Chapter 171 Hand in Hand, Foot in Mouth

Chapter 171: Chapter 172: Hand in Hand, Foot in Mouth

The moment their fingers closed, the arch woke up.

The two carved hands in the keystone began to glow, soft and gold, and a deep voice rolled out of the stone.

"TWO TRAVELERS DETECTED."

Su Wan’s hand was cold and rough, covered in sword calluses, and gripping his so tightly his knuckles creaked. She was staring straight ahead with the expression of someone being walked to the gallows.

"RELATIONSHIP: HOSTILE," the gate continued. "BOND: NEGATIVE. CROSSING PERMITTED. DIFFICULTY: SEVERE."

"Severe?" Daniel said.

"THE MORE YOU DISLIKE EACH OTHER, THE HARDER THE ROAD."

Su Wan closed her eyes. "I hate this world."

"We haven’t even started yet."

The mist in front of the arch rolled aside like a curtain, and a path appeared. It was narrow, barely two paces wide, a ribbon of pale stone stretching away into the fog with no walls and no railing. Beneath it there was nothing at all. Just white.

"Don’t let go," said the gate. "Move in step. If your rhythm breaks, the road will tilt."

"Tilt?" Su Wan asked.

"THE ROAD WILL TILT," the gate said again, with relish.

Daniel looked at the path. He looked at his hand, trapped in a stranger’s iron grip. He thought about Blink, ten mana and an instant teleport. But he had a feeling that a gate that read intent also read cheating, and he did not want to find out what happened to a cheater on a bridge with no bottom.

"Okay," he said. "Left foot first."

"Why your left?"

"Because mine’s closer to yours."

"That makes no sense."

"It’s a gut feeling." He stepped forward. Su Wan stepped forward at the same moment with the wrong foot.

The road tilted.

It did not tilt slowly. The whole path snapped sideways like a trapdoor, and they both went down with a yelp, tumbling across the stone in a tangle of braid, cloak and golden armor. They stopped in a heap. Su Wan was on top, one knee on his stomach, her hand still locked in his, her face about eight centimeters from his.

Her eyes were wide. Her cheeks were slightly pink.

"This," Daniel wheezed, "is the closest I have ever been to a woman who wants me dead."

She drove an elbow into his ribs.

"OW."

"Don’t talk."

"You’re on top of me!"

"That’s because *you* stepped wrong!"

"You stepped with the wrong foot!"

"I stepped with the *correct* foot!"

"THE ROAD WILL TILT AGAIN," the gate announced, "IF YOU CONTINUE TO ARGUE."

They scrambled up at the same time and stood on the narrow stone, both breathing hard, both refusing to look at each other.

"Count," Su Wan said through her teeth. "Out loud. In sync."

"Fine. One."

"Two."

"One is the left. Start on one."

"I know what one is!"

"Then say it with feeling!"

She glared at him. He grinned. After a long moment, her jaw unclenched.

"Left," she said quietly.

"Right," said Daniel.

They moved.

The first twenty steps were agony. The road tilted twice more, once when Daniel’s boot scraped a loose stone and once when Su Wan sneezed. But gradually, the strangest thing happened. Their feet began to fall in the same rhythm, left and right, left and right, and the road stopped trembling beneath them. The mist smoothed itself out. A faint, steady hum rose from the stone, like the sound of a held note.

"Hold on," Daniel said slowly. "It’s working."

"Don’t say that. You’ll jinx it."

"You don’t believe in jinxes."

"I believe in *you*, and you ruin everything."

He laughed before he could stop himself. A short breath of surprise slipped out of her too, and then she bit down on it hard and looked away.

They walked for a while in silence. The mist swirled around their ankles. Somewhere far below, water was running over rock.

"You didn’t come after me because of the card," Daniel said, after a while.

Su Wan’s hand tightened. "What?"

"At the clearing. You said it was about the young master’s honor. But you weren’t angry about the card. You were angry about what happens when you go home without him."

She said nothing. Left. Right. Left. Right.

"The Golden Dragon Clan," Daniel went on, quietly, "isn’t going to give you a medal for failing to guard their precious heir. Are they?"

Her silence went on long enough that he thought she wouldn’t answer.

"I was ten years old," she said at last, her voice flat and distant. "They took me in when my parents died. I was given a bed and a sword. I owe them everything." She stared at the mist ahead. "A guard who loses her master is no longer a guard. She is just a debt."

