Solstice Souls Book 2: Black Fire, White Flame

Back To The Beginning

Lan Zhan's POV

The man's laughter, eery and wild, echoed in the cavernous Great Hall in the silence that followed.

"What. Did. You. Call. Him?" Lan Zhan bit out, enunciating every word.

A chill spread out from the pit of his stomach all through his body, at the stranger singling Wei Ying out from everyone else.

Lan Zhan shook the man again like a ragdoll, irritated with him, and the fact that he wouldn't stop staring at his Wei Ying.

"Who's looking for me?" Wei Ying asked.

Lan Zhan could hear the fear in his voice; all he wanted was to go to his Wei Ying...but this vermin was still alive...and Lan Zhan knew the value of interrogation. He caught XiChen's eye, who nodded in return.

The man just laughed again, cold and creepily.

XiChen placed a silencing spell on the young man, still captive by Lan Zhan and bound his hands with a spiritual rope.

"Xiongzhang, will he be safe?" Lan Zhan asked. This was imperative.

This man was their link to knowing more, finding out how their Clan had been infiltrated, how the guards had been killed, and those were important questions but they lay with whatever had already passed. Much more time sensitive was the questions relating to the future, and more specifically, their future.

And there was someone else they knew, who had more answers than they previously thought. Baoshan Sanren, was someone who should be asked to explain for clarity as soon as possible.

But the more Lan Zhan thought about this, the worry in the back of his head was worsening until a headache formed:

What if the man they held in custody was not the only one? What if more traitors...if they could even be called that, surfaced? Was there a way to tell? And did it end with just the Lan Clan? What if whoever was pulling the strings had had the audacity and sheer genius to pierce every single clan in the cultivation world? Just how far did the rot go?

But they needed a base to start from and that base was here.

Surely, their first priority lay in securing Cloud Recesses and to do that, they needed to be sure of the people they placed their trust in.

His thoughts were all over the place, and Lan Zhan knew that lack of sleep and the after effects of their dehydration in the cave was making his thoughts inconsistent...and yet that still left the problem of this prisoner.

"Wei Ying!" This was the one person aside from his brother, who would understand from as few words as possible, what they needed to do.

"What is it, sweetheart?" Wei Ying came up to him then, as guards took over holding their prisoner down.

Wei Ying lifted his hand to hold Lan Zhan's face, and just this small contact eased his mind a little.

Lan Zhan looked upon his beautiful face, sincerity smiling back at him, and he knew without a doubt that in this room, aside from himself, his Xiongzhang, Lan Shen and Wei Ying, there was no one else who could be trusted...not unless they could be tested.

So he bent down and said right into Wei Ying's ear, "Need a talisman...to find out true members."

He could only hope that no one else overheard him.

Immediately the light of understanding dawned on Wei Ying's face, his lovely starlight eyes illuminated by the challenge.

"The dungeons in the mountainside are no longer safe." His Xiongzhang was saying.