After nightfall, four of the five houses on the fief were lit up.
In the largest hall, Jiang Lin lit an oil lamp. Bai Lingyu brought in a bowl of hot water from the kitchen and placed it beside him. Without saying a word, she sat down on the bench next to him. The four boys had already gone back to their rooms, but Jiang Lin knew they weren't asleep. The light in A Shan's room was still on, and his shadow was projected onto the window paper as he paced back and forth, probably trying to find his way around in the dark. Yi Chen's room was the quietest; the light went out early, but occasionally the sound of someone turning over could be heard. Xiao Man and Lin Du's rooms faced each other, each with their doors slightly ajar, as if they were sizing each other up, or perhaps neither of them was used to sleeping with the door closed.
Xiao Qi was placed on a low couch in the corner of the hall. Jiang Lin fed him a Meridian-Warming Pill and used his Soul Power to suppress the turmoil in his meridians, but it was only a temporary solution. Xiao Qi didn't speak, his eyes half-open and half-closed, occasionally staring at the ceiling for a long time, as if looking at something that others couldn't see.
Jiang Lin opened the notebook and jotted down a few notes about the day's events. The pen tip touched the paper lightly, but the hall was too quiet, and the sound of the pen scratching was faint. Bai Lingyu glanced at him but didn't ask what he was writing.
"I need to go to Heaven Dou City tomorrow," Jiang Lin said, closing the booklet.
Bai Lingyu nodded. "I'll report it to the City Lord's Mansion. I'll go."
"Let's go together," Jiang Lin said. "Take the four of them with us. Let them get to know the way and the people. They'll be staying here from now on, and they can't be completely clueless about which way the city gates face."
Bai Lingyu thought for a moment and did not refute.
Where's Xiao Qi?
Jiang Lin turned his head and glanced at the low couch in the corner. Xiao Qi was curled up, her bandaged arm pressed down on her body, her breathing shallow and rapid.
"Take him with you. We can't leave him here alone."
The next morning, the group set off for Heaven Dou City. A Shan walked to Jiang Lin's left, looking around curiously at everything. Yi Chen walked to the right, his gaze calm, but his pace steady. Xiao Man clutched Lin Du's sleeve, the two walking side by side in silence. Bai Lingyu walked at the very front, the land deed rolled up into a tube and tucked into her sleeve pocket.
Xiao Qi didn't follow.
When Jiang Lin went to the hall to see him, the low couch was empty. The quilt was folded neatly, but the folding method was clumsy, as if someone who had never folded a quilt properly before had learned it by mistake. The window was half open, and a Meridian-Warming Pill was left on the windowsill. It hadn't been moved, but it had been moved to a more inward position, as if it had been pushed back to prevent it from falling off.
Bai Lingyu stood at the door and glanced at the scene. "You left by yourself?"
Jiang Lin didn't speak. He walked over and put the Meridian-Warming Pill from the windowsill into his sleeve. Then he glanced at the ground outside the window. There were a few faint footprints on the yellow soil, heading north. His steps were light, but his left foot was deeper than his right. He was walking with his weight shifted to the right, and his right arm swung less than his left—that was to protect the bandaged arm he was using.
"Never mind that for now," Jiang Lin said. "Let's go to Heaven Dou City."
Bai Lingyu glanced at him, asked no further questions, and turned to lead the team away.
The procedures at the City Lord's Mansion in Heaven Dou City went very smoothly. Dean Feng had given prior notice, and the clerk at the City Lord's Mansion didn't ask any questions after seeing the land deed. He stamped it and filed it, all in less than half an hour. Jiang Lin asked Bai Lingyu to take the four boys around the city, while he went to the blacksmith shop to order a batch of small training equipment and a few pieces of everyday furniture.
By the time he met up with Bai Lingyu and the others at the blacksmith's shop, it was already afternoon.
A Shan had a handful of roasted chestnuts in his hand, Yi Chen carried a bag of paper and ink, Xiao Man hugged a new quilt, Lin Du carried nothing but walked at the very edge of the group, as if he was watching the road or waiting for something.
