The five junior scribes watched Chang-li wide-eyed with amazement as he showed them around the workroom where they would be spending most of their days.

  "We'll start you on the license paperwork," he told them. "Do any of you have experience with that?

  They all shook their heads. It had been too much to hope. Any scribe with cultivation or sect experience was too likely to have compromised loyalty. These had come from the local brotherhoods and been vetted by Min.

  "What were your backgrounds?" he asked with interest. All Min had said was they could read and write, they wanted to learn to cultivate, and they’d sworn oaths not to reveal Morning Mist’s secrets.

  It turned out two of them had worked in warehouses, another as the junior scribe for an important merchant family before the family fell on hard times and had to economize by letting one of their scribes go. One of the others had taught a school for Brotherhood children. The fifth had been fired from his job at the Ministry of Agriculture.

  Chang-li probed at that one for a bit, got him to admit he had been caught drinking on the job, and made a note to have this one watched. He turned back to the schoolteacher.

  "You say you taught Brotherhood children?"

  The scribe nodded. "Yes, the Brotherhood paid for my scribe training, and then, in return, I have spent the last four years educating those young people who show some aptitude for reading and writing."

  "Excellent," Chang-li said, his hands together. "I have an even more important task for you. You're going to teach our cultivators how to read."

  The scribe paled. "Elder Brother, that is, Senior Disciple, I… what?"

  "Most of them are former Brotherhood as well. It should be what you’re used to.” Chang-li frowned, not understand why the man seemed so upset. “What’s the matter?”

  "That's just it, Senior Disciple. It's bad enough teaching children, when they don't like you, all they can do is play pranks. If a cultivator takes offense at being told he's not applying himself enough to his lessons, he could break me. In half."

  “I will guarantee that will not happen," Chang-li assured him. "And, in exchange, you'll be the first of our new scribes here to start getting a few cultivation lessons of your own. I'll ask Brother Stone to make sure you have some time to learn proper cycling patterns every day and that you get to visit the tower the next time we send our juniors in. Just wait until I’m done here and I’ll take you to him.”

  That scribe's face lit up. He bowed very low. "Yes, Senior Disciple."

  "Now," Chang-li said, turning back to the other four, "I'll show you what we need to do. I've got the provisional licenses for each of our cultivators in one of these boxes."

  He gestured to six brimming document boxes, none of which were organized and labeled.

  "Then we have the results of their recent testing here and here," he indicated more boxes. "I have a stack of forms for license upgrade and regularization." The stack was on a table and held at least fifty copies of the form. "Each form has to be filled out in triplicate and reference all of these documents. When they're completed, you'll have to have the cultivator sign each application. Then you'll countersign with your scribe's seal."

  He looked sadly at his own finger where his scribe's ring had once rested. He treasured the Morning Mist Sect ring that he now wore, but sometimes he still missed the weight of his former rank.

  "Once you've got all of that in order, tell me and I'll organize a trip to the appropriate departments to file it all."

  He needed to get that bank loan squared away before they filed anything. Fifty applications for license upgrade and regularization was going to cost a small fortune. "Any questions?"

  They shook their heads.

  "Good. If you have any problems, ask one of the servants to send for me or Min, and we'll sort you out."

  Chang-li stepped out of the room and allowed himself a quick sigh of relief. He would have to spot-check their work sometime later this morning.

  Chang-li turned to the once and future teacher. "I'll take you to Brother Stone," he offered.

  The man looked visibly relieved. "Thank you, Senior Disciple."

  They found Brother Stone working in the training yard with a set of the disciples attempting to reach the Peak of Mental Refinement.

  Brother Stone broke off what he was doing and bowed to Chang-li. Chang-li introduced him to the new scribe. Stone nodded and called over a pair of disciples. "Begin instructing our new brother in the Swirling Mists cycling technique. We will place him on the roster for the next visit to a tower." The juniors swept the clerk away. Chang-li allowed himself a quick sigh of relief. It was good to be able to delegate tasks to others, he had to admit.

  "Anything else, Senior Disciple?" Brother Stone asked politely.

  Chang-li inhaled some of the lux from the condensers and made a note to check on their supplies of lux gems. He was afraid they might be burning through their stocks faster than they'd planned. But the juniors needed to channel, and without access to a tower, they were having to tap their reserves.

  If Noren were elevated to the rank of Prism, would he be permitted to recharge lux gems? After all, if a Prism could break Lumos down into Lux, then he ought to be able to supply for their sect. Maybe it was beneath a Prism's dignity, though.

  "If you don't mind, I'm going to sit in an unobtrusive corner and work on my own cycling," Chang-li told Stone.

  "We are honored by your presence," Brother Stone said before turning back to the disciples.

