My Sect Is Down to Seven People

Chapter 38: A Steady Left Hand

The steps of the Earth God Shrine had been swept, the dead grass piled against the wall, the broom leaning outside the doorframe, handle facing out.

Huo Qing sat on the threshold, his left hand resting on his knee, a strip of cloth wrapped around his wrist. The cloth had been torn from his robe, the edges still frayed. He held one end in his teeth and wound the cloth around his wrist with his left hand—two turns, then a loosening turn, not tight enough, so he undid it and started over.

Xu Yan stood below the steps, the bamboo basket resting on a stone by his feet. He didn't go up, and he didn't offer to help.

The old sword leaned against the wall inside the door, a chip in the scabbard. Xu Yan had seen him unfasten the sword belt before: he'd loop the strap off his shoulder with his left hand, the right hand pressing under his armpit, half a turn, a pause, then another half turn.

On the third attempt, the cloth went on. He pressed it down with the back of his hand, released it from his teeth, tucked the end in with his left hand, and turned his wrist half a turn. It held.

"That's too thick," Xu Yan said.

"It's swollen."

"Swollen still has to move. Moving is what brings it down."

Huo Qing didn't answer. He set his hand back on his knee. The steamed cake was still sitting on the corner of the step, the yellow paper peeled up at one edge, hard enough to knock on, a corner pecked away by some bird.

Xu Yan crouched down, lifted the straw wrap, and brought out two bowls. He set them on the stone step below the threshold.

"From the stove. Still warm."

Huo Qing glanced at the bowls. Didn't pick them up.

"Your left hand is steady," Xu Yan said.

Huo Qing looked up.

"You don't know it yourself." Xu Yan said.

The left hand turned over on his knee, then back again. The wrist rotated half a turn, the five fingers spread and closed. The cloth was thick; when the knuckles bent, the fabric pulled into a crease.

"It caught a sword strike," he said.

"One strike is still a strike."

"Catching one strike doesn't mean much."

"Yesterday at the riverbank, I was on the embankment counting your retreat." Xu Yan said. "Nine steps. In those nine steps, your right hand never once closed fully around the hilt. Her sword never even went for your body, and your grip was still loose."

"She was holding back."

"Right. She was holding back, and you retreated nine steps without your footwork breaking. On the last one, her sword came to the outside of your right shoulder. Your body bent halfway down, your left hand felt through the gravel for the hilt, snatched it up, and blocked." Xu Yan said. "The crater your back foot dug is still there on the riverbank."

Huo Qing looked down at his wrist.

"She's been training with the sword for years. Your left hand has never held a sword a day in its life." Xu Yan said. "It caught the strike."

"What does steady get you?" Huo Qing asked.

"It can hold a sword."

"A sword that catches one strike."

Xu Yan didn't answer that.

"What about the right hand?" he asked.

Huo Qing raised his right hand. The thick callus at the web of his thumb had split open, covered now by a dark red scab. A thin crack ran along the edge of the scab; every time he moved his fingers, it pulled open.

"A cracked scab will bleed again." Xu Yan said. "Don't soak your hand in the well water when you wash."

"I know."

"Knowing, and you still soaked it."

Huo Qing set his hand back on his knee. The clay idol inside the shrine faced the door, the red lacquer flaking off its face until only a spot at the earlobe remained, the bare mud showing through. An old iron bell hung from the eave corner. When the wind came, it rang once. Then again after a while.

"Why did she challenge me?" Huo Qing asked.

"Go ask her."

"She's Foundation Establishment. Winning against me gets her nothing."

"Say that to her." Xu Yan said. "If I say it, she won't accept it."

Huo Qing stood and walked around to the back of the shrine. The rope on the bucket by the well platform had only had a slipknot before; last time, half a bucket had sloshed out. Today there were two more tight knots on the rope. His left hand gripped one end, the bucket went down into the well, and came back up without the rim striking the well platform. He poured the water into the clay vat in the corner. The second bucket came up too. The cloth on his wrist was soaked through, sticking to his skin.

When he came back around to the front of the shrine, the two bowls were gone from the stone step—Xu Yan had taken them inside while he was drawing water and set them on the bench below the offering table, one nested on top of the other. The hard steamed cake outside the threshold was still untouched.

Xu Yan lifted the empty bamboo basket off the stone. "The Market Fair is the day after tomorrow."

