Morning burned the frost off the thatch, and Willow Shade woke in a clatter of buckets and geese. A cart with one lame wheel blocked the market lane; a donkey stamped and tossed its head, foam on the bit. Lanterns from last night's prayers still hung over the well, their paper breathing with the faintest wind.
Xueyin stood at the edge of the square with her instrument wrapped in oil cloth and her breath steady against the cold. She had slept under the eaves of a mill, ribs counting the night. Today she needed coin, or at least hot porridge.
A woman in a reed hat hurried past with a basket of greens. "Musician," she said without slowing, "if you've got a quiet song, the donkey needs it more than we do."
Quiet meant small, steady, careful. The square was full—children trailing elders, a pair of traveling smiths, a yamen runner pasting notices to the board. No space for wide gestures. No space for mistakes.
Xueyin took her place by a low bench near the well and set the guqin across her knees. The lacquer caught the pale sun; the tiniest crack along the bridge looked deeper than it had last night.
She breathed and counted nine.
On the ninth beat she set the line in her mind from the animal's cheek strap to the post behind it—no more than one pace wide. Heel, toe; on the second beat she slid one step to keep the children behind her out of that lane.
One note left the bridge like a thread of glass. The lantern above the well trembled; dust lifted in a hair-thin ribbon. The sound kissed the strap and carried on to the post. The donkey's head jerked as the tension eased; the bit settled, and the animal blew hard through its nose, then stood blinking, surprised to find the world gentler.
Ripples ran across the water in the well bucket and faded to calm.
"That's a trick I'll pay for," the carter said, half in wonder, half in embarrassment. He fished two coppers from a pouch and set them on the bench without looking at her face.
"Not a trick," someone muttered near the notice board. "A nuisance if it gets loud."
Xueyin let the last echo die and palm-muted the strings. "Quiet as I can keep it," she said. "Quiet is the point."
The yamen runner had turned from the board to watch, thin brush still damp with paste. He wore the usual hard look of a man told to keep peace with too little pay and too much day. "We have ring law for a reason," he said, mostly to the crowd. "Declare before you make noise."
"She didn't fight," the reed-hat woman said. "She calmed."
"Horses and donkeys aren't citizens," the runner replied, but his voice had softened and the corners of his mouth pretended they hadn't.
A boy about ten, hair sticking up like thatch, edged close with a broken hoop under his arm. "Can you do a song for—" He stopped when someone swore near the cart.
Two men shouldered through the crowd, one with a cudgel and one with the kind of knife people used to cut rope and things they shouldn't. The cudgel-man grinned at the carter. "Road tax," he said. "New rule."
"That's not a rule," the runner said, stepping forward. "And it's not a road."
The man with the knife smiled wider, like a fish. "We're collecting for the peace of all. Ten coppers per wheel, musician included." His eyes flicked to Xueyin's guqin and lingered there, hungry.
Xueyin's hands rested lightly on the strings. She could feel her own heartbeat under the wood. The boy with the hoop had stopped breathing. The donkey twitched a single ear.
"No crowd cuts," the runner said. He was alone; no other badge in sight. His brush looked flimsy against a cudgel.
The knife-man shifted his grip. He didn't raise the blade. He angled the shoulder, letting the crowd see the promise of it. That was all it took for people to begin backing away, and backing away made room, and room was how bad things got big.
Xueyin breathed and counted nine.
She set a new line—from the knife-hand to the empty post beyond—a one-pace lane. Heel, toe; one step to keep the lane clean. The cudgel-man laughed, sensing movement, not understanding it.
"Last chance," the runner said. "Say your names for the board and leave with a warning."
"Tax," the knife-man said again, and took a step that made mothers pull their children behind skirts.
On the second beat she slid. One note left the bridge—glass-bright, iron-thin. It kissed the wrist and spoke to the post behind him. His hand opened like a startled flower. The knife hit the packed earth, skittered, and came to rest at the runner's boot.
The cudgel-man roared and came in fast, shoulder first, trying to catch her instrument. She didn't give him the angle. She palm-muted the echo and tapped the bridge—tap, tap. The sound ran the boards at the edge of the well and hopped back through his stance; his feet betrayed him with a half step he hadn't planned. The yamen runner's brush hovered over the notice board, as if it wanted to write this down before it forgot.
