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When Qiao Yifan was younger, his master's drafty, dark chamber had frightened him no less than the grim, unsmiling man had. The fear faded with age, but being summoned to his master's chamber was never a good sign, and now was no exception.
“Qiao Yifan, this is your last chance. If you fail to eliminate your target again, don’t bother returning to the assassins’ brotherhood,” thunders Qiao Yifan’s master from above, punctuating the threat with an open-handed slap against the arm of his chair.
Kneeling below, forehead against the floor, Qiao Yifan doesn’t jump. If nothing else could be said in his favor, it was that Qiao Yifan trained diligently and obeyed well. His master disliked any twitches or flinches, what he described as “evidence of a weak nature,” so Qiao Yifan long ago broke himself of those habits. He could stay perfectly still while watching a target for hours at a time, completely unseen and undetected. It was just a pity that Qiao Yifan’s actual talent for killing was poor. His knifework was clumsy, his killing intent nonexistent, and he lacked any stomach for the sight of gore. In short, Qiao Yifan had no skill as an assassin.
The chair creaks as his master sits back. “Such a pity. In any room, you’re the most forgettable existence. Better assassins would kill for such a natural gift. It is wasted on you. Clumsy boy. You had better hope your knives find their mark this time.”
Qiao Yifan does not reply. He is not expected to speak, or contribute anything of substance when his master finds himself in such a foul mood. His master fumes a little longer, then Qiao Yifan is expelled from his master's chamber with a new dossier and a new target.
In the dimly-lit hidden warren of the Assassin Brotherhood, Qiao Yifan finds a tiny nook to squeeze himself into and reads the single sheet of parchment. When he’s memorized the contents, he burns the dossier using a candle from a sconce nearby, the pages curling brown in the heat before darkening to black and scattering to ash.
Qiao Yifan’s shoulders slump. He knows his master means for him to fail. His target is no simple villager or merchant: Gao Yingjie is the most talented young witch of his generation, and the prized apprentice of Wang Jiexi, himself the most powerful witch alive. Qiao Yifan, hardly able to scrape a pass in his lessons, cannot dream of completing such a difficult and well-guarded kill. Still, Qiao Yifan will diligently try his best. The Assassin Brotherhood took him in and trained him. As disappointing as Qiao Yifan’s skills are, he owes it to his teachers to keep trying.
He goes to pack up everything he owns–very little besides his clothing and knives–and begins the journey to the imperial capital, home of the witch Wang Jiexi and the students he teaches there.
Wang Jiexi’s workshop stands at the northernmost edge of the capital, where rural fields and forests bleed into streets and shops. The sheep graze on rich green grass, and birdsong fills the air as courting pairs build spring nests. It’s a warm, pleasant place to live, far removed from the brotherhood’s damp tunnels and caverns, haunted by the sound of steel clashing and the death cries of the animals their apprentices practiced on.
Qiao Yifan walks the area first, mapping out the roads, alleys, and mud paths around his target’s home. He doesn’t hold much hope for killing Gao Yingjie, but following the habits of a lifetime – seeking out an assassin’s entry and exit routes – settles his spirit. Once he’s satisfied he’s learned this area well, Qiao Yifan finds an inn across the street from the workshop, one with an outdoor area for eating, and purchases a meal that he takes to the tables outside, the better to observe the witch’s workshop.
“Workshop” is too ordinary a word for the witch’s home. Grand enough to be called a mansion, with a peculiar and eclectic style of decoration, not just Wang Jiexi, but his collection of students, subordinate witches and other non-magical workers live and work there too. Qiao Yifan observes the pupils and workers come and go from the house to the outbuildings, greenhouses and fields where the witches’ ingredients are grown, harvested and stored.