  Chang-li seated himself as far from the disciples as he could. They kept sneaking glances over their shoulders at him. He only knew a handful of them by name. These were cultivators who had reached the Peak of Bodily Refinement and were seeking to go beyond it at this point. Morning Mist had dozens of those at this point, and he was trying to feel all right with the fact that he didn’t know them all.

  Brother Stone turned back to his students. “Cycle Swirling Mists," he instructed. One or two of the students groaned. Brother Stone fixed a cold gaze on them. "You think you are too advanced to pay attention to the foundations of our path? Swirling Mists technique is the signature cycling pattern of the Morning Mists Sect. You will repeat it until you can cycle it in your sleep."

  Chang-li placed one hand on his midsection, the other on the ground. His core pulsed under his fingers. He directed the lux around his body, into his core then back out, separating out green and red, which he had more of, and venting it into the ground beside him. He’d used this technique many times, often less formally than this. It felt good to return to it. Ever since reading through Noren's path manual, he had been trying to understand what deeper meaning Swirling Mists held. If Noren's manual was not the sham it seemed, then Swirling Mists was incredibly important.

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  Chang-li felt guilty for even suspecting that his master might have given him a less than honest path manual. But it would fit, wouldn't it? A forged manual written for a sect full of frauds, by a grandmaster working under a false name.

  Chang-li felt something resonate between his Intent and the cycling pattern. He focused inward, trying to understand. Something about his thought patterns had connected the two. What was it? How could Morning Mist's nature as a fraud, an association of forgers, liars and cheats, have anything to do with his Intent?

  “I master” was a broad concept, one Chang-li was still trying to come to terms with. But it had nothing to do with lies and deceit, or did it?

  He focused his attention on his core, feeling the pulsing ball of lux just beyond his navel.

  "Brother Stone," one of the acolytes was saying, "Swirling Mists feels wasteful. Why should we be letting lux escape from us on purpose when we have so little of it. Shouldn't we use a cycling pattern that allows us to adapt to the lux we do have?”

  Chang-li thought of the Cyclone technique that Lux Shade Su Nian had told him to practice. That pattern worked more like the disciple had suggested. He wasn’t particularly enthralled by it himself.

  In truth, he was spoiled. Most of his time as a cultivator had been spent in a lux-rich environment, one where it was better to purge himself of any imbalance in lux rather than try to adapt himself to it.

  Brother Stone was speaking to the curious student. "You are only two steps along the path, and already you question?"

  Abashed, the acolyte bowed his head. "Forgive my impertinence, Elder Brother."

  It wasn’t impertinence, though. The acolyte’s question echoed Chang-li’s own. This was exactly what his Intent meant. He didn't take anything for granted, but instead questioned until he understood and owned a technique or piece of knowledge.

  If Swirling Mists was the central cycling pattern of the path Noren wanted them to follow, why? Had Noren grown used to having all the lux at his disposal he could possibly need? Chang-li suspected the Grandmaster had been cracking Lumos, with or without permission, for a very long time.

  The sect headquarters had a Lux well, meaning nearly unlimited lux, at least in the lower concentrations. It took refining and special lux crystals to give it the density needed for higher ranks of cultivation. If they had been at the Morning Mist headquarters, none of these acolyes would been concerned with wasting lux.

  Perhaps it was an oversight on Noren's part. He had forgotten that their lux supplies were so poor. Maybe Chang-li should intervene and instruct them in a different cycling pattern.

  That didn't feel right. He needed to assume that Noren knew what he was doing, even if he hadn't confided it in Chang-li.

  Again, he felt that stirring in his lux patterns as something shifted. The rhythms became even more natural, his breath syncing up with the cycling without him hardly having to be aware of it.

  He stretched out lightly with his Intent and felt the students. Each of them was cycling Swirling Mists, but interestingly, the lux they were venting wasn't all the same. This student had too much red. That one was attempting to push green out of her body. It was hard to tell, even with Chang-li's Lux Endowment-enhanced senses. Their cycling was all out of place. When he focused, it was like hearing a whole series of discordant notes.

  His Intent flared as a possibility emerged. Chang-li stood up.

  Brother Stone stopped in the middle of instructing one of the disciples. Now he jerked upright, leaving one hand on the student's shoulder. “Is something wrong, Senior Disciple?"

  "No," Chang-li said. "Your instruction has been excellent, Brother Stone. I merely wanted a chance to address the students myself."

  Brother Stone stepped back. He made a quick upward motion with his hand. The students all stood, faced Chang-li, and bowed low. "Thank you for your instruction, Senior Disciple," they chorused, before straightening up.

  Chang-li felt dozens of pairs of eyes on him. For a moment he quailed. Then he reminded himself he was the senior disciple of Morning Mist. If he didn't take time to instruct these students, who would?

  "A breathing exercise," he announced. "No cycling. Keep your lux in your core nice and tight while we work on this exercise."

