Crimson Sky Trading's Redstone shop stood near the western gate. Crimson silk covered the reception-room walls. Behind the front table, a painting of the Crimson Bastion hung above a jade carving of the kingdom's crest.
At Wang Tian's name, the attendant's posture straightened.
"Master Qian is expecting you. One moment."
The attendant went upstairs.
Wang Ben remained beside his father. The spirit-stone pouch rested inside his robe, heavy against his ribs.
The skin at the back of his neck prickled.
He turned toward the window. Carts passed beneath the open shutters on their way to the gate, and two porters were unloading cloth across the road. No one had stopped to look up.
Footsteps returned on the stairs. By the time the attendant entered the room, the sensation was gone.
"Master Qian will see you now."
The attendant led them upstairs.
Qian Weishan rose when Wang Tian entered. He was a middle-aged man with soft hands and sharp eyes. He bowed first to Wang Tian, then nodded once to Wang Ben.
"Master Wang. Young Master Wang." He indicated the cushions across from him. "Please sit."
Wang Ben sat beside his father.
"Your message said you wished to discuss a purchase," Qian said.
"Shadow-drinking crystal," Wang Tian replied. "We want to buy part of the shipment due from the Blackwood."
Qian's hand stopped above the teapot. "That shipment is not available."
"The Material Exchange lists it under Crimson Sky."
"Crimson Sky is the buyer." Qian lowered his hand. "The crystal is committed to a defensive-array commission from the Crimson Bastion. I cannot divert any part of it."
"We are prepared to pay above the market price," Wang Tian said.
"I believe you. But Crimson Sky trades throughout the domain. A higher price on one shipment would not repay what we would lose by breaking faith with the Bastion."
"Not even a portion?"
"None."
Qian bowed his head. "If your message had named the crystal, I would have answered last night."
Wang Tian stood. Qian rose with him and bowed with the same care he had shown at their arrival.
Wang Ben followed his father downstairs. The pouch had not moved from inside his robe.
The street had grown busier while they were inside. Wagons bound for the western gate crowded the road, forcing Wang Tian and Wang Ben to walk close to the shopfronts.
Wang Tian waited until they had left Crimson Sky behind.
"That was not bargaining."
"Qian never named a price," Wang Ben said.
"Or a later shipment." Wang Tian stepped aside for a porter carrying two bundled carpets. "He would rather lose our sale than risk his standing with the Bastion."
They turned east toward the Wang compound.
Before they reached the next crossing, the prickling returned at the back of Wang Ben's neck. This time it did not fade when he looked toward the nearest roofs.
He kept pace with his father.
A bronze mirror hung among a shop's wares. As they passed, Wang Ben studied the warped reflection behind them. Two merchants argued beside a handcart. A refugee family moved around them with their bundles held close. Farther back, a man in a straw hat turned into an alley without looking their way.
At the next crossing, Wang Ben slowed until a grain cart rolled between them and the people behind. Wang Tian matched his pace. When the cart passed, Wang Ben looked along the road they had taken.
No one hurried to close the distance. No one stopped.
The prickling remained.
"What is it?" Wang Tian asked.
"The same feeling I had in the shop. Stronger now."
Wang Tian looked once toward the crowd. "Do you see anyone?"
"No."
They continued home. At each crossing, Wang Ben checked the people behind them. The faces changed, but the prickling remained through every turn.
The guards opened the Wang compound gates at their approach. Wang Ben crossed beside his father.
The prickling vanished.
He stopped just inside. Beyond the open gates, merchants and refugees continued along the road. None of them looked toward him.
...
Li Mei was lifting Wang Chen from his quilt when Wang Tian entered the family room, his expression grim. She looked up at once.
"What happened?"
"Ben thinks someone followed us from the western gate."
"Twice," Wang Ben said. "I felt it inside Crimson Sky, then again on the road. It stopped when I crossed the compound gate."
Li Mei settled Wang Chen against her shoulder. "You saw no one?"