When he finishes his meal and returns his dishes, Qiao Yifan finds a ‘Help Wanted’ sign on the counter. Qiao Yifan looks at it thoughtfully. He will need a place to sleep, and a job is a good excuse for staying near his target. This particular innkeeper must have been desperate, because she takes one look at Qiao Yifan and his harmless, mild appearance, and hires him on the spot.
Qiao Yifan finds life at Happy Inn quite comfortable. The other innworkers–the barman Wei Chen, the chamber maid Tang Rou, the hostler Baozi, and Ye Xiu, who does whatever odd jobs need doing–don’t dig too deeply into Qiao Yifan’s false background, and the innkeeper Chen Guo doesn’t make life difficult for her workers. Qiao Yifan can easily split his time between working for his keep, and gathering information on his target.
Qiao Yifan’s dossier did not include any drawings of Gao Yingjie, nor any description, but Qiao Yifan knows he’s found who he’s looking for when the next day a half-dozen young witches come to eat lunch at the inn, and among them is one young man that the others circle like bees around a flower. Gao Yingjie is right around Qiao Yifan's age, Qiao Yifan realizes, and he’s so soft. Full-cheeked, with short, wind-fluffed hair. Qiao Yifan wonders if Gao Yingjie’s hair feels smooth like the fur of a rabbit, or coarse like the pelt of a deer; Qiao Yifan has killed both. Gao Yingjie even carries himself the way a shy, nervous animal does–unsure, and unwilling to draw attention.
Qiao Yifan tries to imagine killing Gao Yingjie, and can’t bring himself to eat for the rest of the day.
Qiao Yifan watches Gao Yingjie carefully on the many days afterward on which their paths cross. For all Gao Yingjie’s status as Wang Jiexi’s chosen successor, the young man seems more uncomfortable than happy with the attention his position brings, and he never uses his station to pressure the people around him. Some of the other young witches take pleasure in ordering Qiao Yifan around whenever he waits on them, having the waiter bring pointless drinks or items, deliberately making messes or dropping things on the floor, but Gao Yingjie never does. He tries to stop the other witches from treating the inn workers badly, and speaks kindly to Qiao Yifan when he could easily get away with treating the person serving his meal as poorly as the others. Qiao Yifan has used this disguise before. An inn worker is invisible and inconsequential, hardly worth noticing as a person at all. It means something when a person like that is treated with consideration.
Gao Yingjie is a good person. Gao Yingjie is kind.
Qiao Yifan is here to kill him.
He flinches away from that thought. He isn’t even close to killing Gao Yingjie–not in public, around other witches who could stop him or keep him from escaping. No, the only way Qiao Yifan might succeed is to get Gao Yingjie alone, with his guard down.
Qiao Yifan keeps his ears and eyes open. Many of the other young witches will sneak out at night, but Gao Yingjie isn’t such a person. He stays within the workshop, working on his lessons, and rarely leaves. When too many days pass without seeing his target, Qiao Yifan even dares to skirt the edges of Wang Jiexi’s workshop, testing for weak spots in the spells defending it. He’s never successful. Wang Jiexi and his fellow witches keep their spells in good condition. Qiao Yifan will just need to wait. He’s good at that.
Ye Xiu, Qiao Yifan’s strangest coworker – who might have been some kind of adventurer or mercenary before he worked at the inn? – keeps trying to convince Qiao Yifan to join the self-defense lessons he gives to Tang Rou and Baozi. When Qiao Yifan, unable to decline without being impolite, finally ventures to join them, Ye Xiu presses a wooden sword into Qiao Yifan’s hands and starts teaching the assassin basic sword drills. Qiao Yifan finds, to his surprise, that he enjoys the exercise. He’d never been good at knifework, too cognizant of the intent, but the sword’s weight feels better in his hands.
