The caravan was a serpent of wood and canvas, a hundred wagons long, coiled at the crossroads. In the predawn gloom, it began to uncoil, the snap of whips and the lowing of oxen cutting through the chill air. From their hidden perch on a rocky bluff, Li and Mei watched it slither onto the eastern road, a supply line pumping directly into the heart of the Dragon Master's domain.
For three days, they shadowed it. They became ghosts in its dusty wake, moving parallel to the road but never on it, using the scrubland's sparse cover. Mei's skills were their greatest asset. She could read the caravan's rhythm—when it would stop to water the oxen, when the guards would change shifts, which scouts rode ahead and how far. She learned that the wagons carried not just grain and salted meat, but ingots of iron and copper, barrels of lamp oil, and great, rough-cut timbers. The scale of the Dragon Master's project was staggering.
Li, meanwhile, wrestled with the new environment. The jade was restless here. The land was tired, over-farmed, its energy thin and scattered compared to the deep, vibrant pulse of the mountains. He felt disconnected, adrift. The constant, grinding noise of the caravan was a psychic assault, a wall of mundane thought and fatigue that made it hard to find his center.
On the fourth evening, as the caravan made camp for the night in a wide, defensible basin, Mei returned from a closer scouting trip with a new intensity in her eyes.
"I found our way in," she whispered, pulling Li deeper into the scrub. "There's a wagon at the rear. It's different. The canvas is heavier, and it's guarded by two men, not one. They don't rotate with the others. And they look… sharper."
"What's in it?" Li asked.
"I don't know. But I heard one of the guards complain about the 'precious cargo' and having to baby it over every bump." She looked at the distant circle of firelight. "It's important. And important things go to important people."
The plan that formed was reckless, but it was the only one they had. They would infiltrate the camp and see what was in that wagon. It was a risk of unimaginable scale, a dive into the belly of the beast.
They waited until the moon was high and the camp had settled into the deep sleep of the exhausted. The only sounds were the crackle of dying fires, the snorting of the oxen, and the occasional murmur from the night watch.
Using Mei's knowledge of the guard patterns, they slipped into the camp. They moved like smoke between the tall, silent wagons, their feet making no sound in the thick dust. The air was thick with the smells of animals, men, and cooking. Li's every instinct screamed at him to flee, but the jade's low, insistent thrum pushed him forward. It could feel something.
They reached the rear of the convoy. The special wagon was there, just as Mei had described. The two guards were alert, one pacing, the other leaning against a wheel, his eyes scanning the darkness.
Li closed his eyes. He couldn't cause an earthquake here. He couldn't shift the earth. But he could work with what was available. He reached out with his senses, past the noise of the camp, and found the earth beneath the dust. It was packed hard by countless wheels, but it was still earth. He focused on a single, small stone near the pacing guard's foot.
It was a test of his control, finer than anything Lao had ever demanded. He poured a thread of intent from the jade, a whisper so quiet it was barely there.
The stone twitched. Then it rolled, just an inch, coming to rest directly under the guard's next step.
The man's foot came down on the stone. His ankle turned with a sickening pop. He cried out, stumbling and crashing to the ground, clutching his leg in agony.
The other guard spun around, his weapon raised. "What is it? What happened?"
"My ankle! I think it's broken!"
As the second guard bent to examine his comrade, Mei was already moving. She darted from the shadows, a blur in the night, and slipped under the heavy canvas at the back of the wagon. Li followed, his heart in his throat.
The inside of the wagon was dark and smelled of dry wood and straw. Moonlight filtered through the canvas, illuminating their prize.
It was not weapons or treasure.
Stacked in neat, padded crates were artifacts. Pieces of carved stone, fragments of pottery covered in faded paint, and several rolled-up scrolls of ancient-looking vellum. But what drew Li's eye, what made the jade flare with such sudden, hot intensity that he gasped, was the object resting on a bed of purple silk in an open crate.
It was a statue, about the size of a human head, carved from a single piece of milky white quartz. It was a dragon, but its form was blocky, earth-bound, its wings mere stubs, its body thick and powerful. It was the spitting image of the Earth-Dragon from his dreams.
And nestled in the carving where the dragon's heart would be, was a perfect, cup-shaped indentation. An indentation exactly the size and shape of the jade sphere Li carried.
Mei saw it too. Her eyes widened in understanding. "It's a key," she breathed. "Or a lock. For the altar they're building."
Li reached out, his hand trembling, not to touch the statue, but to feel the space around it. The air hummed with a familiar, ancient energy. This was a focus, an amplifier. With this and the Heart, the Dragon Master wouldn't just be trying to wake the dragon. He would be commanding it.
A shout from outside the wagon froze them in place.
"—check the cargo! Now!"
The injured guard was still moaning, but the other one was now suspicious. His footsteps approached the back of the wagon.
They were trapped.
Li's mind raced. They couldn't fight their way out. There were hundreds of soldiers just beyond the canvas. He looked at Mei, her face pale in the dim light. Then he looked at the statue.
An idea, desperate and insane, sparked.
He grabbed the quartz dragon. It was heavier than it looked, cold and inert in his hands. He focused on it, pouring his will, his fear, his connection to the jade into the stone. He wasn't trying to wake it. He was trying to do the opposite.
Sleep, he commanded it, pushing the thought through the jade, into the quartz. Be stone. Be empty. Be nothing.
The jade flared, its green light momentarily illuminating the entire wagon. The quartz statue seemed to drink the light, the milky white clouding for a moment, becoming dull, lifeless. The hum of energy around it faded to a faint whisper.
The canvas at the back of the wagon was flung open. The guard stood there, his sword drawn, his eyes wild.
He saw two ragged stowaways huddled in the straw. He saw the open crate. His eyes fell on the quartz dragon in Li's hands.
"Thieves!" he roared. "Sound the alarm!"
It was too late for stealth. Li met Mei's eyes. She gave a sharp nod.
As the guard turned to shout, Li threw the now-dormant statue. It wasn't an attack; it was a distraction. It struck the guard square in the chest, not with enough force to hurt him badly, but enough to make him stagger back with a grunt of surprise.
In that single moment of confusion, Li and Mei burst from the wagon. They didn't run for the perimeter. That's what the guards would expect. They ran deeper into the camp, ducking between wagons, vanishing into the labyrinth of shadows and sleeping men as the first cries of alarm began to ripple through the night.
They had learned the Dragon Master's next move. And they had, for now, robbed his key of its power. But they were now hunted, deep inside the enemy's world, with the entire caravan between them and freedom.