The days passed quickly, long hours of cultivation passed by in moments as she progressed toward new levels of mastery.

  The mountain was peaceful. Even the constant background noise of sanctioned duels faded away as more and more disciples entered closed door cultivation, pushing for some last edge or skill increase. Ling Qi wasn’t much different in that regard, although her training with Lady Cai was taking on a more academic edge.

  Instead of sparring or receiving the heiress’ techniques, she found herself spending a lot of time in the market gathering information on the activity of the disciples there and polishing skills she had left to rust over the course of the year. It didn’t hinder her cultivation too much, but it was hard work to stay focused when dealing with uninteresting things like sales numbers and inventories.

  Most of her remaining time went toward the Sect job she had accepted. Frankly, it wasn’t something she normally would have taken, but the job board was growing emptier by the day, and it was one of the two highest paying jobs left. Thankfully, she wasn’t stuck doing the tedious work alone. Li Suyin was among the other disciples who had taken the job to replant the scar in the forest.

  The sun shined and beat down on the field of crumbled rubble and dirt where the ground had collapsed. The fine gray dust that had covered everything had been replaced by dark loamy soil at some point since the last time Ling Qi had seen the area. Ahead of her and Li Suyin, Zhengui trudged, happily breathing out clouds of drifting, wood qi infused ash that settled into the soil as they passed. Around them, a half dozen skeletal birds of various species fluttered through the air, scattering various seeds from pouches hung from their bony forms.

  Ling Qi and Li Suyin both had more expensive satchels crafted with space expanding formations to allow them to hold seedlings from various tree species. While their companions took care of the more indiscriminate work, the two girls would stop every so often to plant a new tree at the proper flag-marked points in the dirt.

  “I see you’ve really improved those scouts,” Ling Qi said as they crouched down at the next flag. She began to prepare the ground for planting.

  Li Suyin glanced up to watch one of her constructs. The skeletal bird was nearly organic in its motion with only a hint of the jerkiness that marked Ling Qi’s own constructs. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ve figured out several improvements for them, and if you have time today, I’ve received permission from Senior Sister Bao to invite you to the workshop. The constructs have been very useful for my anatomical studies, so I have been giving them some focus.”


  “But not all of it, I hope,” Ling Qi teased.

  “I have been getting out,” Li Suyin huffed, but even the response to her teasing seemed muted.

  “What’s bothering you?” LIng Qi asked as she finished the hole she had been digging. “Every time I’ve seen you for the past few days, you’ve been fretting over something.”


  Li Suyin looked away, even as she placed the seedling and began to pack the soil back in around its roots. “Have I? I know I have been a little distracted, but……”


  “I am sure the only reason Su Ling hasn’t called you on it is that she’s been off-kilter herself,” Ling Qi interjected. “So spill. What’s wrong?”


  “It is nothing so bad as you might be thinking,” Li Suyin replied. “It’s just…… My family is coming to visit for the tournament.”


  Ling Qi frowned. “I thought mortals weren’t going to be allowed at the arena?” she asked. “Ah, is it different for the production track?”


  Li Suyin shook her head and brushed the dirt from her hands, standing back up. “No, Mother and Father just want to be here to support me, even if they can’t observe directly.”


  “I’m not sure what the problem is,” Ling Qi said as she stood up as well,moving to the next flag. She had never heard her friend speak of her parents in less than glowing tones.

  Li Suyin shifted uncomfortably. “I haven’t told them some things,” she admitted in a quiet voice, and Ling Qi didn’t miss the way that Suyin’s left hand twitched as if she wanted to reach for her eye. “I’m just afraid that they might be disappointed with the kind of person I’ve become.”


  Ling Qi kept her expression neutral. “You probably shouldn’t have left something like your eye as a surprise,” she agreed. “But I don’t understand what you mean. You’re still the same good person you were to begin with.” She glanced up at the constructs circling around. “Maybe hold off on showing off your workshop. I don’t know how squeamish your parents are.”


