing, not as handsome as she remembered. Just a man in a wretched state.

---

The constables took the Ji family in for questioning. While Master Zhou conferred with Fan Qiongzhi, who seemed somewhere between dazed and relieved, Xu Hua said: "He's terrified right now. Have Master Zhou offer him his freedom in exchange for a letter of divorce. He'll agree."

Fan Qiongzhi asked. Master Zhou — who had always wanted another piece of her embroidery work — readily agreed.

Ji Hanzhang, alone and frightened in a cell, agreed without bargaining.

The letter arrived the next morning. The ink was still wet.

---

Fan Qiongzhi unfolded it slowly.

She closed her eyes, and she was standing in front of the small house again. Ji Hanzhang held her hand and sighed. Qiongzhi, you've been pregnant three years without giving birth, and the town is saying it's a monster. Mother is furious, but it's for my reputation. Once the baby is born and Mother calms down, I'll bring you both back.

His hands had been clean and warm. His voice soft. A scholarly air, always, refined and gentle. Nothing like the rough men she'd grown up watching.

She had nodded and said: It's all my fault. I will give birth safely, don't worry.

The memory unwound like silk thread from a spool.

The Ji family study, the two of them newlyweds. He read and practiced calligraphy while she ground ink. He watched her hands for a long while, then touched the inkstone and dabbed a spot of ink on her forehead. She raised her small fist in mock protest; he took it in both hands. They looked at each other. No words. No particular closeness. But something that had felt — then — like more than closeness.

Her fingertip moved over the signature on the letter. The name she had said to herself ten thousand times.

She saw their wedding day. The red dress, the colorful ribbons like fire leading her forward. Through the veil, his shoes, his silhouette, her heart loud in her chest.

She saw a rose trellis in full bloom. A young man's face appearing over the wall, whispering: Sister Qiongzhi, I have fresh osmanthus cakes. Come try some. She had tiptoed over afraid of waking her parents, and he grabbed her hand with a grin. Once I have my name and my success, we'll get married. The girl she'd been had gone red to her ears.

Fan Qiongzhi folded the letter closed.

The roses of yesteryear were still as vibrant as fire. Only you and I had withered.

Xu Hua paced behind her — she always stood rather than sat, for the weight. Fan Qiongzhi said: "Huahua. I feel a little empty inside."

Xu Hua pointed out the window. Pomegranate flowers in loud bloom, sun blazing, the world going about its business without asking permission. "As long as you dare to move forward, you'll find newer things and more outstanding people. Don't look back."

Blunt words. Tian Quzi, watching, felt the distance between himself and her as something with actual dimension.

---

An approaching presence: Xi Yunjie had come to fetch him. The Yin-Yang Academy was holding a guidance trial that afternoon. During trials, instructors' weapons were weakened and protective formations disabled. In the Nine Abyss, only the nine academy heads could serve as instructors without real risk — but for certain direct disciples, even that was complicated. There was the precedent of Fu Chunfeng to consider. Being utterly defeated by your own disciple in a formal guidance trial was a humiliation with nowhere to recover from.

The four elders had delegated this trial directly to Tian Quzi. He had been in seclusion for over a decade. It was time to assess his disciples' progress.

He severed the transmission, straightened his robes, and walked out of the Bitter Bamboo Forest.

The Breath of Gods and Demons settled against Xu Hua's neck with a performance of exhaustion and watched Tian Quzi work.

In the gray-stone trial arena, the lineage head faced his disciples. Robes immaculate, movements unhurried, composure absolute. He demonstrated all nine lineage techniques — saber work powerful and fierce, swordplay clean and fast. Xi Yunjie was held entirely within his control, offense and defense both managed, corrections offered gently, praise offered occasionally. Every gesture was that of a grandmaster who had forgotten more than most people learned.

The Breath of Gods and Demons decided this was a good moment to ask its puppet master about the second concubine situation.

Then, in the afternoon, it felt the aura drawing near and went rigid.

---

After the trial, Tian Quzi should have returned directly to Rongtian Mountain. He knew this. His sword, however, disagreed — it kept drifting toward Xiancha Town, close enough to see from here, and eventually he accepted that even the sword understood him better than he wanted to admit.

He found the Zhou family quickly. He appeared, as always, to be twenty-seven: black hair at his waist, white robes with subtle patterns, sword and zither both strapped to his back, the tassels on the sword hilt brushing his shoulder as he moved. No gold or silver or ornament except a yin-yang double-fish pendant at his waist. Hundreds of years governing the Yin-Yang Academy had given him a bearing that made the Zhou family servants step aside without being asked.

Master Zhou couldn't determine who this person was. Tian Quzi didn't explain. "I heard Mr. Zhou recently acquired a peony embroidery from Luoyang." His voice was clear and level, soft and yet with an edge that didn't invite debate. "I am willing to offer twenty thousand taels of silver. I humbly request you part with it."

Master Zhou felt his thoughts stop completely. He took out the embroidery, rolled it, boxed it. Tian Quzi handed over the silver note and walked out.

The embroidery was not worth twenty thousand taels of silver. It was basic needlework from the Flying Needle Workshop — rare enough in the marketplace, but nothing that would look appropriate hanging anywhere in the Yin-Yang Courtyard.

Tian Quzi was aware of this.

The Breath of Gods and Demons' fur stood entirely on end. The contract told it he was close — what was that voyeuristic lonely old man doing here?! Had something snapped in his mind? Was he coming for the puppet head? It couldn't protect against that. Its mind raced in five directions, and at the low point of its panic it arrived at: if I transformed into a girl and let him do this and that to me, could I at least save the puppet head from what's coming?!

The panic peaked. Then: he had bought a piece of embroidery at a ruinous price. And left.

Just left.

The Breath of Gods and Demons sat with this information for a long moment.

That lonely old man had traveled across the realm to Xiancha Town, paid twenty thousand taels for something that sold for three thousand, and then turned around and went home. The Yin-Yang Academy — the most important institution of the number one sect in the Xuanmen — and its head had apparently never encountered a peony embroidery that opened in the day and closed at night.

Heavens. It thought with genuine feeling. The number one sect in the Xuanmen is far too ignorant.