Daniel did not say he was sorry. He had a feeling she would have killed him for it.

"Then let’s make sure," he said, "that when you walk back through those gates, you have something better to show them than my head."

She turned and looked at him, really looked, for the first time.

"Like what?"

"A top hundred finish. A plaque. A story about how you crossed the Gorge of Nine Gates faster than the rest of their precious heirs."

"And you?"

"I’ll take the credit for being a good partner."

"You will take nothing."

"Fine. I’ll take the dinner."

She yanked his hand so hard his shoulder popped. "*Left*," she snarled.

"Right," said Daniel, beaming.

At minute eleven, the mist ahead thinned. A second arch appeared, and the road beneath them slid under it and ended in a plain stone platform.

"CROSSED," said the gate behind them. "ELEVEN MINUTES, FORTY-SEVEN SECONDS. A SLOW CROSSING. A VERY SLOW CROSSING."

Both of them let go of each other’s hand at the exact same moment as if they had been burned.

Su Wan wiped her palm on her armor. Daniel flexed his fingers. Neither of them said a word.

[Affection Level: Su Wan: -38%]

Daniel read it and decided, wisely, to keep it to himself.

---

The fourth gate was a bridge.

It crossed a chasm so deep the bottom had been swallowed by cloud. Two ropes held a line of wooden planks, and a third rope served as a railing. In the middle, the planks were missing in places, and in others they swayed in a wind Daniel could not feel.

The plaque at the foot of the bridge was short.

ONE MUST WALK BLIND. ONE MUST GUIDE. TRUST THE VOICE, NOT THE EYES.

Daniel read it and winced. "Oh, I hate this one."

"Who wears the blindfold?" Su Wan asked, eyeing the strip of black cloth hanging from a hook.

"Not me," Daniel said instantly.

"Not me," said Su Wan.

They glared at each other.

"I am a trained guard of the Golden Dragon Clan," Su Wan said. "I do not walk blind behind a man who stole my master’s card."

"I am a delicate person with a very important face," Daniel said. "I don’t walk blind behind a woman who tried to open my throat."

"Then we’ll fight for it."

"No," Daniel said, with great dignity. "We’ll decide it like civilized people." He held up a closed fist. "Rock, paper, scissors."

Su Wan stared at his fist. "What?"

"It’s a game. Three rounds. Winner chooses." He wiggled his fingers. "I once defeated a pirate captain this way."

"You’re lying."

"He had a hook. He lost to paper. He cried."

She looked at him for a long moment. She seemed to be deciding whether he was insane or merely stupid.

"Explain the rules," she said finally.

He explained. Rock beats scissors. Scissors beat paper. Paper beats rock. She repeated it back to him like a recruit memorizing an order, her face grave, and he had to turn away to stop himself from laughing.

"One," said Daniel, "two, three, shoot."

She threw rock. He threw paper.

"One to me."

She frowned, flexed her fingers, and threw rock again. He threw paper again.

"Two to me."

"Wait," Su Wan said slowly. "You always throw paper."

"Do I?"

"Twice. You threw paper twice."

"Coincidence." Daniel smiled. "Last round. Are you ready?"

She was not ready. He could see it in her eyes, the calculation, the sudden doubt, the way she was now watching his hand like a hawk. She threw scissors, because she assumed he would throw paper a third time.

He threw rock.

Silence stretched across the chasm.

"That," Su Wan said, her voice trembling with fury, "is not fair."

"You assumed. Never assume." Daniel plucked the blindfold from its hook and held it out with a courtly bow. "Your turn."

She snatched it from him and tied it around her eyes with sharp, furious knots.

"If you lead me off this bridge," she said, "I will haunt you."

"I’ll leave a light on."

The first third of the bridge went well. Daniel walked backward ahead of her, calling out each plank.

"Step. Step. Left a bit. Not that left, your other left. There. Good."

Su Wan moved with the careful grace of a trained fighter, one hand on the rope, the other stretched out to feel the air. Her face was tense under the black cloth.

Then the bridge changed.

The planks ahead of Daniel shimmered. For a moment, he saw a gaping gap, ten meters wide, with no planks at all. Then it flickered and the planks were back. Then they vanished again.

An illusion.