Jiang Lin glanced over and saw that all four of them had returned, but none of them brought up Xiao Qi.
"Go home," Jiang Lin said.
On the way back, the four were much quieter than when they arrived. A Shan didn't ask "What's home like?" again. Xiao Man hugged her blankets tightly, Yi Chen looked down at the road, and Lin Du's gaze remained fixed ahead.
Bai Lingyu walked to Jiang Lin's side and asked in a low voice, "Are you really going to ignore Xiao Qi?"
"I didn't say I wouldn't take responsibility."
You didn't chase after him when he ran.
Jiang Lin paused for a moment. "If he really wants to leave, there's no point in chasing him back. If he can't leave, he'll come back."
Bai Lingyu glanced at him sideways, as if she wanted to say something, but in the end she just nodded.
By the time Jiang Lin returned to his fiefdom, it was already dark. He pushed open the wooden gate through the gap in the stone wall, and the scene in the courtyard made him stop in his tracks.
On the wooden stakes in the training ground, leaned a small bundle of freshly chopped firewood. It was chopped unevenly, of varying lengths, but stacked neatly against the base of the stakes. Next to it was a shallow footprint leading to the woodshed behind the hall.
There was no one on the low couch in the hall. But the bedding on the couch was spread out, and the pillows were arranged neatly, as if someone had lain on it, gotten up and folded it, but gave up before finishing.
Jiang Lin walked to the low couch and felt something under the pillow. It was a bone fragment about the size of a thumb, smooth on the surface and with irregular edges, as if it had been broken off from something. There were several crooked marks of varying depths on the back of the bone fragment, as if they had been made with a fingernail.
Jiang Lin stared at those carving marks for a long time.
Bai Lingyu walked in from outside, saw the bone fragment in his hand, and asked, "What is that?"
"I don't know." Jiang Lin tucked the bone fragment into his sleeve, his voice calm. "But he didn't go far."
Bai Lingyu didn't understand what he meant, but she didn't ask any further questions.
After nightfall, Jiang Lin sat in the hall, the booklet spread out on his lap. The four boys had already returned to their rooms. This time, the lights in all four rooms were on, and no one peeked at each other through the cracks in the doors.
Jiang Lin wrote a line in the booklet, paused for a long time, and then closed the booklet.
He turned to look in the direction of the woodshed. There was no light, no sound, but there were new footprints in the dirt, leading from under the low couch window, around the corner of the house, all the way to the door of the woodshed.
Jiang Lin did not go over.
He blew out the oil lamp in the hall, sat in the darkness for a while, and then got up and went back to his room.
The next morning, Jiang Lin placed a bowl of porridge and a Meridian-Warming Pill at the door of the woodshed. Next to the bowl, he drew two words on the ground with a twig: Xiao Qi.
There was no movement in the woodshed. But after Jiang Lin turned and walked away, the door opened a crack, and a hand reached out and took the bowl and pills inside.
The door closed again.
From that day on, the person known as " Xiao Qi " existed in the fiefdom.
The four didn't ask his name, and no one called him junior brother. Xiao Man would glance at the woodshed when he passed by, A Shan would chop an extra bundle of firewood and place it at the door of the woodshed. Yi Chen would occasionally stand by the training ground and look towards the woodshed for a while. Lin Du did nothing, but once during a heavy rain, he placed an old umbrella from his doorway in front of the woodshed.
Xiao Qi didn't come out to say thank you, but the umbrella was later put away in the woodshed.
Bai Lingyu leaned against the gap in the stone wall, watching this scene, and turned to Jiang Lin, saying, "He's observing."
Jiang Lin hummed in agreement.
"He observed us, and he observed himself." Bai Lingyu paused, "But he didn't leave."
Jiang Lin didn't reply, but instead lowered his head, opened the booklet, and wrote a line on a new page. After finishing, he closed the booklet and glanced in the direction of the woodshed.
A thin sliver of dark red light shone again from under the crack of the woodshed door.