  Li Suyin laughed, but she didn’t sound particularly amused. “I do not think greeting Mother and Father from atop a palanquin hefted by skeleton soldiers would give the right impression, no,” she said with a touch of sarcasm.

  Ling Qi shot her friend a narrow-eyed look. “Since when do you do sarcastic?” she asked. “Wait, is that an actual thing? I want a ride if so.”


  Sixiang mumbled sleeplily. The light of high noon had left the bodiless spirit drowsy.

  “I was working on a design with Senior Sister Bao, but we could not get the animation of legs done with proper coordination and balance……” Li Suyin shook her head, cutting off her own tangent. “No, Ling Qi, the point is…… I have not been a good person,” she said. “It might be beneath your notice, but I have been going out of my way to make sure those girls are miserable whenever I have the opportunity. I know it isn’t right to pursue a grudge so, but…… I just cannot let it go.”


  Ling Qi shot her friend a wary look. “You haven’t broken Lady Cai’s peace, have you?”


  Suyin shook her head, her expression bitter. “No, and that makes it worse,” she huffed. “I have become one of those people who spit on the spirit of the law while obeying its letter. How can I face Father like this?” she fretted.

  “Li Suyin…… what have you been doing?”


  The other girl looked down as they reached the next spot. “It started with using Senior Sister Bao’s connections to ruin the market for them,” she mumbled. “Price gouging, refusing sales, purchasing rare reagents I know they need before they can acquire them – that sort of thing.”


  “And she’s okay with that?” Ling Qi asked dubiously.

  “Senior Sister Bao said that it was good practice. She doesn’t see anything wrong with my vendetta as long as it doesn’t cross the line into illegality.” Li Suyin didn’t stop with that worrying statement. “Then after I had time to bond with Zhenli, I started making deals with her kin…… I traded them things to ruin those girls’ Sect jobs where possible or just to ambush them and leave them to hang in the woods for a few days, cocooned and helpless. I made sure that they were never badly hurt, but……”


  “If you want me to scold you, you’re speaking to the wrong person,” Ling Qi said, cutting her off. “As long as you aren’t doing anything permanent……”


  “I am not like them,” Li Suyin fiddled with the strap of her eyepatch.

  “Right. You won’t hear me speaking poorly of you…… but you’re worried that your parents will,” Ling Qi’s first notion was to suggest not telling them, but she was fairly sure Li Suyin wouldn’t accept that.

  “Nobles and cultivators should be above this sort of pettiness, even though I know they are not,” Suyin said glumly.

  “You’re being too hard on yourself like always,” Ling Qi said with a touch of exasperation. “You all but said that you know you’re being unreasonable,” she added as she began to work on the next planting.

  “I know it is not reasonable, but I cannot change my own feelings.”


  “If your Mother and Father are half as good as you hold them up to be, they’ll understand,” Ling Qi said, meeting her friend’s eye. “There’s nothing wrong with giving someone who hurt you their comeuppance.”


  Her friend closed her eyes for a moment. “.…… As you say. Let us get back to the task at hand though. We have much work yet to do today.”


  “So we do,” Ling Qi sighed. The things she would do for Sect points……

  ***

  After completing the Sect job and receiving their rewards, Ling Qi accepted Li Suyin’s invitation to Bao Qingling’s workshop to show off the other improvements Suyin had made with the scout formations. The journey to Bao Qingling’s workshop took them deeper into the Wall. It was not far enough to intrude on the Inner Sect, but it was about as far in as the dragon’s vale.

  Ling Qi and Li Suyin landed at the top of the bulbous structure which clung to the wall of the canyon below. It was shaped vaguely like a gourd with a smaller bulb stacked atop a larger one. Chimneys of metal and stone poked out of the structure at odd angles, billowing colorful and aromatic medicinal smoke. Most of the structure, however, was composed entirely of thick white webbing. Somewhat disturbingly, Ling Qi could see disturbances in the air where spirits of wind had been captured in the webbing, and even as she watched, arachnid legs as long as her arm poked out to drag a struggling spirit inside.

