Visitors from afar

Things would suddenly vanish from the storage room in Elder Su's home.

First nobody really noticed it, as only small items were affected: a couple of cookies, one or two sweet fruits. But later on, sweet buns and even whole loafs of bread would be vanishing.

At that point even the inattentive village chief finally noticed something to be wrong. Because Tang He had been there a lot recently and the theft had happened in rather recent times as well he was more or less the first suspect.

But after a small confrontation Elder Su had finally believed in Tang He's innocence and the blame was shifted to other parts of the household: mostly servants this time.

But even after a whole week of asking around and interrogation he finally gave up and let it be. That was until one day when he wasn't too focused on working at his desk that he heard someone sneaking into the storage room and when he silently followed he actually found his daughter eating away at the sweets.

His mischievous daughter had entered puberty.

Very likely she didn't get as much attention as she was used to before and tried to get some back and if not, at least get some compensation in the form of delicacies. She had decided to punish her father because he would give away all of his attention to that boy.

After her punishment she started behaving even more erratically but this time it was against Tang He. He was the fault her father wouldn't give her the love she wanted. And thus he needed to be dealt with.

Whenever those two kids would be alone Su Liling would do something to him.

Best case she would just ignore him and go out and play but more often she would start throwing small stones at him or doing pranks.

Luckily Frank understood everything very quickly. She was still a well brought up girl so she would always listen when one talked to her and so any time she would start showing signs of misbehaving he would tell her a joke or a funny story to get her attention elsewhere.

That worked for a while because the girl didn't see too much of the outside world beside the village but very soon another problem crept up: She would start pestering him to tell her more stories and it was starting to become rather difficult to find any which didn't involve things out of the scope of a normal village boys experience.

Of course, one could tell stories about elves, dwarfs and dragons but it would be strange if she started telling those to someone else. I mean, where would he have heard of those?

It was a good thing that Tang He actually experienced some stuff in the woods or else he would not have anything to tell her after a while. Listening to the armoured boar or flying bats with horns on their heads was luckily fascinating enough for that girl.

"… So, I was jumping around in the trees to look for some fruit when I found this nest full of eggs inside one of them. They weren't white like the ones you know of, no! They were almost pure red with brown dots on them. I had almost wanted to take some of them with me but I decided against it in the end. You know how I am…"

"Yup, you love the forest! You would never harm anyone for no reason!"

"…exactly! And you know what? It had extreme luck that I didn't even touch them. When I returned to the camp I got told that were the eggs were from one of the big snakes in the woods and it keeps some kind of strong scent on them. That snake would have come for me, hahaha…."

< Boy, that forest is really not to be underestimated. You know, the snake probably picked up your scent anyway as you were on that tree for at least a couple of minutes. >

'Wait what? It knows that I was there?'

< Of course it does so be careful in that area next time you go there. >

'Huuuuu, all right…'

"Hey, why do you make those funny faces sometimes?"

Su Liling had seen it happen very often. It was very entertaining to watch the expressions change and show the whole range of emotions imaginable. He would sometimes be really happy and soon after as disappointed as it gets and sometimes there was even a tinge of frightfulness on his face.

In her opinion Tang He definitely had some secrets he wasn't telling.

Womanly intuition sure is scary!

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It was early spring when another caravan arrived in the village. This one was rather different though, instead of traveling merchants with goods there was a big beautifully ornamented carriage in the centre and around it there were a couple of plainer looking ones. But if one were to inside of them, one would see strong men carrying swords and two robed elder looking people.

Tang He had been sitting at the desk doing some calculations for the Chief when he arrived with his guests.

Two elder people in brown robes with a noble looking boy in the middle stood beside Elder Su and were looking around in the room. They didn't seem too moved when they looked around the room.

"Please, friends from afar… Sit. He'er, get us some tea, will ye?"

Hearing all that Tang He stood up and answered

"Yes, Elder Su."

When he walked past the boy for a short moment both of their eyes met. In Tang He's curious eyes the boy looked very indifferent and rather cold but still very elegant and refined.

Of course, his clothes helped to accentuate this refinement. Anyone could see, this guy came from some kind of noble or at least wealthy lineage.

After doing a small customary bow Tang He went to get some tea for everyone.

