The sun dipped behind the Western Hills, casting long violet shadows across the gray tiled roofs of Lotus-Prince Street.
For the first time in sixty years, all thirty-six historic courtyards were awake with golden lantern light. Red silk lanterns swayed under carved wooden eaves. Cedar tables stretched in four parallel lines down the broad stone avenue, covered with clean white linen runners and polished porcelain bowls.
Eight hundred men and women filled the street.
Three hundred Special Ninth Bureau veterans, led by Commander Long Zhan, arrived in neat military formation. They wore their newly fitted purple-gold armor, their posture straight, their eyes clear of the bitter despair that had haunted them in the subterranean wards.
Mingling among them were the five hundred loose cultivators from the alley. They wore clean gray Taichu work tunics, their wounds bandaged with fresh linen, their faces still carrying the shock of sudden deliverance.
At the head of the central courtyard stood thirty massive copper cauldrons.
Steam rose into the freezing twilight air in fragrant white clouds, carrying the rich, savory aroma of simmered free-range fowl, cured mountain ham, and wild mountain ginger.
Grandma Chen stood on a raised wooden bench, wearing a quilted red apron with embroidered golden carp. In her hands, she held a long-handled stainless steel ladle as broad as a shield.