  Happily, she didn’t have too long to contemplate this as Suyin opened an entrance in the top of the structure. Webs parted smoothly to reveal a ladder leading down.

  Suyin politely invited her in, and Ling Qi followed her down the ladder. The tunnel leading down into the workshop was kind of claustrophobic, and the feel of so many skittering spirit spiders all around them gave her a case of goosebumps, but otherwise, their entry went by in comfortable silence. A quick walk down the rightmost tunnel at the three way intersection at the bottom of the ladder brought them to a room slightly larger than Suyin’s workshop at her home. The room was furnished with tabletops and other worksurfaces glued to the walls, often at heights and angles that left them impossible to reach from the floor. It was also positively saturated with the skeletons of birds, ranging from tiny to huge.

  It was also occupied. Li Suyin’s mentor, Bao Qingling, looked much like she had the first time Ling Qi had met her at the Medicine Hall, an unhealthily pale girl with dark circles under her eyes with black hair gathered into a thick braid wrapped twice around her neck. Rather than a gown, she wore a set of dark brown, bulky leathers, including boots and gloves that left her looking a bit shapeless, especially with the thick work smock she wore, stained and scorched in many places.

  Unlike before though, Ling Qi could feel the Inner disciple’s qi more clearly. Bao Qingling was at the fourth level of the third realm, and her aura felt jagged and murky like a deep pit full of sharp stone concealed by thick, clinging mist and webs.

  “Senior Sister Bao,” Li Suyin greeted as she caught sight of the older girl. “Thank you for allowing me to bring my friend here today.”


  “Thank you for having me, Senior Sister,” Ling Qi added politely, offering a bow of her own.

  The Inner Sect disciple studied her then nodded once crisply. “You are welcome – in this room. I ask that you remain in this room however,” she said, her words uncolored by anything but polite disinterest. “It would be unfortunate if excessive curiosity were to cause us friction,” she added. Ling Qi supposed she could understand; the story of what she had done to Yan Renshu was probably open knowledge at this point.

  “I will, of course, respect Senior Sister Bao’s privacy. It would be very rude for me to repay your kindness to my friend and hospitality with treachery,” Ling Qi replied.

  “Quite,” Bao Qingling said without humor before nodding to Li Suyin. “Do not forget your schedule, Junior Sister Suyin,” she said. “Junior Sister Ling, give my regards to Lady Cai if you would.” Bao Qingling stamped her foot once on the floor. The webbing under her feet parted with an odd stretching sound, and the older girl vanished into the resulting hole. Ling Qi caught a glimpse of chitinous legs and gleaming eyes, as well as a pair of oddly human hands composed of gleaming black chitin in the moment before it closed again.

  “Huh. I wonder what that was about,” Ling Qi mused, warily eyeing the floor .

  “The Bao family is a count clan which administers the north under the Cai family,” Li Suyin answered. “I’m sure that Senior Sister Bao was just offering her respects.”


  “I really do have to do some more research,” Ling Qi sighed. Perhaps she could speak to Cai about that; learning from her would probably be more fruitful and interesting than poking through books on the matter, and she could pick up what the heiress thought of the various players. “Well, why don’t you show me what you’ve been working on?”


  “I’ve discovered how to activate the fusion formations in the advanced scouts without untoward amounts of blood,” Li Suyin explained, leading her over to a wide surface scattered with a score of tiny bird skeletons and strewn with papers packed with notes and calculations. “As you can see here, it was simply a matter of……” Suyin went through her proofs as Ling Qi leaned over her shoulder and followed along.

  While Ling Qi felt that she wasn’t really suited to formations mastery, in a situation like the tournament, it would be good to have a few tricks up her sleeve that were outside her main skillset. A combat construct could certainly be that.

