My Sect Is Down to Seven People

Chapter 41: A Stall with a Stove

At dawn on the first of August, two mules from the Luoxia Town cart hire were already hitched to the shafts. The cart bed was plank wood, bamboo poles at the four corners, a straw mat stretched over the top. Dew had soaked the mat through; anyone boarding had to duck low.

Xu Yan passed four spirit stones up. The carter hefted them, tucked them into his shirt. "Round trip price. The day you come back, I won't ask for more."

The pot went onto the cart bed, its ears wrapped in three layers of cloth. Shi Po set the wooden box straight. Twenty bottles of Qi-Gathering Powder stood in dry hay, two layers of straw under each; he pressed them with a finger, and only when nothing shifted did he fasten the lid. The back basket hung from the tail, three hemp ropes tied around the bamboo poles, one sack of spirit rice wedged deepest inside.

Qian Duoduo came running back from the cart hire entrance, still clutching a small sack, and shoved it behind the rice bag.

"What's that," Xu Yan asked.

"Coarse grain." Qian Duoduo pushed the bag in further. "Mix it in when it cooks; the meal's thicker. Same pot, a few more bowls."

"Write it down."

"It's from home—"

"If it's from home, write it down too." Xu Yan flipped the ledger to the first of August, brush hovering. "How much."

Qian Duoduo gave a number, voice shrinking as he went. Xu Yan wrote: coarse grain, one sack, supplied by Qian Duoduo, value one spirit stone.

The mule cart left town heading east. The official road's stones had been polished bright by cartwheels; on either side, men guided plows through the fields, raising their heads as the cart passed. The sun climbed from ahead, and the straw mat's shadow inside the cart bed shrank inch by inch.

Qian Duoduo sat beside the box, both arms wrapped around it, gripping until the backs of his hands went white.

"Sect Master." After a while he spoke. "Four spirit stones a bowl. In town it's two, and people still say it's expensive. Four—why would anyone pay four?"

"Because after they finish, they'll want a second bowl," Xu Yan said.

"And if nobody wants any?"

"Then it's left over. Rice doesn't spoil."

Qian Duoduo's throat made a sound. He didn't speak again.

Shi Po sat at the cart's tail, both legs hanging off the back, swaying with the cart's motion. He chewed half a flatbread, then held the other half out toward Qian Duoduo. Qian Duoduo shook his head. Shi Po set the bread on the edge of the wooden box, waited a moment, then took it back and ate it himself.

Around noon they rested once by the roadside. The carter unhitched the mules and led them to the ditch to drink, then squatted by the road chewing dry rations. Qian Duoduo crouched by the cart, opened the wooden box, lifted each bottle one by one and shook it beside his ear.

"Twenty bottles," he said, then counted a second time.

"All full," Shi Po said.

"Bumpy road—if one breaks, and when we get there, someone opens the box—"

"If one breaks, there'll be a sound," Xu Yan said. "No sound, nothing broke."

By the time the sun slanted west, the road had broadened and the carts had multiplied. Ahead, a length of gray-black wall grew out of the earth, taller the closer they came. People walked along the top; against the wall's base stood a row of low sheds—water sellers, cart repairers, one hung with strings of straw sandals.

The city gate arch was wider than Luoxia Town's entire main street. Carts, mules, pole carriers, back-basket bearers all squeezed together, sound churning into one mass where nothing came through clearly.

Shi Po tilted his head back, neck craning until it touched the straw mat.

Qian Duoduo hugged the wooden box tighter. "This... this is Linchuan City?"

"Monkey hour." Xu Yan opened the ledger and added after the first-of-August entry: Monkey hour, arrived at Linchuan City.

The carter shouted, and the cart rolled through the gate arch. Inside the arch hung a damp chill, mixed with the smell of fodder, cooking oil smoke, and many men's sweat. Out the other side, the street blazed: shop signs of every color hung over doorways; in a blacksmith's shop a hammer fell on iron, paused, fell again; from somewhere high above, a voice called prices, the words impossible to make out.

The Market was in the city's east quarter. The cart turned down an alley; at its mouth hung a wooden sign so worn the characters were unreadable—an inn.

"One room." Xu Yan asked the price, then said.

"Two plank beds, two spirit stones a night. Pay when you leave." The shopkeeper said, "Three rooms available too."

"One room."

Climbing the stairs, Qian Duoduo lagged behind and tugged Shi Po's sleeve. "I'll sleep on the floor." Shi Po said, "I will." Xu Yan glanced back: "Push the plank beds together. You two share one."

That night he sat under the lamp writing the accounts. The first-of-August line was filled: cart, round trip, four spirit stones. Above it the balance was seven hundred sixty-nine; subtract four, remaining seven hundred sixty-five.

