My Sect Is Down to Seven People

Chapter 70: Two Sacks of Rent Rice

The first sound came from the gravel at the foot of the mountain gate—slow, one step at a time, with pauses in between. Nie Bo's broom swept up to the rain-carved gully beside the gate and shifted half a step aside.

The man coming up carried a shoulder pole with a sack hanging from each end, straw padding the bottoms, the hemp ropes wound twice around the pole. When he reached the blue stone at the mountain gate, he set the load down, planted both hands on his knees, and wheezed like a mule just unharnessed from the mill. His straw sandals were caked with yellow mud from the mountain path; his trouser legs were rolled to below the knee, and the rolled cuff was dry.

"Se—Sect Master Xu."

He only managed the name after catching his breath. Then he paused, raised a hand to wipe his forehead, and said, "Old habit. Called you Steward Xu for ten years."

Xu Yan came down the steps, crouched beside the load, and untied one sack. He scooped out a handful of rice. New rice, white and clean, carrying the dry fragrance of sun-drying when spread across his palm. It slipped through his fingers, each grain uniform.

"Uncle Wang," he said.

"Here." Wang Shuan answered fast, like the response was second nature to him.

"You left before dawn?"

"Left at the tail end of the Yin hour. With two sacks on my shoulders, I rested twice on the road, sat a while at the stone bridge." Wang Shuan pressed the cloth towel on his shoulder to his face. "You've retiled the roofs up here." He lifted his chin toward the West Wing. "Last time I brought rice up, that eave was rotten—leaked so bad there were three basins catching water inside."

"Changed in the ninth month," Xu Yan said.

"Good change." Wang Shuan studied the slope of new tiles before folding his towel and tucking it back into his waistband.

Qian Duoduo came out of the kitchen, wiped his hands on his apron, bent down, and hefted one sack onto his shoulder. His shoulder dipped, then held. "Two sacks?"

"Two sacks," Wang Shuan said. "Sun-dried for four days, winnowed twice. Not a grain of sand in them."

Qian Duoduo hauled the sack into the kitchen and came back for the second. Shi Po had appeared from the foot of the wall, his hand resting on the sack's mouth.

"Shi Po." Someone called from the doorway of the Medicine Hall.

Cheng Banshan stood there, one hand braced on the door frame. Shi Po's hand stayed on the sack a moment, then withdrew and closed into a fist.

"I can carry it."

"Even if you can, you don't." Cheng Banshan said. "The rice isn't going anywhere."

Shi Po retreated to the wall and stood watching the sack disappear into the kitchen. Wang Shuan glanced at the boy's shoulders, then at the empty sleeve Cheng Banshan had tucked into his belt. He didn't ask.

In the kitchen, the jar lid was moved aside and both sacks poured in. The half-jar of old rice at the bottom was buried; the surface rose to within two fingers of the rim. Qian Duoduo patted the jar's edge twice, turned both empty sacks inside out and shook them, tipping the last handful from the corners into the jar. Then he folded the sacks flat and set them against the wall. "Wash them, dry them, give them back next time."

By the end of the Snake hour, the three woodcutters had come back from the west slope and leaned their firewood against the kitchen wall. Huo Qing hung his chopping knife on its nail, his right arm hanging, his sleeve flecked with bark. Shao Ming and Du Xiaochuan stood their carrying poles upright. Qi Qi crouched in the front courtyard, repairing the bottom of a back basket with a bamboo sliver, working it in and out.

"Uncle Wang, let's sit in the Main Hall," Xu Yan said.

In the Main Hall, Wang Shuan held the bowl of water A He brought him without drinking. He looked at the roof beams first, and only then set the bowl down.

"Sect Master Xu, the rice is good. The field didn't fail you this year."

"Mm."

"There's something else. I've been thinking on the road how to say it." He pressed both hands flat on his knees. "The water in the fields—it's stopped."

No one spoke. Sunlight climbed past the eaves and laid a strip of brightness on the threshold.

"When did it stop?" Xu Yan asked.

