Chapter 10: Suspects

In the morning Mu-yeol hung Woo-jin's junior from a plum tree by his own belt.

He did it very politely.

He did not touch Jun-seo except to lift him.

He set him dangling in the courtyard of the Iron Crane Sect, toes a foot off the ground, with a plate of rice cakes just out of reach.

"Senior brother," Jun-seo called, in a high voice. "Senior brother, I'd like to register an objection."

"Noted," Woo-jin said.

He stood under the tree with his arms folded.

He did not like it, and he had not argued, because he knew why Mu-yeol was doing it.

Mu-yeol had explained over breakfast, calmly.

"I want to know who in this sect knew where my brother's party was going, and when."

"Jun-seo's a gossip," Woo-jin had said, "not a traitor."

"I'm sure he is. I'd like to hear it from him."

Now the tree creaked under Jun-seo's weight, and the early sun lit his round, outraged face.

Mu-yeol crouched in front of him, a mountain folding up to talk to a dumpling.

"Pyo Jun-seo," he said. "When my brother's dumplings arrive, who do you tell?"

"The kitchen!"

"Anyone else?"

"The cook. His wife. The other cook."

Jun-seo swung slowly.

"The gardener, because he asked. The boy who sweeps. A woman from the Azure Hall who wanted the recipe."

"Which road does the courier take?"

"The river road! Why would I know that? It's the only road."

Mu-yeol's face did not change.

"Did you ever tell anyone the road?"

"Everyone knows the road!"

"Did you tell the Deputy Chief?"

"I've never spoken to the Deputy Chief in my life!" Jun-seo wailed.

"She doesn't know I exist! Nobody in the Alliance knows I exist, that's my whole tragedy!"

Woo-jin put a hand over his eyes.

Mu-yeol studied Jun-seo for a very long time, and then his shoulders eased.

"He doesn't know anything," he said to Woo-jin. "He's too frightened to lie."

"I've been saying that for a quarter of an hour," Woo-jin said.

He cut Jun-seo down.

Jun-seo fell on the grass, rolled over, and lay on his back looking at the sky.

"I will have the rice cakes now," he said.

"Take them," Mu-yeol said, and sat down on the ground beside him, and put his head in his hands.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Rival Who Killed Me Remembers Too from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.