The Moment Between Flying and Falling

Book 1: Chapter 1

A hundred years before

Cui Yanbo was curled up in a corner, her head buried in her knees, the fire raging around her. The heat engulfed her, making her feel like she was sitting in a live furnace, but even though she was very scared, she refused to cry, and instead bit her lip, curling up tighter. Someone had just come... someone scary, who'd seemed to take away something from her and then replaced it with something weird, something that didn't fit, left in a hurry, leaving behind only a clear, tinkling sound and a crying Yanbo, and then the fire had started.

The fire had been raging for perhaps an hour now. But she hadn't been burned yet. All she felt was the smoke in her lungs, choking her, but she refused to cough, to cry, and sat there like a little statue. Faintly, in the distance, she could hear her mother's cries, but Yanbo couldn't get out. There were no windows in the room, and the door was probably the only thing keeping the fire out of the room. The foundation of the house creaked eerily, and Yanbo let out an involuntary shudder.

Suddenly, the door was blasted open with great force, and the heat rolled in in a big wave, hitting Yanbo in the face. She wanted to let out a cry, but in the end, only the quietest of whimpers escaped her lips.

Yanbo risked a glance up, and saw a girl, about five or so years older than her, dressed in a set of white robes and a golden belt with a tassel. A cultivator, she recognized. Her brothers were cultivators. The girl immediately came over and scooped her up, even though she must've been getting heavy, at ten years old, and holding her with one arm, she waved her other arm vaguely, and small baby paper cranes made of some sort of flaming paper emerged from her sleeve and the curtains of the fire parted for them.

"Stuck in a burning house and don't know to cry for help? Your stubbornness will be your downfall someday." The girl muttered under her breath, but Yanbo was staring at the girl, mesmerized by the look of her concentration, and the way the baby paper cranes followed her instructions, circling around them, leading their way out. Yanbo reached her hand out, and the girl rushed to say, "don't touch!", but Yanbo grabbed one anyway, not caring about the flaming paper. Surprisingly, her hand wasn't singed, and the baby crane seemed to settle on the palm of her hand obediently. Yanbo suddenly smiled. She hadn't smiled for a while. She liked those baby cranes. She liked the fifteen-year-old girl who could make the baby paper cranes. She tucked the baby crane tight in her grip and refused to let go of it.

The older girl sighed and didn't fight with Yanbo for it, instead leading her out the front door. As the exited, there was a loud clamor of noise from her mother.

"Yanbo! My daughter, you made me so worried!" Her mother rushed over, and the older girl was slightly surprised, setting Yanbo on the ground. Yanbo clung to the older girl's robes and looked up with big eyes, feeling slightly shy.

Yanbo's mother was busy checking up on Yanbo and making sure she wasn't hurt at all, and so it took her a moment to realize what had happened, and she turned to Jinghe with a huge smile on her face.

"Thank you so much, cultivator. May I ask your name?" Yanbo's mother asked politely.

The older girl dipped her head slightly in respect. "I'm Lin Jinghe, junior cultivator of the Desert Sect. I did only what I was supposed to, there's no need to thank me." Jinghe glanced towards the house, whose flames had been nearly put out. Yanbo turned her head to follow Jinghe's gaze at the same time as an eerie silhouette appeared in the fire, flickered, and then seemed to run away. Jinghe frowned, but said nothing further in front of the mother and her daughter. Her gaze flickered to Yanbo, and then dipped to see the gray outline in the vague shape of a flame on the back of her neck, exposed by the loosening of her collar. What a unique birthmark.