Lupi 06 - Blood Magic

as it suited her to be - she especially approved of conventions involving respect for your elders - and profoundly disinterested in any rules or norms she didn't agree with.
    No, it was knowing for certain that her grandmother had a lover of any sort. Not in the past. In the present. That was just... weird. "Rule wouldn't be protected, then."
    "We do not think so, no." Li Qin put a gentle arm around Lily's waist. "This is a great deal to hear all at once. I have been able to absorb pieces of this tale a little at a time over the years. You are trying to arrange it inside you all at once. This is difficult."
    For no reason, Lily's eyes teared up. It infuriated her. She blinked frantically. "I'm... sort of topsy-turvy."
    "Will you indulge me by taking tea once more? It is not your practice, I know, but I do not have a garden here to offer you. Perhaps a few quiet moments will allow your insides to settle."
    "That... " Lily hesitated. "Okay. Yes. Tea would be fine." For maybe the first time in her life, she actually meant it. If nothing else, the ritual would give her something to do where she knew the rules. Speaking of which... As Li Qin released her and moved away, Lily looked at Rule.
    He held her hand still, but was watching Sam, who'd risen from his curled posture. His wings were slowly unfolding as if he were about to depart for the sky. "One question before you go. No, two questions."
    Sam didn't respond, but he paused.
    "Was this Chimei behind the attack on Cullen?"
    Certainly. Sorcerers are dangerous to Chimei.
    "How?"
    I will not explain. Was that your other question?
    Rule grimaced. "No. You spoke of the consequences of your indirect actions breaking the treaty. I assume the Chimei can act indirectly, also."
    She can.
    "What happens if the Chimei's actions cause the treaty to break?"
    There was distinct amusement in Sam's "voice" this time. Lily Yu is not the only one to joust with questions. If this Chimei causes the treaty to break, I kill her.
    "But you said - "
    I said the creator of the Chimei intended them to be fearless and impossible to kill. He achieved the first goal, however disastrously. He nearly achieved the second goal. Nearly, but not quite.
    He did not allow for dragons.
    Sun Mzao gathered a body whose nose-to-tail length might have stretched out over the entire twice-a-football-field span of his landing pad. He crouched, then sprang for the sky. The great wings unfurled fully and beat once, twice, again...
    And he disappeared.
    "Ah, good," Li Qin said. "Sam heated the water for us before he left."

 
    NINETEEN

    The city of Luan; Shanxi Province, China; nineteenth day of the eleventh month of the forty-fourth year of the Ching Dynasty
     
    Four people waited outside the home of Chen Wu Yin, the man who held the license for collecting night soil in the district where the sorcerer had taken up residence - two hungry, desperate women, a middle-aged man, and Li Lei.
    She had planned to arrive after the women, who came every day. She had not planned on the man.
    He had long hairs growing out of his nose. Li Lei regarded those hairs with disgust. How had he heard that the collector would have a job available today? After all Li Lei had gone through to make that possible, it was patently unfair for the man to be here.
    She'd needed to find a young employee, one without a family of his own who would be left behind to starve. Whatever bribe or blackmail the sorcerer had used to procure his place, it had been effective. The sorcerer controlled the city and its gates. It was not too difficult to slip a single person through the gate, but smuggling out an entire family without the proper papers would have been impossible.
    Then she'd had to persuade the young servant man to leave. She had plenty of coin, which is a fine persuader, but by then she hadn't been able to speak to him... or to anyone. In the end, she'd had to use one of the three stones Sam had given her as part of her training.
    If he thought she was foolish to have used his gift on such a paltry target when she could simply have killed him, well, he could laugh at her later. If she had a later. If not, he might still laugh. But she hoped he would also burn things. A great many things.
    Oh, she had considered killing the man. She was not squeamish, whatever Sam said. She could have told herself that the man died in service to the city or even the whole of China. Sam believed the sorcerer would not be satisfied with a single city, that his