Sect Year 1 · seventh month · day 2 · Azure Stream Sect, Inner Court north ridge
The dew still lay heavy on the lower stones, and the sun had not yet cleared the ridge. Lin sat with his back against the cave door and his knees drawn up. He had slept with the blanket wrapped round his left arm, because the nights had turned cool at last, and his shoulders still ached from the stone. Somewhere below them a gate bell rang once for the lower gate’s morning count, and then the valley went quiet again.
Su sat on the step beside him with her coat buttoned to the throat and the bound book open on her knee, its paper label curling at one corner from the damp. She read the way she did everything. Each word was set down squarely, and the hard ones got a little more weight, so that a sentence about a man’s hands sounded like a sentence about a wall.
“Heart runs ahead of the breath,” she read. “Breathes like a lamp. Sleeps without intent.”
“Skip the third,” said Lin.
“It’s the only copy.” She read the third. “Lies down asking for nothing. Does not dream. Wakes before the bell. Says nothing of the night.”
