65. End of an Era

Yanli sat in her prison cell with all the dignity should could muster.

“Sect Leader, please eat,” Liu Peng said softly, holding out the cracked bowl. Jiang Minhao hovered behind her, radiating typical Jiang worry by looking very cross and annoyed.

In the cell across them from, Jiang Wu watched them with concern.

They were all still wearing the same robes they had on when Jin Zixuan’s troops brought them to Koi Tower three days prior. Jin Zixuan had respectfully introduced her to his father as “Sect Leader Wei Yanli, of the Yiling Wei sect,” only to stop in horror when his father burst out laughing and ordered Yanli and her disciples arrested.

“Father! Why?”

“The Jiang are defectors, and their so-called sect leader is a bastard girl of no consequence. The fact she is pretending to be sect leader is deserving of punishment on its own, but on top of that her brothers—also bastards—are responsible for the murder of the Chief Cultivator’s eldest son, the honorable Wen Xu.” He shook his head in a mockery of paternalistic disapproval. “Lock them up.”

“But Father!”

“Quiet! You dare question your father? This is about politics, A’Xuan. Leave it to me,” Jin Guangshan answered.

Jiang Wu had bristled and readied for a fight, but Jiang Minhao looked at Yanli questioningly.

She shook her head and stepped in front of her disciples. “Your disrespect to a fellow sect leader shames the Jin,” she said with a slight bow. “But I will not allow your crass words to influence my own behavior. We will go peacefully to your dungeon. But be forewarned, Sect Leader Jin: when it comes time, I will not show you any more mercy than you have shown us.”

Jin Guangshan went red with rage, and Yanli knew the only reason he did not attack her was that Jin Zixuan got between them and ordered his own disciples to escort her to the dungeon. Nie Huaisang loudly exclaimed that his brother would consider such treatment of one of their allies as a hostile act, causing Jin Guangshan to turn his fury on him, Nie Meitong and the Nie elders who were also shouting at the Jin sect leader. Luo Qingyang took advantage of the distraction and quickly led them down to where they were locked up like common criminals.

Where they were still locked up like common criminals.

Yanli suspected the only reason they were being fed was through Jin Zixuan’s influence. Even his mother had not deigned to visit Yanli in captivity, which was not surprising, but sat like a bruise on Yanli’s heart. Madam Jin had been so kind and supportive of her, once upon a time.

The damp and the cold had affected Yanli, which after all the stress of the past few weeks meant that she had come down with a fever the first night. Luo Qingyang had brought in a doctor the next day, and made sure that Yanli was provided medicine, but it was clear that was the limit of the help she could provide, and she had bowed deeply to Yanli in apology.

Yanli had been mostly unconscious for the next two days and was only now able to sit up without sweating. She had not missed her spells of illness, but she also knew they were generally fleeting.

No, it was everything else that was upsetting her at the moment.

“Sect Leader, please.” Jiang Wu pleaded with her from where he sat in the cell across the hall.

Her stomach roiled with her anger and frustration, but she thought of her brothers and her responsibility to them, as well as her disciples trapped in cells with her. She opened her mouth and let Liu Peng feed her while Jiang Minhao looked on in grim satisfaction. When she could not take another bite of the flavorless swill, she put her hand up.

“I will meditate for a while, to circulate my qi,” she said softly.

“Mild inedia does not affect me much, Sect Leader. Please let me know if I can bolster your reserves,” Jiang Minhao said with a half-bow. Yanli nodded in reply, then settled in to do what she could with the energy she had, a little annoyed that the horrible food had, actually, helped improve her strength.

She had lost track of time when she heard Jiang Wu yelling.

“You treat a sect leader like this? Scoundrel! Dishonor upon the Jin!” He was pounding on the bars.

Her eyes flew open to see one of Jin Guangshan’s guards use their sheathed sword to poke hard at Jiang Wu’s chest, sending him stumbling backwards.

