Zhengui had grown, and not just physically.

  When she had lain down for her weekly sleep, he had still been big enough to fit in her hands. When she awoke and went to fetch him from his kiln, she had found the entrance cracked open and two, much larger sets of eyes staring up at her. She could still pick him up comfortably, and even hold him in her arms, but he was nearly a half meter long, ignoring his serpentine half.

  His thoughts were growing more ordered, allowing her to more easily translate the meanings into words. She could feel his sheepishness as he pawed at the ground with his stubby claws and the serpent half studiously avoided her eyes.

  “I guess it was only a matter of time before I needed to build you a new bed.” Ling Qi sighed , shaking her head. He had shot up to the middle of the first realm too, as far as her senses could tell, and he was racing on toward the end of it. It seemed her little spirit was reaching the end of his infancy.

  She glanced back down at him to meet his bright green eyes, hopefulness shining from his blunt, beaked face.

  She was faced with a second set of eyes, this time of fiery red.

  “.…… Breakfast first.” Ling Qi crouched down, slipping her arms under his shell as she picked him up. He was warm to the touch, and his shell had grown rougher, like knobby, petrified tree bark. “C’mon, then. You’re going to have to start helping though, you know? You’re growing up quick.”


  two voices chorused together. Gui nestled against her chest while Zhen peered cautiously over her shoulder, forked tongue trailing ash as it flicked in and out. Ling Qi almost missed a step.

  “Big Sister,” she said quickly, reaching down to rub his blunt beak with her finger. She did her best to convey feeling as well as words. “I’m not that old yet,” she added lightly.

  Bright green eyes blinked up at her in confusion.

  The moment was interrupted by his other head, who looked to her plaintively.

  “Yeah, yeah, no need to be impatient,” she chided, even as she fished a stick of wood from her pocket to calm Zhengui’s rumbling belly. She would have to start cutting these sticks larger with how much he was growing. She would miss being able to have him ride on her shoulder. Maybe Cui could teach Zhengui her size adjustment trick?

  For now, it was time to gather a healthy meal for her little glutton of a spirit. Once that was done and he was settled in, she would have to arrange something else for his bedding. Then, she would head up to the vent to begin working on refining the Thousand Ring Fortress. Even in its early stages, it had proved very useful in bolstering her friends and allies, letting the group break through the enemy line with minimal injury.

  She still had a long way to go before that art could be considered mastered. She remembered Li Suyin tumbling to the ground in a heap, and blood blossoming on Meizhen’s white gown. Next time, she would do better.

  Ling Qi descended the mountain to hunt and forage, keeping the cores and various fruits and plants that he seemed to enjoy and selling the rest for various spiritually infused woods and even more cores.

  Once she had a large stockpile built, the main challenge was keeping the hungry little snake-tortoise out of it and resisting the twinned powers of wide and plaintive eyes combined with increasingly articulate childish pleas for treats. She held firm though. She would only give him so much each day. If he wanted more, he had to do some foraging himself……

  Well, she mostly held firm. A few treats while he sat in her lap chirping happily couldn’t hurt, right? The day blurred by, and she did not get very much cultivation done until late evening when it was time to meet Meizhen for some further training time.

  Ling Qi hadn’t seen the girl since the day of Sun Liling’s return, and their conversation that evening had been quick and utilitarian. She was happy to see her friend looking as hale and graceful as ever as she flowed through the motions of what Ling Qi recognized as one of her family’s unarmed combat exercises.

  “Meizhen, good evening,” she greeted as she stepped off the porch and onto the garden path. Zhengui trundled along at her side, his blunt clawed feet scrabbling a bit at the polished wood. “I’m glad to see you’re doing well. Have you been keeping busy with shoring things up around here?” Ling Qi was a little unsure as to how deeply involved Meizhen was with the Cai heiress at this point.

  Meizhen turned to face her as she approached, lowering her hands from their combative position. “Good evening,” she greeted, acknowledging Ling Qi with a slight nod. “I have been refining certain underdeveloped portions of my repertoire. Cui has needed some aid in acclimating to her new status as well,” the pale girl continued evenly, her golden eyes flicking over to the garden pond.