Huo Qing sat down on the threshold and pressed at the damp cloth, but gave no answer.

Xu Yan headed down the dirt road. The flattened grass beside the path still held last night's damp. At the bend he looked back. The man in the doorway was unwrapping the cloth from his wrist—one layer off, then another, then wrapping it again.

July 25. Market Fair day.

The dirt road up the slope had been trodden nearly white. Qian Duoduo came down from the slope, his carrying pole rocking on his shoulders, a pot hanging from each end, cloth over the pots, stones weighing down the cloth. One hand gripped the pole tight, the other had to hold down the lid of the front pot.

"Slow down. Slow down," he said to himself.

Shi Po walked ahead, carrying half a door panel on his back. The panel was wider than his shoulders, and he tilted with every step. He looked back. "Let me take it."

"That thing you're carrying is heavier than the pots."

Shi Po thought it over, then kept walking.

On the last stretch of the downhill slope, Qian Duoduo's foot slid and the pole slipped from his shoulder to his back. The two pots tipped, one high, one low. Soup surged against the rim of the front pot and splashed out in a line, hit the dirt, and steamed white.

He set the load down and looked back up the road. Xu Yan was behind them, bamboo basket in hand, walking slowly.

On the opposite side of the road, the man with the sword stood. No telling how long he'd been standing there, his left hand resting on the sword belt at his waist.

He walked over, his shoes caked with dirt.

"Give it to me."

Qian Duoduo didn't catch it. "Huh?"

He reached for the rope loops. Qian Duoduo glanced at Xu Yan. Xu Yan said nothing, so Qian Duoduo let go.

Huo Qing crouched, gathered the loops at both ends into his left hand, and straightened up. The pole came down on his shoulder—first the right shoulder. The right shoulder dropped half an inch and his body tilted with it. He hitched the pole up, steadied himself, walked a dozen steps, then pushed the pole forward with his left hand, turned sideways, and rolled it over onto his left shoulder. The load swayed once; his left hand went up to steady it.

"Left shoulder," he said, like he was reporting for duty.

Qian Duoduo kept pace beside him. "The soup in the pots... don't bounce it."

"I won't."

A bowshot of road, and he never stopped once. The soup never spilled again. At the base of the collapsed wall, he crouched and set the load down steady. The bottoms of both pots touched the ground without a sound.

Qian Duoduo wiped his hands on his apron. "You... you're really—"

"Set up the pots first." Xu Yan said from the door panel. "Talk won't slow down eating."

The door panel went up on the collapsed wall, the wooden box set beside the panel, the stones on the pots straightened. Huo Qing withdrew to stand at the wall's base, both hands hanging at his sides. There was a loose brick in the collapsed wall; the wind shook dirt from it. He reached out, pushed the brick back into place, and pressed the dirt beneath it firm with his fingers.

While he stood at the wall, Qian Duoduo leaned in close to Xu Yan and lowered his voice. "If he comes every Market Fair..."

"Then he comes."

"What if someone from Chixiao sees him?"

"Then that's how it looks." Xu Yan straightened the wooden box. "He's not taking a single coin. It'll go in the ledger."

Qian Duoduo glanced at the wall and swallowed the rest of his words.

By the hour of the Snake, customers had arrived. The first few were regulars, squatting in front of the door panel and blowing on their bowls. One said last time's soup was half a pinch short on salt; another said today there was more ginger. Qian Duoduo answered them one by one from behind the pots. New customers came in, looked first at the sword on the man by the wall, then down at their bowls.

"Is the sword real?" one asked.

"It's real," Qian Duoduo said.

"Has it cut anything?"

Qian Duoduo opened his mouth and looked toward the wall. The man by the wall wasn't looking their way.

The Qi-Gathering Powder was set out in the sun. A rogue cultivator picked up a bottle, checked the seal on the bottom, and asked whether it was really brewed by Qingya Sect itself. Qian Duoduo said yes, Elder Cheng up on the mountain watched the fire batch by batch himself. The rogue cultivator weighed it in his hand and set down money for two bottles. "I'll come back next Fair."

The wind lifted a corner of the pot lid. Qian Duoduo's hands were full. Huo Qing pressed the lid down with his left hand and held it until the wind passed. Qian Duoduo looked back, his mouth moved, and he swallowed whatever he'd been about to say.