"No."
"I searched the street with my spiritual sense," Wang Tian said. "Twice. I found nothing."
Li Mei's gaze moved between them. "Then how did Ben sense anything?"
"I don't know."
"Or there was no one," Wang Ben said.
Neither of his parents answered.
Li Mei drew Wang Chen closer. "Until we know, you don't leave the compound alone."
Wang Ben nodded. His father opened the door.
A household guard was crossing the courtyard. Wang Tian stopped him.
"Bring the patrol captain to the outer gatehouse before the night patrol begins. Quietly."
The guard bowed and went ahead. Wang Tian followed.
...
From the roof of a closed dye shop, Xue Feng watched the Wang compound fall quiet for the night.
Wang Tian crossed the outer courtyard with the patrol captain. The two men stopped beneath a lantern at the gatehouse, spoke briefly, then separated. Guards moved along the walls in pairs. Others watched the street from above the gate.
Xue Feng kept his qi drawn close.
He had studied the compound for a week. Qi condensation guards held the gates, but they were only the first obstacle. Wang Tian had broken through to early-stage foundation establishment. Stronger presences remained deeper inside, cultivators who could kill Xue Feng before he crossed half the distance to the family rooms.
The wooden bar struck its brackets. For an instant, Xue Feng was back in the tunnel beneath Redstone, the broken Xue crest behind him and his grandfather left to die somewhere above.
He had called that survival. The lie had carried him as far as the Blackwood.
Scattered demonic cultivators had gathered near the forest's edge after the war. They kept apart and watched one another. One man was different. The others lowered their voices when he passed and left space around him without being ordered.
Xue Feng approached him.
He knelt before the man could ask it of him.
"My name is Xue Feng. My family had contacts in Redstone and the domain capital. Merchants. Officials. People who owed us favors." He raised his head. "I can still be useful."
The man looked down at him for a long time, then nodded once.
The rituals began soon after.
Pain tightened beneath Xue Feng's collarbone. He pressed two fingers against the place. Under his robe, a dark line crossed his chest and joined the other body inscriptions beneath his skin.
Months in the northern caves had left him pale and marked. The stone had stayed cold through every ritual. The pain remained after each one ended, sinking to a dull ache until the next line brought it back.
His master called the inscriptions seals and described them as gifts that drew out hatred and refined it into strength.
Xue Feng had felt that strength steady his cultivation and drive it higher. He had also felt the seals tighten and release at his master's will. The same power that carried him toward late-stage qi condensation could close around his meridians until every breath hurt.
It was a leash, whatever his master called it.
He had accepted it with his eyes open. When the Wang Clan was gone and he had taken everything he needed, he would turn on his master.
The pain beneath his collarbone eased. Xue Feng looked down at his hand against the roof tile. Even in the moonlight, it looked bloodless. Another marking showed for a moment at his wrist before he pulled his sleeve lower.
He turned back toward the compound.
The hatred should have come easily. Instead, there was a blank place where it had been.
Some mornings he woke with the same absence. He would speak the Wang name and feel nothing. Then he had to begin again.
He returned to the story he had carried through every ritual. The Wang Clan had taken everything. Nothing that followed had been his fault.
He repeated it until the blankness receded. Heat gathered beneath the inscriptions. Dark qi moved through his meridians in answer.
For seven days, he had watched Wang Ben come and go. He had learned every route Wang Ben used, when Wang Tian came and went from the workshop, and which courtyards Li Mei crossed with the infant in her arms. Killing Wang Ben would end one life. Taking the people around him would leave him alive long enough to understand what had been taken.
But not behind those walls.
A guard above the gate turned toward the dye shop. Xue Feng lowered himself behind the roof ridge. Inside the western wall, a foundation establishment cultivator passed close enough for him to feel. He would not reach the doors alive.
Sooner or later, Wang Ben and his family would leave the walls.
When they did, Xue Feng would be waiting.