The streets of the Eastern Capital had grown quieter—not safer, just more watchful. After the incident in the Sun Market, the alleyways no longer teemed with hawkers and gossip but with silence, and silence always meant someone was listening.
Feiyan sat cross-legged in a cramped back room above a dye merchant's shop, a dagger on her lap and her eyes fixed on Lianhua.
"I still don't trust you," she said.
Lianhua didn't flinch. She sat beside the boarded window, rolling a silver ring between her fingers. "That makes you smarter than most."
They hadn't spoken much since the tea house. Ziyan had left them to work out the plan's next step—either because she trusted them, or because she needed space to think. Perhaps both.
"You're quick with numbers," Feiyan continued, "but why help us now?"
Lianhua didn't answer immediately. The candlelight threw flickering shadows across her features, sharpening her expression into something unreadable.
"I've lived in a cage for most of my life," she said softly. "Li Jun built it. Whether he meant to or not. The day I saw my name on that contract, I knew I had to start keeping records of my own."
Feiyan's jaw clenched. "And now you want revenge."
"I want the people who broke this country to suffer. That includes Li Jun. Maybe even some of your nobles too."
The silence between them was sharp, but not bitter. Something more dangerous—an understanding between two women shaped by suffering, sharpened by survival.
Below them, a bell rang.
Lianhua stood. "We need to move."
Feiyan followed. "Why? It's not even noon."
"Because," Lianhua said, pausing at the trapdoor leading to the merchant floor below, "Li Jun's men found our trail. One of the couriers you blackmailed got nervous."
Feiyan's breath caught. "How do you know?"
"Because he sold that same information to the wrong guild." Lianhua opened her sleeve and showed a small piece of parchment. The symbol stamped on it was unmistakable—a hawk with three talons.
The Black Talons. One of Li Jun's informant rings.
"They're already here," Lianhua said. "We have less than five minutes."
No more questions. They moved fast.
Out the trapdoor, into the back alley, weaving through dye-soaked laundry lines and storage baskets. Feiyan ducked behind an awning as footsteps approached. Lianhua's hand gripped hers without warning and yanked her through a narrow wall crack hidden behind crates of dried reeds.
The passage was black, barely wide enough for two people, and reeked of mildew.
"Shortcut to the Butchers' Guild," Lianhua whispered. "The Talons won't follow there. Too many unions. Too many eyes."
Feiyan didn't speak. She just ran.
When they finally emerged, gasping, filthy, and covered in bits of reed, Lianhua slowed her pace.
"Next time," Feiyan said, panting, "you might mention that people are hunting us before we sit down to plan over boiled tea."
"You needed to calm down," Lianhua said evenly. "Now you're focused."
Feiyan gave her a sidelong glare—but it wasn't all anger. "You're dangerous."
"So are you."
Back at the hideout, Ziyan had already begun laying out a rough strategy on the map with Shuye. She looked up when Feiyan burst in, winded.
"We were followed," Feiyan said. "Lianhua got us out."
Ziyan turned to Lianhua, who merely gave a small nod.
"I suspected as much," Ziyan said. "Li Jun's too aggressive lately. He's overreaching."
"Good," Lianhua said. "That means he's scared."
Ziyan stepped aside to reveal a new piece of information—another scroll, delivered in secret by a contact.
It bore the seal of the Ministry of Accounts.
Feiyan frowned. "That's Duan Rulan's domain."
Ziyan unrolled it. Inside were figures, names, shipment discrepancies—deliberately falsified, but only slightly. A trail leading back to one of Li Jun's secondary trading accounts.
"Duan Rulan sent this," Ziyan said. "She's feeding us pieces of his network."
Shuye furrowed his brow. "So what's the plan?"
Ziyan looked at them all—Feiyan, recovering but sharper than ever. Shuye, quiet but resolute. And Lianhua, standing like a mirror reflecting their faults and strengths.
"We're going to bleed Li Jun out," she said. "Quietly. We leak these documents to the guilds. The Ministry. The low-ranking court scribes. Create just enough doubt to make him claw for control."
Feiyan nodded slowly. "And when he claws too hard…"
"He reveals his real holdings," Lianhua finished. "Then we strike them all at once."
"Three-pronged," Shuye said. "Guilds, court, street networks."
Ziyan nodded. "But it needs to be clean. No martyrs. No bodies that can be spun into rebellion."
Feiyan cracked her knuckles. "Just humiliation and exposure."
"Exactly."
Across the city, deep within a private estate draped in imperial blues, Lord Li Jun stared at a list of names on his desk.
Three of his spice traders were under audit. One paper merchant had mysteriously vanished. And a member of the Ministry of Accounts had resigned without explanation.
He scrawled a line across the parchment.
"They're coordinating," he said aloud. "But they're still amateurs."
A steward approached. "Lord Rulan's audits show no indication of irregularity."
"Then they're using her," he said. "Or worse—she's helping them."
He stood, moving to the window.
"Send a message to the pavilion," he said. "Pull every girl tied to Ziyan's group. And double the patrols at the tax offices."
He looked back toward the streets, eyes cold.
"They think they can bleed me dry," he murmured. "Let's see what they bleed when I crush them."
That night, Feiyan stood on the roof of their hideout, arms crossed.
Lianhua joined her quietly.
"Still don't trust me?" she asked.
Feiyan didn't answer for a while.
Then she said, "I trust you to want him dead."
"That's enough," Lianhua replied.
They stared into the dark together, not as friends, but as weapons pointed in the same direction.
Below them, the city slept, unaware that war had already begun.