Qiao Yifan continues to watch Gao Yingjie. He can tell bad days from good by Gao Yingjie’s order: an extra custard tart if the day’s lesson went well, and plain food if it didn’t. Gao Yingjie loses his appetite when he feels he’s disappointed Wang Jiexi. When Gao Yingjie’s gone out to gather ingredients, Qiao Yifan knows from pink-red burn that spreads across the witch’s nose and cheeks, and the weeks the witch spends brewing, Qiao Yifan sees the potion stains on his fingers. On the afternoons when Gao Yingjie looks especially windblown he’s gone flying earlier in the day. Gao Yingjie loves to fly; he’s brightest and most confident on those days.
Gao Yingjie comes to eat at the inn more often these days, and the extra coin makes Chen Guo happy. Qiao Yifan is happy too. He’s reassured when he can see his target in front of him, and sometimes Gao Yingjie even says a few words to Qiao Yifan. Not many words, but Qiao Yifan’s heart thumps a little faster anyway. In the back of Qiao Yifan’s mind lives the fear that somehow Gao Yingjie knows what Qiao Yifan is here to do, a fear that Qiao Yifan can only quiet, not silence.
Qiao Yifan’s chance comes when he overhears that Wang Jiexi’s students will be going out into the woods without him, checking on the workshop’s sources of timber for broomsticks and magical staves. Qiao Yifan tells Chen Guo he will need the afternoon off for personal business, dresses in grey and brown, tucks his knives into their hiding places under his clothes, and climbs a tree overlooking the path into the woods, where the students will certainly pass.
Summer’s heat haze sits oppressively over the fields. With the cicadas in his ears, Qiao Yifan watches the dust puffing underneath the young witches’ feet, closer and closer with each step. They’re unwary, every last one of them; they never look back and find Qiao Yifan shadowing them, their laughter and shouting drowning out the cicadas’ song. Gao Yingjie is the most unwary of all. He’s smiling. Happy.
One by one, the witches split off to survey different groves. Qiao Yifan’s heartbeat thumps harder in his temples, sensing the opportunity is coming that he’d planned for. The last student-witch leaves, and Gao Yingjie is alone. The witch’s nose is already showing traces of a burn, and the sweat on his neck and forehead makes him shine underneath the sunlight. Gao Yingjie continues trudging forward and Qiao Yifan follows. His pulse thunders so hard he can hardly hear the crunch of leaves underneath Gao Yingjie’s feet, or the babble of a creek flowing over smooth grey stones.
Gao Yingjie turns, following the sound of water. Qiao Yifan’s chest squeezes painfully, his assassin’s training nudging him. Killing an animal is easier while they drink. Qiao Yifan’s done so many times.
Like a deer offering itself for the table, Gao Yingjie kneels down on the bank, innocent and unaware of Qiao Yifan’s presence at his back.
Qiao Yifan palms the hilt of his dagger, crouched low behind the tall reeds. One quick lunge, and he could do it. He could kill Gao Yingjie.
Qiao Yifan can’t breathe. He feels like his vision is swimming. A terrible silence fills his head. This is a perfect opportunity. No true assassin could pass it up. Gao Yingjie will be dead so fast that he won't even suffer.
Gao Yingjie dips his hands into the water, running his fingers through the current–he’s playing in front of his killer–before cupping his hands and splashing water over his flushed face. The water drips down, matting his hair against his unprotected nape.
Qiao Yifan imagines Gao Yingjie’s neck dripping blood instead, and thinks he might vomit. His chest squeezes. All the times Gao Yingjie had been kind to him, had smiled, had thanked Qiao Yifan, gone in an instant. Gao Yingjie, gone in an instant.
Qiao Yifan imagines Gao Yingjie’s still body, left out in the forest for the scavengers as his blood stained the mud and water scarlet. The dagger slips out of Qiao Yifan’s hand and he covers his mouth to gag.
Gao Yingjie turns his head. Qiao Yifan made too much noise – truly, he was no good as an assassin.
“Hello, is someone there?” Gao Yingjie calls.
Qiao Yifan flees.
