Past noon, the Gobi grew even more violent.
The wind picked up, whipping sand into their faces. Xi Yu finally understood why people in the borderlands wrapped their heads and faces so thoroughly—if you didn’t, the sand really would get into your eyes.
He squinted, pulling the white cloth at his collar up to cover half his face, pressing his hat brim lower until only the tip of his nose was visible.
“The wind’s picking up!” Que Zhi’s voice cut through the sandstorm from ahead. “Stay close to me!”
Neither spoke again, pressing on in silence.
The camels’ steps grew heavy and slow, each footfall seeming to pull free from the sand before planting again. The bells at their necks clanked and jangled in the wind, their rhythm growing increasingly urgent.
Xi Yu leaned forward, one hand holding his hat in place, the other gripping the reins tightly, his knuckles whitening from the strain.
Sand pattered against his sleeves in fine, crisp taps. He kept his head down, watching the path through the narrow gap between his hat brim and collar—seeing only the dust kicked up by the camels’ hooves and the tail of the beast ahead.
Then Xi Yu realized the sandstorm wasn’t so frightening anymore.
Someone was in front of him—not blocking all the wind and sand, just walking ahead, leaving him a clear silhouette to follow.
That silhouette was enough.
He suddenly wondered if this was what Old Zhou meant when he told him to find someone who could protect him.
Then he shook the thought away—he didn’t need protecting.
He was only traveling with this man for now. Once they reached the western reaches, they’d go their separate ways.
By dusk, the wind and sand gradually subsided. The Gobi returned to its vast, open silence.
Que Zhi chose a leeward sand dune as their campsite.
The two camels were tethered to a clump of dried tamarisk roots at the base of the dune. He gathered a few stones to form a simple fire pit, pulled a flint and some dried dung from his pack, and crouched down to start a fire.
Xi Yu stood nearby watching. He wanted to help but didn’t know what to do—he’d never started a fire in the wild before, didn’t even know how to use a flint.
In the past, he’d only needed to survive, not to live.
Xi Yu stood there, hands clasped behind his back, like an outsider watching the show.
Que Zhi glanced up at him, then gestured to the side. “The blankets are in the pack. Get them yourself.”
Xi Yu retrieved the pack from the camel’s back, pulled out two thick wool blankets—spreading one on the ground and folding the other neatly beside it.
Then he sat down on the spread blanket, hugged his knees, and continued watching Que Zhi make the fire.
Xi Yu noticed how practiced Que Zhi’s movements were—first striking the flint to spark dry grass clippings, then carefully layering the dried dung on top. The flames flickered weakly at first, then slowly climbed, licking the edges of the dung with a dry, crackling pop.
The firelight played across his face, casting that sharp-featured countenance in alternating light and shadow, the old scar on his cheekbone surfacing and fading in the glow.
His fingers were rough but nimble, arranging the stones around the fire pit as if handling some delicate weapon.
Xi Yu watched for a while, then said, “Did you often stay overnight outdoors before?”
Que Zhi set the last stone in place and straightened up. “Mm.”
“On campaign?”
Que Zhi’s hand paused.
Just for a moment—then he went back to tending the fire.
He didn’t look up, the flames dancing in his eyes.
“How did you know it was campaign?”
“A guess,” Xi Yu said.
They exchanged a glance, and neither pursued it further.
The fire was burning now.
Night fell hard on the Gobi. The moment the sun disappeared, the temperature plummeted—from the scorching heat of day to the biting cold of night, with almost no transition in between.
Xi Yu wrapped himself in his blanket and sat by the fire, bundled up like a stuffed dumpling with only his face showing.
His face beneath the hat brim was warmed by the firelight, his eyes reflecting the dancing flames like two golden fish swimming in a pool of warm water.
Que Zhi took out dried provisions and jerky from his pack, divided them, and handed half to Xi Yu.
Xi Yu took it and bit into the jerky—it was tough, hard enough to make his jaw ache, but salty and savory, growing more flavorful the more he chewed.
He chewed for a long time, his jaw sore, but he didn’t put it down—just worked it slowly with his teeth, taking small, deliberate bites, as if savoring some rare delicacy.
“The jerky is yours too,” Xi Yu said. It was a statement, not a question.
“Mm.”
Que Zhi acknowledged with a grunt, lowering his head to draw his curved knife from his belt and lay it beside his knee—within easy reach.
He wasn’t relaxed by the fire, Xi Yu noticed—even while eating, his posture maintained a certain alertness. His back wasn’t fully leaning against the dune, his knees slightly bent, ready to rise at any moment.
Xi Yu glanced at the curved knife—its handle was wrapped in the same dark red leather cord as the dagger, clearly the work of the same hand.
“The dagger and the curved knife are a set?” he asked.
“Mm.”
