Violetgrass

Bait

Yelan was at the door at the crack of dawn. Chaoxing, who had opened the door, stared at her, still half-asleep. "Would you like some tea?" she asked, her morning voice making her wince.

"You look like you need it more than I do."

"You're right about that," said Baizhu, shoving a cup in Chaoxing's hand as she yawned.

"Thanks," she muttered as she took a sip. "Xifeng and Mingxia are still asleep."

"I expected that. But I really do need to talk to them."

"Don't you have any other information networks you can use?" Baizhu leaned against the doorframe. "I would hate to see you distress my patients."

Chaoxing smiled to herself. Baizhu was overly protective of anyone he was looking after. She liked that about him.

"If I could, I wouldn't be here."

"What the heck is even happening?" asked Chaoxing, now fully awake. "Human trafficking?"

"Correct. You got all that from this?" asked Yelan. Chaoxing nodded. "Interesting. Would you like to join the Ministry of Civil Affairs?"

Chaoxing blinked and Baizhu sighed. "Back to the matter at hand please. Human trafficking isn't something that's happened in Liyue before."

"Not that the public knew of," tutted Yelan.

"I would." Baizhu sounded defensive. "Anyone injured comes to me."

Yelan avoided answering with a smile. "Oh, she's up."

Chaoxing and Baizhu turned, and Baizhu walked over to the half-dead woman who was leaning against the wall for support as she headed over to them. "Xifeng, you shouldn't be up."

"I'm okay." She was definitely not okay. "I need to talk to Miss Yelan."

Baizhu sighed, and Chaoxing placed a hand on his arm. "Why can't people just rest when they need to?"

"Come on, we can watch over their conversation from a respectable distance."

Xifeng and Yelan stepped outside, and Xifeng sat down on the bench. Yelan stood in front of her, nodding as Xifeng spoke. Chaoxing could only see Yelan's expression, and Xifeng had her bandaged back to Chaoxing. Yelan's eyes turned darker and darker as she spoke. Chaoxing did not want to know the contents of their conversation.

Yelan walked over, a glint in her eyes. "I need your help," she said to Chaoxing.

"No," said Baizhu, pulling Chaoxing back.

"What?" Baizhu gave Chaoxing a hard look. "I just want to know what she wants." Chaoxing raised her hands in surrender.

Baizhu shook his head. "There are better people for this. Chaoxing isn't even a trained fighter. She doesn't have a Vision."

"I'd rather keep the situation quiet. You could let her speak for herself."

"She would go just out of a sense of obligation and guilt," scoffed Baizhu. Chaoxing was surprised he knew her that well.

"Do you want to use me as bait or something?" asked Chaoxing.

Yelan's eyes sparkled. "I knew you were smart. You wouldn't be in any danger. I guarantee it."

"Sure."

Baizhu sighed. "I'd rather you didn't."

"Helping isn't a bad thing."

"The lengths you're going to is." Baizhu was trying to keep his voice even, but Chaoxing could hear how agitated he was getting. "You're valuable just being alive. As good as Yelan is, a small variable in the plan could easily get you in trouble. And you can't get yourself out of it."

"But let me help them. We don't need more victims. And besides, as you say, isn't it always best to solve the root cause of a situation?"

Baizhu gave her a long, hard look. They stared at each other for a few more seconds, and then he sighed. "Yelan."

"Decision made?"

"If anything happens to her—"

"Yes yes, you could name all my bones while breaking them," said Yelan, brushing him off. "Nothing will happen to her, I promise."

"What do you need me to do?" asked Chaoxing. Yelan described her plan, and Baizhu was apprehensive, but Chaoxing felt a rush of adrenaline. "When do we start?"

Baizhu sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Tonight."

And that was how Chaoxing ended up walking down a mountain alone in the middle of the night. From what Yelan deduced from speaking to Xifeng, they'd been targeting travellers who travelled between Qingce Village and Liyue Harbor. Chaoxing briefly wondered if any of them had met Lumine, but then quickly dismissed the thought. There wouldn't be any of them alive to tell the tale if they had met her.

She heard rustling nearby and froze. But this was a forested area, she should be more worried if there wasn't any noise... right?

Either way she picked up the pace, and then stopped. She was bait. She shouldn't be hard to catch. While she debated the technicalities of this, someone stepped out from the shadows. A treasure hoarder.

"Do you have anything valuable on you?" he asked, looking her up and down.

"Sometimes, I wish I did."

He blinked. "Even if you did have something on you, I doubt you'd say so."

"So why did you even ask?"

He just shrugged, and from their surroundings, another six people stepped in from the shadows.

"That's a lot of people," said Chaoxing. "Were you expecting me to walk by or something?"

"Not at all. There are more of us stationed up North," offered one with a hat on.

"Idiot! Don't go revealing our secrets to her!"

"What's the point? Aren't we going to kidnap her anyway?"

Chaoxing watched as they started fighting amongst themselves, and then wondered why the Millelith was taking so long. Someone grabbed her arm—the treasure hoarder nearest her. In her moment of panic, she kicked out at him, and he fell to his knees. She ran, and arrows flew behind her.

Thundering footsteps followed her, and then the sounds of fighting rose and faded away. She was glad her allies had finally decided to show up, and knew the treasure hoarders would be outnumbered. Three pairs of footsteps were following her, and Chaoxing stopped abruptly, rocks tumbling off the cliff she almost ran off of. The most annoying part of Liyue's terrain, she thought bitterly as she turned.

The treasure hoarders had caught up, and one of them sneered. "Bad luck, sweetheart."

Giving him a disgusted look, she took a step back, mindful of the edge. She imagined tumbling over, and then was surprised at what she found. She didn't want to die. Not like this. Not now, when there was finally some warmth in her life.

Someone slammed into one of the treasure hoarders, and he crashed into Chaoxing, who went over the end of the cliff, her eyes wide. Panic filled her, and then everything stopped, as though she'd been frozen in midair. When she opened her eyes again, she stared into the face of a masked man, shadows swirling around him.

"Xiao."

"You should've called." His voice indicated that it'd been ages since he'd spoken to anyone. He set her down softly.

"Thank you."

He didn't respond, and instead looked up, eyes narrowing. Someone grabbed her in a hug, and she turned to see Baizhu, his eyes filled with relief. "Thank the archons."

"I'm sorry," muttered Chaoxing under her breath.

Xiao had vanished.

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