Cloud Demon

The old man's laughter echoed over the well platform, dry and hollow, like an echo carried from a dried-up well.

Chen An did not retreat. He stood there with one hand on his saber hilt, shifting his gaze from the well mouth to the old man's face.

The old man's smile had yet to fade. On that wrinkled face, the smile was like a mask worn for too long—impossible to remove. Or perhaps he had never intended to remove it.

"Did you see it?" the old man asked.

Chen An did not answer.

"For those seeing this well for the first time, nine out of ten retreat," the old man went on by himself. Leaning on his bamboo staff, he slowly walked to the edge of the well platform and looked down at the swollen smiling face in the water. "As for those who didn't retreat, they're all in the well now."

"What is that?" Chen An asked.

"What is it?" The old man repeated the words as though savoring their taste, then slowly shook his head and sat down on a stone beside the well platform.

"Young man, you came from Jinghai Prefecture. Have you heard of Cloud City?"

Chen An nodded. "The seventy-two Cloud Cities, Skycloud Heavenly Palace, and the Cloud King's lineage—their fame thunders in every ear."

"You know quite a bit." The old man gave him a somewhat surprised look, then shook his head again. "But all that you know is old almanac lore."

He extended a shriveled finger and pointed at the low-hanging canopy of gray-white clouds overhead. "The skies of Cloud Prefecture were not like this before."

"When this old man was young, the sky was blue, like azure jade washed by water a thousand times over. Back then, the clouds of Cloud Prefecture