  The pond rippled, and after a moment, emerald green scales broke the surface and Ling Qi found herself under the regard of another set of golden eyes. Cui had grown as well. The serpent was as thick as a young tree now and looked as if she could swallow a large dog whole.

  Ling Qi’s eyes caught motion out of the corner of her eye, and on the other side of the garden, she saw Cui’s tail slip under the surface of the area’s second and entirely unconnected pond. That was a…… powerful ability.

  “Everyone is growing so fast these days,” Ling Qi mused. “That reminds me though. Is that shrinking trick of yours something any spirit can do? Zhengui had a little growth spurt himself.” Ling Qi wondered when talking to a snake big enough to fit her head in its mouth had become normal.

  Cui flicked her tongue twice silently, and briefly, Ling Qi wondered if the serpent would ignore her. Then Meizhen tilted her head slightly, giving her cousin a pointed look and the snake let out a soft hiss.

  Cui responded haughtily, giving Zhengui a look of reptilian disdain. He responded by hiding behind her legs, but Ling Qi saw his serpentine half peeking out, giving off a feeling of awe as he stared up at the bigger snake.

  “It is not impossible, no,” Bai Meizhen said frankly. “Many spirit beasts are able to vary their size somewhat, although there is a limit.” A slight smile touched her lips as she glanced at Cui. “She will no longer be able to play choker, for example.”


  Cui sulked, even as she shrank and slithered from the pool, vibrant scales glimmering with moisture. By the time she stopped shrinking, Cui was still over two meters long.

  she grumbled.

  “Well, that is good to know,” she decided. “How are things outside though? I’ve been down in the forest today.”


  “They are holding,” Meizhen replied simply, and it was a relief to see her speaking normally and without hesitation, meeting Ling Qi’s eyes with only a slight pause as she folded her arms. “That barbarian is licking her wounds, and if I know her kind, she is likely rearming and training her subordinates. Several older disciples from the western territories have openly joined her, as has Ji Rong.”


  Ling Qi frowned. That was trouble in the making there. She doubted that Sun Liling would be satisfied with merely having her own faction, even if its existence in and of itself was a snub to Cai Renxiang as she understood things. “Are we doing anything about that?” she asked, toying with the end of her braid.

  “We are regrouping ourselves,” Bai Meizhen answered, shifting her stance slightly to a more combative one as her flying sword manifested in a flash above her shoulder. “For now, we push our own strength. I should like to begin, if it is all the same to you. We do not have the luxury of dawdling.”


  “I can get behind that,” Ling Qi agreed, slipping into her own stance. “I need to get faster myself.” She glanced down at Zhengui, who looked up at her with worry emanating from his thoughts. “It’s okay, Zhengui. My friend and I are just going to play a little, alright? Why don’t you go get a treat from the wood shed?”


  He looked to Meizhen uncertainly but backed away, toddling off toward the flowerbed Cui had disappeared into.

  “You do not need to speak aloud to communicate with him,” Meizhen said as she examined Ling Qi’s stance.

  “I know, but I’m not very good at trying to project thoughts yet. Speaking is easier. I’m working on it,” Ling Qi said. After a moment’s thought, she summoned up the practice weapon she had been working with, the heavy glaive materializing in her hands from within her storage ring. “Do you mind if I work with this? I want to try out Sable Crescent Step with a different motion set.”


  “Do not blame me for the blows you suffer in doing so,” Meizhen allowed. “And do not forget to practice. Instant communication with one’s partner is invaluable in battle.”


  Ling Qi nodded, and they began to circle one another. Then, Bai Meizhen blurred, a fine spray of mist kicked up in her wake, and Ling Qi’s limbs dissolved into shadow as she strained to match the other girl’s speed.

  It was nice, aside from the stinging pain of the minor toxin Meizhen used for the spar. Sparring and cultivating together was something they could still do without awkwardness, and Ling Qi was glad for it.

  All good things come to an end though, and they parted ways well after midnight to get back to their own tasks. Zhengui had fallen asleep in his adjusted kiln while they sparred, so Ling Qi ghosted away without any trouble, returning to the higher cliffs she had taken to using for absorbing starlight. She needed to meditate further to decipher the cloud of images, sounds, and memory that had flashed through her thoughts when she was considering the tasks from various phases of the moon.

