Both Sect Heads Wanted Out of the Marriage, So They Tried to Ruin the Town Together novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: The Night the River Came to Market

The river came up the lower lane one stair at a time.

By the time Luoyi reached the landing, it had taken the first row of stalls and was nosing at the second.

Half the town stood on the hill in its nightclothes, staring down at its own market.

"A line from the grain sheds to the temple steps," she shouted. "One arm apart. Pass the sacks, don't run."

"Who put you in charge?" someone yelled.

"The river did. Move."

They moved.

Above them, on the platform of the signal tower, a silver bell began to ring in code.

Zhuyuan was up there in his sleep robe, striking three fast and one long, over and over.

Far up the valley, Silverbell's relay towers chimed back out of the dark.

"The east gate is shut upstream!" he called down. "Two hours!"

"Tell them one!"

"It's a bell, Mistress Tang, not a magic stone!"

"Then ring harder!"

He rang harder.

Then a child screamed from the lower lane.

A boy of six sat on the roof of a drowned pigeon coop, hugging a chicken, and the water was already at the eaves.

Zhuyuan came down the tower ladder in a way that would have shocked his entire sect.

He knotted a ferryman's rope to a post and threw her the loose end.

She was lighter than he was, and she could swim.

She tied the rope round her waist and waded in.

The water bit her knees, then her thighs, cold as a blade.

The boy let go of the chicken and fell into her arms, and the chicken screamed about it.

"Got you," she told him. "You're fine. The chicken's fine."

The rope went taut behind her, and a big warm hand closed over hers on it.

Zhuyuan had waded in up to his chest.

"I have you," he said.

They hauled in together, his hand over hers the whole way, the boy between them and the hill cheering.

By the third watch the water crested a hand below the stall line and stopped.

Nobody was hurt, and not one sack of rice had gotten wet.

The Inspector found them on the temple steps, wrapped in a bedspread, a pot of dumplings in one hand and her notebook in the other.

"I have never seen a more orderly flood," she said warmly, and turned the notebook round.

The page was headed, in careful letters, EVIDENCE FOR THE HEARTH: COMPETENT GOVERNANCE.

The list under it was very long.

Luoyi felt the whole autumn tilt the wrong way.

Beside her, Zhuyuan looked at the page.

"I must ring the all-clear," he said, and went back up the tower ladder without a glance.

She lasted to the count of twenty.

Then she climbed after him.

The bell room at the top was one plank floor, four open windows and a great deal of rope.

He stood at the east window with his back to her, dripping, both hands on the bell rope, not ringing it.

His robe was plastered to him from shoulders to heels.

She could count every knob of his spine through the wet silk.

"You went in to your chest," she said.

"You went in to your waist."

"I'm a brewer. I've fallen into worse."

He turned around.

He was shaking, a fine hard tremor all through him, and she knew it was not only the cold, because it was in her too.

For eleven minutes the only thing between that boy and the river had been his hand on hers.

"Ring the bell, Head Jiang," she said.

He rang it once, long and clean, and the valley rang back.

Then she took the rope out of his hands and let it swing.

"Now take that off."

His fingers fumbled at the sash and would not work.

She lost patience and stripped it for him, peeling the wet silk off his shoulders and down his arms.

← Chapter 4 · All chapters · Chapter 6 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend