Cí knew that if he backed down, he’d get this sort of treatment for the rest of his time at the academy. He walked over to Gray Fox’s table and, before the students could do what the other tables had done, planted a foot in the empty place. The students on either side shot him ferocious looks, but he squeezed in between them and took the seat. As soon as he did, Gray Fox spoke up.
“You aren’t welcome at this table.”
Cí ignored him. He took some soup and began sipping at the bowl.
“Didn’t you hear?” said Gray Fox, more loudly now.
“Oh, I heard,” said Cí.
“The fact that you don’t know who your father is,” said Gray Fox, “must mean you don’t know who mine is, either.”
Cí put the bowl down, placed his hands on the table and stood up slowly.
“Now you listen to me,” he said in a quiet voice. He had the whole table’s attention. “If you value your tongue, my advice is that you prevent it from ever daring to mention my father again. If you do, you’ll be speaking to the world in sign language from that point on.” Then he sat down and carried on eating as if nothing had happened.
Gray Fox’s face lit up with rage. Without a word, he got up from the table and fled the dining room.
Cí congratulated himself. His opponent had only made a fool of himself in front of everyone. He knew it wouldn’t be their only encounter, but it had been no simple thing to overcome him in public.
By nightfall the tension had increased. The room they were supposed to be sharing was a small cubicle divided by a paper panel. The only privacy to be had was in the small amount of space where the lantern light didn’t fall. There was barely room for the two beds, let alone the two small tables and two wardrobes, their personal possessions, and books. Gray Fox’s side was overflowing with silk robes and a splendid collection of beautifully bound books. Cí’s just had cobwebs. He brushed these aside and placed his father’s book on his shelf. Then he knelt down and, under Gray Fox’s disdainful gaze, prayed for his family. Gray Fox began changing into his night-clothes, and Cí did the same. Though it was hopeless in such a small space, he tried to hide his scars.
They both got into their beds without a word. Cí listened to Gray Fox’s breathing and couldn’t sleep. His head was buzzing—with thoughts of his family and this opportunity, which Gray Fox seemed determined to ruin. How could he quench this animosity between them? Maybe the best thing was to ask Ming’s advice. With this decision, his thoughts calmed and he began to drift off, but then he heard a hiss from his roommate.
“Hey, freak! So this is your secret, eh? You might be clever, but you’re also revolting like a cockroach.” He laughed. “It’s hardly surprising you read bodies, when your own looks like a rotten corpse!”
Cí didn’t answer. He gritted his teeth and tried not to pay attention to the rage bubbling in his stomach. He wrapped himself in his blanket and cursed his disgusting scars and the condition that meant he never felt pain. Gray Fox was right—he was an aberration.
But just before finally dropping off to sleep, he suddenly had the thought that perhaps his burns might present some way of reconciling with Gray Fox. And with that hopeful idea, he was asleep.
Every day, Cí got up earlier than anyone else and stayed up later, going over the day’s lessons long after he finished work at the library. He spent his few moments of free time rereading his father’s copy of the penal code, trying to commit to memory the criminal chapters in particular.
Whenever he could, he accompanied Ming on his hospital visits. There were always many herbalists, acupuncturists, and moxibustion practitioners, but very few surgeons, in spite of the obvious need for them. Confucianism prohibited interventions inside patients’ bodies, and so surgery was permitted only in the most serious cases: open fractures, deep wounds, and amputations. Unlike his colleagues, Ming showed a rare interest in advanced medicine, and he complained bitterly about the closure of the Faculty of Medicine.
“They opened it twenty years ago only to shut it now,” said Ming. “The traditionalists among the deans argue that surgery is somehow backward looking.” He snorted. “They expect our judges to solve crimes using their knowledge of literature and poetry.”
Cí agreed with Ming. He had attended classes at the Faculty of Medicine when he was working with Feng, and it was one of the things he missed most. But he had also been one of few who appreciated it. Most students preferred focusing on the Confucian canons, calligraphy, and poetics—these were what they’d need for the official exams, after all. And a lot of judicial work was paperwork. If you ever had to deal with a murder, most of the time you’d just call a slaughterman to clean the body and give his opinion.
But any change was a good change, considering Cí’s life recently, and he felt in his element among the students, debating philosophy, examining wooden anatomical models, taking part in impassioned judicial discussions.
His peers were surprised to find that Cí’s knowledge was by no means limited to wounds and corpses; he knew the sprawling penal code very well, and bureaucratic procedure and interrogation methods, too. Ming had put him in an advanced group of students who would have the chance to enter directly into the judiciary at the end of that academic year.
And as Ming’s confidence in Cí grew, so did Gray Fox’s envy—as demonstrated when Ming told them they’d be taking the November exam, and that they would be working as a team in mock trial at the prefecture headquarters. One of them would serve as principal judge, the other in an advisory capacity.
“You have to come up with a shared verdict,” said Ming. “If you work together, you’ll have a chance. But if you squabble, I can promise you the other teams will take advantage. Understood?”
Both Cí and Gray Fox kept their eyes lowered. Eventually they said yes.
“Good! Oh, and one other thing: the winners of this test will be in competition for the one Imperial official job with fixed tenure that we are allowed every year. Your dream job, both of you! So you’d better be well prepared.”
Gray Fox wanted to play principal judge, and Cí didn’t actually mind. What worried him, though, was that he didn’t think Gray Fox was ready. Ming accepted Gray Fox’s proposal of roles not because he made a particularly convincing case for being ahead of Cí, but simply because he had been at the academy longer.
Cí knew this was too much of an opportunity to let their animosity spoil it. He was also willing to admit that Gray Fox had a better knowledge of certain legal and literary subjects, and that they’d probably need these to stand a chance of winning. After dinner that evening, students were breaking off in pairs to get in some last-minute study time, and Cí suggested he and Gray Fox do the same.
“Tomorrow’s a big day. Maybe we could go over some cases together.”
“What makes you think I’d want to study with you? We’re only together because Ming ordered us to be; I don’t need your help. You do your job, I’ll do mine, and that’ll be the end of it.”
Cí didn’t follow him to their dormitory, but stayed up late going over his notes, and in particular the subjects Ming had suggested they concentrate on.
But there was something else worrying Cí. Going to the prefecture headquarters raised the specter of Kao once more. For all Cí knew, if the sheriff had put a ransom on his head, he might well have distributed descriptions of him, too.
Still, it was the most amazing opportunity.