Chapter Text
Wei Ying was utterly, entirely, in his element. His commitment to his mission would be frightening to observe if Yanli had not seen him do the same thing numerous times over the years.
“Will he be okay? He didn’t even sleep last night. He should rest.” Meng Yao stood in the main hall of their newly rented, decrepit, smelly siheyuan with his hands on his hips while Wei Ying ran around breathlessly with a cheap, second-hand loupan and a piece of chalk. A’Cheng followed after him, complaining about everything but diligently holding up the bagua map every time Wei Ying asked him to.
“It’s just like the first week he was allowed in the sect library. I thought he would go blind, reading so many books in such a short period of time.” Yanli hummed happily at the memory.
“How does he know so much about feng shui?” Meng Yao shifted to cross his arms over his chest.
“Did I mention the sect library?” She giggled at Meng Yao’s consternation.
“How? He does not have a good memory.”
“Not everyone remembers things like you do, A’Yao. Ying’er is terrible with names and dates and recent events, but when he learns something important, he never forgets it.” She reached out to tug him away from the scene. “They will figure out what we need to do to fix the energies here.”
“They? It’s all Ying’er.” Meng Yao continued to grumble as he trailed after to towards the kitchen.
“No, the analysis is all Ying’er. A’Cheng has an impeccable sense of taste. He won’t let Wei Ying pile up pine logs in random locations, or pretend an old ugly pot is a ‘pond’.”
“Oh, good heavens.” Meng Yao rubbed his temples, looking ten years older.
“Tell me how your trip into town went.” She set about starting dinner. Cooking for a whole family every day was much different from cooking as a hobby, but after two weeks in their new home, she felt like she was getting the rhythm down.
“I have two clients already.”
“Really?”
He gave her a mild glare.
“A’Yao, it is not you I doubt! But you look even younger than you are. I’m surprised business owners would hire you to run their accounts.” He was barely fourteen, and she was not sure she would have hired him, even knowing how smart he was.
“I bought a hat. It makes me look older.”
“Hm. I’ll be the judge of that!”
“I like my hat.” He looked at her suspiciously. “Nothing better happen to my hat, JieJie.”
“If A’Cheng disapproves of it, I make no promises.” She pointed at a chopping board, and Meng Yao went over to start on the onions.
“An eleven-year-old should not be in charge of my sartorial decisions,” he grumbled.
“Believe me when I say that I trust him with mine. He’s been choosing the colors for my robes since he was six and learned the difference between purple and indigo. He was quite excited about it.” She smiled at the memory.
Meng Yao made a disbelieving noise, but then was silent for a while.
“Even with two clients, I don’t think I will make enough to support all of us. I will get more clients, eventually, but Yiling is not a large town, and Lao He has been doing accounting for many people here for over a decade. They won’t quit him, no matter how good I am.” He kept chopping, not looking up at her.
“Mn.” She sighed. “I thought of making talismans to sell—Wei Ying could help me—but I fear it would draw too much attention to us.”
“Mn,” Meng Yao nodded. He glanced up at her. “No offense intended, but what is a cultivator girl trained to do, if she can’t fight?”
She blinked in surprise. “Oh! Didn’t the boys tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
“About Jin Zixuan?”
He frowned at the onions. “Only that he is, I quote, ‘an arrogant, stuck up, rude, and ungrateful peacock.’ They may have included words unfit for a lady’s ears.” He smirked a little. She tried not to find it cute.
“They didn’t say why they hate him?”
“No. I assumed just boys having grudges against other boys. You know how it is. A playground fight.”
“No no no!” She laughed. “He is…he was my betrothed.”
Meng Yao froze with the knife hanging in the air.
“I thought everyone knew! But I suppose it’s not news that would matter to commoners. To answer your question, I was raised to be a sect leader’s wife.” She looked around the worn kitchen at some of the crooked planks in the walls and the evidence of a fire long ago in the scorch marks along the ceiling. “I suppose running a sect’s household is not entirely different from running a regular household. Just smaller.” She paused thoughtfully. “And poorer.”
He resumed chopping with a dignified chuckle. “Indeed.” They worked in silence for a few moments. “How is your needlework?”
“Excellent. I spent a lot of time on it when I was younger, since I was sick so often. Do you need something repaired?”
“No, I was thinking that is something we can sell.”
“I’m not a seamstress.” She shook her head.
“You don’t need to be. Ribbons, sashes, scarves, even tuanshan—a delicate hand with such items can bring a high price. Some of the most expensive and coveted items in the Dragonfly Shoal, outside of jewelry, were sashes and fans.”
