My Sect Is Down to Seven People

Chapter 47: Things Returned

The hour had not yet reached mid-morning, and only two door panels were off the tea stall at the town gate. Qi Qi sat on the bench farthest inside, his back against the earthen wall, both hands tucked into his sleeves. The bowl of tea on the table in front of him had not been touched.

Old Tao leaned the remaining door panels against the wall one by one and glanced down the road toward the town gate, but asked nothing.

By the time Xu Yan arrived, the sky was fully light. He set his cloth bundle on the table and sat down across from him.

Old Tao came over with the pot and poured a bowl. "Four coppers."

Xu Yan fished out four coppers and set them on the table. They clinked twice.

"Drink." He pushed the bowl across to Qi Qi.

"I've got my own." Qi Qi lifted his chin toward his own bowl.

Xu Yan untied the cloth bundle, took out the account book, and flipped to the page with the rough paper tucked in it, pinning it down with a finger.

A page turned under his hand.

[Debit: Heritage, one point.]

[Balance: Heritage, six points.]

[Audit: Qi Qi. Wind Spirit Root, half-defective. Strengths: Speed.]

Qi Qi stared at that hand from across the table. The old ledger opened, closed. The paper was yellow, the corners worn soft. He saw nothing.

"The money you stole. Where did it go?" Xu Yan asked.

Qi Qi lifted his bowl for a sip. The tea had gone cold. He set it back down.

"Who says I spent it."

"Fifteen mid-grade stones, and you won't pay them back. That's enough to live on in this town for the rest of your life."

"I didn't know that's what was in there." He looked up. "I know bright. Low-grade stones don't shine like that."

"You know now." Xu Yan set the brush down. "That pouch of money was enough to rob every shop on this street, one by one."

Qi Qi's mouth twitched, but the smile didn't come.

"Stolen money. What did you do with it."

"People in town. People from out of town. Both." Qi Qi said.

"I asked what you did with it."

Qi Qi turned his eyes away, out past the stall. Under the old pagoda tree at the town gate, two people squatted sunning themselves. Someone walked by carrying water, and drops splashed from the buckets onto the flagstones, darkening a thin line.

"There are three in the ruined temple at the east end of town," he said. "Two of them aren't even as tall as a stove. The other one drags a leg, can't move fast. I buy them flatbread. Flatbread's two coppers each. Three kids, twelve coppers a day. Two meals a day."

Xu Yan said nothing.

"One winter when I was little, I was in that temple too," Qi Qi said. "Nobody bought me flatbread then."

"There are rice shops in town. There's work at the wharf."

"I tried the wharf." Qi Qi let out a short laugh. "The overseer took one look at me and said, 'Those arms are too thin.' I squatted on the embankment and watched them all morning. One sack of salt, eighty catties. Two coppers a sack."

"You couldn't carry it."

"Couldn't carry it."

"You're fast."

"Fast puts food on the table?" Qi Qi said. "I've been on this street since I was a kid. Nobody hires me. Fast—that's the one thing I've got."

Xu Yan turned the tea bowl half a circle.

"Your Wind Spirit Root is half-gone," he said. "But your footwork is quick. You built that yourself. No one taught you, and no one ever gave you a single spirit stone."

Qi Qi looked up.

"Half-gone." He repeated the words, then looked down at his own hands. "So that's it. When I run, that breath in my chest never feels like enough."

"It's enough. You just don't know how to use it."

Qi Qi clenched his hands inside his sleeves, then let them loose.

"You want to learn something real." Xu Yan said. "First, return everything you stole this month. Every single thing."

Qi Qi straightened on the bench.

"The second. Liu Sao, who sells needles and thread on South Street. Her coin purse, forty-seven coppers in it." He started counting it off without stopping for breath. "The night of the third, in the back courtyard of Luoxia Inn, an out-of-town cloth merchant's pouch. Two taels of loose silver. Didn't spend a coin of it—gave it all away. The fifth, market day. The old woman who sells vegetables, a string of coins in her basket. Twenty-six coppers. I only took the ones pressed on top. The sixth, half a cured chicken the butcher had hung under his eaves. The seventh, a new hemp rope by the wharf. Used it for a rope ladder, then put it back when I was done. The eighth, a martial hall student's coin purse. Two hundred ten coppers. I kept ten, stuffed the rest back onto his belt. The ninth, a single shirt left drying outside an inn's back window. The tenth, a porter's water flask at his waist. The eleventh—that was yours. Fifteen stones."

