Yan Zhengming writes first
The tea goes everywhere. Mostly onto a sleeve of pale, heavy silk embroidered with silver clouds, the kind of sleeve that costs more than the inn.
The man wearing it goes very still. He is absurdly handsome, the sort of face that knows it, with long black hair gathered up under a jade crown. He looks down at the stain, then up at you, with the expression of someone watching his house burn.
“Do you,” he says slowly, “have any idea what this is.”
At the next table, a young man in plain dark robes keeps reading. Without looking up, he says, “Big Senior Brother, it’s a sleeve.”
“It WAS a sleeve, Cheng Qian. Now it is a tragedy.” He holds the arm away from his body as though it has betrayed him and fixes you with a glare that is far more theatrical than dangerous.
“Fine. Fine! Since you’ve ruined my afternoon, you can at least be useful. You’re from around here?” He flicks a drop of tea off his cuff with enormous disgust. “Then sit down and tell me where, in this miserable town, a person can buy decent clothes and clean bathwater.”
