Min had been supervising work crews in the headquarters all morning. They had gotten quarters cleaned and restocked, and for the past three nights, everyone had slept indoors in beds. Now the kitchens were working again, and Min was tackling the job of cataloging the various rooms on the third floor, starting with the infirmary, to see what needed to be restocked, and what capabilities they had.

She was following Brother Stone's suggestions, and cycled constantly as she went about her daily duties. The influx of lux here in the valley, combined with the hours a day she spent studying with Brother Stone. Min's core had condensed for a third time two days ago. She sat up long into each night poring over Chang-li's course of study, learning the advice and techniques he'd set her by heart. It warmed her to see how thoughtful he had been, choosing each scroll with obvious care. The techniques came more easily to her than her previous attempts at cultivation had been. While she learned much from Brother Stone's more general tutelage, it was from the scrolls that Min truly felt her knowledge beginning to expand.

Though she longed for Chang-li's return, she was also excited to see how far she could get while he was gone. They'd heard nothing from him, Joshi, or Noren, but Min wasn't worried. If there was a problem, they'd know.

Which was why she started at the sound of a loud gong sounding from outside.

Min put down her records on the shelf of the infirmary she had been cleaning and documenting and hurried out to the balcony of this floor. She peered down. The gong continued ringing, a series of booming chimes Min recognized. She had helped decide the alarm patterns several days ago. Intruders were in the valley.

The island was abuzz with activity. Acolytes and Brotherhood workers running about everywhere.

Min started down to the first floor, meeting some excited work crews as she went.

"Elder Sister, what should we do?" Their worried faces told her they had no more idea than she did what was going on.

"Get to your defense assignments while I find out what's going on," she instructed.

She hurried through the muffled first-floor training room. She didn't like this place. It had a funny feeling to her, and there wasn't nearly as much lux inside as everywhere else in the building. Nevertheless, she rushed through as fast as she could and outside.

Brother Stone was easy to find. He stood on the lawn leading down toward the lake, bellowing orders to people.

"What's going on?" she asked. "There was no drill scheduled for today."

"Watchers have spotted intruders in the valley," he said. "We're getting everyone to— "

He broke off, and they both looked upward as a pair of powerful wills clashed in the air above them. Min recognized the same feeling from the Prism battle in Vardin City a few months ago. Chills ran down her spine.

Color and light flashed in the sky. She felt a roar of thunder reverberating against her, but she couldn't spot the combatants.

"Forget the sky for a moment. That's why we sounded the alarm." Brother Stone pointed grimly. A small army was assembling on the shore of the lake across from them, wearing orange and purple cultivator robes.

Min squinted, then used lux to enhance her senses. She gasped. "Those are Soaring Heavens robes."

She recognized them quickly enough, the same colors that Young Master Feng had worn at Golden Moon Tower. She counted 28 cultivators. Like a lot of better-established sects, they wore sashes over their robes showing their rank, with a white sash for initiates, adding various stripes as they went. Most of them were at the Peak of Bodily Refinement, but there were several at Peak of Mental Refinement. One man stood at their head, who she guessed must be their leader. He bore a distinct resemblance to Feng, though slightly older. His sash was all black, signifying he had reached the Peak of Spiritual Refinement.

This was bad.

As Min surveyed the crowd of opposing cultivators on the far shore, she forced herself to remain calm, even as her heart beat faster. She was the senior cultivation spouse of Morning Mist, the elder sister of the Oaken band Brotherhood. Everyone here was relying on her. Surely it was just a matter of time before Joshi and Chang-li emerged from their training. They would be able to push back Soaring Heavens, she was sure of it. All she needed to do was keep her people safe and alive until then. They had made rough plans for defense when they set up the alarm system, but they had expected bandits or some similar intruders, nothing like this.