Someone out on the street hawked tofu, the cry slapping against the walls and scattering. Old Tao passed by with his pot and topped up both bowls halfway. He said nothing.

"You remember clearly," Xu Yan said.

"After I steal, I keep it in my head." Qi Qi licked his lips. "Can't pay it back, can't settle my heart."

Xu Yan picked up the brush and set it down on the rough paper, line by line. Second, Liu Sao, forty-seven coppers.

"Third, the cloth merchant, two taels." He looked up at Qi Qi. "Keep going."

He counted through to the eleventh, then paused. "Eleventh, one from the accounts room, fifteen stones. Returned same day."

"That one's written off." Xu Yan pressed the brush to the paper. "Starting tomorrow, you take me to each one, house by house."

"You're not going to ask me why I stole."

"I've noted it." Xu Yan closed the account book. "It stays noted for now."

At noon, Xu Yan went to the grain shop and weighed out twenty catties of spirit rice for A He: eight stones. The shopkeeper scooped the rice and asked, "Selling this market?"

"Fifteenth, on the fifth."

A new line went into the account book: August 12, expenditure, spirit rice, eight stones. Balance on hand below it: 1,822 stones.

The next day, mid-morning, the two of them walked from the town gate toward South Street.

Liu Sao's stall was set up in front of the ready-made clothes shop. Needles, thread, buttons, paper patterns for shoe uppers—each in its own little square. Qi Qi stepped up and placed a stack of coppers on the stall board. "Liu Sao, this is your coin purse. Forty-seven coppers, not one missing."

"My coin purse?" Liu Sao stared at him for a long moment, then her voice shot up. "Well, I'll be. So it was you, you little brat."

She counted the coins, then counted them again.

"Three coppers short."

Qi Qi dug three coppers out of his own pocket and placed them on the board.

"I bought half a flatbread on the way that day," he said.

Liu Sao scooped the money into her sleeve in one grab, cursed once, and turned away to greet a customer. She didn't look at him again.

Qi Qi knocked on the butcher's door himself. The door opened halfway. An old man stood inside holding a boning knife, and the moment he saw Qi Qi, his face darkened.

"Half a cured chicken," Qi Qi said. "I ate it."

"Ate it?" The old man took a step forward. "You ate it and you still couldn't fill yourself with half a chicken! You sure know how to pick—took the driest one hanging under the eaves."

"I'll pay you back."

"With what?"

Qi Qi said nothing.

The old man looked at him for a while, then drew the door back. "It's eaten. Leave it. Just don't let me catch you passing under my eaves again." The door shut. From inside came the clang of iron against iron.

The third house was down a narrow lane. The door opened a crack. A hand reached out, took back the shirt, and the door closed. Qi Qi stood outside for a while. There was no sound from within.

Two stone footings stood in front of the martial hall gate. The young man was in the yard practicing his forms. When he'd heard it all, he came down from the steps. "I wondered where that went when I couldn't find it that night. Thought I'd dropped it by the river." He took the money, then abruptly asked, "So why give it back?"

Qi Qi said, "It's in the ledger."

The young man glanced at Xu Yan, not understanding.

The porter was at the wharf, not home. The things were handed to a man who shared his room. The man couldn't read, so Xu Yan wrote on the rough paper and had him press a fingerprint into it, using mud from his own finger. The mud smeared a square print against the paper.

The old vegetable seller was sitting on the stone at the market entrance, with half a basket of scallions in front of her and two small bunches of greens. Qi Qi placed the coins in her basket.

She first pushed half the money back, then looked at him, and at Xu Yan beside him.

"Don't steal again," she said.

The half she'd pushed back, Qi Qi pushed forward again. She didn't push it back a second time. Instead, she pulled two bunches of scallions from the basket and stuffed them into his hands. He walked on holding the scallions for a ways, then suddenly said, "She gave me a bunch last time too."

The last item was at Luoxia Inn.

The innkeeper flipped through his register. "Left early on the morning of the fourth. Paid up his room. Said he was heading toward Linchuan City, something about a big market there."

Qi Qi stood before the counter, both hands tucked back into his sleeves.

Xu Yan spread the account book on the counter and added a new line: August 13, debt, out-of-town cloth merchant, two taels of loose silver. Handled by, Qi Qi. When he finished writing, he let the brush tip rest a moment on the paper.

