The River Viper tossed his staff from one hand to another. "I can hear sweat pour down your back from over here. I'll toss you into the river to chill."

Xi charged up the slope and slammed his borrowed weapon into the robber. The man's move to intercept the blow was languid, but just fast enough.

"Negotiate," Xi said, parrying three playful strikes. The Viper was only testing him. "Lord Wu—-"

"Shen love talking." The Viper span and swung wide, almost cutting feet from under him. "We talk or fight."

Xi skipped sideways like a goat.

The staff whistled back through the air, more serious now. "We talk or make love."

He had his staff up in time to parry the blow. They circled one another.

The River Viper darted his staff past Xi's defence. The move was far too quick and high to pack a serious punch, but it knocked the hat off Xi's head, making the strap tighten around his throat.

"Never both," the Viper concluded his lecture.

Bursts of laughter startled Xi, but the Viper was aware of the gathering audience. The soaking guards and more people from the fortified crag crowded in. They stood dangerously close, and they scowled dangerously as well once they'd stopped laughing at their leader's witticisms.

Xi turned the next blow aside.

"Cool down!" He tore a gush in the wet soil, liquefied it under the spectators's feet, and shoved it all towards the river.

The released energy propelled him towards the palisade, but the Viper still landed a hit on his shoulder.

Excitement overrode pain. He made it all the way up to the slanted thatch roof of the guard tower and tossed the staff aside with a yelp. Blinking away the tears, Xi rotated his arm. It moved, but it hurt worse than the demons's claws.

"Blighted mage!" the Viper screamed and gave chase, gaining ground too fast for Xi to nurse his injury.

The bandits did not take a break either, letting go a volley of arrows, but he understood beforehand. The shafts ignited, got consumed in a flash, fell to the ground as ash.

The Viper shinnied up the wooden structure.

"You and yours are on the borrowed time." Xi talked as fast and as quietly as he could. "Wu does not move in because he would not offend your Emperor. Your Emperor would not move in because it pleases him that you are a thorn in our side. This won't last."

He offered a hand to the Viper to pull him up the roof. "Negotiate a deal, while you can."

The Viper swatted his hand aside and slithered up the ledge on his belly smoother than his namesake.

Xi wisely retreated. "I could burn down half of your men right now, and the other half - after I kill you."

"Blighted mage..." the Viper tossed his staff away too.

"...is not your biggest problem. The Demon Horde is coming---" Xi braced himself as the Viper surged towards him, striking.

Xi caught his arm and redirected reflexively, dropping the Viper down, with the shoulders hanging over the edge of the roof, nothing but air underneath.

The Viper recoiled and pushed him off. Xi staggered back, surprised by the Viper's strength. His lapse lost him the initiative, the Viper lunged. Xi rolled down the sloping roof, but not far enough. The Viper grappled him. The man's elbow squeezed the air out of his throat, but worse, it drove his emotions all the way up into Xi's skull.

Xi convulsed under the strain of keeping his focus under the barrage of rivalry. Thankfully, it was not a murder's lust. He struggled to relieve the pressure on his windpipe, catching glimpses of the Viper's looming face. His eyes shone like polished gems; the man was having far too much fun. Xi kneed him in the groin. The white teeth between the plump lips snapped together with a satisfying clank.

"Negotiate." Xi pleaded during the brief respite, working himself free from his larger opponent. "The Demon Horde is coming, many will die, your parents, brothers, wives, children... you have those, right?"

The Viper's iron-hard palm slammed into Xi's tender shoulder. He squealed 'idiot' as his fingers found purchase on the stubborn bandit's throat and squeezed. Hot flash of rivalry pulsed through his veins, either Viper's or his own, it was impossible to tell.

The Viper jerked this way and that, sending them both sliding towards the edge. "Why... no... magic?"

"Seemed unfair," Xi croaked, straining to keep his grip on the man and on the prickly roof. "I might have to if we fall."

The Viper hit his stupid shoulder again, harder, and Xi's vision swang between solid black and the daylight, then mostly black.