"By the twentieth it was already low. I went out at dawn and the stream only came to my instep. Used to reach my calf." Wang Shuan said. "By the morning of the twenty-second, the stream was dry. A damp line down the middle, but the stones were dry. That little pond east of the fields—the mud at the bottom was hard."

He paused, then went on, slower than before: "These fields have to sit under water through winter. Water over the fields all winter is what keeps the spiritual qi in the soil. Come spring, when you plant, what you cut is spirit rice. If it goes dry for one winter..." He wiped his palm over his knee. "The ground goes hard. Hard as a threshing floor. Come spring, a hoe comes down and leaves a white mark. Same seed, same fertilizer—what grows is ordinary rice."

"Twelve mu—how much water to flood them?" Xu Yan asked.

"As long as the stream flows, they fill on their own. No carrying needed." Wang Shuan said. "With the stream stopped, I could carry water all day and not keep up. I tried for half a day yesterday. The water I poured in soaked away in no time."

Shao Ming sat by the door, twisting a grass stalk between his fingers. "Will the field embankments hold? Water pressing all winter—they'll collapse."

"They'll hold. They do every year." Wang Shuan said. "I built up the banks again in autumn, trampled the foot firm."

"You didn't go up and look?" Xu Yan asked.

"I got halfway up the ridge." Wang Shuan's voice dropped. "There are men in red moving on the ridge. Two or three of them. Knives at their belts. I'm just a farmer—I didn't dare go higher."

Cheng Banshan had worked his wine gourd halfway off his belt. At the words "men in red," he hung it back, wrapping the cord once around his waist to hold it.

Jiang Wan leaned against the door, sword across her knees. "What kind of knives."

"Black scabbards." Wang Shuan thought. "Something shiny on the scabbards—flashes when the sun hits."

"Chixiao people wear red," Qi Qi said from the front courtyard, his bamboo sliver going still.

"Have they come down." Xu Yan asked. "Have they come down to the fields."

"No." Wang Shuan said. "They just sit up on the ridge in the daytime. Around dusk they disappear."

Du Xiaochuan had been standing under the eaves listening since setting down his pole. Now he spoke: "When Outer Court members are sent out to guard something, they rotate. Three days at a stretch, then relief." He paused, then added, "They guard things that can be carried away."

Cheng Banshan listened from the doorway without speaking, tucking his sleeve further into his belt.

A Sui squeezed in from the kitchen side and stood behind Xu Yan. Suddenly she asked, "Uncle Wang, if the fields have no water, does that mean no more rice for us next year?"

The Main Hall went quiet.

Wang Shuan spread his hands on his knees and looked at the child. "There'll still be rice. It'll just be ordinary rice." He spoke slowly, afraid she wouldn't understand. "Ordinary rice smells good too. But it won't make you strong. People on this mountain need spirit rice."

A Sui nodded once and withdrew behind Xu Yan without asking more.

"Qi Qi," Xu Yan said. "These past days on the ridge—have you looked?"

Qi Qi set down his bamboo sliver and stood. "I haven't been up the ridge once since the Autumn Evaluation."

After saying it, he seemed to find it shameful himself, his ears going red. He added, "You never told me to go."

"Withdrawing the watch was my call," Xu Yan said.

He said it flatly, and no one answered. Qi Qi stood a moment, pressing his hands to his trouser seams, then sat back down, sitting straighter than before.

"Tomorrow at the Dragon hour," Xu Yan said. "Myself, Qi Qi, Huo Qing. We follow the stream up and look."

"By the Dragon hour, at the mountain gate," Huo Qing answered from the doorway.

"I'll go too," Jiang Wan said.

"Senior Sister, you watch the mountain gate."

"There are knives up there."

"Which is why they sit on the rocks waiting." Xu Yan said. "Three of us going up is a scouting trip, not a fight."

Jiang Wan shifted her sword on her knees. "And if they won't let us look?"

"Then I come back."