  She watched as Li Suyin demonstrated her new formation, merging a great swarm of little sparrow skeletons into a bony horror in the vague shape of a large eagle.

  “You really are great at this kind of thing, Li Suyin,” Ling Qi commented, peering into the empty “eye” socket of the “eagle” now perched on Suyin’s work surface. Its head was made of a dozen tiny skulls partially merged together like the crow she had seen during the Sect mission with the shaman. It was a creepy effect.

  “It is not just size either,” Li Suyin pointed out. “The more complex array matrix allows for more advanced effects as well.”


  The skeletal eagle on the workbench let out a shrill cry, and its bones pulsed with a faint blue light. Ling Qi blinked as she felt the activation of an actual technique, some kind of defensive water art.

  “You made a construct that can use techniques?” Ling Qi asked.

  “Well, only one, and it has to be pre-encoded by the user so it can’t be changed in battle,” Li Suyin admitted.

  Regardless, Ling Qi could see the use in that. If she had a construct that could cast defensive or support techniques on her, it would allow her to focus on her offense in the tournament.

  “Are you sure you really want to just show me all of this?” Ling Qi asked, dubious. “You’ve done all the work on this. You practically had to rebuild the entire formation from scratch!”


  “I don’t mind at all,” Li Suyin replied, shaking her head. “It is your treasure that allowed this anyway, and…… I do not feel as if there needs to be transactions between us.”


  Ling Qi eyed her friend, sensing no insincerity from the other girl. “I won’t complain then,” Ling Qi said. “It’ll definitely be a useful surprise to pull out in the tournament.”


  Threads 182-Return 1

  Near the ceiling of the archive, the quintet of silvery wisps danced, orbiting and circling one another in a complex pattern. As the strains of her music rose to a crescendo, their movements sped up until the flashing lights seemed like one strobing sphere, then in time with the descending tone, the orb shrank and the light inverted, leaving a tiny-two dimensional circle of wispy shadow hovering near the rafters. It darted upward then, passing straight through the warded ceiling of the archive’s first floor.

  Ling Qi opened her eyes as a faint applause echoed in the study room to see the other members of her “music club.” On the wide couch across from her, Ruan Shen and Bian Ya sat beside each other. Yu Nuan sat backwards on a wooden chair, resting her arms on its backrest.

  “An interesting twist on a common technique, junior sister,” Bian Ya said politely, letting her applause fade. “I think you might need further polish to the transformation given your intentions.”


  Ling Qi smiled sheepishly. “Yes, I’ll need to make it more subtle for field use, but I think I like this more for performances.”


  “Nothing wrong with learning to play with your lighting,” Ruan Shen commented, his fingers dancing across the strings of his lute, plucking silently and adjusting their tension. “Stage presence is more than just songs.”


  “How’d you tear out the regular qi projection and replace it with music?” Yu Nuan asked. “I’ve tried that with a few things, but it usually just makes the technique collapse.”


  Ling Qi leaned back in her own heavily cushioned seat, luxuriating in the comfort of the plush armchair.

  “I helped a lot,” Sixiang boasted, manifesting as a child-sized figure perched on the back of her chair. “Heh, when your whole being is composed of song and expression, that kind of thing comes natural. She just copied some of my patterns.”


  “There’s a bit reductive,” Ling Qi protested. “Copying some of Sixiang’s manifestations helped, but it’s mostly trial and error. You have to observe the original effect and compose new lines until you hit on one that makes the qi react in the same way as the base qi pattern.”


  “There are methods which you can use to be more systemic about it, but that is the gist of it,” Bian Ya agreed.

  “Oh, can you share those later?” Ling Qi asked.

  “I don’t see why not,” Bian Ya said. Yu Nuan glanced over to her and nodded in thanks.

  “Well, that’s my project. What have you all been up to this past month?” Ling Qi asked.