  The odd post-combat vision and her actions in the immediate aftermath made her a little wary, but she was more aware now of the foibles of the lunar qi she used. She wouldn’t let herself grow so erratic again.

  It did not take long to return to that place within her thoughts, the dark pool that reflected the phases of the moon. This time, when she reached for the reflection of the Grinning Moon, she kept her focus, and the torrent of sensation did not overwhelm her.

  Soft, amused laughter rang in her ears as her surroundings spun away in a whirl of silvery luminescence, and for a moment, she felt the sensation of cool, delicate hands upon her shoulders as visions flashed in front of her eyes, imparting the quest of the Grinning Moon. The jade slip and the book, a thick tome with a dark red cover and no title, were a piece of power and a piece of knowledge, the first for her, and the second to share.

  The figure in the mist grew clearer, revealing a tall, whip-thin boy with dark catlike green eyes that glowed faintly and who cast a hunched, misshapen shadow. She did not recognize him, but her memory spun, and the words spoken by the boy she had threatened rose to the surface. Yan Renshu. Her target was the older Outer Sect disciple, the one who Cai had said was the maker of that puppet that attempted to frame her.

  The visions of ghostlike green lanterns and an underground room came next. The location perhaps? It remained unclear.

  What did not remain unclear was her objective. She was to steal a technique slip and acquire the book from him, or at least the knowledge inside of it. She was to…… reveal something from the book, which would cost him much face. What exactly would be revealed, however, remained shrouded in her mind’s eye.

  It seemed that was all she was going to get. The visions faded, replaced by the twinkling of stars overhead. Ling Qi remained seated for a time, considering the scant details of the task she had been given. It was barely an outline of a task; she had the absolute essentials, but nothing else.

  She could feel something had subtly changed in the practiced flows of her internal energies. As she slipped down from the high cliff, blending in with the shadows, she felt a tiny trickle of qi continuing to flow into her dantian, only to cease as she stepped out into the street outside of her house. Slipping back into the shadows on a whim, she followed another girl unseen for a time and with each soft and unheard step, her qi cycled, just a little more.

  It seemed the Grinning Moon had given her a taste of her blessing already.

  Threads 95-Diplomacy 4

  Ling Qi had secured an in. Wang Chao seemed to be in a pretty good mood so she suspected he’d be amenable to more weekly training sessions. But Ling Qi thought maybe she could push for more.

  “It might be interesting to make something more of it,” Ling Qi mused.

  Sixiang silently encouraged her.

  “What did you have in mind, Miss Ling?” Wang Chao asked.

  Rather than answer directly, Ling Qi asked, “Alingge, do you think you might be interested in training with us sometime?”


  Alingge came up short, looking briefly bewildered by the sudden invitation. “I would not be opposed.”


  “I assume you wouldn’t be opposed to allowing Liang He along either,” Ling Qi said, turning back to Wang Chao. “And maybe one or two others from time to time?”


  “It would be more difficult to pass on the lessons you are looking for like that,” Wang Chao said slowly, but he was not dismissing her suggestions out of hand. She caught him looking briefly at Alingge. “Would your lord truly be fine with that, Miss Alingge?”


  The girl twitched. “Lord Luo does not seek to leash his followers.”


  Wang Chao held up his hands, speaking quickly. “I meant no offense!”


  Her head really was in the gutter. Ling Qi blamed Sixiang.

  they whispered unrepentantly.

  That aside, looking at them talk, she didn’t get the sense that Wang Chao was interested in Alingge that way. Ah, that was it. Wang Chao was isolated. The Wang were new to their lands and position, so they had few vicontiel vassals, and not even that many baronial vassals. So compared to someone like Luo Zhong, Wang Chao wouldn’t have the wide base of vassal acquaintances needed to really play the same game as the other comital scions. But a comital scion was still comital, and together with someone of her position pushing it……

  “I’m just not very skilled at setting up gatherings,” Ling Qi hinted heavily. “I was hoping you might assist me with that as well. Of course, I’d be happy to accommodate anyone you wanted to invite as well.”


  Wang Chao brightened up considerably, and she was certain that she had hit the mark. “Oho, I see. That is what you mean! An interesting proposition, Miss Ling!”


