Sect Year 1 · seventh month · day 27 · the Azure Stream spring, above the grave
Lin climbed to the grave before the sun cleared the bamboo. The path was wet from the night’s cold and slick on the stones, so he went slowly and kept one hand on the bank. He didn’t mind the slowness. His breath came steady without any effort, and he noticed it on every step, as a man notices a shutter that has been left open in a house he had kept shut for a long time.
On the upper terrace the Inner students were at their morning forms, a row of grey sleeves moving together under the eye of a senior who watched without moving. One of the younger ones saw him on the path and lifted his sword a finger’s width in greeting, and Lin returned the nod. He had once been the boy who swept the edge of that ground with a broom taller than himself, the flat stone slabs cold through his sandals in the dark before the bell. He could still feel the weight of the broom in his shoulders. Nobody on the terrace looked at him now as though he were a warning. That was something.