  “I haven’t had much time to work on anything serious,” Ruan Shen admitted. “I want to start thinking about my first personal art, so when I’m not deployed, I’ve been doing research on places to journey to.”


  “The Ruan family has plenty of resources and sites on hand,” Bian Ya pointed out.

  Ruan Shen looked away, plucking out a low note on his lute. “And I told you, if you want me to do this, I’m gonna do it right.”


  There was a moment’s silence as Bian Ya pursed her lips unhappily, leaning away from his side. “Well, junior sister, I have been deployed too often to come up with anything new, but I have refined a few of my songs. I do not mind showing you while we discuss theory.”


  “Same for me. Too much time on the front line,” Yu Nuan said. “Mostly been working on teamwork and my movement arts.”


  “I was meaning to ask about that. What happened to…” Ling Qi trailed off as she looked down into the shadow under Yu Nuan’s chair. Glinting azure eyes looked back at her. She realized that she had never learned the spirit’s name.

  “He goes by Qiu,” Yu Nuan said.

  “Borf,” agreed the shrunken thunder hound. He did not look much like the gigantic herding dog made of lightning and clouds she had seen last. He was actually rather tiny and looked more like a limbless loaf of fluffy blue and white fur with a grinning canine face while lying down.

  “Yeah, he figured out he can get more treats and pets looking like that,” Yu Nuan said dryly. “He’s a total attention hog. Don’t indulge him too much, okay?”


  Qiu panted happily, looking back at Ling Qi with a certain performative innocence that she was all too familiar with via her dealings with Hanyi.

  Sixiang thought in her head.

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” Ling Qi shared a chuckle with the others. “But I should probably ask, how are things? What has been new over the past month?”


  The mood in the room dimmed.

  “The Sect has been victorious in all clashes with the cloud tribes,” Bian Ya said. “But Sect Head Yuan pressed us to a hard pace. It is good that we stopped. Many were becoming exhausted.”


  “So much winnin’ that you just don’t want anymore, like wolfing down too many sweets,” Ruan Shen said lightly. Ling Qi didn’t miss the slightly bitter twist to his lips.

  “It’s all pretty ugly,” Yu Nuan said quietly. “Can’t say I’m much of a fan. Especially once the quakes started.”


  Ling Qi looked at each of them in turn, and eventually, it was Ruan Shen who followed up.

  “The things underground started ramping up their presence toward the end of the month. Nothing that could stop us, but there’s a lot of traps. Sudden ambushes from swarms of nasty things from below. Weird, explosive formation devices that everyone’s perception arts missed. Sudden releases of plague spirits. The Sect didn’t take a lot of losses, but it did bog us down.”


  “We’re not the only ones getting hit. Bunch of mines in the Wang lands collapsed. Heard there was a military outpost that went dark in Luo lands too,” Yu Nuan offered.

  “But every time they have brought force, we have met it,” Bian Ya said, “and came out superior. Once we discern the function of their tricks, the leaders of the Emerald Seas will stamp down on it.”


  “Of course we will. Doesn’t make it any less nerve wracking to be marching and wondering if the ground is gonna blow up and cover you in toxic gunk,” Ruan Shen said.

  “Yeah, I’m not a fan.” Yu Nuan rubbed the side of her neck, as if recalling an old wound. “I made it out okay thanks to Qiu, but my squad wandered into a plague trap, and it wasn’t pretty. We lost most of the lower realms, and the other officer is in the medicine hall’s isolation rooms.”


  Beneath her chair, there came a low growl, deeper than the tiny frame of the dog below it should have been capable of emitting.

  “Ah, but those caught in the caldera events have recovered for the most part,” Bian Ya cut in, her cheer sounding a little forced. “Elder Yongrui is still not in combat ready condition, but he is awake.”


  “That’s something at least,” Ling Qi said, thinking of Senior Brother Liao Zhu.