"Enough," Xueyin said, voice level, hands low. "Pick up your friend and go."
The cudgel-man swung anyway, a short, mean arc meant to bruise a collarbone. She let it pass in front of her coat. The wind of it smelled like old onions. She slid again and sent a short, rain-fast pair of notes that herded him sideways into the cart's lame wheel. He barked his shin and swallowed a curse when he saw the crowd had heard it.
The runner bent and toed the knife toward his own ankle. "Names," he said again, more confident now that the metal was near his foot and not in someone's hand.
"Write yours first," the knife-man said through his teeth, flexing numb fingers.
The runner didn't bother to answer. He dipped the brush into his paste and wrote three plain words that were not names—Xueyin couldn't read them from here—but the intent was clear: a public line, a mark that said who had tried to be bigger than the square.
"Take the cart path out," Xueyin said, still not looking away from the men. "Walk until the lanterns stop. After that, the road won't forgive you if you look back."
The cudgel-man's anger had become calculation. He could see how many eyes were watching and whose brush was already moving. He could see that a woman with a quiet song had turned a crowd into a witness. He tugged at his companion's sleeve. "Later," he muttered. "Different place."
They backed away, slow enough to pretend they weren't retreating, fast enough to admit they were. When they were far enough to save their pride, they turned and went.
The square breathed. The donkey shook itself and sneezed. The boy with the hoop exhaled so hard he almost fell over.
The yamen runner slid the knife into his belt with fingers that wanted to shake. He glanced at Xueyin, then at the guqin. "You kept it small," he said. It wasn't exactly praise, but it wasn't not.
"No more than one pace wide," she said. "And only toward wood."
He grunted. "If you must make a lane, make it toward a post." He tapped the board where his fresh paste was drying. "I'll note the incident under obstruction. If they come back, I'll have more than a story."
"Stories matter," Xueyin said, and heard the man from the shrine in her mouth.
He looked at her a second longer, weighing whether to warn her about permits and rings and the trouble that came from people who did not belong to any gate. Then he shrugged the thought away. "Keep it quiet," he said. "We've got babies sleeping in daylight in this town."
"I prefer quiet," she said.
The reed-hat woman came back and set a steaming bowl on the bench. "Porridge," she said. "Payment for a strap saved and a square unscared."
"You already paid," Xueyin said, because it felt right to say it once in a morning. But she took the bowl and the heat made her wrists ache in a good way. The boy with the hoop edged close again, hopeful.
"Can you mend this?" he asked, holding out the split reed.
"After I eat," she said. "And only if you hold it still."
He nodded as if she had sworn an oath.
She ate slow, letting the warmth fill places that had been empty since before dawn. The market uncoiled around her into its ordinary business, which was the best kind of victory. She wiped the bowl clean with the heel of bread the woman had tucked under it and set both on the bench. Her fingers throbbed where the string had kissed them too hard.
Cost: right ear ringing; split skin at the nail.
She pressed the split against her sleeve and breathed until the sting became only information. The boy held the broken hoop so solemnly it was funny. She took it and wound the reed back on itself with the coil of silk thread the caravan driver had given her, hands careful, breath steady.
When the hoop held, the boy stared as if she'd done something impossible. "How did you—"
"Count," she said. "Hold still. Tie small. Same rules for everything."
He nodded again, wise for a moment. "Will you play tonight?" he asked.
"If the square is quiet," she said. "If the wind behaves."
The yamen runner cleared his throat. "If you play," he said, "play near the well. Fewer windows to shake."
"Near the well," she agreed. She rose, lifted the instrument, and felt its familiar weight settle against her ribs. The ache there felt like hers again, not the cold's.
Outside the square, the road ran toward the next town and the next problem and the next place where a lane had to be small. For now, she had a bowl in her, two coppers, and a square that wanted calm more than noise. It would do.
She walked the edge of the market to listen for trouble. Only geese complained. Only the lantern paper breathed. The day opened like a small door, and she stepped through.