Keen Sense told him the truth. The planks were there, solid and real. The gap was a lie painted on the air. But the real trick, he realized, was what would happen to Su Wan, who couldn’t see any of it, and had only his voice to rely on.

"Su Wan," he said.

"What?"

"There’s a gap ahead."

She froze. "How wide?"

"About ten meters."

"That’s not possible to jump."

"I know." He kept his voice calm and steady. "But I need you to jump anyway."

"You’re lying."

"I’m not."

"If I jump and there’s no ground on the other side..."

"Then you fall, and I’ll be very sorry, and you can haunt me for the rest of my life." He held out a hand she couldn’t see. "But there’s ground. I promise. The gap isn’t real."

She stood there, breathing hard, her blindfolded face turned toward him. He could see the war going on behind the cloth. A girl who had trusted no one since she was ten, who had been taught that every smile hid a knife, standing at the edge of a drop.

"Why should I believe you?" she whispered.

"You shouldn’t," Daniel said honestly. "But I’m asking anyway."

A long silence.

Then Su Wan took a deep breath, bent her knees, and jumped.

She flew across the gap in a perfect arc, her braid trailing behind her. Daniel stepped aside just in time. Her boots hit the planks with a solid thud and she stumbled, caught the rope, and stood there swaying, breathing hard.

She had crossed ten meters of bridge. The gap had never existed.

"...I’m alive," she said slowly.

"You’re alive."

"There was ground."

"Told you."

She pulled the blindfold off. Her eyes were very bright. She looked back across the bridge where the gap had been, and then at Daniel, and something shifted in her face. It was not a smile. Not even close. But it was a little less like a closed door.

"If you had lied," she said, "I would have died."

"Then I’d have had to explain it to a lot of very dramatic people."

Her lips twitched. She turned away at once and started walking, but he saw it.

[Affection Level: Su Wan: -29%]

Daniel decided to keep that one to himself, too.

At the end of the bridge, a plaque waited beside the stone arch. He read the top line and stopped.

1. Yun Xi. 00:00:22. Companion: Sleeping.

"Sleeping," Su Wan read over his shoulder. "What does that mean?"

"I have no idea."

"Who’s Yun Xi?"

"A girl who is winning by walking." Daniel looked at the word again. "And apparently, her companion is taking a nap."

"That doesn’t make sense."

"I know."

"Nothing about this test makes sense."

"I know." He grinned, though it was a little thinner than before. "I’m starting to love it."

His Keen Sense pinged.

Two heat signatures, closing fast from behind. Fifty meters. Forty. Moving in a tight pair, one with a light, quick step he knew very well, and one that sounded like a small avalanche wearing boots.

Daniel’s stomach sank.

"Oh no," he said.

"What?"

"Don’t move."

"Why?"

"Just..." He glanced down. "Look at your hand."

Su Wan looked down.

Somewhere between the bridge and the arch, without either of them noticing, her fingers had found his again. They were still laced together, loosely, unthinkingly, the grip of two people who had spent twenty minutes depending on each other not to fall.

She yanked her hand away like it was on fire.

It was too late.

Lyra came around the bend at a sprint, with Paul behind her and Brick Head thundering after them both. She skidded to a halt in a spray of gravel and took in the scene: Daniel, red in the face. Su Wan, the golden-armored woman who had held a blade to his throat the day before, standing six inches from him with her cheeks flushed. The hands, still in the middle of being separated.

Lyra’s pistols were out before anyone could breathe.

"Daniel Black," she said, very quietly.

"It’s not what it looks like."

"You are holding hands," Lyra said, "with the woman who tried to cut your throat."

"The gate made me!"

"I’m aware this looks bad," Su Wan said stiffly.

"It looks *terrible*," said Paul.

Brick Head peered at Su Wan, then at Daniel, then at Lyra, who had gone a very specific shade of pink.

"Are we fighting her?" he asked hopefully.

"No," said Daniel.

"Yes," said Lyra.

"No!"

"Why are you *blushing*?" Lyra demanded of Su Wan.

"I am not blushing!"

"You are, a little," Paul murmured.

Daniel put his face in his hands. Somewhere behind him, the bridge creaked in a gentle wind, and the fifth gate waited in the mist, silent and patient.

And far ahead, where no one could see her, a small girl in grey was still walking, and still, in her own way, winning.