“Did you forge them yourself?”
“No. Took them.”
Xi Yu stopped chewing and looked at Que Zhi.
Que Zhi stared expressionlessly at the fire, chewing his jerky.
Xi Yu couldn’t tell if he was joking or telling the truth.
After a few seconds, Xi Yu decided to take it as a joke and went back to chewing his jerky.
Que Zhi tilted his head slightly and shot him a glance.
The firelight illuminated Xi Yu’s profile clearly—his lashes casting faint shadows beneath his eyes, the tear mole just resting at the edge of that shadow, like an ember from the fire had accidentally landed there.
His cheeks puffed out slightly as he chewed, then flattened again, quiet and soundless, like a squirrel nibbling on a nut.
That squirrel, nibbling away, stared blankly at the fire, completely unaware that his hat brim had tilted to the left, his right eyebrow nearly exposed.
“Your hat’s crooked,” Que Zhi said.
Xi Yu reached up and felt it—it was, indeed.
He took the hat off altogether and set it on his knee.
The firelight flooded his entire face at once—those peach-blossom eyes shimmering with shifting light in the glow, the thin flush at their outer corners deepening in the warmth,
as if someone had rubbed a streak of sunset glow at the corners of his eyes with a fingertip, the tear mole hanging diagonally below that blush like a single ink drop perfectly placed on a crimson seal at the edge of rice paper—so beautiful it seemed unreal.
Que Zhi looked away, fixing his eyes on the fire.
A piece of jerky in his hand crumbled under his grip.
Xi Yu noticed.
He looked back at the fire and said nothing.
But the firelight caught the corner of his mouth, and that curve held something a little extra than usual.
At night, Xi Yu lay wrapped in his blanket beside the fire, the entire starry sky overhead.
The stars over the Gobi hung lower than anywhere else—low enough that you could almost reach up and pluck one down.
Stars densely blanketed the sky, some blindingly bright, others flickering in and out of sight. The Milky Way stretched across the heavens like a silk ribbon worn smooth by wind and sand.
He’d seen stars in the cold palace before—divided into four panes by the window lattice, one star per pane. But now there were more stars above him than he could count, and he didn’t need to count them—he could just look.
He gazed at the sky, slowly drawing a deep, full breath.
The Gobi night was very quiet—only the occasional snort from a camel, the dry crackle of dung burning in the fire, and the faint moan of wind sweeping in from afar.
He felt his own heartbeat slow down too, blending with the rhythm of the camel bells—one beat after another, unhurried, steady.
“Que Zhi.” His voice cut through the darkness.
“Mm.”
“Thank you for bringing the blankets.”
A long silence followed—so long Xi Yu thought he’d fallen asleep—before a low, muffled response came from the other side of the fire.
“Mm.”
Xi Yu closed his eyes.
The blanket smelled of mutton and candied pastry, with a faint hint of soap—he breathed in those scents, and beneath the blanket, he tightened his grip on the dagger a little more.
He thought of the dusk by the well, the cold tea on the counter, the innkeeper’s wife saying “he just won’t leave,” those steamed buns, that dagger, those words—”Eat more, you’re too thin.”
In the darkness, Xi Yu smiled soundlessly—just a slight curl at the corner of his mouth.
Then he fell asleep.
On the other side of the fire, Que Zhi leaned against the sand dune, the curved knife resting on his knee, his eyes still open.
Through the dancing flames, he watched the thin figure curled into a ball under the blanket opposite him—watched the hat brim tilted to one side, revealing a sliver of impossibly pale forehead and scattered strands of hair.
He remembered the sight he’d turned back to see this morning on the Gobi—dawn light flooding the earth, Xi Yu riding atop his camel, head tilted back to gaze at the sky, radiant as the morning clouds on the horizon—he’d almost forgotten to hold his reins.
They’d traveled for days, left the small town behind, and reached this godforsaken stretch of Gobi with no village ahead or behind.
Not once had Xi Yu asked “How much longer?” Not once had he complained of exhaustion. He hadn’t even noticed his own hat was crooked until someone pointed it out.
But Que Zhi’s gaze had been stuck on Xi Yu’s back the whole time.
Xi Yu still didn’t know who he was, nor did he seem to care.
His origins were unclear, and yet Xi Yu had accepted the dagger.
Even knowing he wasn’t a blacksmith, Xi Yu still called his name with that same casual, indifferent tone.
He probably thought they were just traveling the same way for a while.
Que Zhi turned the curved knife half a rotation, blade facing outward.
Same way? The Gobi stretched eight hundred li—”same way” could take them all the way to the end of the desert, all the way to the court, all the way to the royal city.
The thought pulled at the corner of his mouth—not a smile, but something settled, certain.
Then he closed his eyes, the curved knife laid across his knee, still unsheathed.
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