She stopped and looked up, lost in thought, thinking of all the similar items she had embroidered over the years. “That’s a much better idea than being a street food vendor.”
“A what?” He sounded appalled.
She gestured at the dinner they were working on. “I am a good cook. I thought maybe I could open a soup or dumpling stall.”
He looked thoughtful for a long moment. “No. Overhead is more expensive for restaurants, even food stalls with no seating. Low margins. You can buy cheaper materials and use them to make uniquely embroidered products to sell for a very high price.” He then returned to chopping as if he had not just exploded her world.
Years of helping both her mother and the quartermaster at Lotus Pier had taught her a wealth of information about fabrics, threads, silk, and dyes—knowledge mostly known only by the mistresses of large households, very high-end seamstresses, weavers, and dyers. As a young gentry lady, she had also received extensive instruction on both embroidery and painting. Her skills were considered decent among her gentry peers, but few commoners outside of Lanling itself could produce anything better than she could make.
Her mind spun out with possibilities. Buying mid-range fabrics to start, she could create beautiful works of art and sell them for a significant markup. She could do a series of matching fans and sashes, which were always in demand among her gentry peers. She was better at painting flowers and animals than landscapes, but Wei Ying was showing promise as an artist himself. Together they could design standing screens featuring complex landscapes filled with details for her to embroider.
“That’s it! Yes!” She bounced in place, causing him to look up at her. “That’s what I’ll do! Do we have enough coin to spare for materials?”
His eyes went distant in the way they always did when he was balancing ledgers. “Yes. Not enough for expensive silks, but enough to get you started, now that I’ll be bringing in some income. We should go into town on market day, so you can see if you find anything acceptable. We might have to wait until one of the trader caravans comes through. I hear they travel by monthly, in good weather.”
“I’ve seen some fabric in town suitable for tuanshan. It’s the thread I’m concerned about. Yes, let’s plan on that.”
She smiled at him and he coughed, looking back at the onions. “I’m glad you like the idea.”
“I do! Thank you, A’Yao. You are so smart!”
He chuffed and shook his head, but continued smiling. Soon, he passed over the bowl of chopped onions.
“I was helping A’Cheng with his studies. He’s got a head for maths.”
She nodded. “He does. Before we…well, before. He was set to start being trained by, ah, Sect Leader Jiang on sect management. Mother was very proud of how well A’Cheng did with math and numbers and money.” She shook her head. “A good thing too, because Ying’er can barely add, and does not seem to understand money at all. As brilliant as he is, he works best with abstract theory or practical application, nothing in between.”
“Mn.” He paused before clearing his throat. “It might be good for me to take A’Cheng on as an apprentice. If he can learn accounting, he will never want for work.”
“Work.” Yanli looked at him, her mind gone completely blank.
Meng Yao studied her for a long moment. “He’s not a sect heir anymore, Yanli,” he said kindly. “Even if he becomes a powerful cultivator, what will he do with that? Become a rogue cultivator?” Meng Yao shook his head. “I can see that path for Ying’er, he has a wanderer’s spirit, but not A’Cheng. He is a homebody. He will never leave you behind, not unless he’s forced to.”
Yanli reached behind her for a stool and dropped onto it.
“Oh.” She took a deep breath. “I guess I just assumed he would join a sect one day.” Even as she said it, she realized how absurd that sounded. At some point, there would be no hiding who he was—who his mother was—and there would not be a sect in the jianghu desperate enough to take him in for fear of insulting the sect leader of Yunmeng Jiang. Qinghe Nie might not care and was powerful enough to stand against Yunmeng Jiang’s displeasure, but they were in a constant, informal war with the Qishan Wen and Yanli would not allow him to go there just to get killed in a pointless skirmish.
“Ah, Yanli,” Meng Yao said, coming over to stand next to her and rub her back. It was only then that she realized she was crying.
“He would have been such a great sect leader!” She hiccuped.
“It is unfair,” he said, and it was true, but it wasn’t enough. It was all unfair—that her mother had committed such sins and brought innocent children into the world to suffer for it; that the man she thought of as her father was so cruelly indifferent to the children he had helped raise; that Wei Ying was an orphan who had thought he found a home only to end up on the run with his new-found siblings; that Meng Shi was used and betrayed by a powerful man who could save her and her son for a price far less than the cost of some rings he wore.
Once she got her breath back, she looked up at Meng Yao. “I need you to take Wei Ying into town tomorrow.”
He frowned in confusion for a moment before his expression cleared. “I understand.”
With that, they returned to making dinner, silent but companionable company, while Yanli considered what she would have to say to A'Cheng the next day.