He started a new line and worked out tomorrow: a stall was five per day, pay ten days up front, fifty; ingredients for three pots, eighteen; total sixty-eight. In hand, seven hundred sixty-five. Enough.

When he finished, he laid the brush on the inkstone's edge and stared at the two figures for a while before blowing out the lamp.

On the second, at the hour of the Dragon, the door of the Market Office on the north side of the Market had just opened.

A long table stretched across the middle of the room. Behind it sat a woman, hair pinned with a single wooden hairpin. On the table lay a register, a brush, and an inkstone.

She glanced up at the three standing in the doorway.

"Where from."

"Qingya Sect," Xu Yan said. "Dongzhou. Ninth Rank."

The brush moved across the register. She didn't look up. "Selling what."

"Spirit Meals. And Qi-Gathering Powder."

"Stall with a stove, five a day, ten days up front, fifty." She set the brush down. "Pay and I issue a tag. The tag hangs on your stall. Renew when it's due. No debt."

"The stove's already there?" Xu Yan asked.

"Stone-built. Firewood you buy yourself. Water's in the well at the east end, two trips a day; go late and you queue."

From under the table she produced a wooden tag, a number carved into it: "East Row Three, toward the back. That stove's a big one."

Xu Yan counted fifty onto the table. She ran two fingers through the stacks, pile by pile, then wrote a stroke in the register.

When she finished, she stood and walked to the wall. A row of wooden boards had been nailed there, each carved with characters, most of the lacquer worn off, the edges glossed smooth by many hands.

"I'll read them to you," she said, one character at a time, unhurried. "For stalls selling food: if someone reports your food unclean, I seal your stall first. Within three days, an alchemist from the Medicine Guild comes to test. If poison is found, you pay compensation, you're expelled, and you may never enter the Market again. If no poison is found, the accuser bears the cost."

"Three days counted from when," Xu Yan asked.

"From the day of sealing. The test comes before sunset on the third day. If it can't be done, the seal lifts anyway."

"Lifts what."

"Every day sealed, that day's stall fee is refunded." She rapped the board. "One more rule: fires on stalls may not burn through the night. When you close, block the stove mouth. If you can't block it, I'll send someone to block it."

Xu Yan took the wooden tag and turned it over. The back was blank.

"In the Market, I only go by the books." She sat back down and picked up her brush again. "Whose accounts balance, who's in the right. Whether you charge four a bowl or ten, I don't care. If you short someone a bowl, I care."

"Understood," Xu Yan said.

Outside the Market Office, around the corner, an old man was splitting bamboo, long poles stacked at his feet, a bamboo knife in his hand, strings of bamboo baskets and sieves hanging in front of his stall.

"Do you have thin bamboo slivers," Xu Yan asked.

The old man pulled a bundle from underneath. Thin-sliced, about a finger wide. "For lining steamer trays. How many do you need?"

"The whole bundle."

"No charge." The old man shoved the bundle into his arms. "When you open, give me a bowl."

"Four spirit stones a bowl," Xu Yan said. "I'll put it on the books. Whenever you come, it counts."

The old man smiled. "You. All right, I'll remember." Then he said, "That stove in East Row Three? Good spot. Once the pot's on, people come—in this Market, noses are sharper than ears."

The stove was built of stone, with a substantial firebox, half a cord of firewood stacked at its base. Shi Po set the pot on top, shook it, wedged a broken tile under one foot, shook again—steady. Qian Duoduo crouched at the stove mouth striking a fire; the firewood was left over from the neighboring stall. He'd asked, and they'd said take it.

Xu Yan recorded the entry: firewood, half cord, borrowed from East Row Three neighboring stall, unpaid.

The ingredients had been weighed out at a rice shop outside the Market that morning: three pots, eighteen spirit stones. Qian Duoduo stared at the six-stone-per-pot ingredients and squatted by the stove without moving for a long time. "Rice that costs four in town costs six here."

"Here a bowl also costs four," Xu Yan said.

Before the Snake hour, Xu Yan spread the bundle of bamboo slivers across his lap and carved numbers into them one by one with a small knife. Around the thirtieth, Qian Duoduo poked his head up from the stove mouth. "Why carve those?"

"One sliver per bowl. The number matches the person."

"The person finishes and leaves. What use is the number?"

"The number stays after he leaves." Xu Yan said it, then kept carving.

Just past the Snake hour, when the shops in the Market had only just finished opening, a man carrying a sack on his shoulders came from the east, walked a few steps past, then turned back and stood before the stove, sniffing. "What's the price."

"Four," Xu Yan said.

The man untied a small cloth pouch from his waist and counted four onto the stove's edge. Qian Duoduo ladled a bowl and held it out; Xu Yan pulled a bamboo sliver from his lap and handed it over. The man looked at the sliver, tucked it into his sash, and squatted against the wall to eat.