Jin Guangshan himself was staring directly at her.

His eyes were narrowed, assessing and thoughtful. He was a terrible human being, but no one ever accused him of being stupid, and Yanli felt the first frisson of fear at his calculating expression. With a flick of his wrist as their only order, his honor guard unlocked the door to her cell and dragged it open.

Jiang Minhao stepped in front of Yanli, obviously prepared to fight—and likely die—to protect her, but Yanli stood up from the floor with only a little wobble and put her hand on her shoulder. Unhappy but following her lead, Jiang Minhao moved to the side to let her by.

“Protect Liu Peng,” Yanli whispered as she passed, and Jiang Minhao bowed her head in obedience.

“Sect Leader Jin.” Yanli bowed properly as one sect leader to another, which was to say, not much. Jiang Minhao and Liu Peng reluctantly bowed as well, only slightly lower.

Jin Guangshan snorted in amusement. “You are keeping up this charade?”

“I am the sect leader of Yiling Wei.” She stated it plainly and simply, and folded her hands in front of herself. She wished she had a bit of the Lan stature, thinking that it might look more impressive to regally hold her hands behind her back, but the last thing she wanted to do was put his focus on her chest.

“You are a lost child, and a bastard at that. I admit, you have grown into your mother’s looks, though.”

Jiang Minhao actually growled. Jin Guangshan raised an eyebrow at her, then turned back to Yanli.

“Wen Ruohan wants your brothers.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Why?”

“To execute them in revenge for the death of Wen Xu, I assume,” she said with a pleasant smile.

“Oh, of course. Of course. That goes without saying, which is why I find it interesting that he wants them captured alive. I know,” he raised a hand to forestall a protest that Yanli had not made, “You think he wants to kill them himself. You do not know the Chief Cultivator as I do, though. He prefers efficiency over vengeance, and usually I would say that anyone who can bring him their heads would be well rewarded. Not this time. I suspect he wants them for a different reason.”

Either he knew about Ying’er’s use of resentful energy, or he suspected something of the kind, but Yanli was not a fool.

“As you say: you know the Chief Cultivator’s inclinations better than I ever could.”

There were a few muffled gasps at the verbal slap, and Jin Guangshan’s expression went cold. He turned to one of his guards, putting his back to her. In any setting other than a dungeon, it would be considered extremely rude.

“Have her brought to my office, I’m tired of smelling the shit down here.” He walked off, a couple of the guard splitting away to trail behind him.

Jiang Minhao looked ready to throw down again, but Yanli walked out of the cell to the waiting guards, who did not bother to put restraints on her.

“Sect Leader!” Jiang Wu called out as she passed.

“I will be fine. Care for one another until I return,” she said loudly, to make it clear to the guards she took her role as sect leader seriously. As both of her mothers had explained to her in very different ways at very different times in her life: perception was often more important than reality, and presentation affected perception more than facts.

They led her up and through the buildings of the Jin sect, from dungeon to storage areas to low ranking offices and on up the hierarchy to the innards of Koi Tower itself. Jin Guangshan’s office was a large, impressive room laden with gilded decorations and precious items displayed on every surface. He stood by his desk as she was brought in, one of his ministers at his side, talking quietly together. He did not even look up or greet her when she was brought in, so she stood there quietly, focusing on looking out one of the windows, where a colorful wild bird hopped back and forth on the sill. It blinked at her and suddenly took off, and she was left feeling more alone in the nest of an enemy.

“Leave us,” Jin Guangshan said eventually, and everyone bowed their way out of the room, leaving her alone with him. Yanli stifled her nerves, which were as heightened as if she was trapped with a wolf. She thought she probably was.

“Don’t fear, I will not hurt you,” he said pleasantly, walking over to her. She took a step backwards instinctively, then willed herself to stand still. He smirked as he closed in on her. “Keeping you alive is a good way to draw your brothers in from the wild, so your life is safe.”

