As the Crows Fall | ONC 2020 Grand Winner

vi | Wherever You Go

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Ruwei does not lie.

Words are the one weapon she has never mastered and she does not trifle with trades she does not understand. Words are tricky creatures, wild and unpredictable. No matter how she tries to tame them, they still taste like poison on her tongue, feel like imposters in her mouth, slip like sand through a sieve. Words are a weapon, but she wields them like a shield, and if she is to kill a person, the least she can do is be honest about it.

She stands in a coffee shop, blood dripping down her wrist, and whispers, "There is someone I want dead."

Xuanwu does not accept the blood of most people, but they accept hers. "This will put blood on your hands."

She snarls. "Then let them run red."

It is not the first time she says those words and it is not the last.

"There was blood on my hands the moment I walked away from my sister," she continues, unwavering, "and there is nothing in this world that can wipe them clean. All I can do is add to my ledger those who deserve to be in it."

The god studies her. She does not back down, she does not look away, she does not change her tale and above all, she does not lie.

Lying takes a toll on a person and it always comes with a price. She knew that long before she sold her blood, long before her sister died, and so when she stands before Xuanwu for the first time, she can only tell the truth.

No, Ruwei does not tell lies, but her truths are so brutal that they may as well be.

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News breaks at dawn.

The crows bring an old radio to Douxiu and it sits unplugged on the dirt floor by the water. It has no source here, no battery or plug, but it runs nonetheless, feeding off the undercurrent of power in Douxiu.

A ragged cackle of static pulls Ruwei from her restless haze. She pretends she slept, but in truth she has not slept in months. The insomnia started back when she was twenty years old and bargained her blood for the first time. At that time, her insomnia was paranoia, minutes of sleepless nights tied together with fear. Over the years, it shifted to dark thoughts and nightmares that wriggled into her mind when night falls, dead faces of dead men guided by the crows.

And now, it is desperation, tried and true, that runs in her veins, threading adrenaline through them so finely that she almost doesn't notice.

But it is there. Thrums against her heart. Beats in her neck. Seeps through her thoughts.

She doesn't sleep more than four hours a night anymore. She doesn't have time to.

She has a room in town, mostly a formality, should anyone seek her out. She leaves a careful trail behind her, one that those who chase her can follow, one that leads nowhere. Everything she needs, though, is here, in Douxiu.

Ruwei rolls to her feet, turning the volume knob on the radio to listen as she dresses. A medium sized bejeweled mirror sits atop a stone at the cave wall, her accessories and comb before it. Her clothes, what few she keeps with her, are folded neatly in a small trunk at its side.

She kneels in front of the mirror, taking the comb in hand. One of the crows nudges a small cup of cha her way. Static blips sound in the empty cavern, words drifting through.