#random bit

“Ah, Sect Leader Jiāng!” crowed Sect Leader Yao as he approached with his entourage. Sect Leader Jiāng looked him up and down as the older man bowed obsequiously, looking faintly amused. “Thank you for the invitation to your home.”

“It’s a Cultivation Conference, everyone is invited,” said Jiāng Chéng flatly and Wèi Wúxiàn looked away to hide his grin.

“Still, it is an honour to be received so warmly,” said Sect Leader Yao in a bald faced lie because Jiāng Chéng’s expression was flat and empty as he stared at the man. “I brought a gift.” A disciple hurried up and held out a pretty lacquered box. Jiāng Chéng reached out and flicked it open, revealing an ornate hand mirror. Jīn Líng and Jiāng Mín peered at it with approval, and Jiāng Mín took the box from the disciple. Jiāng Chéng watched them take it away and said,

“Do you think I’m pretty Sect Leader Yao?”

Wèi Wúxiàn choked on the wine he’d been drinking and buried his face in his elbow to smother the sound as Sect Leader Yao let out a noise of offence and Jīn Líng said,

“Uncle, stop trying to be funny!”

“Who said I was trying to be funny?” asked Jiāng Chéng and Wèi Wúxiàn turned back in time to see Jiāng Chéng tilt his head to the side without the slightest change in his expression, “Why else would you give a Sect Leader a mirror?”

Sect Leader Yao sputtered a bit more before Jiāng Mín came back and quietly beckoned them to follow. As soon as they were out of earshot Jīn Líng rounded on Jiāng Chéng,

“Uncle, you can’t say that to a sect leader!”

“But I just did,” said Jiāng Chéng, his tone as flat as his expression.

“You would break my legs if I did it!”

“Really? I don’t think I’d give a shit what you do,” said Jiāng Chéng. Any amusement Wèi Wúxiàn had felt before vanished.

“Uncle what is wrong with you?” Jīn Líng demanded.

“You think something is wrong with me?” asked Jiāng Chéng.

“Well you’re acting weird!”

Jiāng Chéng looked down at Jīn Líng for a long moment, and Jīn Líng started to squirm under the gaze. Wèi Wúxiàn tensed up, there was something very unpleasant in the way Jiāng Chéng was looking at Jīn Líng, like he was an insect Jiāng Chéng was considering crushing. Jīn Líng shifted backwards, his shoulders tensing and his grip on Suihua tightening. Then Jiāng Chéng reached up and pinched Jīn Líng’s chin, which made Jīn Líng jump about a foot in the air and stumble backwards. Jiāng Chéng smiled, a slow, malevolent smile.

“Pathetic.”

It is a small town, a quiet town. The sort of place where everyone knows everyone, where doors are left unlocked at night and children wander without fear. Some call it idylic, some call it a paradise, others simply call it home.

Things are different, however, when the visitor comes to town. No one knows their name. They barely know their face. Each time, they are a little different, the details a little strange. They come to trade, to barter for what they cannot find or make.

Their wares are good, and their dealings fair. If one can afford their talismans, the things are well worth the cost. One of them saved the Peters boy from a bear, you see, and another protected old man Callaghan from breaking his neck when he fell from his deer stand. In mountains like these, good protection is worth the price.

For there is a price. All things have one.

The people of the town do not speak of it. They do not mention how the visitor never ages, how their town is sheltered from ill luck, how the creatures that lurk in the woods around them dare not cross the town line.

They do not speak of it, when a child goes missing on a moonless night. They do not need to. A child lost on a night when the moon is dark becomes nameless, existing only in memory.

They keep no record of them, they mount no search.