As expected, Qiao Yifan is a failure of an assassin. By failing his task, he cannot go back to the brotherhood. So Qiao Yifan, adrift without the profession whose expectations he’d spent his life trying to meet, stays. He pretends he really is a forgettable waiter at an inn, and he continues living his life the way he had before. He eats breakfast with Chen Guo and his fellow innworkers, and spends his days serving customers, and joins Ye Xiu’s self-defense training at night. And Qiao Yifan keeps watching Gao Yinjie, because—
Because it’s comforting, watching the witch alive and unhurt. Because Qiao Yifan likes it. Because he likes Gao Yingjie.
It’s a meaningless habit, Qiao Yifan knows. Gao Yingjie barely knows that Qiao Yifan exists. Gao Yinjie doesn’t need to acknowledge Qiao Yifan back, only continue living safely and happily.
Several weeks pass before Qiao Yifan realizes he’s overlooked something important. He’s serving during the lunch rush at Happy Inn, when he realizes a stranger in the corner is pretending not to watch Gao Yingjie and the other young witches, and Qiao Yifan recognizes that technique.
Qiao Yifan hadn’t killed Gao Yinjie like he was supposed to. With the job left incomplete, another assassin would eventually be sent to finish off the target. Qiao Yifan is looking at that assassin right now.
A burst of anger surprises Qiao Yifan. He doesn’t know who requested Gao Yingjie’s death, but Qiao Yifan isn’t about to let them succeed.
He calmly continues working, keeping an eye on the assassin, who spends the afternoon drinking tea at the tables outside much like Qiao Yifan had once done. The assassin disappears around dinnertime. Qiao Yifan doesn’t panic, because he knows Gao Yingjie’s schedule almost better than Gao Yingjie himself does, and tonight Gao Yinjie will be having dinner with Wang Jiexi before they begin the witch’s weekly astronomy lessons. The assassin won't dare strike while Wang Jiexi is present with his apprentice. That leaves Qiao Yifan plenty of time to solve the problem.
Qiao Yifan doesn’t want Gao Yinjie to worry. It’s better if the problem is taken care of cleanly and quietly. Qiao Yifan finishes his shift, dons his old work clothes, and sets out to find his target.
There are a limited number of inns and hostels near Wang Jiexi’s workshop. Qiao Yifan takes a leisurely evening walk that takes him past each one, pausing to chat with the staff who recognize him as a local. It’s easy enough to find where the assassin’s staying, and even simpler to find a corner to lie low in, waiting until the staff and guests are deep asleep. Qiao Yifan scales the outside of the building, peeking inside windows, and forces one open on the second floor to slip inside. In the morning, the hostel staff will find one of their guests left during the night, and the city guard will find a tied-up assassin delivered neatly to their doorstep.
After that, Qiao Yifan takes precautions. Qiao Yifan’s former master wasn’t overpraising him when he said Qiao Yifan’s skills at remaining unnoticed were Qiao Yifan’s only good point. If Gao Yingjie isn’t safely tucked away inside his teacher’s workshop, Qiao Yifan is shadowing him discreetly, making sure no one else is following Gao Yingjie with harmful intentions.
Somehow, Qiao Yifan’s coworkers have gotten the idea that Qiao Yifan has a crush on Gao Yingjie – Qiao Yifan suspects Wei Chen had something to do with it – and Qiao Yifan suffers through their gentle teasing. They’re not entirely wrong; Gao Yingjie is easy to like, but Qiao Yifan is content with simply watching over Gao Yingjie until whoever’s trying to kill him gives up.
More assassins come – one every couple of weeks or so; the person after Gao Yingije’s life is persistent – and Qiao Yifan foils each attempt. Some of the assassins are quite good. Qiao Yifan has to bury more than one body, but assassins aren’t good people, not like Gao Yingjie, so Qiao Yifan does what’s needed.
