Outside, the city was draped in long evening shadows. Dust stirred from the dry roads by horse’s hooves and pedestrian traffic hung in the motionless air. Dusk had brought down the temperature, but it was still unseasonably hot, even for late summer, and the red clay tiles on the roofs of the nearby buildings were dusted gray with ash. Jun had heard people saying it was from the wildfires to the southeast, the worst in decades, which were responsible for the yellowish haze in the sky that obscured the distant but constant sight of the Snake Wall, looming on the forested hills beyond the city, its wide ramparts divided down the center and patrolled day and night by soldiers of opposing armies who prevented anyone from crossing from one nation into the other.
Jun paused on the steps outside the opera house. A covered traveling wagon stood outside the double doors, two harnessed horses waiting patiently. Ren, having shed her beautiful blue-green silk costume in favor of unadorned traveling clothes, was guiding the blind flutist Chang with a hand under one of his elbows. She tapped the special metal rail on the side of their wagon and helped him up onto the bench.
Jun called out to them, “Goodbye, Uncle Chang. Travel safely!”
The man turned toward Jun’s voice and waved to him. “Stay out of trouble, young man!”
Jun leapt down the remaining steps and skidded to a stop in front of Ren as she was closing up the back of the wagon. “You danced well tonight,” he said. He cleared his throat. “As usual, that is.”
Ren dusted her hands and turned to face him, pushing a stray strand of hair off her cheek. “Thank you.”
“So … I suppose that was the last show you’re doing here for a while?”
She nodded. “We’re spending the night at the Phoenix Inn and then heading out of town tomorrow morning. Sifu wants to take our time getting to Xicheng.”
Even though the flutist had raised her since she was a small child, Ren called Chang her sifu because he was not her father by blood. Ren never spoke about her birth family, saying only that she was lucky Sifu Chang had taken her in as his daughter. Jun glanced up at the flutist, who was snacking on a meat bun while he waited for Ren to finish her conversation. It didn’t seem safe for a blind man and a young woman about the same age as Jun to travel alone through West Longhan—they would be easy targets for bandits—but the last time Jun had mentioned this concern to Ren, she’d chuckled and told him not to worry; she and Sifu were used to taking care of themselves.
Jun ran a hand through his hair. “If you’re going to be in Xicheng next month, that means you’ll be seeing the Guardian’s Tournament, right?”
“Of course. The biggest crowds in six years will be gathered there, eager to spend money after the matches are over each day.” When Jun rocked his weight back and forth on his feet and said nothing in reply, she arched a slim eyebrow at him. “Aren’t you planning to go watch the tournament? You used to talk about it all the time when we were younger, remember? You said it was your dream to compete.”
Jun hesitated. He didn’t see Ren very often or spend much time with her, but she and Chang had come through Cheon regularly for years, so he’d known her since they were twelve. In the last year, however, it seemed she’d changed dramatically. She’d always been tall and graceful, even as the girl who used to run around with him backstage during his father’s performances. Because she assisted the blind flutist, she’d always struck Jun as older and more responsible than other children their age, certainly more mature than the neighborhood Cheon boys. Ren was worldly, too, traveling all over the country in a wagon and having been to so many places he had never seen. On top of all that, however, it seemed to him she’d developed an air of adult confidence that Jun secretly wondered if he would ever have. Onstage tonight, she and Chang had seemed less like father and daughter than artistic partners.
And when she had danced the part of the Blessed Consort, it seemed no one in the opera house could take their eyes off her.
Jun rubbed the back of his neck and glanced over his shoulder, as if expecting his father to emerge from the opera house behind him. He desperately needed to confide in someone. Leaning in toward Ren, he lowered his voice. “I barely make the age cutoff to enter the tournament this year.” He’d turned sixteen a week ago. “I know it’s unlikely I’ll get to compete,” he added in a rush. “The Iron Core school only sponsors one entrant, so Master Song will probably send one of the older students. But there are sparring matches at the school tonight so Master Song can evaluate all the contenders before he makes his final decision. If I manage to come out on top…” He spread his hands and shrugged, trying to seem nonchalant and confident even though he felt jittery with nerves even talking about it.
He pushed to the back of his mind the fact that he’d already lied to his father earlier that evening, and in the event he was chosen, he’d have a hell of a time explaining himself, to say nothing of convincing his father to let him go to Xicheng.
Jun bit his lip. He’d cross that bridge when he got there. Li Hon did always say that he wanted what was best for his son. Jun simply had to convince his father that what was best wasn’t some safe government job in the future but to aim for greatness right now. It was long past time for his father to move on from the regret and guilt that had dogged him for ten years. In West Longhan, there were hundreds of schools teaching the fighting arts. Martial prowess was celebrated, and at no time more so than the Guardian’s Tournament, when the youth of the realm vied for the honor of being named Guardian of the Scroll of Heaven. The Guardian was recognized as the best warrior in the West because he had to defeat all rivals in the arena. A contender didn’t train for years simply to back down when it mattered. And he certainly didn’t perform fake fights on a stage for coin. The Guardian fought for real, and he fought to win.
Ren tilted her chin up and studied his face, as if sizing up his odds. Jun felt a warm flush creeping farther up his neck the longer her large, evaluative eyes rested on him. “I would like nothing more than to say I know the Guardian,” she declared. In one smooth motion, she pulled herself up into the driver’s seat of the wagon and took the horses’ reins. “Good luck tonight, Li Jun. I hope I’ll see you in Xicheng.”