The heavy snow drifted down; the east was turning pale, and dawn was close.
In a bluestone alley of Daye Ward, Xu Buling walked unsteadily in blood-soaked clothes, his four-foot saber held out before him, the blade scraping the stones with a cha-cha— sound. At that hour before dawn there was no one in the alley, so it drew no notice.
The night before, in the underground palace of White Horse Manor, cutting down the tiger and killing the men had cost him dearly; the last of it was taking Zhu Manlong's old fist head-on. His constitution was sturdy and he had taken no wound, but the cold poison inside him could no longer be held down.
The Dragon-Locking Gu was a Miao poison gu, and strong liquor suppressed the gu-worm; otherwise it produced cold poison without cease, gnawing through his four limbs and every bone in his body. If he ignored it and went all out, the end would be burst vessels, blood from all seven orifices, and death.
The Broken Jade Fire in his gourd was all gone. The indescribable stinging had eased a great deal, but it was still more than a man could bear.
Xu Buling's steps were unsteady; in the bitter winter cold he breathed out puff after puff of mist, and walked slowly toward the Sun family's shop...
The cold wind keened, whipping up dead grass and snow dust along the alley.
The Sun family's shop had a dim yellow lamp burning; the old shopkeeper was just taking the stools down off the table and setting them out in neat rows.
Cha, cha—
The sound of a blade being dragged came from far off, drawing near.
Shopkeeper Sun frowned. Wiping his hands on a towel, he walked out under the wine shop's banner and peered into the dark, and saw a handsome man in black coming toward him with a four-foot saber held out before him. His face was like jade—but streaked with blood.
Shopkeeper Sun had kept a wine shop in this alley his whole life. His wine was good, so the gallants who came to the capital all liked to drink a bowl here, and he had seen every kind of man and every kind of affair. Men of the jianghu who killed all night, came staggering over at dawn rank with blood to drink a bowl of wine and then shut their eyes in peace—he had seen even that more than once.
Shopkeeper Sun was about to turn back and warm some wine when he looked again, closely, and realized that the bloodstained man was Xu Buling.
"Aiyo! Young Master, how did you come to this state..."
Alarmed, Shopkeeper Sun trotted forward at once, meaning to steady Xu Buling.
Xu Buling crooked the corner of his mouth and raised a hand to refuse the help. Carrying the dripping saber, he walked into the shop, sat down at the wine table nearest the alley, and let out a long breath:
"Shopkeeper, a jug of wine."
Lanterns hung in the shop; by their light Shopkeeper Sun studied him a few times, and not until he saw that Xu Buling had no wounds on him did he relax a little. Turning back to the stove, he fetched the jug he had kept warming and came over:
"Young Master, what were you about last night? A body worth a thousand gold like yours—how could you do the killing with your own hands..."
Xu Buling took the jug and tipped his head back to pour it down. The strong wine spilled from the corner of his mouth, washing the blood from his chin and soaking his collar.
Glug, glug...
A little two-liang jug, emptied in a blink.
Xu Buling let out a long breath of foul air; he had finally come around. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve, unfastened the small bundle at his waist, and tossed it onto the table, where it landed with a muffled thud and the clatter of colliding silver.
"Sancai stole the shopkeeper's silver. I was out on business last night, so I brought it back for you while I was at it."
"...This..."
Shopkeeper Sun stood frozen on the spot. He turned his head to look at the bloodstained bundle on the table, then at Xu Buling, who reeked of slaughter; alarm crept into his dim old eyes, and he slapped his knee:
"Aiyo! Young Master Xu, what are you doing? Last time I only let it slip in passing—what call was there for you to go to such pains to get the silver back? How am I ever to repay a kindness like this? Even the wine will taste off now..."
So saying, he trotted over to the stove, poured hot water, and hunted up a towel.