Summer drifts into autumn, and Qiao Yifan realizes he’s happier than he’s ever been. Protecting Gao Yingjie in secret, watching his life from afar…Qiao Yifan wouldn’t mind doing this forever. After all, there’s no guarantee that the person after Gao Yingjie’s life will ever give up. What if they stopped now, but someday decided to try and hurt Gao Yingjie again?
Qiao Yifan isn’t under any illusions that he means anything to Gao Yingjie. If he doesn’t expect anything in return, surely it should be fine if he stays, right?
So when Gao Yinjie stays late one afternoon after finishing his lunch and asks Qiao Yifan if he’d join Gao Yingjie and the other young witches at the Mid-Autumn Harvest Festival, Qiao Yifan panics.
“I–I can’t, I’ll be working that day,” Qiao Yifan spits out.
Gao Yingjie’s wind-fluffed head lowers. “Oh. Maybe another time.”
Is Gao Yingjie disappointed? At not being able to go to the Harvest Festival with Qiao Yifan? Qiao Yifan’s heart gives one hard pump. He panics harder. “I won’t be working all day! I’ll be done before the fireworks start. I could…meet you then?”
Gao Yingjie’s head comes up and his eyes clear. “Yes! Ah, I mean, that’s good.” They make arrangements for where to meet up, and Gao Yingjie goes back to his lessons.
Qiao Yifan watches him go, feeling like he’s taken a hard blow to the head.
In the days leading up to the festival, Qiao Yifan receives more light-hearted teasing from his coworkers, who overhead the exchange, but he can’t bring himself to panic properly because the whole idea of Gao Yingjie puncturing the barrier between their separate worlds and inviting Qiao Yifan anywhere doesn’t feel real. Qiao Yifan marvels every time he thinks about it. The most promising witch of his generation wants to celebrate the Harvest Festival with invisible failure Qiao Yifan? It doesn’t feel possible.
Qiao Yifan doesn’t want the festival ruined, so he stays especially cautious in case another assassin comes through. Luck seems to be on his side. He works through the day without anyone suspicious showing up, and goes to meet Gao Yingjie and the other witches as promised.
Gao Yingjie’s eyes light up when he sees Qiao Yifan approaching. “Yifan!” he calls.
Qiao Yifan’s heart leaps into his throat. He stumbles a step, and hurries forward to meet them.
The other student witches treat Qiao Yifan’s presence as something to be largely ignored. Qiao Yifan hardly notices. Gao Yingjie has his fingers tangled in Qiao Yifan’s sleeve, and he’s tugging his former assassin along while they look for the best place to watch the fireworks. Qiao Yifan knows his face is flaming.
He doesn’t remember where they decide to stand, or anything about the fireworks show, only how Gao Yingjie’s face looks lit by the bright blooms of red, blue and gold light next to him.
Afterward, the witches walk back to the workshop. Qiao Yifan tags along since the inn is right across the way. “I’m glad you were able to come,” Gao Yingjie admits, voice too low to be made out by the others. “I’ve wanted to talk with you for a long time.”
“You did?” Qiao Yifan murmurs back, overcome at the very idea of being noticed by the person he’d watched for so long.
Gao Yingjie ducks his head. “Yes. You’re always so thoughtful. You know when I feel like I’ll never meet everyone’s expectations and you encourage me. I wanted to thank you.”
Qiao Yifan doesn’t know what to say. He wasn’t used to being thanked, and especially not by someone he liked and who he’d seriously considered killing. He feels his face heat again and mutters a hasty, “You’re welcome.”
Glancing over at Qiao Yifan, Gao Yingjie smiles. “I want to get to know you better. Would that be alright?”
“Yes,” Qiao Yifan blurts out once he’s recovered from his shock. “And I want to get to know you too!”
Gao Yingjie smiles again, this time private and soft. “I’d like that.”
Qiao Yifan’s breath catches. The world feels new and bright. A lifetime as Gao Yingjie's bodyguard? He can't think of anything more wonderful.