Chapter 123: Two Fingers at the Edge of the Ring

Meng Ting drew the two sheets from his sleeve, one in each hand. He held them up to his eye first, comparing their thickness, then walked to the center of the ring and stopped.

The noise around the martial arena died down. People on the viewing stands leaned forward. A few in the middle aisle stood up to get a look and were shoved back into their seats by the people behind them. The sun had climbed above the row of pillars at the east end of the stands. It was early in the Snake hour. In the front row of the eastern observers' seats there was still only one person seated, a sword laid across his back, both hands resting on his knees, not moving at all.

The paste sealing the slips had gone dry and hard by now. He picked the seal open with a fingernail, and the paper edge went fuzzy. He opened the one with "Qingya Sect" written in the corner first, pinching both ends and pulling the paper flat.

"Qingya. Round one, Qi Qi. Round two, Bai Xiaoman. Round three, Jiang Wan. Round four, Shi Po. Round five, Huo Qing."

He read without haste, pausing after each name as if waiting for that person to answer up from somewhere in the crowd. When he reached round three, someone on the east stand let out a low grunt, then went silent. The tall, thin Cloud Terrace Sect leader had his hands tucked in his sleeves, his eyes following Meng Ting's lips. The old man from Azure Brook Sect pressed his chin down half an inch, then raised it again.

Xu Yan stood at the west side of the ring without looking up. Jiang Wan's slot was a forfeit. He had written her name into that red grid with his own hand at Dragon hour, and his brush tip had paused a moment. Now, hearing it read aloud, he still thought the grid was too narrow.

Meng Ting folded Qingya's sheet back and tucked it between his fingers, then opened Chixiao's.

"Chixiao. Round one, Ma Ping. Round two, Lei Yuan. Round three, Yi Tuo. Round four, Ding Zhao. Round five, Zhou Kui."

When the last name landed, the four men sitting on Chixiao's long bench straightened their backs in unison. Zhou Kui planted his iron staff by his foot, and a pebble bounced off the butt.

Xu Yan mentally overlaid the two slips into one. Jiang Wan's slot was empty. Four rounds remained; they needed three wins. Qi Qi's round was one they could afford to lose—he was there to probe: how the body inspection was done, how the incense was lit, how many times the ring judge would check within one stick of incense. And also one they could not afford to lose—four rounds, three wins, they could not spare a single person. He looked up just as Qi Qi turned to look back at him, so he gave a single nod and said nothing more.

Voices came down from the stands.

"Round five, Zhou Kui. Chixiao's putting their strongest last."

"Strongest last or not, doesn't matter. Qingya sent their skinniest kid out first."

"Skinny as a bamboo pole. Last time, Willow Bank Gate's soft whip dragged him out by his shoe upper."

"I'll wager Chixiao sweeps all three." Someone said it loud. "Three clean wins. Who'll take it?"

No one answered. The words "three clean wins" circled half the stands and broke apart at the edge of the ring.

The clerk copied both sheets into the file ledger from his low stool, blew on the ink to dry it, then stood and withdrew outside the ring.

"Round one." Meng Ting said. "Combatants from both sides, to the edge of the ring."

Qi Qi stood. He undid the cloth strap at his cuff and rolled his sleeves up to the elbow, walked over, and extended both hands, backs up.

Meng Ting placed two fingers on his left wrist, paused, moved to the right wrist, paused again. His fingers were cold. When he finished, he looked up at Qi Qi's face, then down to his neck, the strip of skin above the collar, examining from top to bottom.

"Pass."

Ma Ping came over from Chixiao's side and stuck both hands out without undoing anything. He was half a head taller than Qi Qi, an old scar running diagonally across the back of one hand, from wrist to the base of his fingers. Meng Ting's fingers settled on, left first then right, then checked face and neck.

"Pass."

Just those two fingers: press down, say pass, and the man entered the ring. Xu Yan stood three paces away watching, and he watched closely: when Meng Ting pressed Ma Ping, his fingertip rested on the pulse gate, held long enough before withdrawing—exactly the same as when he'd pressed Qi Qi. Not one spot lighter, not one spot heavier.

The clerk took a stick of incense from the wooden tray and set it into the bronze incense holder at the ring's edge, then struck a fire starter and bent to light it. The incense tip glowed red. Wind slanted across the center of the ring from the east, and the red point wavered, then straightened.

"Enter the ring." Meng Ting said.

The ring was three zhang across. One man circling, one man holding center—three zhang was plenty of room.

Ma Ping entered and backed to the ring's center first, feet spread a step apart, toes pointed forward. He did not look at Qi Qi's feet. His eyes rested on his shoulders.

Qi Qi paced along the lime line. He walked slowly, the soles of his shoes pressing the line. When he reached the patch of soft earth at the south end, his footfalls were nearly silent—Xu Yan had led him over it at Dragon hour, one step sinking in a good half inch, and he had remembered it ever since.

Ma Ping turned with him, half a turn. He only shifted his feet within that single stride of space at the center: one foot lifted and came down, the other followed.

"Two steps, then switch." Bai Xiaoman suddenly murmured from the combatants' bench. Her hands were still pressed on the cloth bundle in her lap, her eyes fixed on Ma Ping's feet. "Two steps left, two steps right, the middle foot stays planted."

"Watching his feet won't help." Shi Po said.

"I'm watching which foot he pushes off with."

Qi Qi abruptly stopped, reversed, and cut for the other side. His upper body dropped left; his feet had already gone right. In the preliminary round against Ink Pool Gate, this was how he'd pulled a man out of the ring: offer half a body length, wait for them to follow, then circle around.