Xu Buling sat on the stool and rested a little. As the strong liquor went down, the icy stabbing between heart and belly gradually melted away and his color came back. He leaned the long saber against the wine table and laughed softly:
"I was on my own business; it was no more than a hand's turn. No need for such ceremony, Shopkeeper Sun—if you truly want to repay the kindness, one jug of wine is plenty."
Shopkeeper Sun came over with the basin of hot water and set it on the table:
"That's what you say, but a kindness is still a kindness and must be remembered. Jianghu folk set store by paying back a kindness or a grudge on the spot, but this old man is no jianghu man—ai~ I've nothing else to my name. From now on, whenever the Young Master comes, the wine is on the house..."
Xu Buling nodded his thanks, washed his frozen cheeks in the hot water, and said with a light smile, "If you stop taking silver for the wine, I'll be too ashamed to come again."
Shopkeeper Sun opened his mouth. He had dealt with people his whole life, and knew it was useless to say more to a young man with chivalry in his bones; he could only nod with a bitter smile. Then he thought a moment and added:
"In all my years keeping a wine shop, the Young Master is the first of his kind I've met—a good deal more forthright than those jianghu gallants with 'benevolence and righteousness' forever on their lips."
Xu Buling crooked his mouth: "That's because it's no crime for me to kill. Ordinary folk can't be that free and easy."
Shopkeeper Sun shook his head; he had nothing to answer to that.
After resting a while in the shop, Xu Buling wrapped the bloodstained saber in cloth, rose, and set off toward Kuishou Street.
Shopkeeper Sun walked out of the shop and watched the receding figure until it vanished; then he shook his head with a smile, put away the bundle on the table, and went on puttering about his little wine shop as he did every other day...
At the corner where Bluestone Alley bent away in the distance, Ning Qingye, fox fur on her shoulders, rested one pale hand on the bluestone wall and watched everything that passed in the wine shop without blinking.
After she left the wine shop yesterday, she had still wanted to wait for that frail, foolish heir to come by, but Shopkeeper Sun would not take her silver and even said she was no better than the man who had abandoned his wife and daughter. I'm a little angry—I'm not going back to that wine shop.
The shop had only just opened today when Ning Qingye came and took up her post at the alley corner. As she had expected, that foolish heir did come every day to buy a jug of wine; what she had not expected was that Xu Buling would come staggering over drenched in blood, steadying a long saber.
She knew Xu Buling carried the Dragon-Locking Gu, and how much agony any flare of temper would cost him; she had assumed something had happened to him the night before.
Only after hearing the exchange between Xu Buling and Shopkeeper Sun did she understand.
Xu Buling had heard the tale too—the wine shop's hired hand who had driven his own parents to their graves and robbed the man who had done him kindness—and he had gone and fetched the stolen silver back.
Two hundred taels was not a hair off nine oxen to the heir of a vassal prince; going to such trouble over it looked a little baffling.
But watching this, Ning Qingye understood why Shopkeeper Sun had said she was no better than her father, who had vanished without a trace long ago.
Jianghu folk set store by drawing the blade when they see injustice in the road.
To see a poor family in distress, draw your blade, win back their money and pocket not one coin of it—that is chivalry.
To see a poor customer in distress and quietly make up his loss out of your own purse—that is charity.
Both are kindness, and both earn respect, but not every man is willing to accept charity.
Take Shopkeeper Sun: with a craft in his hands he would never starve, and he would not eat food offered to him in contempt, so he would not take her silver.
But the silver had been Shopkeeper Sun's to begin with. Xu Buling brought it back and asked one jug of wine as payment; Shopkeeper Sun could accept it as entirely fair, and it sat easy with him besides.
Put plainly, she had no grasp of the ways of the world. However fine her martial arts, she was still only a girl with a little kindness in her, not fit to be compared with a true jianghu traveler.
Ning Qingye blinked, and understanding kindled in her cool, clear eyes. After watching Xu Buling out of sight, she drew her fox fur close and walked slowly back to the empty courtyard...