The mood had been easy enough until Lei Xiuming rounded on Cai Zhao out of nowhere.
Chang Ning leaned against the corridor pillar, arms folded, watching the fallout. "You see those little ducks with the ribbons on their heads? Those are Master Lei's."
"Who keeps ducks?" Cai Zhao said.
"Same people who keep cats and dogs. Uncle Lei won't let anyone eat them. They die of old age on his property." Chang Ning shook his head. "Lucky for you, your aunt asked about a robe and not a duck. If you'd walked off with a duckling, Uncle Lei would never have forgiven you."
Cai Zhao went quiet. She had, in fact, been watching the ducklings and thinking exactly that.
That afternoon she had planned to train. The moment she stepped back into Qingjingzhai, Dai Fengchi was already there with Cui Sheng in tow: "Madam Zong requests you both."
Chang Ning's expression closed. Cai Zhao smiled. "Let me guess. The master went down the mountain?"
Dai Fengchi said nothing useful.
Chang Ning would have sent them both packing regardless. But Cai Zhao agreed with a pleasant smile, so Chang Ning went along.
On the walk to Shuanglian Huachi Palace, Chang Ning kept his voice low. "Nothing good comes from Madam Sulian calling for you. Better to wait this out until Qi Zong returns."
"Have you really never had to manage a spoiled child before?" Cai Zhao said. "The moment I offended Senior Sister Lingbo, I knew Madam Sulian would come for me sooner or later."
"So you kept provoking them anyway?"
Cai Zhao's expression was thoughtful. "How do you know she wasn't going to come for me either way?"
Chang Ning didn't believe a word of it. "If you're going to make a move inside Yin Sulian's territory, at least find yourself a clean angle first. Otherwise, the charge of disrespecting elders will stick, and no one will be able to defend you once Qi Zong gets involved."
"Brother Chang, please." Cai Zhao waved him off. "I'm a decent, peaceful person. I don't attack elders. Ask anyone in the three hundred li around Luoying Town. They'll tell you I'm a gentle, mild-mannered woman who smiles at everyone."
Chang Ning stared. "Did you drink at lunch?"
"Don't worry. I'm not touching Master's mother. I'm not insane."
Chang Ning remained unconvinced.
The palace opened up ahead of them. A lotus pond stretched wide and still, the water dotted with rare blooms in deep crimson and white. White cranes moved beneath the flowering trees. Gilded rafters caught the afternoon light. The whole place felt assembled to impress.
"Look at this," Cai Zhao said approvingly. "Compared to this, Luoying Valley is just a farming village that finally got two square meals." She glanced sideways. "Is Qingque Sect actually wealthy?"
"Yes," said Chang Ning.
"How can you be sure?"
"The eaves are plated in gold."
Cai Zhao looked at him with genuine admiration. "Brother Chang sees things clearly."
Dai Fengchi, walking ahead of them, looked like he was developing a headache.
Inside the main hall, Yin Sulian sat high on a throne shaped like a golden lotus. Her daughter Qi Lingbo perched to one side, satisfied with herself. Flanking them on both sides stood a row of sword-bearing attendants, faces hard, followed by a second row of servants gripping long snake spears. When Cai Zhao and Chang Ning walked in, every pair of eyes swung toward them at once.
The formation was excessive. The personnel, Cai Zhao noted, were not.
"Finally," Yin Sulian said coolly. "Rare guests keep us waiting."
Cai Zhao smiled warmly. "You flatter us, Master's Mother. What a fine afternoon. Did you call us here to enjoy the flowers?"
Yin Sulian's palm came down hard on the armrest. "Enough! From the moment you set foot inside these cliffs, you have wronged my daughter three times over. Today, as her elder, I will see that you answer for every one of them!"
"With respect, it was Senior Sister Lingbo who wronged others, not the reverse." Cai Zhao kept smiling. "And as for Master Mu Zunchang, I'm simply here to see you, Master's Mother. Nothing more."
Yin Sulian's voice dropped to something colder. "I've heard how quick your tongue is. Let's see what else you have. Kneel. Serve tea. Kowtow. Make proper amends to my daughter."
The attendants took one step forward in unison.
Qi Lingbo smiled at Chang Ning directly. "And you. Kowtow to me and apologize." She lifted her hand. A broad-shouldered woman in martial dress carried in two bowls of something black and reeking.
Cai Zhao leaned away from it. "Senior Sister, did you pull that out of a cesspit?"
Chang Ning's eyes moved over the woman carrying the bowls. The cheerful performance was a shell. Underneath it, the woman's breath was locked and her energy sealed inward. A top-level horizontal combat practitioner.
