Chapter 112: Top Four

The incense tip glowed. The tall man from Willow Bank Gate didn't wait for it to burn properly. He reached out and grabbed Shi Po by the front of his robe.

His other hand slipped around behind Shi Po's waist. He turned his body sideways, twisted at the hips.

Shi Po's feet didn't move. The dirt under him had long since been packed solid, a fine ring squeezed up around the edges. The collar cut into his neck. He lowered his head half an inch, but his shoulders stayed at the same height.

The man switched hands. He grabbed Shi Po's belt, yanked him west, then shoved him east. Shi Po shifted half a step with it, his soles scraping a shallow groove through the dirt, but he didn't topple over.

Outside the ring, Jiang Wan's voice came low: "Don't loosen the ground."

From the Willow Bank Gate side, someone shouted: "Twist his waist!" Then: "Drag him across the line!"

The man did turn sideways and slam his shoulder into Shi Po's chest. Once, then again. On the third try he slid back half a step himself, his heel crushing a clod of dry earth.

Meng Ting stood beside the incense holder, arms hanging loose, saying nothing.

The man backed off, then lunged in again, bending low to grab Shi Po's leg, trying to flip him over from the heel. Shi Po drew his left foot back half a step. Knees still. Waist still. The man wrapped his arms around the leg and drove forward three times, his shoulder thudding dully against Shi Po's thigh. He was the one who came up panting.

That Vajra Pillar scroll—Xu Yan had once read it to Shi Po passage by passage, and the line he repeated most was: feet never leave the ground.

Half the incense had burned. Outside the ring, Xu Yan hadn't watched Shi Po's hands at all. He watched his feet.

The left foot shifted inward a fraction—a tiny movement—then planted and held. Then the right foot slid forward half a shoe-length.

Shi Po took a step forward.

The step landed heavy, the dirt sounding under his sole. The man still had hold of his collar; the step drove him back half an inch, and his footing broke first.

Shi Po took another step.

The man switched from pulling to wrapping his arms around Shi Po's waist, trying to lift. He lifted twice, then gave a step of ground himself.

Their feet had plowed two furrows through the ring. Shi Po kept coming, step after step, not fast, every step landing and never being retracted. The man went from hugging to shoving, from shoving to bracing, until he was pressed up against the south edge of the ring and his heel hit the earth ridge of the lime line.

He held out for three breaths. Then his whole foot landed outside the line.

Meng Ting waited until he'd steadied himself, then said: "Out of the ring. Qingya wins."

Two to one.

Shi Po walked back. The front of his robe was torn open from collar to shoulder, showing the red-brown skin beneath. He tucked the torn corner into his belt. It wouldn't stay. It hung there.

Bai Xiaoman got up from the wall and reached out: "I'll sew it for you when we get back."

"Mm." Shi Po looked down at his shoes. The uppers were caked with dirt.

The tall man from Willow Bank Gate stood outside the line, arms at his sides, fingers spreading once before clenching into fists. He turned and walked back to his own side without a word.

Xu Yan laid the old ledger slip across his knee and made the third stroke with his brush. Three strokes for three rounds: one loss, one win, one win.

Qi Qi leaned over to look: "That round, he didn't retreat a single step."

"All his retreat energy went into pulling." Xu Yan folded the paper once. "Couldn't throw him, still had to keep pressing forward—by the end, he had nothing left in his feet."

Round four.

Huo Qing took the sword from his back, holding it in his left hand, his right arm still hanging at his side, the sleeve dangling limp.

Willow Bank Gate's fourth-round fighter used a sword too—black lacquered sheath, cloth-wrapped handle. Standing at the ring's edge, he glanced once at Huo Qing's right hand, then didn't look again.

Xu Yan said quietly: "Back up to the line. If he doesn't commit to that lunge, you don't go out."

Huo Qing didn't answer. He just nodded, very slightly.