  “What of you, junior sis?” Ruan Shen asked, leaning forward. “There are already quite a lot of rumors circulating. Care to share the truth?”


  Ling Qi gave a wry smile. “I’m afraid to ask what people are saying. The truth is the meeting went very well. The people from the other side of the Wall are friendly and not inclined to war. Lady Cai and I negotiated for further peaceful meetings at a neutral ground in the mountains. They are strange but definitely not barbarians.”


  “Well, that is welcome news,” Bian Ya said thoughtfully. Ruan Shen strummed an agreeing chord on his lute. Yu Nuan merely grunted in acknowledgement.

  “Lady Cai has requested that the Duchess leave us at the center of negotiations due to our success,” Ling Qi added.

  That brought silence to the room, as all three of them stared at her. Eventually, it was Ruan Shen who broke the silence.

  “That’s… ambitious,” he said. “What does that mean for you exactly?”


  “It means we’ll be leaving the Sect a little sooner than intended,” Ling Qi replied, idly willing her wisp back down to circle her chair. “It looks like I don’t have to worry about the intersect tournament after all.”


  “I will have to wish you good luck. Ah, perhaps that is why I heard that the Duchess was enquiring with the Clan Head about communications specialists,” Bian Ya murmured, rubbing her chin.

  Yu Nuan looked at her with a frown. “Am I missing something or is that not really risky for a heiress? Aren’t you supposed to use your youth to build up reputation with folks around the courts?”


  “You’re not wrong,” Ruan Shen said.

  “Lady Cai is aware that this is a risk, but all the same, she thinks this is the best place she can be for the good of the province… and I agree with her. It’s hard to explain, but I’m really the best suited to dealing with these foreigners, at least until there is some trust built up.”


  “It is not all risk, I think,” Bian Ya said. “If this whole matter succeeds, it will be quite an accomplishment, even if there are some in the province who will not value it.”


  “That’s what I thought as well.” Ling Qi sighed. “But for now, how about those lessons? I want to finish my modifications to Roaming Moon’s Eye art to truly make it the Silent Songseeker’s Regard art.”


  “You’re slipping, junior sis. Not a bit of wordplay in your art?” Ruan Shen laughed.

  “Quiet, you. There is nothing wrong with being dignified,” Bian Ya huffed. “But yes, it is really just a twist on the application of common qi harmonics…”


  Ling Qi leaned back in her chair, listening to the older girl's words. She still had time to learn yet.

  ***

  “So you’re really diving in head first, huh,” Yu Nuan said to her as they left the archive sometime later. The other girl held her hands behind her head, looking up at the evening sky. Qiu trotted along at her side, his short legs working furiously to keep up with their longer stride.

  “That is one way to put it,” Ling Qi observed.

  “I don’t know how you can do that. Even with everything going on, I’m still kinda glad I have service ahead. Someone like me doesn’t have any business running a pig farm, let alone a town,” Yu Nuan mused.

  “I think that’s being overly harsh. Administration is a skill to polish like any other. You have time to learn it,” Ling Qi said encouragingly. It wasn’t an enjoyable subject, but that was responsibility.

  “I wonder about that,” Yu Nuan said. “I think you need the right temperament for it too. Besides, what am I supposed to do with a ‘Yu clan’ that’s just me?”


  “Ling Qi slowed her walk, glancing over at the other girl with her wild blue hair and glinting piercings. “No other family members?”


  “Had a grandfather once and some aunts and uncles now. Don’t really feel like inviting folks who didn’t want anything to do with me until they scented gold on the air though,” Yu Nuan said. “Nah, it’s just me.”


  Ling Qi couldn’t think of anything useful to say, and Yu Nuan seemed content with her statement for a time.

  “Hey, the land you're likely to get… It’ll be in the hills or mountains, right?” Yu Nuan suddenly asked.

  “Most likely,” Ling Qi said. “Before, we probably would have started with a small settlement, but we’ll have to build from scratch now.”


