A deep canyon cut through the south rim of Thousand-Star City. The hot waste from the crater met the cold water of the Boundless South Sea there. Fog hung over the docks and smelled of kelp, salt, and wet granite.
Dawn was breaking over Pier Eighteen. Galleons, whaling cutters, and low smuggler skiffs waited for the sea gates to open.
Pei Jing walked the wet deck in his charcoal robe and bamboo hat, with the chipped cleaver on his back. He’d cleaned the two needles he’d used at the warehouse and put them back in the wrist guard. All thirty-six sat under his sleeve.
Song Bo waited beside an iron bollard in a patched oilskin poncho. He blew into his hands to warm them. When Pei Jing came up, he passed him a bronze transit token.
“The tide’s running south,” he said. “The wards open in twelve minutes. Gu, his son and Xiao Ling made the Cloud-Sparrow. The fleet clerk waved their cabin through the west sluice on the predawn tide.”
Pei Jing felt the stamped face of the token with his thumb. “What are they saying at the guild hall?”
“Wan Jinbao came back at the third watch. You could hear him two halls away. The city assayers found burned barrels and eight bodies in Warehouse Seven. The wardens are calling it an alchemy accident. A charm went off near volatile stock, they say.”
