Sect Year 2 · sixth month · day 4 · the milestone camp above Sallow Basin
The rider came up the Deacon’s road before the sun had cleared the shoulder of rock. Lin heard the horse first, a hard uneven clatter on the grey plates, and then he saw it come out of the glare with its neck black with sweat and its flanks heaving. The rider slid off before it had stopped moving. He was a young man with a wind-cut face and the Deacon’s wax still on two of his fingers. He went straight to the fire without looking at the milestone or the dead man beside it.
“For Su Yanqing,” he said. “From the Deacon. He said to give it into her hand and nobody else’s.”
Su was already on her feet. She took the packet from him and broke the seal with her thumb, and she didn’t sit down to read it. Lin watched her face while she read. It didn’t change, not in the mouth and not in the lines beside the eyes, but her free hand closed slowly at her side and stayed closed.
The carter had put the kettle on. The thornwood was still smoking, and the water had not begun to sing. Pei sat up in her blanket and looked from Su to the rider and back, and she didn’t ask what it said.