  “Gui doesn’t quite get it, but Big Sister wants to fight lots of people?” her little brother questioned. He was resting his forelegs on the lip of the crater, peering up at them.

  “Something like that. You could meet other spirit beasts as well, I’m sure,” Ling Qi said, crouching down to rub his dusty head. “I think it’s a good idea.”


  “Miss Ling’s ambition has grown since we traded our first words,” Liang He said dryly, only to quail as she shot him a look.

  “Do not be like that, Liang He,” Wang Chao said, clapping him on the back. “We can use more sparring partners.” Wang Chao was increasingly taken by the idea of having something like Luo Zhong’s parties to his name. “Hm, hm, I’ll have to look into booking one of the good training grounds. And we would need sparring licenses……”


  “I can see to those if you give me a list of names,” Ling Qi offered, standing back up. “I would not want to make you do all of the work.”


  “Yes, of course,” Wang Chao said. “We’ll have to speak of things later. Still, that’s going to take some time to arrange, particularly with deployments!”


  Ling Qi winced. “Ah, I hadn’t thought of that.”


  The stocky boy nodded enthusiastically. “Things slip by all of us. So for now, why don’t we just decide on a time for me to give you some of that advice you sought?”


  “Thank you very much,” Ling Qi replied, clapping her hands together and bowing her head. She found her smile was genuine. This…… wasn’t so bad.

  ***

  They scheduled their lessons for later that afternoon, and with a bit of wrangling, every third day for an hour in the evening. Wang Chao was not an inspired teacher, but Ling Qi listened carefully to his words anyway as he began to walk her through hardpoint tactics, herding maneuvers, and other such things. There was a surprising amount of social maneuvering and manipulation when it came to battlefield tactics. A cultivator could just blast away with their biggest techniques, overrunning enemies with superior power, but it was wasteful.

  Instead, Ling Qi could accomplish so much more with a little cunning and tactical sleight of hand. Perhaps she had been engaging with full battlefields entirely wrong. Rather than thinking of it like a duel with a whole mess of people on either side, she should have been thinking of battles more like…… very violent heists.

  However, even as she drank in everything that Wang Chao had to say on matters of tactics and war, she found herself frustrated in other ways. Her cultivation still felt sluggish. Each cycling of her qi sent a twinge of pain up her spine, making it difficult to relax and meditate. Thankfully, it wasn’t so bad as to cause her to fail in opening meridians. With the help of Suyin’s meridian clearing tool, all eight of the meridians she needed to open for cultivating techniques next month were open, but……

  She still felt slow.

  Ling Qi did not need Sixiang’s advice to know not to mention her complaints in Wang Chao’s hearing, not when she was closing in on the fourth stage of the green soul realm despite her sluggishness. Besides, Zhengui was really enjoying himself, as far as she could tell. She wouldn’t want to dampen his spirits.

  ***

  “You have been quite the butterfly recently,” Meizhen said dryly, entering the worn down circle of foundation stones. “Beast, inform me where you have hidden the real Ling Qi.”


  “Ha ha,” Ling Qi said, saying the sounds flatly. “I wasn’t that bad.” She didn’t turn from her seat on the round boulder, keeping her eyes on the glittering beam of moonlight ahead of her. Sixiang was working hard, but they couldn’t quite manage to manifest without expending a great deal of qi yet.

  “You were,” Meizhen disagreed, her flowing steps carrying her to stand beside Ling Qi. “I was as well.”


  “You’ve improved more than I have. I barely managed to stumble through a dinner with Bao Qian without making a total ass of myself. But you……” Ling Qi gave her friend a sidelong look, a mischievous sparkle in her eyes. “You’ve had success.” Tinkling laughter, Sixiang’s laughter, drifted on the wind.

  Meizhen’s eyes flew open wide, and her cheeks pinked. “What?! How did you—?!”


  “She didn’t. She’s guessing,” Sixiang’s disembodied voice called out. “We just heard that Bao Qingling came to her cousin in a fluster.”


  “Gotta work on that reaction,” Ling Qi teased.

  “Wicked girl,” Meizhen hissed, turning her face away. “Is that why you invited me out to this ruin?”