  He guided them through a simple rhythm: breathe in through one nostril, hold breath three counts, breathe out through the other nostril routine, until they were breathing in unison.

  "Now," he told them, "let your lux flow from your core. Don't worry about the colors just yet. Keep up that breathing pattern and cycle it around your channels like you were doing Swirling Mists, but don't let any out of your body just yet."

  He observed, correcting where necessary, until most of them were in rhythm. "All right. Now you may allow the excess to drain from your bodies."

  The disciples cycled Swirling Mists, and this time they were in unison. Chang-li listened to the notes, which melded together to form a chime like a bell. The courtyard began to fill with exhaled lux. It dissipated quickly. The lux batteries couldn't collect such thin stuff. Chang-li sampled what he could, and was surprised how evenly balanced it felt. There was almost none of the spiritual luxes, but plenty of the three physical fluxes and green.

  Brother Stone was studying Chang-li. Suddenly self-conscious, Chang-li stepped away. "I think you've got the hang of that," he said, before giving Stone a polite nod. "Thank you for allowing me to instruct your students, Brother Stone."

  He quickly excused himself from the courtyard, heading for the senior cycling room while still half distracted.

  This was important. He was sure of it. Swirling Mists was more than just a basic cycling pattern. It took advantage of the differences between one sect member and the next. He couldn't see how it would work in practice. None of these students had enough Intent to pull in the lux that others were giving off.

  Chang-li hadn't even known it was possible until he was nearly at the Peak of Mental Refinement himself. Even then, it had taken all of his focus to wrest control of ambient lux away from another cultivator. That was because the act of cycling through a cultivator's body imprinted the lux with trace amounts of that cultivator's will and Intent. Unless you were consciously opposing that influence, it wasn't possible to wrest control of that lux.

  To his surprise, as he stepped into the room, leaving his shoes in the hall outside, Noren was sitting in the corner, seemingly lost in meditation. The Grandmaster cracked an eye and nodded to him. "Good afternoon. I'm pleased to see you were on time for our lesson."

  Chang-li started. "What lesson?"

  "The one that began when you opened the door. Come inside."

  Chang-li obeyed. He took up a cross-legged position across from Noren and waited. After a long moment Noren spoke again. "Your core is more quiet than it was a day ago."

  "I've lost some lux. I'll need to visit a tower again."

  "It is not a matter of lux. You yourself are calmer."

  "Delegating was a good idea," Chang-li admitted. He remembered suddenly that he did still have other responsibilities. "Oh, I have to prepare for our meeting with the bank."

  "You have some time yet," Noren said quietly. "I have let your lady wife know where to come looking for you when she's ready to go. Right now, you need to focus on your own cultivation."

  He was getting tired of hearing that, especially when Noren was one of those responsible for loading him with too many tasks.

  "I'm working on it," he said stiffly.

  "Tell me what you've learned,” Noren invited.

  "Swirling Mists is valuable in a lux-rich environment, but I suspect there may be other benefits to it," Chang-li said, before, at Noren's encouraging nod, explaining his thoughts.

  Noren steepled his fingers together. "No technique I teach you will ever be only useful in one circumstance," he said quietly. "This is also part of the path of Morning Mist."

  Chang-li might have accused him of saying purposefully obtuse things in order to look wise, but he was starting to think he understood what Noren was getting at.

  Noren exhaled. Lux flowed from him, largely blue with hints of green, weaving together without him seeming to influence the threads. The room around them transformed.

  Chang-li and Noren were sitting on a stone ledge high up on the side of a mountain, looking down into a forested valley covered in mist. Chang-li could see nothing through the gold and white swirling below.

  "If we had time to do this the proper way, I would have you sitting on this ledge every morning until its meaning got through your thick skull," Noren said softly.

  Chang-li refused to take the bait. "Where are we?" He stretched out his senses, but felt only the edges of the room, invisible through Noren's illusion. "Is this the valley where Morning Mist headquarters is?" he ventured. It was the only thing that really made sense.

  Noren nodded.

  "Watch," he said, as the light increased, and a moment later, atop the ridgeline across from them, the sun appeared.

  The light crept downward, revealing the heavily-forested slopes of the mountain valley. As the sun’s rays touched the mist, it parted, dissipating into vapor. Below, the Morning Mist headquarters lay tranquil. Chang-li found himself holding his breath as the sunlight marched across the valley, shining off the river and lake, picking out the details of the towers and buildings that made up the ancient sect.

  “Do you see?” Noren asked, so quietly Chang-li almost didn’t catch it.

  He didn’t, and yet — something nudged at his awareness. “Almost.”

  Noren sighed, and the vision dissipated. “Almost,” he agreed. “Well. Keep at it. I hear your lovely wife coming now. Perhaps your meeting with the bankers will be more fruitful.”