"We retreat," she told Brother Stone. "Get everyone into the first floor of the headquarters." The walls there were enchanted to dampen techniques. That would provide some safety from enemy weaves, at least. Although the damage a cultivator could do on an ordinary human with just bare hands was considerable, they had cultivators too.

"That leaves us trapped, Elder Sister."

"There's no way to escape past these."

Brother Stone shouted instructions, and before Min knew it, they were being obeyed.

She felt a strange sense of calm flow over her as she watched the enemy assemble on the other side. What were they waiting for?

Then the one who resembled Young Master Feng stepped forward. He shouted, and his words carried easily.

"Morning Mist! I am Exalted Master Feng. I am here seeking revenge for the wrong you have done to our sect. I demand that you send forth the cultivators who so dishonorably ambushed and destroyed my brother!"

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Brother Stone started to step forward. Min grabbed his arm.

"Let me do this," she whispered, and stepped forward.

"I am Lady Min, cultivator spouse of Morning Mist," she called back. "Your brother and our cultivators were competing to summon the master of a tower and receive his boon. It was a fair fight, more than fair."

"They ambushed him two on one!" Master Feng called.

An idea struck Min. She whispered to Stone, "Remember the scripts library we found on the third floor?"

Brother Stone's eyes widened. "Yes, of course."

"Send Cui and Sho."

Brother Stone slipped through the crowd to find the senior disciples, sending them off on their task.

Min called back as Master Feng turned. "Most of our people are mere workers and not even cultivators. Please leave them out of this dispute between yourself and the seniors of our sect."

"I am looking for Young Master Joshi and Young Master Chang-li," Feng shouted. "Which of them is your husband?"

"I have the honor to be married to Cultivator Wu Chang-li," Min said, her spine straight as a board as she stared across in cold rage. Behind her, people were following her orders, moving in quiet bunches back to the headquarters. She would buy them time to get there.

Master Feng had his hands on his hips as he grinned across at her. She recognized this behavior; she'd seen it in his younger brother and in other cultivators. He thought he was strong enough that he was toying with them. Well, his toying would buy her time.

"If you surrender we will have mercy," Feng said. "We are going to destroy Morning Mist and all of its senior disciples, but we have respect for the Gem Court. You and the servants may be spared, but if the murderers don't come out soon, we will have to force their hand."

He raised his voice, "Do you hear me, so-called Young Masters of Morning Mist? I challenge you to a duel here and now on the shores of this lake. If you do not make a reply, I will begin to slaughter your disciples and everyone you care about."

They had waited long enough. This was only going to escalate. "Brother Stone," Min said crisply, "I need a diversion now."

Brother Stone called, "Disciples, Obscuring Fog!"

Brother Stone had retained 10 of the better-trained acolytes, men and women who had made steps toward the Peak of Bodily Refinement and were as progressed as Min, if not more. Now, they stepped forward, and as one, began to weave a simple technique they'd learned from one of the scrolls Chang-li had translated, a yellow, green, and blue weave.

As one, they released their technique. It sprang out, forming a wall between them and the edge of the lake.

"Now retreat," Brother Stone called. At once, they headed for the headquarters.

Min could see that most of the workers had already reached a place of refuge. She started back, conjuring her own lux bow as she went, and firing off a few multi-headed explosive arrows to drop through the wall of mist and explode among the approaching Soaring Heavens cultivators. She didn't expect to injure or kill anyone, but sowing discord was always worth the lux.

She heard a few shouts and angry voices. They didn't have long, though—that wall of mist was no obstacle to any cultivator. She and Brother Stone hurried to the headquarters. They slammed the door shut behind them. Min looked at Brother Stone, "Now what?"

He shook his head, the same fear and uncertainty in his eyes as in her own. "Now," he said grimly, "we hold out, and we hold out hope someone comes to our rescue. I'll go and see to the defense."

"I'm coming with you," Min said.

He caught her arm. "Lady Min, you should remain here. You'll keep the people calmer with your presence."