  “Partially,” Ling Qi said, still grinning widely at her friend’s flustered expression. This kind of thing…… She was still deeply wary of it in her heart, but Bai Meizhen was strong. No matter what happened, she was sure that Meizhen was in control. “So,” she said eagerly, “tell me what happened.”


  “I do not see why I should share such private matters,” Meizhen said huffily, refusing to look at her.

  “C’mon, I’m sorry for teasing,” Ling Qi cajoled. “But please, I

  to know how you managed to get that girl to notice what you were trying to do.”


  “She is not half as dense as you,” Meizhen shot back.

  Ling Qi recoiled dramatically as if wounded, and the wind echoed with snickering. “She’s got you there,” Sixiang said.

  “Now you’re just being cruel,” Ling Qi complained. “Please tell me?”


  Meizhen finally turned to look at her, though her cheeks were still pink. “If you must know, I— That is—” It was bizarre to see the usually perfectly composed Bai Meizhen stumbling on her words.

  “If you really don’t want to say, I won’t keep pressing,” Ling Qi backed off.

  “No, it’s just—I was aiding her with the cataloguing of factors to the toxins which the medicine hall was studying, and conversation turned to issues of betrothal. She mentioned finding all of her suitors to be blithering irritants, and I concurred,” Meizhen said.

  It was weird that Ling Qi could picture that conversation so easily in her head. She remained silent, not wanting to interrupt her friend’s momentum.

  “She then lamented that she could not get a match with someone as competent as I, and…… I also agreed.” Meizhen coughed. “I may have…… complimented her as well, and er…… lamented that I was not in position to grow closer to her.”


  “And then what happened?” Ling Qi asked, unable to help herself as she leaned forward.

  “She told me to stop making fun of her,” Meizhen said. “I…… told her I was not.”


  Ling Qi almost winced at the high-pitched squeal Sixiang let loose inside of her head before the muse devolved into babbling about how cute the scenario was. “She believed you?”


  “.…… There may have been some convincing involved,” Meizhen replied evasively.

  “You kissed her,” Ling Qi accused.

  “I asked permission first,” Meizhen defended. “Qingling…… may have thought I was still jesting however.”


  It was only her familiarity with Meizhen that told her how very tense the girl was. She couldn’t imagine how hard that must have been for her after…… “Congratulations, Meizhen.”


  “I even,” Meizhen said, flushing further, “embraced her briefly at our parting.”


  Ling Qi and Meizhen ignored Sixiang’s wolf whistle. “I don’t understand how you can be so forward. You’re so much braver than I am.”


  “Have you ever met an individual that you would consider doing such things with?” Meizhen asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “No,” Ling Qi admitted. It was a hard thing to even picture without uglier thoughts corrupting it. “But my statement stands.”


  “You are braver than you think, Qi,” Meizhen said, briefly resting her hand on Ling Qi’s shoulder. “Now, what is it you are working on out here?”


  “Sixiang has been trying to teach me to move more like they do.” Ling Qi sighed. “But I’m having a hard time with it.”


  “Sixiang is an immaterial spirit,” Meizhen pointed out.

  “Right, right, and I’m not at a level where I can replicate that,” Ling Qi said, frowning at the worn stones. “Not for long anyway. We’re trying to meet each other halfway.”


  “Ah, you are trying to step into the liminal realm,” Meizhen said, understanding dawning on her.

  “Pretty much! I can pull her in when she’s asleep, but doing it consciously is hard!” Sixiang agreed.

  “Wait, what’s that term?” Ling Qi asked.

  “It refers to the space where certain spirits dwell, not wholly outside the material realm, yet not wholly part of it either. It is also called the realm of consciousness, or the Father’s Hearth by some,” Meizhen explained academically, elegantly seating herself on another stone. “It is typically accessed through dreams and mirrors. The technique which allows communication with Grandmother Serpent makes use of it as well, or so I have been taught.”


  “Huh. I just call it the Dream.” Ling Qi shrugged.

  “Not inaccurate,” Meizhen conceded. “I am not sure I can assist much on the matter.”


  “That’s fine,” Ling Qi replied. “Despite what you said earlier, I mostly wanted to hang out with my best friend, even if I’m taking dance lessons while I do it. Gotta learn to split that focus, you know?”


  Meizhen let out a sigh, rubbing the bridge of her nose. “Well, I cannot say that I object.”