What he and Frank didn't see of course, was a small smirk on the boy's face when he saw him bow. He himself didn't show any kind of courtesy like that which made Frank a bit unhappy but not delving too deep into that matter they vanished into the kitchen to heat up some water.

It was about 15 minutes later when he returned into the room where he heard a very lively discussion:

"Village Chief Su Xuefeng, our young master has come to know of the water-crystal in your possession and we'd like to ask you some questions about it."

The elder to the left had been speaking in a very friendly voice.

"You see, our young master is going to be accepted into a sect of immortals very soon and he'd like to buy the stone from you."

"I want to offer it to my future master hence sell it to me."

The boy's tone was more strict and not as courteous as the elder's. Frank noticed an undertone of impatience and boredom in the voice. It seemed as if he didn't really want to talk to the village chief at all or even saw it to be beneath him.

Strangely Elder Su didn't mind this tone. He behaved almost as if he was their subordinate.

"Of course! … Of course, young master Yang. I will give it to you, but you surely know of the situation of my village. I really hope you can give us a fair and just price."

The elder to the right scoffed and answered in a darker tone.

"Are you implying our clan would try to do unfair trades? Impudence! Who do you think owns all the caravans going through your village?"

Noticing his mistake Elder Su tried to apologize but young master Yang interrupted him:

"It doesn't matter. Show us the crystal!"

It was at this moment when Tang He came back inside with a tray of tea and some pastries.

Frank had told him to be very careful and not to say anything unnecessary. Those guys didn't seem to care at all and with their manpower they would probably be able to enforce anything they wanted.

So when he entered the room, Tang He tried to be as unnoticeable as possible. After placing the tray on the desk he was just about to turn around when this young master Yang switched his attention to him.

"Boy, it was your brother who found the stone? Did he find anything else on the fields?"

The elder to the right added in a threatening voice:

"Tell the truth boy, else it could be the last thing you say…"

< Tsh, those guys ey! So what if you have money? Sigh… >

< He'er be really careful with what you say or do! >

'Understood!'

"No, young master Yang. This was the only thing any of us found of value"

With a smirk the right elder turned to the young master in the middle of them and asked:

"If you want to check again I can have my people scour the whole village."

For a short frightful moment – especially for Chief Su – the boy was thinking, but soon with a small shake of his head he decided:

"Not needed! Let's buy this stone and get out of here..."

When the stone was placed on the table everyone held their breaths for a moment. Intense greed could be seen in the eyes of the elders.

< It does seem as if this stone is worth more than just a couple dozen gold coins… >

The left elder was the first one to return to his normal façade. With a serious tone he asserted:

"We can give you 30 gold for it. Take it or leave it!"

Village Chief Su had seen the faces of the three before and understood clearly that this probably wasn't the best trade he could do for the stone but after a short consideration of his circumstances he agreed to the trade. Those people probably controlled the merchant caravans going through the village. If they weren't pleased with the trade they could easily cut away the whole supply from the them and maybe even do more evil things.

The rest of the trade went through without any hiccups but still after everything was done darkness was already setting in.

With common curtesy Chief Su invited them to dinner and stay the night so they could proceed on their travel well rested.

The left elder thought for a moment about that proposal and after a short dialogue with his young master they decided to receive the invitation. It was indeed safer and quicker to spend the night in the village instead of setting up camp a couple of li outside.

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In recent times it was rather normal for Tang He to eat and sleep in the house of the village chief on days where he worked with him. It was just more efficient that way and so this evening the dinner table was more filled than usual.

Elder Su Xuefeng, his daughter Su Liling and Tang He were already sitting at the table when the two elders and young master Yang entered the room. Even though they were considerably late they didn't apologize and instead showed unhappy expressions to find them already sitting. Had they started eating already, who knows what they would have done, Frank surmised.

Without many words everyone started eating and because nobody spoke a rather awkward atmosphere soon established itself in the room. Even Su Liling who normally would start talking to Tang He about his most recent adventures in the forest was quiet today. Eerily so.

When Frank and Tang He tried to find out why she was behaving so timidly they found out that young master Yang had been staring at her for a long time while they were eating.

And his eyes didn't show any normal curiosity any boy could have, no his eyes showed something different:

They looked as if they wanted to possess the thing in front of them.