"Idiot," the Viper hissed somewhere outside his darkened field of vision, two or three centuries of pain later.

Xi howled before discerning that this was a different pain: the Viper twisted his arm to the point just before breaking. And he thought he did not blackout...

"Set something on fire." The Viper's lips touched his ear, an unexpected soft touch in the middle of their fight.

He would have sat up in surprise if he could. Instead, he slobbered into the thatch. "What?"

"Big fire." The Viper eased off his grip. "Start a big fire."

"No," Xi wheezed. "What... what do I set on fire to not kill... and not burn the whole place down?"

The Viper jerked his chin towards a shed below.

Xi did not question the building's obvious lack of strategic value: the Viper knew his people best. If setting the shed ablaze would convince them to let the Viper go over to Shen, then burn it shall...

He focused, and the shed flared up like a bonfire. A column of black smoke shot up into the sky, obscuring the sun for a moment. Two naked bodies spilled out of its doors, screaming.

"If I get any more nephews," the Viper said, his upper lip quivering with suppressed laughter again, "I'll have no choice but to march on Xichon."

"Oh." Xi cleared his parched throat. "We can't have that."

On the rooftop and with an aching shoulder, Xi was not at his most graceful, but he put every effort into the formal bow.

"I am Chong Xi, the war mage of the Evershining Empire, and the envoy from Lord and Lady Wu, the wardens in Luitong, sworn knights of the Son of Heavens, the Benevolent Emperor Zha Yao."

The robber baron nodded curtly. "Call me Minh."

***

Xi slept in his boat to reduce the risk of misunderstandings with Minh's restless subjects. They were afraid of him, angry with him, and he was not in the mood to keep proving himself. He was tired, and his shoulder ached. He wished Yu was still skulking about, or even Sayewa... Why is Sayewa avoiding me? The ten thousand reasons why scattered his thoughts, but when he'd finally called his mind to order and dozed off, the river lulled him into a far deeper sleep than normal.

"You are heartless," Xi complained groggily, when Minh shook him out of slumber before the sunrise. "Entirely heartless..."

Minh let go off his throbbing shoulder, because, yes, that was the body part he chose to grab to perform the shaking. "Chong Xi, the war mage of the Evershining Empire, weren't you eager for us to set out on our embassy to Lord and Lady Wu, the wardens ---"

"Yes, yes..." Xi groaned. "I was. And I understand that your grip on power is tenuous and that the sympathies and fears swing---"

The familiar quiver riffled through the mustache. "Shen do love talking."

He shut up and climbed onto his seat, ready to cast the boat off.

Minh's suppressed amusement turned into an open one. He flashed a wide grin at Xi. "I have a reputation to uphold, Xi, and your excuse of a boat... Let's just say I won't be caught dead in it. Pack up, war mage."

Once they'd tied Xi's tiny boat behind Minh's far larger one, Xi winced. Moving this caravan up-river with two pairs of oars would be a workout. His shoulder complained preemptively, bitterly... and in vain.

Minh settled on the prow, padding himself with the blankets. "You get the first shift, war mage, since I had to get up earlier to provision the boat. Wake me up by noon."

He was snoring or pretending to snore before Xi mastered his objections. He put his back into the rowing instead, to a pitiful result. The crawling pace did have some advantages: mist clung to the riverbanks turning it into the land of the fairy tales.

Right there, just around the bend, could be the road to the peach gardens of eternal happiness. The rising sun tinted the mist in the colours normally reserved for the flower petals: lotus-pink, gentle violets, and a scarlet streak of poppies that should have clashed with the pastels but it did not. Observing such beauty made Xi if not forget the pain, then push it to the back of his consciousness. He remembered Sayewa's blooms, but got distracted by watching Minh's restful face. It looked attractive in the light of the rising sun, and what wouldn't? Xi searched his memory for an image in bronze that Minh reminded him of, an important and ancient prince, from the Dynasty of ---

Minh cracked one eye opened to survey the shoreline, "Is your strategy to wait out the demon invasion on the river?"

Xi kept his mouth shut. He was not making much progress, but asking Minh for help was not an option, since his every instinct told him that their duel was not done until Minh said it was done.

