Ulara made a move as though to leave, but at that moment, the grandmaster spoke.
“Ulara,” he said. “She will be all right.” Then he looked at Lan, and she felt as though he was looking into the spaces in her soul. “So you have found the first of the Demon Gods,” he said at last, and the words jolted through her. “And Zen has bound it.”
She stared at him, swallowing the question on the tip of her tongue.How did you know?
Dé’zismiled. “Shàn’jun and Chó Tài came to me with the information you had given them shortly after your departure several days ago. This has allowed us to remain one step ahead and to plan for the appropriate precautionary measures.”
“The Elantians were after the Demon Gods.” She had no idea why she was still defending Zen and his actions. Perhapsa part of her felt guilty. Complicit. “Zen and I only wished to find them first to stop the Elantians. But…he bound the Demon God to use its power to fight the Elantian army. He thinks doing so will save our lives—the lives of all Hin.”
She had expected a strong reaction—for the masters to burst into conversation, perhaps. Yet there was only the exchanges of grim glances, a knowing that seemed to settle between the ten figures in the chamber.
“This buys us some time,” the grandmaster said at last. “No matter the situation, I still have high expectations of Zen’s abilities. We must come to an agreement on the contingency measures we have discussed, masters of the School of the White Pines.”
“Are we not to discuss the situation at hand with Zen?” Ulara cut in. “Should we have a repeat of the Nightslayer, our problems may be far worse than simply dealing with the Elantians.”
“The Nightslayer had yielded much of himself to the Black Tortoise and was at the end of his bargain, Ulara,” Dé’zireplied, “whereas Zen has just bound this Demon God. Moreover, Zen believes he can save us with this newfound power; at the very least, he will buy us time before he loses all control. We must decide, right now, the course of action to take in the precious time he has given us.”
“Evacuate,” Ip’fong, Master of Iron Fists, suggested promptly. “The only reason we have survived the Elantians’ hunt for this long was due to our location and the strength of our Boundary Seal.”
“Our Boundary Seal will hold should they come searching for us,” Gyasho, Master of Seals, stated. “In the thousands of cycles this school has stood, none that are unwelcome have managed to breach the Boundary Seal, nor have those with ill intentions managed to find our location.”
“It will still be good to take precautions,” advised Nur, Master of Light Arts.
“I, for one, will not sit here like a squatting duck, waiting to be butchered,” Ulara declared. “Grandmaster, we should attack first, while we have the element of surprise. This is our land, our territory; we know the terrain. Let us use that to our advantage.”
“The Elantians brought a battalion,” Lan interjected. “I saw them making their way over the mountains.” There had been so many. Too many. “Even you will not beat those odds, Master Ulara.”
“We are doomed!” cried Feng, Master of Geomancy. “I have read this in my oracle bones—”
“We arenotdoomed,” said Cáo, Master of Archery, “not if we use clever planning and strategy. Not if we draw on our advantages. We have a wartime playbook. Let us use it.”
As they deliberated in the flickering lamplight, the grandmaster’s gaze remained on Lan. At last, he raised a hand, and the masters fell silent.
“We hope for the best but prepare for the worst,” he said. “Master Nur and Nameless Master, evacuate the youngest through the back cliffs. Make for the west—and wait for my word.” The Master of Light Arts and the Nameless Master of Assassins bowed their heads in salute. “The rest, gather those who are able and willing to fight.”
“Grandmaster,” Lan called, but he had walked out exceptionally quickly, and by the time she caught up to him, someone was ringing the bells to the rhythm of war. Paper lamps flared up across the mountain, small spots of yellow blinking sleepily into existence as the disciples began to wake.
Dé’ziturned to Lan.
“Grandmaster, you can’t hope to fight the Elantian army,” she said. “We have to run.”
“Lan,” he said, as though testing her name. “Just in time for our second session together.”
Lan opened her mouth to protest. The Elantians were on their doorstep, and Zen was lost to a Demon God—truly, this was no time for alesson. But the grandmaster gave her a significant look. “Please. This is important. Just a few minutes of your time.”
Skies’ End was beginning to wake up, disciples streaming into view from the stone steps lining the mountains. She watched as the children trembled, clutching their bundles. Watched the older disciples shore up weapons—spears, swords, and rounds and rounds of arrows. All made mostly of wood that would surely splinter against the thick metal armor of the Elantians. These disciples were barely older than children themselves. Their eyes, though, bore none of the light of youth—only the wearied, hardened looks of those who had lived lives of suffering.
The grandmaster circled the groups clustered around each master of an art of practitioning, exchanging words with each master and nodding before moving on. They would use the Thirty-Fifth Stratagem from theClassic of War: the Linked-Chain Attacks, which involved layering different traps to weaken the enemy in unexpected ways. It was the second-to-last of the Thirty-Six Stratagems, for use when enemy forces were overpowering.
A play of last resort, should the Elantian army breach the Boundary Seal.
“Archery as the first line of defense,” Ulara called out from the very front of the congregation. “Seals, next. Swords and Iron Fists as the last.”
Yet looking around at the ten masters and the disciples who had elected to stay behind, Lan realized that no stratagem from theClassic of Warcould turn the odds for a hundred or sopeople against an army of thousands. She looked at the faces of the children being shepherded to the back cliffs by Master Nur and the Nameless Master; saw the naked fear in the eyes of the older disciples that no weapon or armor could hide.
And suddenly, she understood, so deeply, what Zen had said to her on the shores of that black-glass lake.It was a worthwhile trade: a single person for the power to save this land and this people.
Because no matter what, if he hadn’t sought out the power of the Demon Gods, they would lose. Power was a double-edged sword…but to not have it—that was to have no weapon to fight with at all.