Halfway through, he raised his head. "Thicker than the place diagonally across."

"Is it salty enough," Qian Duoduo asked.

"Enough."

He returned the bowl, wiped his mouth, and left, the bamboo sliver still tucked in his sash. Xu Yan swept the four spirit stones into the cloth pouch and tucked it under the wooden box, then recorded: Snake hour, tally one, four spirit stones.

The second came following the smell. The third came following the second. By the time the first pot bottomed out, seven or eight people stood in line before the stove—men in short jackets, a rogue cultivator in a patched old robe, and a shop hand holding a wooden platter who wanted four bowls to go.

Shi Po came back from carrying water, set the buckets by the stove, and stood a pace in front of the stall, not moving. Xu Yan hadn't told him to stand there.

"Shi Po, wash the bowls," Qian Duoduo called.

"When it thins out," Shi Po said.

When the crowd thinned, he squatted by the buckets and washed both stacks of bowls. Finished, he stood and returned to that same spot.

Before Horse hour, the first pot had been scraped down to a scorch at the bottom. Qian Duoduo scraped the scorch out, mixed it with hot water, and squatted behind the stove to drink it himself. Two sips in, he looked up. "A pot, twenty bowls. All twenty went out."

"Twenty slivers in the tube," Xu Yan said. "Numbers one through twenty, and twenty entries in the ledger."

Qian Duoduo, still uneasy, dumped the slivers from the tube and counted them one by one. Done, he slapped them back in—and knocked up a puff of dust. "Twenty."

He stood there a long moment before he set the ladle down, his face gone red.

When he loaded the second pot, his hands were steady. He scooped, ran the back of the ladle once around the rim, and looked up at the customer. "Don't leave the broth. The rice is underneath."

A rogue cultivator in a patched robe finished eating but didn't leave. He studied the wooden box by the stove. "What's in there?"

"Qi-Gathering Powder. Five a bottle."

"Refined up on the mountain?"

"Refined by an elder of the sect."

The rogue cultivator bought two bottles, opened one, and brought it to his nose for a long time. "The fire was a bit overdone."

"The old furnace on the mountain burns wood. Fire control follows the medicinal aroma. When you can't see it, it goes a little old."

"That explains it." The rogue cultivator recorked the bottle, tucked it away, and left. More came after; first one, then the next—twelve compartments in the wooden box emptied.

At the Wei hour, the third pot. The day was hot; the Market's flagstones baked, and the sweat on Qian Duoduo's forehead ran down his face to his chin and dripped into the stove mouth, sending up small wisps of white steam. He wiped his face; his hands were slick with rice starch, and the wipe left his cheeks gleaming.

By the time Monkey hour had passed, the third pot had bottomed out.

Before each pot went on sale, Xu Yan ladled out a spoonful first and poured it into a small porcelain jar. He covered the mouth with oiled paper, sealed it with wax, pressed a fingerprint into the wax, and wrote on the jar in ink: the date and which pot it was. Three jars sat in the corner of the stall. Qian Duoduo stood there scrubbing the pot, glancing at them.

"What are those for?"

"Retained samples," Xu Yan said. "Whatever's in the pot is gone once it's sold. What's in the jars stays. Starting tomorrow, you seal the jars."

At the You hour, Shi Po lifted the pot from the stove, arms sinking under the weight, the soot on the pot's bottom smearing his sleeve. The bamboo slivers from the tally tube went into a cloth pouch, which Qian Duoduo tied shut with three turns of cord. The stove mouth was blocked with stones, then doused with a ladle of water.

Xu Yan wrote the last entry beside the stall. Three pots, four per bowl, two hundred forty; Qi-Gathering Powder, twelve bottles, sixty; out for stall fees fifty, out for ingredients eighteen. Seven hundred sixty-five, add three hundred, subtract sixty-eight—balance: nine hundred ninety-seven.

He finished writing and slipped the brush into the ledger, looked up. The light was sinking behind the ridge of roofs to the west.

Diagonally across stood a shopfront, a freshly lacquered plaque above its lintel. The lamp inside was the first to come on.

A man stood in the doorway, green robes, sleeves rolled, both hands clasped behind his back. He wasn't looking at the street. He was looking this way.

Shi Po carried the pot off the stove; the man was still there. Qian Duoduo swept the water from the ground; the man was still there. Xu Yan finished the last line of the accounts, blew the ink dry, and lifted his head. Their eyes met straight on.

The man neither looked away nor nodded. Someone inside the shop called for the shopkeeper; he answered and turned to go in. The door panels closed one by one; as the last one came halfway shut, he stopped, and through that crack he cast one more glance toward this side.

Xu Yan added one final line at the very bottom of the ledger.