After a pause filled only with the splashing of Xi's oars, Minh rummaged under the canvas that covered the boat's bottom. He produced three sturdy poles, snapped them together into a single tall one, and jammed it into a mysterious metal bracket. Xi avoided stabbing his toes on this nuisance all morning.

"My turn," Minh said, pulling the square of canvas up the makeshift mast. It unfurled into a sail, and the boat surged forward catching the light breeze.

Minh took over the rowing with another huge grin. "Tell me about the demons from the North. We have some to the east of Bao. Those are much like Shen. They build cities, they take their taxes, they rule. People that live under them don't come crying to Bao to save them."

Xi clutched his shoulder. Resting it felt great at first, but without the constant movement, it stiffened. "Northern Hordes are wilder, Minh."

Seeing Minh narrow his eyes suspiciously, he added, "They slaughter rather than farm the humans."

In response, he was regaled by another spectacular view of Minh's teeth. "That's what any clever man says of his foe, and the tales grow in telling."

"I fought them. They are merciless, vile. They steal your qi even as you kill them, and sometimes you never get it back. A part of you is forever lost..." Xi found himself at a loss for words to describe the horror of the demon preying on him and shrugged. The pain the movement brought on was not bad, but it was sudden, and it went with the memory of sliding down the wall towards the bloodied claws. He whimpered and shut his eyes in frustration.

"Look... I know I don't sound like a demon-slayer, whining about a bruise, but trust me---"

Minh took a sharp turn, landing the boat in the reeds. "Take your shirt off, demon-slayer."

A hot sensation spreading across Xi's cheeks and neck confirmed his worst fear: he was blushing and staring at Minh wide-eyed. His memory tangled his past naked vulnerability with the reality of the river's gurgles, the wind's warm touch and Minh looking askance. At him, looking at him... waiting. Luckily, he misinterpreted Xi's stupor - not that Xi was able to offer a lucid interpretation - and leaned forward solicitously. "You need help with it? That bad?"

"No... I..."

Minh did not listen to him struggle with his numb tongue. He leaned over the side of the boat to pluck a wide leaf and stuffed it into his mouth bit by bit till his cheeks puffed up. "Well?" he was chewing, so it sounded more like 'ffell?" but the impatience in his tone was clearer than the words. Despite the amiable exterior, he was used to people hop when he said jump, even if his domain was not large.

Once Xi wriggled out of his garment, Minh spat out the green paste over the bruise with visible relief. "The stuff tastes vile."

Xi produced a reedy chuckle. "My shoulder looked more panoramic than the sunrise earlier today. That profusion of colours!"

"Uh-huh. Very pretty." Minh topped the treatment with a handful of river muck. His hand lingered after smothering the medicine, while his eyes travelled down the pink cross-hatch of scars. Before Xi used to worry that their jagged edges weakened his tattoos of power, now he was worried about how ugly it looked. And how close Minh was. And what he should say, because the pause stretched on uncomfortably. Again. Again!

"You did not kid about going toe to toe with the demons," Minh said finally, cringed and washed his mouth with a handful of river water. "I am no doctor, but it should stop you from grimacing in manful silence."

Xi smiled before he checked himself. His thoughts stopped buzzing around like bees. He was capable of the light banter again. "I am glad I upheld the fierce reputation of Shen."

In a complete reverse of his lapse, the restless energy buoyed Xi up. Maybe the herbal remedy had a stimulant effect, because his skin prickled with the sensation of tiny needles, and the big happy smile would not go away. Hopeful, yes, that's what it was, Minh made him feel hopeful.

While the cause of his elation sloshed and gurgled more water, Xi focused on the air temperature trying to increase the differential, increasing the speed of the breeze down the valley. It picked up steadily—

"Slow down, wizard, or we'll capsize."

He nodded, experimenting with the heat and cold until Minh approved of his efforts in the same way he responded to nearly everything: by grinning. "Who knew making wind was your special talent."

Xi threw his head back and laughed like it was the funniest thing he had ever heard.