“Am I supposed to thank you for that?”

He studied her for a long moment, then slapped her so hard across the face that she fell down. He simply stood there while she pulled herself up off the floor, one hand cradling her burning cheek. She knew he had held back, because a full hit with his level of cultivation would likely have broken her jaw or killed her outright.

“You need to learn your place, girl.”

“You need to learn some decency,” she replied. Her eyes were tearing up from pain and frustration and fear, but she managed to keep from crying by force of will.

He did not even look mad, just amused. He did not consider her a threat, and was clearly finding the whole situation hilarious.

She hated him.

“I see a little lesson in appropriate behavior is called for.” He stepped away and undid the wide golden silk sash around his waist, throwing it on his desk, and slipped off his topmost robe. “A girl like you is only good for one thing, and it’s time you learned that your place is on your back.”

Her vision whited out for a moment, but then she thought of her brothers, and A’Yao, and Meng Shi, and stood up straight as a proper cultivator should.

And then, improbably, she remembered dear Lao Wang, and what he would say to a man like Jin Guangshan.

“You are a vile piece of shit. Go to hell.”

He stalled, shocked by her coarse language, eyes wide. Then he laughed, loud and obnoxious. She took the moment to back away from him. She had no plans, no way to stop him, but she was not going to let him just take what he wanted.

He noticed, of course, and started walking toward her again, a tiger stalking prey.

She backed up further until her hip pressed into a small table holding a vase. It was a precious, valuable piece, she knew that in the same way she knew fine silk when she saw it, but she dared not take her attention off Jin Guangshan as he closed in on her. The table jostled when she tried to back up even more, and the vase finally became unbalanced. She instinctively turned to catch it anyway, cursing her own reflexes when Jin Guangshan took the distraction and lunged the final distance between them.

It was a clumsy dance, with her grabbing the vase as it fell and Jin Guangshan grabbing her as she fell, and they all toppled to the ground together. The impact shattered the vase in her hands, pieces spraying out along the floor. Jin Guangshan quickly shoved her down onto her belly, and one of her arms slid out. She yelled when her hand was sliced open by a porcelain shard, the pain of it coalescing into fury, clearing her mind of everything other than survival. Every lesson she had gotten over the years—from her mother, from her brothers, from Xiao Xingchen, from A’Yao—rose up through her bones and her muscle memory, and she started fighting for her life.

She jammed one heel into his knee and then elbowed him in the neck. It was less like proper martial arts and more like the brawls Ying’er and A’Cheng would get into when they were younger, but it was enough to put some space between her and Jin Guangshan.

His surprise at her attack was enough for her to crawl free, but as she twisted around he jumped at her with snarl of frustration and grabbed one of her wrists. She slapped him with her free hand using every drop of qi she could call on for strength, then landed on her back when he simply flopped bonelessly to the side.

Her mind a haze of fury and fear, she stumbled to her feet , slipping on the wet floor, and only then realized that the hand she used to slap him was holding a long, sharp shard of porcelain that was soaked in blood. She took in a deep, slow breath and finally looked down.

She had not slapped him; she had slit his throat so deeply she could see cartilage. His blood spread out around them in a widening circle, covering her feet. His eyes were entirely vacant. Distantly, as if hearing someone in the other room, she thought that he had probably died almost instantly. Her brain cycled that information over and over on a loop as she stood there, the adrenaline and shock making her whole body tremble.

“Father, I’m coming in! I know you have Sect Leader Wei in there!”

She started at Jin Zixuan’s voice and almost slipped on the blood again just as the heavy wooden door slammed open.

She looked up to see Jin Zixuan and Luo Qingyang in the doorway, staring at her in shock, along with the sect leader’s personal guard. Nie Huaisang was peeking around them, eyes wide.

As one, all their gazes tipped down to where Jin Guangshan—Sect Leader Jin, the second most powerful man in the jianghu—lay dead at her feet.