She didn't press further. She turned to the doorway. "Huo Qing, your sword stays on the mountain."

Huo Qing pressed his hand to his knee and answered, "Stays."

No one in the room spoke. Wang Shuan looked from face to face and finished the water in his bowl.

"Sect Master Xu," he set the bowl down, "should I go to the Branch and speak? I'm crude with words, but everyone in town knows me."

"No need." Xu Yan said. "You farm. What water's left in the fields, keep it. Don't try to carry more up."

Midday meal was served in the Main Hall. Wang Shuan had a bowl of spirit rice with sauce poured over, and Qian Duoduo added an extra ladle. "You carried the rice up on your own back. You get a bowl."

Wang Shuan held the bowl and took a bite, chewing slowly.

"This is rice from my own field," he said.

No one laughed at him. A Sui sat near him and broke half of her spirit cake onto the edge of his bowl.

Cheng Banshan sat by the door, took the gourd down again, and held it out. "Have a drink."

"I still have to walk down with the pole."

"An empty pole." Cheng Banshan said. "Rope wound around it—it won't weigh on you."

Wang Shuan took it, sipped once, made a raspy sound of satisfaction, and handed it back with a small smile. "When the Old Sect Master was alive, after taking the rent rice he'd pour me a bowl of wine."

"He didn't pour it." Cheng Banshan hung the gourd back on his belt. "That wine was poured by me. He sat in this seat and said, 'Good rice.'"

"He did. He said 'good rice.'" Wang Shuan lowered his head and took another bite.

After the meal he pushed his bowl aside and rose to leave. The pole was empty now, the rope wound round and round. Xu Yan saw him to the mountain gate.

"Sect Master Xu." Wang Shuan stopped at the top of the slope and shifted the pole to his other shoulder. "If the water doesn't come back, those fields..."

"First we look." Xu Yan said. "After we've looked, I'll send word."

Wang Shuan nodded and started down. The empty pole was light; he went faster than he had come, the gravel crunching until he was out of sight. Nie Bo's broom swept along behind the sound, smoothing the slope.

That afternoon a bamboo pole was strung under the West Wing veranda. Winter clothing, quilt batting, Cheng Banshan's sleeveless vest—all hung to dry, turned inside out to sun the lining. Shi Po worked through the loose rope ends by the wall, straightening them one by one. Qian Duoduo brought out a basin of washed empty sacks, shook them open, and hung them up, mouths down, dripping water onto the blue stones, drop by drop.

At night in the Accounts Room, Xu Yan drew the winter-supplies list from the front of the ledger. The paper had been folded twice; the creases were soft and deep. He spread it under the lamp and read from top to bottom: October rations, roof tiles for the West Wing, window paper for the Medicine Hall, winter clothes and quilt batting, charcoal.

Tiles—crossed off. Window paper—crossed off. Quilt batting—crossed off. Under October rations there were two more lines in small script, added on the twentieth: one sack of coarse grain, ten spirit stones; two sacks of spirit rice, waiting for Uncle Wang's rent rice.

First he used his thumbnail to strike through the bottom line—from "spirit rice" through to "rent rice." A straight line. The rice was in the kitchen jar now, carried up on Uncle Wang's back.

Then his thumbnail moved to "October rations" and crossed it out. The sack of coarse grain for the thirtieth market day—the spirit stones sat in the accounts; this line could come off.

One line remained on the list: charcoal.

He smoothed the paper flat and read it through from beginning to end. There had been no spirit stones in or out today; the running ledger page was blank, and he didn't add anything to it. He hadn't touched the ledger in his coat either.

The lamp wick had shortened, the light shrinking back a finger's width. On this slip of paper, from start to finish, there was not a single mention of water. Water had never cost a spirit stone, so there had never been a line for it.

He folded the paper shut and pressed it back into the front of the ledger. There was still a small sound from the kitchen across the courtyard—Qian Duoduo pressing the jar lid tight, then patting the rim twice when he was done.

Xu Yan blew out the lamp. The rice was here. The water was gone.