â éŁ. â â ââ ABOUT A WEEK'S journey southeast of the capital, where the air grows thick with brine and perpetual damp clings to skin and cloth, the remnants of a temple stand hollow and forgotten. When Shi Qingxuan enters it, she feels like she is climbing inside the gutted carcass of a great beast in the late stages of decomposition. The walls, stripped of thousand-threaded tapestries and couplets, sweat salt and lichen. Cracks spider along the stonecut floor, widening into rifts where altars, pedestals, and cabinetry carved from mahogany once stood. Palm-sized icons lay fragmented beneath the niches they once inhabited, like the driftwood of a shipwreck. In the center of the main hall, the statue of an ill-fated god gazes upon its ruined empire from atop an intricately detailed stone pedestal. Although exposure to harsh elements and reoccuring vandalization have largely defaced the statue, Shi Qingxuan still recognizes who it is.
   "You've changed a lot since I last came to visit, ge," she says as she lowers herself to the floor, relying on her cane to keep steady. The chill rising from the stone floor seeps through the thin material of her trousers, burrowing beneath her skin and gnawing at aching joints. She grimaces, then forces her cracked lips into a smile. "That's fine. I've done a lot of changing since then, too. I'm much better at writing with my left hand now. My hair's a lot longer. I've earned a bit of money here and there. Nothing you'd be impressed by, but," a shrug somewhere between nonchalant and sheepish, "sometimes it's enough to get us a few mouthfuls of something good. Haven't spent a single coin on wine. Never thought you'd see the day, did you, ge?"
   Her laughter echoes, making the plundered shrine feel even more hollow, even more disconnected from the world Wudu said she would never survive in without him. He never did place much faith in her capability to simply exist without need of his interference. It incensed her then, and it incenses her now. In a way, though, he'd been right. Why else does she keep coming back here, despite the toll it takes and her viciously conflicted feelings? Why else does she babble nonsense to him whenever she lays at his feet, even though she knows beyond a shadow of a doubt he cannot hear her?
   Overcome with exhaustion, Shi Qingxuan nestles closer to the foot of the pedestal. As she drapes her upper body across the shallow platform, head pillowed into the crook of her arm, she admits, not for the first time, "I miss you." A sharp, shuddered intake of breath. The corners of her eyes sting. "That doesn't mean I forgive you. Some days, I really, really ha..."
   Movement in the corner of her eye. Her mouth snaps shut around the half-finished sentiment. Someone is entering from the lefthand vestibule.
   Apprehension curls its icy fingers 'round her ribs, eager to crack them open at a moment's notice. In all likelihood, it's another wanderer seeking shelter from the encroaching night. But she can't be sure, not with how much contempt for her brother continues to simmer in the mortal realm. Her entire body tenses in preparation either to curl in on herself or attempt to flee, depending on who the shadows give way to. Filaments of sunset slanting through an unshuttered window glint on filigreed armor. Recognition flickers to life on her face, followed by incredulity. This is the last person she wants to see, now or ever.
   Yet there is a taut thread of relief in her voice when Shi Qingxuan gasps,  "...Pei Ming?" That thread quivers, close to snapping when she pushes herself up and eyes him with narrowed eyes. Centuries of caustic distaste grapple with fresh grief in the space between her pinched eyebrows. "What are you doing here?"
