Chapter 5: The Water

The next gu was a Grey Moth, and it was the smallest thing the Hall had ever fed him.

It was a dull winged speck in a jar, no bigger than a flea, and the Elder had chosen it himself.

"A gentle one," he had said. "You have earned a gentle one."

Cen Yu lay down on the floor of the north room with the shutter facing the wall, and Pei Ruo tipped the moth into his mouth.

It tickled going down, and then it settled in his chest, on the left side, and began to eat.

He kept his hands folded and counted.

A clay jug of water stood by his head, as it always did.

Vessels were allowed water through the night, and the Long Shed carried it up to the Insect House at dusk.

Tonight, as always, Gao Tie had carried it.

Near midnight, Cen Yu's throat went dry and he drank, and the water tasted of nothing, because everything did.

He counted on.

The pain was small and patient, and it sat under his left collarbone.

At dawn it was still there.

The ache did not go out of him all at once, as it had with the Black Ancestor and the Frost Bell.

It did not go out of him at all.

He lay in the grey light with his heart going fast, and he waited for the moth to rise in his throat.

It did not rise.

He coughed instead, and the cough went deep, and something wet came up on his hand.

It was red, with a grey froth on it.

Pei Ruo was across the room in a heartbeat.

She did not ask what was wrong. She knelt, put two fingers to his throat, and went quite still.

"It is not dead," she said. "It should have been dead by the second watch. It is still eating."

"It's a small one," Cen Yu said. His voice came out thin. "It's gentle."

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