The first pot ran dry, and the second went on. The sun climbed over the rooftops of the front row. The shadow at the wall's base shortened.

Shi Po was eating flatbread. He broke off half and held it out. Huo Qing didn't take it. Shi Po set the half piece on the edge of the door panel and went back to eating his own. After a while, the half piece on the panel was gone. No one mentioned it.

The second pot sold out, and so did all ten bottles of Qi-Gathering Powder. Qian Duoduo pulled the spirit stones out of the cash box one by one, stacked them on the door panel, and counted twice.

"Eighty. Thirty." He said. "One hundred and ten total."

Xu Yan spread the ledger open on the wooden box and wrote entry by entry: income, two pots, eighty; Qi-Gathering Powder, ten bottles, thirty. He finished writing and looked up.

Qian Duoduo had already ladled out a bowl and brought it to the wall. "Have a bowl."

"I'm not eating."

"Why not? Don't you eat?"

"He doesn't eat for free." Xu Yan said.

Qian Duoduo blinked. "Then... then should I put it on the books for him?"

"For the hauling this trip, at wharf rates." Xu Yan pressed the brush tip to the paper. "One workday, six wen."

"No," Huo Qing said.

"Keep it on record." Xu Yan wrote the line, adding "unpaid" at the end.

Huo Qing looked toward the Town Gate. The noise of the Fair drifted over in waves, mixed with the snorting of mules and some child crying.

A customer who'd finished eating wiped his mouth and looked up at the wall. "Your mountain... got another one?"

Qian Duoduo opened his mouth.

"Here to help out." Xu Yan said.

The man said "oh," scraped the bottom of his bowl clean, stood, and left.

The stall closed in the hour of the Goat. Shi Po hoisted the door panel onto his back. Huo Qing came over and pulled the end of the hemp rope tight with his left hand, tied a knot, and tugged it twice. The knot held. Shi Po carried the panel up the slope, bent lower than when he'd come. Qian Duoduo shouldered the empty pots—light now—and walked fast.

Xu Yan went to the grain shop to buy spirit rice.

The grain shop proprietor worked his abacus without looking up. "Where's the boy who carried the rice last time?"

"He's already back on the mountain."

"Different man this time." The proprietor lifted his eyes and looked toward the door.

In the doorway stood the man with the sword, right hand hanging at his side, a scab on the web of his thumb.

"Eight." The proprietor said.

Xu Yan counted out eight low-grade stones and set them on the counter. The proprietor called toward the back, and someone carried out a sack of rice.

Out of the grain shop, the sun had started west, and shadows on the dirt road fell east. Qian Duoduo was already up the slope with his empty pots. Huo Qing walked behind Xu Yan, his left hand steadying the sword strap at his back.

On the road, Xu Yan went over the roster in his mind: Jiang Wan, Shi Po, Bai Xiaoman. The Ninth of the Ninth needed ten names. Right now there were three. He had 659 stones in hand; three formation stones would cost 300, plus another carriage fare. He did these calculations every day, and doing them never produced an extra name.

At the fork, the northern road climbed a gentle slope, with a stone bridge at its base. The western road led through overgrown grass, past three willow trees, and ended at the shrine.

Huo Qing stopped.

"The Qingya mountain gate—which way?"

Xu Yan turned and pointed north. The trees on the slope were gray-green, and beyond them, the sky.

"Out of town north, cross the stone bridge, up the slope. Follow the stone steps to the top. The gate faces south."

"How far?"

"Ten li," Xu Yan said. "About an hour."

Huo Qing looked north for a long moment, pulled his eyes back, and nodded. Then he turned and walked west. The dirt road ran straight, past the three willow trees, all the way to the half-collapsed shrine.

Qian Duoduo called back from the slope. "He's not coming up with us?"

Xu Yan took the ledger from his robe and flipped to today's date. Income: two pots, eighty; Qi-Gathering Powder, ten bottles, thirty. Expenditure: spirit rice, eight. Balance on hand: 659. Debt owed: 2,100. Shortfall remaining: 1,441. He looked further down. The last line read: "One workday, six wen, unpaid."

"Is he coming or not?" Qian Duoduo called again.

Xu Yan closed the ledger and tucked it back inside his robe.

"The books still owe him six wen," he said.