"You've pushed me around long enough," Qi Lingbo said, still smiling. "I'm your senior sister in rank. Apologize, kowtow, and drink this, and we call it even."
"And if I don't?"
Yin Sulian's face hardened. "Then you don't have a choice."
The swords came out. The spears leveled. Dai Fengchi's hand moved to his hilt. Cai Zhao looked at the blades pointed at her from every direction and let out a short, sharp laugh.
"Yesterday at the apprenticeship banquet, Master told everyone in the sect not to lay a hand on Brother Chang or me. You're not worried about what comes after?"
"Think again," Chang Ning said pleasantly. "These aren't sect disciples. Every one of them is a private guard out of the Yin family. When Lady Qinglian and Lady Sulian married, their father sent a contingent with each daughter. If Zhao Tianba and Han Yisu hadn't gone off the rails a decade ago, the Yin presence inside Qingque Sect would be even larger than it is now."
The fake grandmother stepped forward, eyes burning. "You think because the old patriarch is gone, the Yin family has no teeth? Let me show you what that means. Circle them."
The ring of blades tightened.
"Fine," said Chang Ning, his expression going flat. "We've given them enough chances."
"Brother Chang, please." Cai Zhao stepped forward before he could move. She raised her voice and began to recite clearly: "Brother Zhang San. Since parting on Qianqiu Ridge, months have passed without sight of your face. My younger sister misses you terribly, day and night, and my heart"
"Stop!" Yin Sulian was on her feet, the color gone from her face. "Not another word!"
Qi Lingbo flinched at her mother's voice, ears ringing.
Cai Zhao folded her hands. "Master's Mother. Let us speak civilly."
Yin Sulian was shaking. "Everyone out. Twenty steps from the hall. Stand guard."
The room cleared fast. Qi Lingbo went with them, confused, pushed along by the fake grandmother. Dai Fengchi followed. Chang Ning gave Cai Zhao one long look and withdrew.
Three people remained: Yin Sulian, the fake grandmother, and Cai Zhao.
"Where did you find those letters?" Yin Sulian's voice was unsteady.
"My aunt left them to me."
The fake grandmother stepped in: "Don't play games. What letters? We don't know what you're talking about."
Cai Zhao tilted her head. "Then I'll recite another. Brother Zhizhen. I heard a few days ago that your cough has grown worse, and I've barely slept since. The pain you carry, I carry too. I made loquat paste with my own hands"
"Stop." Yin Sulian's voice cracked.
"You had a real gift for it when you were young, Master's Mother. The feeling comes through in every line. Far more than Master's poetry recitations." Cai Zhao rubbed one ear gently. "The early letters were written around the time you were still engaged to Lord Qiu Renjie. The last ones, after your marriage agreement with Master had already been arranged."
Yin Sulian sat down hard.
"Who knows if those are genuine," the fake grandmother said, clinging to the denial.
"I'm not the only one who's read them," Cai Zhao said. "My aunt wrote to Lady Qinglian as well. Guangtian Gate may still have those letters. Any wife of Siqi Gate could compare handwriting and know in a moment."
The fake grandmother's knuckles clicked, soft and deliberate.
Yin Sulian's voice had gone thin. "Cai Pingshu was always wary of me. She took those letters. She meant to hold this over me."
Cai Zhao smiled, almost gently. "You and my aunt knew each other. Whatever you thought of each other, would she really steal letters from you without your knowing?"
The silence answered.
"Uncle Zhou gave them to her. He wanted her to understand and let go of any doubts she held about you."
"No." Yin Sulian shook her head, reaching for the grandmother's arm. "No, Zhou Zhuang was a man of principle. He wouldn't have."
"He was principled," Cai Zhao said. "But even principled men weigh their loyalties. In Uncle Zhou's reckoning, giving my aunt peace of mind mattered more than keeping your secret."
Yin Sulian pressed her hands over her face and wept.
The fake grandmother said quietly: "He trusted Lady Cai completely. He knew she would never spread it."
Cai Zhao was still for a moment. "My aunt isn't that kind of person. That's true."
"Then how did you get them!" Yin Sulian looked up, voice gone ragged.
Cai Zhao paused, choosing. "Master's Mother, you raised your daughter. Think about my aunt. With someone like you waiting here, would she have let me come to Qingque Sect without making sure I had some way to protect myself?"
The fake grandmother stepped forward, energy rising.
