[b]Fengye![/b]

There are lights on the other side of the river. They are not candles; they are not entirely fireflies. Cinnamon and honey hangs over the omnipresent smell of rain. The House of Lapis Lazuli is close at hand, and the gods are thick and close about, unseen but intent on you as you catch up to the spirit of clinging mud wading through some farmhold’s rice paddies.

Incense rising on the other side of the river. The sound of strings and bells. Blue silks and chains. Zhaojun would either thrive here or be in dreadful peril here. But she is not here; it is you, hemming in this minor spirit, shaking your umbrella at it. It roars and bubbles defiance, and tries to break around you. To the river. To the House. To file a [i]complaint.[/i]

If the Maid passes into that House, it is likely that she would never be permitted to escape. She would be sealed away beneath Lake Zenba by the priestesses of the Sapphire Mother, a shard of Hell imprisoned in the world that rejected those ancient titan-powers. Jazumi, conversely, has equal odds of sharing such a fate or being ransomed to the wind-courts. And you? You, Fengye?

Polite, curt dismissal, if you are lucky. Battle with priestesses and gods of river and rain, if you are not.

[hr]

[b]Kalaya![/b]

The kiss on your cheek is sad. But it’s as much as Ven can give you. The brush of her lips against your cheek; the inhalation as if she means to remember your scent. “Then go to her,” she says. Not a command. A prompting. A hope.

And then she follows her witch, and leaves you with the dumplings that taste like nothing. She doesn’t look back.

It is as you sit by the last dumpling, wondering whether you should bother to eat it, that a very disheveled priestess approaches the inn. She looks sleepless, her cloak askew, her hem trailing in the mud, her hair frizzing out from under her hood, and when she looks at you the first time her gaze passes right through and past you. Then she takes several more steps and happens to actually notice you, and a small spark of attention lights in her eyes.

“You! You there,” she says, pointing, a little desperate. “You’re a knight, aren’t you? You do, you do [i]quests,[/i] and finding people, and making things right?”

Whatever she wants you to do, you could ask for a meeting with the Sapphire Mother herself as a reward. Or, well, maybe not, if she’s looking for someone’s lost dog or had her wagon stuck in a ditch, but she could point you to someone who could! Clearly, this is a sign!

And she would probably appreciate that dumpling.

[hr]

[b]Giriel![/b]

“Hello, Bruinstead.”

Of all the things to interrupt your valiant efforts to get this half-a-raiding-party pointed in the right direction to do the right thing! It would just have to be Peregrine (again) working with someone shady (again)— in this case, the warlock, the one that Kalaya is besotted with. They’re following a Necessity of Emptiness, one that Peregrine’s called into the world, seeking something or someone out.

“Where is the vessel of the General?” The warlock gets straight to the point, chin lifted proudly high, brass hand on the hilt of her sword. “You had her, didn’t you?”

“It was definitely here,” Peregrine says, drumming tunelessly against her thigh. She looks even worse than usual— something’s really got her by the reins. Is it Uusha, do you think? Or, no, a new project. Something even more interesting to her.

[hr]

[b]Lotus![/b]

You cling to those solid, dirty, warm fingers like they’re your only handholds.

She fought for you. For you! You couldn’t do a thing, and you couldn’t save her when she dunked herself in the river, and you can’t escape being led by the servant of the Dominion towards a promised captivity, but she still fought for you, and whenever you start to pull back, self-conscious of how clingy and needy you’re being with the hands you can’t even see, she tugs you back. So gentle. So insistent.

She wants to hold your hands. That’s what keeps you grounded as your heart keeps racing, as your legs start to complain about the walk, as you feel the heat of your cheeks and the blood thumping through them, caught between a rock and a soft place. You’re unable to talk, to embarrass yourself by trying to thank Han through words, to try to convince Piripiri to let you go, to open yourself up to humiliation when she points out that you’re not even sure that you want to be let go.

You’re not even sure you want her to let Han go.

Which makes you a terrible person.

And yet, whenever you let her go, there her hands are (so strong, so careful, so rough, so good for holding) to tug you back. To rub a thumbpad over your nail in a way that makes fire race up your spine and a pathetic mewl burble through your well-covered lips. To invite you to explore her hands, her sweat-clammy palms, her raised scars, her downy backs. Of her hands. Just her hands. You can’t even reach her back. Because you’re tied up. And because it’s one thing to hold her hands but she probably wouldn’t. Even though. Imagine her wrestling shirtless like one of your mother’s courtiers. The shape of her back, how strong, how firm, how very made to be kissed…

You stumble and are suddenly caught with attention from both sides: your captor catching you by the arm, arresting you, making sure you don’t fall, and your… your… your [i]Han[/i] squeezing both of your hands tight and desperate with the need for you not to fall.

You try to hide your face in your shoulder, sure that the entire world can tell how conflicted and full of forbidden desires you are, uniquely terrible and unworthy of all the love— all the [i]affection[/i] you are being shown from either side. Affection you are likely making up because it’s a pretty story to tell yourself, because Piripiri sees you as a captive pawn of the Dominion and Han is just the kind of woman who protects travelers, even if they keep being absolutely unworthy of her.

But whenever you pull away, there her fingers are, telling you a different story. Stay, Lotus. If I could, I’d swing you up into my arms and carry you to safety and I’d accept a demure shake of your head when I ask you if you want to be untied…