She shook him off. "These people are well-trained," she said, raising her voice so everyone in the room could hear. "They are Brotherhood members. They are acolytes of the Morning Mist sect. They don't need me to hold their hands and tell them everything is going to be all right, not when I could be upstairs helping make sure that it really is. And I know, Brother Stone, that you are trying to protect me, but I'm a cultivator myself now. If my husband and my sect and my brethren are at risk, I will do everything in my power to help."

Brother Stone bowed respectfully to her as the room erupted in cheers. Everyone looked a little more optimistic. "Organize the defense," Min said, and made for the steps leading up to the second floor.

On the third floor, there were eight cultivators under the instruction of disciples, Cui and Sho, each with armloads of ancient scripts, prepared long ago by Morning Mist cultivators and left behind in one of the rooms here in the headquarters. These were lux weaves which had been formed and then transferred to paper for later use. Chang-li had shown Min the theory of how it was done, though it was considerably beyond her own expertise. But the beauty of a script was that you didn't have to be a spiritual refinement level cultivator to activate a spiritual refinement level script; all you had to do was have enough lux in you to push into the script and an idea of what it did.

These scripts were, fortunately, all kept tightly rolled in small wooden scroll cases. On the end cap of each was a symbol, and the new Morning Mist disciples had deciphered the meaning of each of the symbols: this symbol meant what level the script was; that symbol indicated whether it was an offensive or defensive spell; and this one indicated the sort of flux needed to activate it.

Sho and Cui were sorting through piles of scrolls, handing them out frantically. Min stepped up to the rail and peered out. Here came the Soaring Heavens cultivators, striding across the green island toward the headquarters. So far, they had ignored the library buildings. Min took some deep breaths to steady her nerves.

She felt a blast of will and heard a crack of lightning. Overhead, the sky flared purple for an instant. She looked up, as hundreds of feet above her, the two great cultivators passed overhead. It wasn't easy to tell them apart, but she'd seen them dueling in the sky once before. Grandmaster Noren fought Inquisitor Pak.

Noren was wielding a long black sword. Every time he swung, an arc of blinding light flashed out from it. He seemed to have the Inquisitor on the back foot. She was responding to his attacks using lux patterns as she held a spear of her own in her right hand.

Min returned her focus to the battle on the ground, which she could affect. She drew her lux bow and, conjuring a simple orange arrow, took aim at one of the cultivators on Soaring Heaven's flanks. He was still over 200 yards away. Min focused, kept her breathing careful, aimed, and fired. Her arrow shot out, and she had another nocked to her string and in the air before the first hit home. She heard the screams as her arrows found victims and smiled grimly to herself.

Beside her, Cui was overseeing a trio of cultivators. "Those ones with the character for thornbush on them. Yellow and blue lux. Now!" The three stepped up to the railing, holding scripts in their hands. They fed lux in.

At least no one here had to worry about running out of lux, with a well at their feet to supply as much as they needed. Yes, it was a double-edged sword, since their attackers would also have access to the lux, but it meant they could use as many of these scripts as they liked.

Min shouted, "Get some of the Brotherhood up here to run scripts from the library to us."

"Oh, good thinking," Cui said, before sending a junior disciple to relay the message.

The acolytes at the rail unleashed their scripts. A flurry of patterns flew out, striking the ground between the tower and Soaring Heavens. Wherever the patterns struck, they planted themselves and then began to grow thick dark thorns, forming a hedge twenty feet tall. The Soaring Heavens halted briefly. The hedge was five yards wide.

Master Feng was chiding them. He attacked the hedge with his own sword, and a moment later, stepped back in dismay. Min smiled. The hedge was resisting their attempts. From here, they threw some patterns at it, but it seemed to absorb the lux. Min blessed whatever nameless Morning Mist cultivator had spent hours creating those scripts.

As Disciple Sho shouted new orders, Min nocked another arrow to her bow and fired, and fired.

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