Both of them extended their wrists to the ring judge. Meng Ting pressed two fingers to each, examined their faces, examined their necks, said "pass" twice. Fresh incense was set. The fire starter flared again.

Behind Xu Yan, Qi Qi whispered: "Why not let him seize the initiative?"

Xu Yan's eyes were still on the ring: "That thrust of his only works once. If he uses it early, it's gone."

Huo Qing entered the ring first, positioning himself east. Willow Bank Gate's man opened with a chop down from the shoulder. Huo Qing sidestepped, retreating half a step.

The second strike came in horizontally. He retreated again.

The third, the man pulled back halfway and switched to an upward flick, the sword tip grazing past Huo Qing's waist. Huo Qing's left hand never moved. The sword still hung at his side, tip down.

Outside the ring, Bai Xiaoman clutched her handkerchief. Qi Qi stood beside her, counting without moving his lips: "Two... three..."

The man pressed relentlessly. Huo Qing retreated relentlessly. On the fifth step back, his heel met the earth ridge of the lime line; his heel pressed down and the ridge crumbled slightly.

Someone from the Willow Bank Gate side shouted: "He's spent! Press him!"

The man heard it. He lunged forward, driving his sword straight at Huo Qing's left shoulder, his whole body committed to the strike.

Huo Qing's left hand went out.

The move was so short it was nearly invisible. The onlookers only saw his wrist loosen, then grip again, and the sword tip was already an inch from the man's throat. Stopped.

Stopped. Then withdrawn.

The man stood frozen, sword still raised mid-air, the skin of his throat twitching. After half a breath, he lowered the sword and said to Meng Ting: "I concede."

Meng Ting: "Qingya wins."

Three to one. Round five wasn't fought.

The man slid his sword back into its sheath—took him two tries to get it in. As he withdrew, he didn't glance at Huo Qing's right hand again. Bai Xiaoman's grip on the handkerchief loosened; the five stones didn't fall out. Outside the ring, Jiang Wan watched Huo Qing walk back and said: "He retreated just right. A step too soon or too late and it wouldn't have worked."

Huo Qing slung the sword onto his back. The empty right sleeve swayed in the wind.

Zhou Kui had stood three paces outside the lime line the entire time, feet never moving. He'd watched that thrust from the launch to the withdrawal. When it was done, he lifted his staff out of the dirt, shouldered it, turned, and left without a word. Ge Song fell in behind him. After a few steps, Ge Song looked back at the ring once.

In the dirt outside Ring Two, there was still a small crater where the staff butt had struck.

By the Horse hour, all four rings had finished.

The clerk carried a low table over to the wall and added lines to the results board, stroke by stroke. The six from Qingya sat at the foot of the west wall, eating flatbread with a pot of hot water. Qian Duoduo had baked the flatbread on the seventeenth; it had sat for days now, hard at the edges. It needed soaking before you could bite through it.

Qi Qi came back from scouting: "Cloud Terrace Sect won. Azure Brook Sect won too."

"What was the score?" Bai Xiaoman asked.

"Didn't get a close look." Qi Qi sat down and broke apart some bread. "I watched round four over at Ring Four. That staff fighter—somebody got behind him and grabbed him, tried to wrestle him to the ground. Pushed for half an incense stick and couldn't put him down."

Shi Po looked up: "Which sect?"

"Didn't ask."

Shi Po reached out: "Give me another half piece."

Qi Qi tossed over the half in his hand: "That round didn't wear you out. You're just hungry."

"It did." Shi Po said. "The choke hold."

Bai Xiaoman spread the handkerchief on her knee, the five stones lined up inside it. She hadn't untied the two knots: "I didn't press a single one down this match."

Xu Yan took a sip of hot water: "In your last match, you pressed four of the five. If they're tied, leave them tied. Don't untie them."

"I'm afraid of losing them if I do."

"Then don't."

Names were being called from the far wall. The clerk read the results board aloud, over and over, making sure no one misread.

