Sect Year 3 · eleventh month · day 7 · the inn on the Hesk road above Tarn Mouth
The road climbed out of Tarn Mouth through wet grass that came up to the horses’ knees. Herders’ carts went past them going down, heavy with hides and sacks of salt, and the drivers lifted a hand without speaking and did not look twice at three strangers on a grey mare, a bay, and a dun gelding that Jiang had paid double for.
Above the grass the land folded into shoulders of bare rock. Beyond those the mountains stood up blue along the eastern edge of the sky, close enough that Lin could see the snow lying in their gullies. By the middle of the day the wind had dropped to something a man could ignore. He noticed that he had stopped listening for it.
Jiang rode at the front with the black book buttoned inside her coat and her back very straight. She hadn’t spoken since the stable. Su rode behind Lin with the record strapped to her saddle under an oilcloth, and every so often she reached back and touched the strap, the way a person checks a pocket for a key.
