Page 23 of Song of the Crimson Flower

“Why not?” she asked, a bit offended.

“The way you talk. And the way you’re gripping me right now,” Bao answered, and she loosened up a bit. “They just want to make sure we don’t know more than we’re telling them.”

“Well, apparently the Empress is at an estate somewhere, and if the owners know my father, they’ll send us on our way. Maybe they’ll even let us borrow a carriage for the journey.”

“You’re very optimistic.”

“We shouldn’t lose hope. Not yet,” she said. “And at least you’re going to stay solid, and you won’t be frightening the wits out of this horse by slipping through it like smoke.”

Bao gave a short laugh and relaxed a bit more in her hands. “Maybe if I did that, it would take off running and you could escape from these soldiers. You could get home.”

“I told you. I’m not going anywhere until the spell is broken,” Lan said. “I gave you my word and I’m going to see it through.”

“Thank you. I’m glad you’re here,” Bao said quietly, and she smiled when she saw the tips of his ears turn bright red. He cleared his throat. “Is my flute still safe?”

Lan checked through his sack, which had been secured to the saddle alongside hers. “Yes. Don’t worry. I’ll tuck it at the bottom so it doesn’t fall out.” She pushed the instrument beneath a spare tunic and heard a crumpling noise. It was a piece of paper, and on it she caught the wordsYou crossed the grass and the wind kissed every blade.Heat flooded her face as she cinched the sack shut and glanced at Bao, but he was distracted, watching two soldiers argue nearby.

He had been so angry with her, angry enough and hurt enough to leave the river market behind for a new life. He had told her that he had hoped never to see her again—and yet he had brought with him the lyrics to the song he had written for her.

Tam would never have done such a thing. She knew that now. Tam was bold and reckless and handsome; he would have swung himself onto this war horse and pointed it at the highest fence he could find. He would have laughed at the sentimentality of carrying around songs and love letters. He would never have sat on the river, gathering each and every flower she threw because he didn’t want to miss a single one, the way Bao had every night for weeks.

When Bao had asked her why she had loved Tam, she had said that Tam was the first boy who paid attention to her. But Bao, she reflected, had been the first boy to ever tell her he loved her. She looked at the expanse of Bao’s back in front of her, at her hands still on his waist.

“Are you all right?” Bao asked suddenly, and she gave a guilty jump. “You haven’t said anything in five minutes and it’s a bit unsettling.”

Lan chuckled. “I do like to talk. It makes me feel better.”

“Don’t hold back because of me,” he said, and she wondered if that was his way of saying that her talking made him feel better, too.

Around them, Commander Wei’s men had finished the grisly task of burning the corpses and mounted their own horses. Eight soldiers surrounded a large wooden cart carrying something bulky, concealed beneath a thick canvas cloth and strapped down securely with rope. Together, Lan and Bao watched the cart roll by to the front of the procession.

“Is that the black spice they confiscated from the smugglers?” she asked, craning her neck. “I want to see what has caused such a fuss.”

“I don’t know much more about it than you do,” Bao admitted. “Aside from the fact that it comes in the form of incense, and that the Gray City gave Empress Xifeng wagonloads of it when she reigned over Feng Lu.”

The words sparked a memory in Lan’s mind. “My brother said the Gray City has always been good at flattering whoever is in power. They gave black spice to the barbarian kings who ruled over them once, too,” she said, as an officer stalked around the cart in front of them, checking the ropes. “He said an epidemic killed the barbarians. Do you know anything about that?”

“A bit. They were ambitious pirates who swept out of the Shadow Sea and took over the Unclaimed Lands for a century,” Bao said. “It’ssaid that the Dragon Lords sent down a vicious plague to liberate Feng Lu of their hold. But this happened seventy years ago, and the physicians of that time didn’t keep good records, so no one knows much about the nature of the disease.”

“Do you think it was something like bloodpox?”

Bao shrugged. “Whatever it was, it spread fast. It emptied the Unclaimed Lands within a month, and Dagovad and the Sacred Grasslands were free to go back to fighting over them.”

The horses pulling the wagon of black spice began to drag it forward and, one by one, the soldiers of Commander Wei’s company followed behind it. Lan noticed the first touches of light appearing in the east as the new day dawned. Soon, the Vu household would bustle with activity, and her parents would find her gone. She hoped the note she had left would be sufficient, and that they wouldn’t send out a search party. She didn’t want to know what Lady Vu would say if she knew Lan was straddling a horse with a young man, surrounded by a hundred other men.

A mounted soldier came and tugged on the lead rope attached to their stallion, pulling it after his own, and they trailed after the group with Commander Wei at the head. The open field became rolling plains of bright green-gold grass, swaying gently under the brightening sky. Farms and estates dotted the land, and here and there teams of oxen tilled the earth. Lan, who had never been far from home, found it rapturously beautiful.

The procession rode for about an hour, and when the sun had fully risen, they came to a black metal gate surrounding an immense plot of land. Through the bars, Lan glimpsed a garden shaded by towering cypress trees and a building of shining dark wood, the shutters thrown open to the sweet-smelling air and light. Commander Wei spoke to theguards at the gate, and once they were allowed inside, the soldiers led the wagon toward that building.

Instead of following his men, the Commander himself took the lead rope on Bao and Lan’s horse. “The soldiers are encamped there,” he said, nodding at the neat wooden building. “You’re coming with me to the house, where Her Majesty is staying.”

“That’s not the house?” Bao asked incredulously.

Lan laughed. “They probably use that for storage, or extra accommodations as they are now. No one with a property this lovely would live in such a drab little structure,” she said, and she was soon proven right when the family home appeared before them.

This building was made in the style of the palace of the Sacred Grasslands, with bright mahogany beams and red lacquered pillars holding up curving roofs. Walkways hung with climbing vines connected the upper levels of the buildings together. Lan thought it was similar to how her own family’s house was laid out, with three sections around a central courtyard, but this home was at least five times grander. Whoever lived here must be important indeed.

In the courtyard, lined with pale gray tiles and containing a sparkling pond full of orange fish, servants hurried forth to help them off their horses. They were accompanied by two captains in the armor of the Great Forest, who came out of the house to bow low to their Commander.

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