"If he passes through Luoxia Town again, this debt gets paid to him. If he doesn't come, it stays on the books."

"And if he never comes back?"

"Debts are cleared when the man shows up. If he doesn't show, the debt doesn't clear itself."

Qi Qi lowered his head, looking at the line.

"I'll pay this one back myself."

"With what."

"Errands." Qi Qi said. "Can't carry sacks, but I can run. Delivery work in town, two coppers a trip."

Xu Yan closed the account book. "Clear the debts first. Once they're clear, do as you see fit."

By the time they headed back toward the town gate, the sky was already going dark. In an alley, someone was taking clothes down from a bamboo pole. The pole swayed, and the shadows swayed with it. At the fork in the road, Qi Qi stopped. He didn't turn down toward his own place.

"Where do I go tomorrow?"

"The Mountain Gate. Snake hour."

On the fourteenth, at the Snake hour, Xu Yan waited at the Mountain Gate.

Qi Qi came up the mountain path alone. His clothes had been washed; the water stains at the cuffs hadn't dried yet.

Nie Bo was sweeping in front of the gate steps. The broom went back and forth, pushing a few yellow leaves to the side. When Qi Qi walked past, he shifted half a step aside, without stopping the broom.

There was a threshold between the front courtyard and the Ancestral Hall. Qi Qi stopped outside it and looked in. On the offering table stood a row of ancestral tablets. The top tier held the Founding Patriarchs; the tier below held past Sect Masters, generation by generation. The lacquer on the last one still gleamed.

Xu Yan went in first. He pulled the wooden box out from under the offering table, spread the roster on the table, ground some ink, and laid the brush beside the roster.

"Come in."

Qi Qi stepped inside and stood before the table. He didn't know where to put his hands, and finally tucked them back into his sleeves.

"Three steps," Xu Yan said. "First, kowtow to the Founding Patriarchs and the past Sect Masters. Then bow to me. Then say, in your own words, that you're willing to come. After that, write your name."

He knelt. Three kowtows, his forehead striking the brick with a sound.

When he rose, he turned to Xu Yan and bowed.

"I willingly join Qingya," he said, his voice trembling slightly.

"Write your name."

Qi Qi took the brush and first wiped his hand on the cuff of his sleeve. When he wrote "Qi," the right vertical stroke huddled at the top; when he wrote "Qi," the horizontal stroke stretched too long, and the final stroke came too fast, the brush tip digging into the paper and leaving an ink dot. He looked at it, then handed the brush back.

A page turned in the ledger.

[Balance: Registered Disciples, five.]

Qi Qi let his hands fall and looked at the line of his own writing in the roster. Then he suddenly turned to face Xu Yan.

"Sect Master."

The words came out small. Xu Yan answered with a grunt.

"Sect Master." He called it again, louder this time. The hall gave back a faint echo.

Xu Yan closed the roster and slid it back into the wooden box. "There's a plank bed in the West Wing. Bowls are in the kitchen."

Quite a few people were standing in the courtyard. A Sui squeezed out from behind the others and asked, "Which room are you sleeping in tonight?"

A He answered from behind her: "There's still one plank in the West Wing."

Cheng Banshan leaned against the Ancestral Hall doorframe, one hand on his wine gourd. "Another mouth to feed."

Qian Duoduo was already coming up the steps. "There's still some in the pot. Let me get you a bowl."

Bai Xiaoman crouched on the steps, a cloth bundle hugged to her chest. She looked up at him. "Can you go up the back mountain? Bring some water up tomorrow."

Huo Qing leaned against a pillar and was silent for a long while before he finally spoke. "Wash your own bowl."

Qi Qi turned around and called out toward the East Courtyard. "Senior Sister!"

Jiang Wan was standing on the veranda outside the Ancestral Hall, sword sheath in hand. She glanced at him, lifted the sheath a little higher, and turned toward the East Courtyard. She didn't stop walking.

Qi Qi stood there and only closed his mouth after she was long gone.

Carrying his bedding, Qi Qi went into the West Wing and looked through the rooms one by one. The door to the innermost room was open. Shi Po sat on the plank bed, one shoulder bared, a few pieces of clothing draped over his arm. The scab on his right shoulder had formed; a ring of white skin surrounded it.

Qi Qi stood at the door for a while, shifted his bedding from one shoulder to the other, then shifted it back.

"That wall you broke. How much did it cost to fix?"

Shi Po thought for a moment.

"Don't know. The Sect Master covered it."