"I don't want anything dramatic," Cai Zhao said quietly. "What happened between your generation stays with your generation. From here on, I'm asking only that you stay out of anything between me, Senior Sister Lingbo, and my fellow disciples."
The sky had turned gold and deep red by the time Cai Zhao and Chang Ning walked back. The light poured across the Double Lotus Pond Palace and made something extraordinary out of it. Cai Zhao breathed in the smell of grass and didn't say anything for a while.
Chang Ning said, without inflection: "So Madam Sulian had feelings for Zhou Zhizhen."
"Don't." Cai Zhao's voice was sharp. "Uncle Zhou was not that kind of man."
"Unrequited, then. Her feelings, not his."
Cai Zhao deflated. "Chang Xia told you."
"I could have worked it out." Chang Ning walked with his hands behind him. "A young woman writing love letters to someone she shouldn't. Already promised to one man, then to another. If those letters surfaced, they would ruin everything. The terror on her face tells you the letters weren't written to either fiancé."
"What if they were?"
"She wouldn't have panicked. She would have laughed it off." Chang Ning smiled thinly. "Twenty years ago, three names were rising together in the martial world: Song Shijun, Wu Yuanying, and your uncle Zhou. Song Shijun was already spoken for by Lady Qinglian's family, and by reputation he had no shortage of admirers. Lady Sulian had defended her sister more than once. Not him."
He continued: "Wu Yuanying came to Qingque Sect constantly. There were places on the cliffs where they could meet in person. No letters needed. That left Zhou Zhuang. Best-looking of the three. Finest character. And if you wrote to him, the letters might eventually reach your aunt, who would be gracious enough to understand and let it rest." He smiled and turned his palm up. "Generous to the end."
Cai Zhao walked in silence for a long time.
"You read the front right," she finally said. "But the back was wrong. My aunt didn't give me those letters."
Chang Ning looked at her. "Your mother, then. To protect you."
"No."
She looked up at the red sky. The light was almost too bright to look at. "I found them when I was small. I was going through boxes in the back of the house. Children do that."
"My aunt had forgotten they existed. She would never have used something like that against anyone. That wasn't how she lived." Cai Zhao's voice was steady, even. "When she found out I'd read them, she burned every one. She told me: using what you know about someone against their will is not honest. It's not who we are."
She paused. "I had already memorized a few."
Chang Ning looked at her. "But you used them against Yin Sulian anyway."
"Yes."
Cai Zhao stopped walking. Her eyes were very still. "Because I'm not my aunt."
The end of her conversation with Yin Sulian came back to her:
"If you want me to stay out of your affairs in this sect, you'll need to hand over those letters. Otherwise I have no guarantee you won't come at me again."
"I won't hand them over. You'll have to take my word."
"How can I possibly"
"Never mind." Yin Sulian had silenced the fake grandmother herself. She had looked at Cai Zhao for a long moment. "Fine. I believe you. You were raised by Cai Pingshu. She walked the right path her whole life. I'll take that on faith."
As the hall doors closed behind her, Cai Zhao had heard the fake grandmother's voice, low and urgent:
"Does she not know who Cai Pingshu was? She had the martial ability to crush anyone in this sect. She never threatened anyone. She never raised a hand against Lady Sulian. Not once in all those years. That's exactly why she was so easy to push around. If it weren't for this girl showing up at Qingque Sect, Cai Pingshu would never have thought of those letters at all..."
The red sky deepened. Every flower and leaf along the path had lost its color to it.
Cai Zhao let out a quiet laugh. "So they all knew. They always knew exactly who my aunt was."
That was the cruelest part. Yin Sulian and her kind hadn't hated Cai Pingshu out of misunderstanding. They had known she was good, known she would never fight back, and chosen her for that reason specifically.
Chang Ning understood what was moving behind the girl's stillness.
He watched her profile against the dying light, the long line of her neck, and opened and closed one hand slowly.
"So what's the point of the anger?"
Cai Zhao glanced at him.
"You're furious. You feel wronged for her. You think it should have gone differently." His voice was even, almost cold. "And Yin Sulian goes home tonight to a fine dinner. Your anger doesn't touch her."
The mountain wind moved through his robes. In the gold-red light, his eyes had taken on an odd color, and his lashes threw long shadows.
"Heaven and earth show no mercy. They treat all things as expendable. You're either the unmerciful force, or you're what gets used up." He said it plainly, like a fact. "Grieve her if you want. But don't carry the injustice inside you. It has nowhere to go except back into your own chest."
The wind held the moment open.
Then he walked on ahead, solitary and precise, his outline clean as a blade pressed into all that blazing gold.