  “You’ll have to run off herding. Land up there is shit for farms,” Yu Nuan said idly.

  “You have some experience?” Ling Qi asked, cocking her head.

  “My grandfather’s pastures were on the edge of Luo territory. Just first realm sheep and cows,” Yu Nuan said. “Feh, bet you never thought I was a farm girl.”


  “You don’t give that impression,” Ling Qi admitted.

  “Good. I tried hard at that,” Yu Nuan said. “Still, I remember the ropes.”


  Ling Qi shot her a sidelong look. “You’re not usually so indirect. What’s on your mind?”


  They stopped, and Yu Nuan looked at her for a long moment. “Yu clan’s never gonna go anywhere, and I can’t say I like the idea of selling it off in a marriage either. Guess I’m asking what’s the Ling clan’s adoption policy?”


  Ling Qi stared at Yu Nuan. The Ling clan in her mind was really just her family, not a noble clan. She knew intellectually that one of the ways for a young clan to grow was by merging with others, but she’d never really considered the idea. “You have your debts to the Sect still. I can’t easily erase those.”


  “Sure, but assuming I don’t get melted, those’ll be paid off eventually,” Yu Nuan said.

  It had been a reflexive excuse. In reality, Ling Qi strongly suspected that after the auction, she would be able to pay a tuition fee or two. Ling Qi found the thought that had been drifting through her mind as she completed the cultivation of the Roaming Moon’s Eye Art drifting through her mind.

  The future changes with every step. Never be certain she knows what’s coming.

  So much had changed in the last two years. So much continued to change every month and every day. The idea that someone would seek adoption into her near nonexistent clan would have seemed absurd just a couple months ago.

  “You’re not asking for a simple thing,” Ling Qi said. “My family is small. It’s just my mother, sister, and spirits.”


  “I’m not asking you to suddenly care about me like a sibling. You know that’s not how clans work,” Yu Nuan said with a small shrug. “I get it if you don’t want to answer me now though. You probably want to talk to the rest first.”


  Ling Qi frowned. “That might not be how clans work in general, but I’m not sure if I want my family to work like that. But I don’t really object in principle. Yu Nuan, you should understand how important my family is.”


  There was the faintest frisson in the air, a quick gust of wind that sent the trees on either side of the road swaying. Sixiang chuckled in her thoughts, and Ling Qi felt phantom arms wrap around her shoulders.

  Yu Nuan looked worried, and the older girl ducked her head in apology. “Right, I hope I didn’t offend you too much. I wasn’t trying to insult you or—”


  Ling Qi held out a hand to stymie her apology. “I’m not rejecting you. My family is already half adoption by number.”


  It was a funny thing to consider. What did that make family even mean really? Ling Qi felt a faint tingling in her chest, a feeling of pressure. Her thoughts were circling the issue that had plagued her for months now. What did she want from her family? What did she owe it? How was she to carry it with her?

  “You’re right that I need to talk to the rest of my family about it, but I’m not against the idea,” Ling Qi repeated.

  “That so?” Yu Nuan inquired cautiously. “Well, uh, thanks for the vote of confidence.”


  “It’s not like I’m unaware how unstable it is being the only significant cultivator in a clan,” Ling Qi said wryly. “But you should understand that just being tied to Lady Cai doesn't make us stable either. If anything, it makes our position more dangerous. The Duchess’ scrutiny is… rough.”


  Yu Nuan was silent for a long moment. “I still think you’re my best bet, if I want to be satisfied with myself. I’m not cut out to rule, but I’d not like being under a hundred layers of hierarchy either.”


  Ling Qi blew out a sigh and turned back to the path. “Then I’ll talk to my family and get back to you.”


  She didn’t think her mother would object, nor Zhengui. Hanyi might be reluctant over the idea though. At least Biyu would be sold on the idea easily, she mused, glancing at the trotting dog.