Ma Ping didn't follow. He pressed the raised shoulder back down, shifted two inches right, and was somehow blocking Qi Qi again.

"He's just running laps." Someone on the east stand laughed. "Running till dark?"

"The incense won't even burn halfway."

Qi Qi changed tactics. This time he didn't stay on the outer line; he tucked in and pressed two steps inward, seeing if Ma Ping would come. Ma Ping didn't come, so he drifted back to the line, scraped his shoe in the soft earth, and cut across again from that end—fast and light.

Still nothing. There was always three feet between them. When he moved a step, the feet on the other side shifted half a step to match. Those three feet never changed.

On Chixiao's side, Ding Zhao was sprawled on the bench and shouted into the ring, "Save your strength, Ma Ping."

Qi Qi heard it and didn't look back.

Halfway through the fourth lap, he settled the matter in his mind: if this man wouldn't chase, he had no counter to fall back on. If he burned through the incense, the judge would rule in favor of the defender—him. The words from the bench stuck with him: if by the fourth lap he still hadn't moved, don't drag it out. Even if he lost, he had to make people see he'd tried.

The incense at the ring's edge had burned down a small third. The wind bent it north; the smoke ran along the lime line.

Qi Qi committed. His foot feinted left, his body cut in from the right, his shoulder dropping low. That drop put everything he had into it.

Ma Ping's palm arrived. Not fast.

Qi Qi could see where it was coming from; he knew a sidestep would clear it by half a foot. On the twenty-third day of the Second Month, Jiang Wan had prodded him at the base of the wall: "When you go in, your shoulder moves first." Three times he'd missed by half a foot. He'd answered, "I've got every half breath counted."

His shoulder moved first.

Just half an inch. Ma Ping's hand followed that half inch, and his palm slapped Qi Qi's right shoulder.

The blow wasn't hard. But Qi Qi flew sideways, both feet leaving the ground, his back scraping the earth as he rolled—across the lime line, two more rolls beyond it before he stopped. He lay a moment, then pushed himself up, dirt all over his shoulder and hip.

Meng Ting walked to the line. He looked first at the Ma Ping inside, then Qi Qi outside, then finally at the incense.

"Out of the ring." He said. "Chixiao wins."

The clerk went over, pulled the incense out, and pressed it out against the edge of the wooden tray. A stub remained, longer than half.

Clapping rose from the stands, and under it a voice: "Didn't even make half a stick." The voice that had wagered on Chixiao's clean sweep got a little louder.

Qi Qi got up on his own. First he pressed his left hand to his right shoulder and lifted the arm, got it halfway up, stopped, and slowly lowered it. He looked once into the ring. The incense was already out. He walked back to the bench and sat down using only half his body.

"He read me." Qi Qi said.

"Which part did he watch?" Xu Yan asked.

"The moment I started my move, his eyes were on my shoulder. I drift left, he shifts left. I drift right, he shifts right. Those two-step shuffles of his—he didn't swap them three times in four laps."

Xu Yan nodded. At Dragon hour he had told Qi Qi: Ma Ping has fast hands. His palm doesn't aim for the face; he waits for you to offer your shoulder. If you can't shake free, don't let him land it on your shoulder. Qi Qi had gone and tried—tried once, and handed his shoulder over.

"You said don't let him land it on my shoulder." Qi Qi looked down at his own shoulder, his voice carrying some pique. "I listened. But when he went for it, there was nowhere to dodge."

"He hit the right shoulder." Xu Yan said. "Don't use that arm for leverage in the next four rounds."

"It's bruised. Nothing else." Qi Qi said.

"Bone's not broken." Shi Po repeated after him. He shifted over to leave the inner half of the bench clear, then took Qi Qi's arm in one hand and laid it on the bench, steady as could be.

"That look of yours hurts worse than medicine." Qi Qi grimaced.

Huo Qing sat at the very edge. He nudged his sword half a foot over with his foot to clear the aisle, his eyes following Ma Ping all the way back to the Chixiao bench before he pulled them back. He rubbed his left hand once on his knee and tucked it into his sleeve.

On the west stand, Jiang Wan sat motionless. Her hands had been resting on her sword's sheath opening; now she removed the right one and placed it on her knee, slowly. She looked over toward the ring's edge, saw that Xu Yan was watching her too, and turned back to look at the extinguished incense.

Xu Yan reshuffled the four rounds in his mind: round two, Bai Xiaoman; round three, forfeit; round four, Shi Po; round five, Huo Qing. All three remaining had to win. He crossed Qi Qi's entry out mentally, crossed it clean, left no hole, and made no sound.

On the judging stand, Wen Su opened her register and wrote something beneath the Qingya column with the tip of her brush. The tip lifted, then fell again.

The clerk handed Chixiao's slip back to Meng Ting. Meng Ting turned it over and held it under his palm, glancing at the second line.

"Qingya. Bai Xiaoman."

Bai Xiaoman stood.

She laid the cloth bundle on the bench and drew the four banners out one by one, holding each by the cloth's edge, careful not to touch the banner faces. The banners had been painted under lamplight at Mao hour; the cinnabar had dried for two shichen, and a fine red powder dusted off the corners.

"If you plant one banner, it counts as one." Xu Yan said.

"I know." she said. "Plant one, fall back a step. If he comes at me, I'll plant it anyway. The fourth one goes in the ground, and I'll go down with it."

"He knows you'll plant first. He probably won't give you those four steps."

Bai Xiaoman nodded, then rolled the banners back into a bundle.

"Two steps, then switch." she said again. "I've got it."

She held the four banners in one hand and closed her fingers. The cinnabar at the corners stained her whole hand red.