Sect Year 8 · first month · day 30, afternoon · Azure Stream Sect, record room
Jiang Ziyue came up the record-room steps in the afternoon with her grey cloak buttoned to the throat and the small black book held against her side. She didn’t knock. The door stood open for the air, and she stopped in the frame and looked into the room the way a clerk looked down a column before she began to add it. The lamp was lit on the desk, though the light still came in gold through the high window. The record box stood open in the corner. Lin was by the far wall with his shoulders against the plaster, and she looked at him for exactly as long as she had looked at the lamp. Beyond the high window the wind moved in the pines below the Outer Court, and somewhere in the lane a cart went by without stopping.
Su did not look up. She finished the line she was writing, blotted it with the square of felt she kept for that purpose, and turned the page. Only then did she say, “The chair is there.”
Jiang did not move toward it. “I’ll stand, if the Keeper of the record allows it.”
