Chapter 21: Two Hundred Real Banners

The horn came again, long and low, from the dark pines beyond the gate.

The invaders checked.

Their front rank had reached the middle of the courtyard.

The six banner-bearers stood in a line with their black cloth streaming.

For one breath every man behind them turned his head to look back at the gate.

Then the Salt Tide guard came out of the night.

They came in four ranks, at a walk, two hundred men in black robes with silver wave-stitching.

They filled the east gate from post to post.

They carried swords in their hands, and in front of them, held high, rode nine banners.

Black cloth, white waves.

Zhaoxue did not need to count them.

Every person in the courtyard could see that they had nine.

For a moment the two sets of flags faced each other across the paving, black against black, seven against nine.

It was so quiet that she heard the fires hiss.

"Look at the hems," said the Master of the Third Peak.

She had risen to her feet.

She said it loudly, with the pipe forgotten in her fingers.

"Look at them, all of you. Seven. Nine."

Another of the Peaks, an old man in grey with a long white beard, stepped forward beside her.

"I have seen Salt Tide's flag on the coast," he said slowly. "It has nine crests."

"Those aren't the old banners," another voice said. "That one is wrong."

The invaders' front rank wavered.

A few of them stepped back, uncertain, and bumped into the men behind.

"Hold!" the man who had shouted the cry roared. "Take the hall! Take the old man!"

He was a thin man with a pocked face, and he led the charge himself.

The black flood surged forward.

Linxia met it at the foot of the steps.

She did not move like a woman who had crawled through a drain the night before.

Her sword came out of the sheath in one clean arc, caught the lantern light.