Morning registry duty felt like stepping into a cage that was already crowded.
Wuchen arrived at the registry hall before the first bell, blank forms in his arms, ink pouch tied shut, collar trim neat. He kept his face dull and his breath stacked, holding three grains low in his belly like a secret he couldn't afford to spend.
Han's clerk was already there, awake in the way tired men were awake: eyes sharp, mouth sour, hands moving even when the mind wanted to stop.
He didn't greet Wuchen. He only glanced at the bundle and said, "Set it."
Wuchen set it down and bowed.
The clerk's gaze flicked to Wuchen's hands. "Still shaking?" he muttered.
Wuchen let an ugly leak warm his fingertips just a little, enough to keep the story consistent. "This one leaks," he said quietly.
The clerk snorted. "Leak somewhere else," he said, but he stamped the receipt strip anyway and tossed it at Wuchen as if feeding a dog.
Wuchen caught it and tucked it into his sleeve.
As he turned to leave, he felt eyes on his back.
Not just the clerk's.
Two inner disciples stood near the doorway pretending to wait for something. Their robes were clean, their posture idle, their gaze too focused.
Lan's people.
Or Han's.
Or both.
Wuchen walked out without changing pace.
He took the corridor route that Han's platform overlooked, because that was the point. Han wanted to see his new leash move. He wanted others to see it too.
Halfway down the walkway, a shadow joined his reflection in the lantern glass.
Wei.
Wei didn't walk beside him. He walked a few paces behind, pretending coincidence.
That meant Gu Yan had decided not to fight Han's new claim openly.
Not yet.
In Gu Yan's pavilion later, Gu Yan listened to Wuchen's report and smiled faintly.
"Han put you on a deacon route," Gu Yan murmured. "Good."
Wuchen's stomach tightened. "Good?"
Gu Yan's eyes were bright. "A leash can also be a corridor key," he said softly. "Han just gave you permission to be seen every morning. That visibility is dangerous, but it's also access."
Wei spoke quietly. "Access to clerks. Access to stamps. Access to rumors."
Gu Yan nodded. "Exactly."
He leaned forward. "Now you do what you always do," Gu Yan said gently. "You make people comfortable enough to show hands."
Wuchen swallowed. "How?"
Gu Yan slid a small folded paper across the table. It wasn't sealed. It was written in the bored, neat hand of a clerk.
A registry correction request.
Not for Mu Tao this time.
For a Ridge Patrol pass number.
Wuchen's throat went dry.
Gu Yan smiled faintly. "Han's clerk will see this," he murmured. "He will stamp it, file it, and complain about it."
Wuchen kept his gaze down. "And someone will hear."
Gu Yan's eyes brightened. "Lan's lungs will hear," he said. "And Captain Zuo's shadow will hear. And Han's own dogs will hear."
Wei added, "And they'll start stepping on each other's toes."
Gu Yan nodded once. "That's the point."
Wuchen bowed. "So I carry it tomorrow morning."
Gu Yan smiled. "Yes," he said softly. "And you leak ugly while you do it."
Wuchen's throat tightened.
He was being turned into a moving rumor printer, walking the brightest corridor every day with just enough weakness painted on his hands to make people underestimate him.
He left the pavilion feeling the three grains steady in his belly and the new duty heavy on his shoulders.
Deacon route.
It wasn't punishment.
It was a stage.
And stages were where knives looked like smiles until the moment they entered your ribs.