Headman Luo seized the opening.
"Your Regent gives you rope," he said. "He doesn't tell you where to tie it. You can hang us all, Captain. But then who farms this strip? Who pays your next supply? And when word of that reaches other halls, how many will tear down their tiles and pretend they never knew us? How much law will you have left to stand on?"
The captain's nostrils flared.
"You dare lecture me on law?" he snapped.
Luo swallowed his fear.
"We obeyed the law when it arrived on clay," he said. "We obey your taxes. We ride when your conscription drums sound. Now another law has arrived, on wood and stone. If your Regent orders you to break that second law, at least be honest which master you serve when you raise your hand. That's all we ask. Under witness."
He spread his arms wide, palms open.
The soldiers watched their captain.
Inside the tavern, Sun Wei's story about Du Yan's broken tablet and punished patrolmen had made a long, quiet journey. It sat on the backs of tongues now, waiting.
The captain's fingers flexed on the whip. He could taste two paths. One led to a quick demonstration and a report full of names. The other led to something much less satisfying: symbols punished, reports massaged, unease blooming.
He thought of Ash Hall. Of regent's decrees that changed like weather. Of captains punished not for cruelty but for failing to keep things tidy.
Slowly, he rolled the whip up.
"Fine," he said. "You want law? Here."
He turned, yanked the decree from the scar-chinned soldier, and marched toward the sparrow tile.
The crowd tensed.
He stabbed the decree's nail into the wooden beam under the tile, hard enough to make it creak.
"Read this," he said. "When my men come for your grain, when the Regent comes for your sons, remember which law has swords behind it. Keep your sparrow if you like. But if I find bandits hiding under it, I will not be cutting wood."
Headman Luo bowed again.
"We'll remember," he said.
The captain mounted up.
On impulse, perhaps thinking of stories, perhaps thinking of reports, he added:
"And if anyone here bets they can find a better master than the Regent, I hope their Road City stands between them and the wolves when that master wants his due."
He spurred his horse. The troops followed, boots leaving prints that would melt by noon.
When the dust settled, the villagers exhaled as if they'd all been struck at once.
The tavern woman reached up and patted the sparrow.
"He moved the arrow," she said. "Didn't shoot it. But he nailed his threat right next to ours."
Luo let himself shake now, a little.
"We send word," he said. "They need to know which nails hold what."
A boy ran for the pigeon loft.
In Yong'an, the pigeon arrived with ice on its wings.
Ren warmed the tiny body in his hands while he untied the silk. Ziyan read as soon as the ink lay flat.
"Green Dike," she said. "Captain from Qi. Threats. No blood, yet. He nailed the decree under the tile."
Wei frowned. "That's not the worst outcome," he said. "They're still standing."
"That's the dangerous part," Feiyan said. "No corpse to mourn. Only fear, and a paper with sharper teeth than any whip."
Han leaned over Ziyan's shoulder, reading.
"That captain is clever enough not to be clumsy," he said. "He obeys enough to write a clean report. He threatens enough to satisfy his own temper. But he has also made it easier for the next man to come and claim he warned them first."
Shuye chewed the brush-stem. "Green Dike needs to know they counted well," he said. "That what they did—demanding to read, making his men show the words—makes cracks in other halls too."
"And we need to make that captain's choice echo," Ziyan said. "If he can be pushed into punishing wood or paper instead of flesh, perhaps others can. Or at least, perhaps other villagers will know their questions have weight."