The artillery shot struck the empty road before Yan’s party reached the lower aqueduct. The bolt came over the ridge with a whine, then broke a stone marker into pale chips. The blast threw grit against the slope and made the horses rear.
One of the scouts waited for the dust to settle, then crawled toward the marker. He stopped several paces short of the crater and pointed with his knife. The impact had torn a shallow pit in the road, but the aqueduct wall still held. A strip of paving had been thrown against its base.
“They can reach the road from this angle,” he called. “The next shot might take the bend.”
Wei looked toward the ridge. “Could it reach the lower channel?”
“Not from this position. The wall blocks the line.”
Yan kept his gaze on the gun platform. The channel flowed dark beneath the stone. They had no reason to expose it by crossing too soon. The shot had proven the artillery could break a path and injure anyone close to it, even when it missed its target.
Wei dropped behind the aqueduct wall. “Down. Nobody crosses the path until we know where the next shot falls.”
