Dawn came gray and damp, the kind of morning that felt like the world hadn't decided whether to wake up or just stay hungover.
Mei opened her eyes to find Sùyīn already packing. The healer moved with the economical rhythm of someone who'd been running for years—bedroll rolled, fire buried under dirt, wooden box slung across her back in three practiced motions.
"You snore," Sùyīn said without turning.
"I do not."
"You do. Like a small, angry badger."
Mei sat up, rubbing sleep from her eyes. Her scalp still ached where the wound had scabbed over, but the feverish heat in her core had dulled to a low simmer. Whatever was in that regret-flavored pill had done its job.
She stood, stretched, and immediately regretted it. Every muscle protested in new and creative ways. Apparently sword-saint muscle memory didn't come with sword-saint soreness immunity.
Sùyīn glanced over. "Can you walk?"
"If I have to."
"You have to." She tossed Mei a strip of dried rabbit wrapped in cloth. "Breakfast. Chew slowly or you'll choke and I'm not doing mouth-to-mouth."
Mei caught it, tore off a piece with her teeth. It tasted like smoke and salt and stubborn survival. She chewed while they started moving west along a faint game trail that eventually widened into something that might once have been called a road.
They walked for hours. The landscape changed slowly—hills giving way to shallow valleys, pines thinning into stands of birch and wild plum. Twice they heard hoofbeats in the distance and crouched behind rocks until the sound faded. Black Lotus scouts, probably. Or tax collectors. In the frontier, the difference was mostly academic.
Around noon they reached a crossroads marked by a weathered stone tablet half-buried in ivy. Someone had scratched crude characters into the surface with a knife:
North – Ironcrag Mines
East – Ghostmarsh (avoid)
South – Red Willow Village (bandits welcome)
West – Border Town of Yānchéng (three days if you don't die)
Sùyīn studied the tablet like it owed her money.
"Three days if we push," she said. "Four if we're smart."
Mei touched the jade hairpin. It was quiet, but she could feel it listening.
"Smart sounds better."
They turned west.
By late afternoon the trail brought them to a small traveler's rest—little more than a lean-to roofed with thatch, a fire pit blackened from years of use, and a rickety table where an old woman sat selling roadside odds and ends. She had one milky eye and a pipe that never seemed to go out.
Sùyīn slowed.
"Information stop," she murmured. "Stay quiet unless I ask you something."
Mei nodded.
The old woman looked up as they approached. Her good eye flicked from Sùyīn's healer's box to Mei's torn noble robes, then lingered on the jade hairpin.
"Travelers," she rasped. "Rare sight these days. Black Lotus has the roads jumpy."
Sùyīn set her box down with a deliberate thud. "We're not looking for trouble. Just news."
"News costs." The woman tapped ash from her pipe. "Herbs cost more."
Sùyīn reached into her cloak and produced the small pouch from last night. She shook out three snowdrop petals onto the table—pale, faintly luminous.
The old woman's milky eye widened.
"Frost-bloom. Out of season." She leaned closer, sniffed. "Fresh, too. Where'd a runaway healer get these?"
"Doesn't matter," Sùyīn said. "What matters is what you know about the Celestial Sword Academy's spring trial."
Mei's heart kicked once—hard.
The old woman cackled. "Bold. You planning to sneak a disgraced girl back in?" Her gaze slid to Mei. "Or is the disgraced girl standing right here?"
Mei kept her face blank. The hairpin warmed against her scalp—warning, or encouragement, she couldn't tell.
Sùyīn didn't flinch. "Trial starts in twenty-three days. Gates open at first light on the equinox. What's changed since last year?"
The woman sucked on her pipe, considering.
"More guards. Triple watch on the outer wards. They're expecting trouble—word is some old grudge is stirring. Also…" She lowered her voice. "They've added a new gate exam. Not just combat and scripture anymore. Something they're calling the Mirror of Intent. Looks into your heart, they say. Shows what you truly want. Most applicants break before they even draw steel."
Mei's fingers curled into fists at her sides.
Sùyīn slid one more snowdrop petal across the table. "And the Frost Sovereign's daughter? Still judging the entrants?"
The old woman's smile turned sly. "Lán Xīuyīng hasn't left the inner peak in three seasons. But rumor says she'll appear for the final ranking duel. Wants to see if this year's crop is worth her time." She tapped the table. "Or maybe she's waiting for someone specific."
Mei felt the air leave her lungs.
Sùyīn noticed. She placed the last two petals beside the others.
"That's all we have."
The old woman swept them into a wrinkled palm. "Pleasure doing business. One last thing—free, because you've got brave eyes, both of you. There's a back way into Yānchéng. Smuggler's cut through the plum ravine, two days west. Avoids the main checkpoint. But the ravine's got… things in it. Old things. Hungry things."
Sùyīn nodded once. "We'll manage."
They turned to leave.
The old woman called after them, voice suddenly sharp.
"Girl with the hairpin—if you're the one they exiled, you should know something else. The Mirror of Intent doesn't just show desire. It shows truth. And truth has teeth."
Mei stopped. Didn't turn.
The hairpin pulsed—hot, insistent.
She's right.
Sùyīn touched Mei's elbow lightly. "Come on."
They walked until the lean-to disappeared behind a rise.
Only then did Mei speak.
"She knows who I am."
"Half the frontier probably does by now," Sùyīn said. "Doesn't mean they'll catch us before the trial."
Mei looked down at her hands—still trembling, just a little.
"I'm going to fail the mirror," she whispered. "Whatever it shows… it's not going to be noble vengeance or redemption. It's going to be her."
Sùyīn stopped walking. Turned to face her fully.
"Then you'd better make sure that's enough to survive it."
Mei met her eyes. For the first time since waking up in this body, she didn't feel like apologizing for wanting something impossible.
"I will."
The jade hairpin gave one slow, satisfied throb.
Ahead, the plum ravine waited—shadowed, quiet, and already beginning to smell faintly of frost and old promises.