By the Monkey hour, Wen Su rose from the judging stand.

The four ring judges stood below the platform. Two clerks flanked her, holding the results. The noise in the martial arena fell away bit by bit until only the wind snapping at the cloth awnings remained.

"Round two is complete. The top four: Qingya, Chixiao, Cloud Terrace Sect, Azure Brook Sect."

She paused, letting the low murmur below run its course.

"The final round draws lots at the Dragon hour on the third day of the Third Month. Master lot, field judge Meng Ting."

A collective roar went up from below. Some clapped, some turned to look at the Qingya side, others turned toward Chixiao.

Xu Yan didn't look back. Jiang Wan stood half a step to his left, also not looking at him. Neither spoke.

Meng Ting stood in the second position below the platform, as straight as he'd been during the morning's body inspections. He held his place until Wen Su finished speaking, then withdrew.

On the Chixiao side, Ge Song collected the lineup sheet and passed it to a clerk. Turning back, he swept his eyes once across the Qingya contingent. Zhou Kui wasn't beside him—he'd already headed out of the arena.

When the crowd dispersed, people from every sect mingled together at the gate. The clerk had copied out a separate top-four list and posted it on the wall by the door. The ink hadn't dried, and the people crowded around it didn't dare touch it. Willow Bank Gate's steward walked out last, quick-strided, speaking to no one.

At the Rooster hour, Xu Yan went out the city gate to the carriage yard outside the walls.

The yard sat below an earthen slope. Hitching posts for the mules stood in a row, several damp ropes still tied to them. A man squatted in the yard, brushing down a mule, the brush falling in steady strokes.

"Qingya. Six people." Xu Yan stood and said it. "Back to Luoxia Town at the Mao hour on the twenty-fourth."

The man looked up: "Mao hour?"

"Mao hour."

He fished a wooden tag out from behind the post and drew two lines on it with charcoal—one horizontal, one vertical. Looked up: "Six?"

"Six."

"And the fare?"

"Paid for the round trip when we boarded on the eighteenth day of the Second Month."

The man nodded, hung the tag back on the post, and squatted down again to his mule. After two more brushes he remembered something: "You're from Qingya?"

"We are."

"Top four?"

"Top four."

The man grunted, hand still moving: "I'll hold this cart for you at the Mao hour."

Xu Yan stood on the slope and looked down. Beyond the yard, the official road ran west, two white ruts pressed into its surface by cartwheels, stretching on until they disappeared from sight.

He turned and went back into the city. The soldiers at the gate were collecting stall fees from the peddlers; the food vendors along the street were taking down their pots, the scraping of pot-bottoms ringing out. The registration rules were still tucked inside his robe; through the cloth, he could feel the folded corner of the paper.

The Dog hour. The communal bed in the guest quarters.

All four were asleep. Shi Po lay facing the wall, one hand hanging off the edge of the bed; Qi Qi's legs were stretched out long—he'd probably kick someone in the middle of the night; Bai Xiaoman's handkerchief, still tied, lay pressed under her pillow; Huo Qing's sword stood upright at the head of the bed, tip down.

In the courtyard, the water stove's fire had been banked. The last sounds of water had gone quiet.

Xu Yan sat under the lamp, the rules spread across his knee.

He read through from the beginning. At the third item, he paused, then read on, his finger moving down until it reached the ninth. There it stopped.

"Before each match, the field judge shall inspect the contestant in person; should the chief evaluator observe anything questionable on the field, she may descend to conduct a personal inspection, and her findings shall stand."

He read that line twice.

The lamp wick popped. The flame leaned sideways, then straightened.

In his mind he counted the days from start to finish: ten days until the third day of the Third Month.

Across the sleeping platform, Jiang Wan lay on her side, eyes open. She saw the paper spread under the lamplight, saw the finger resting on that line.

She said nothing.

Xu Yan closed the rules, folded them once. The crease landed exactly on the line about body inspection.