Read Chapter 8: — THE SHIPYARD

They entered the abandoned shipyard after dark.

It was not abandoned.

Warehouses stood full of imperial grain.

Tang and Xiaoxi found a second ledger recording shipments that matched the dates of supposedly sunken canal boats.

The scheme was simple once seen whole.

Cargo was unloaded in secret.

The boats were damaged or sunk.

The loss was charged to the government.

The stolen grain was later distributed through the river-god cult for silver.

Fear turned theft into religion.

Lin went separately to investigate the offices above the yard.

There he heard Li Sheng speaking with a Japanese man whose face was marked by a long scar.

Yagyu Ichiro.

Lin’s body went cold.

Ten years earlier his master had nearly killed the pirate. The wrist-bolt had left the scar.

Li Sheng planned to finish one final operation: allow Yagyu’s raiders through Zhenjiang’s river defences during the public river-god ceremony, seize an imperial tribute vessel, then flee with the pirates.

Lin listened from the rafters.

Below him, Tang and Xiaoxi were discovered.

Li Sheng ordered them killed.

They escaped with the ledger only because Lin used concealed darts and clouds of lime powder to cover their retreat.

Tang was cut across the backside by a thrown blade and complained about the indignity more than the blood.

Xiaoxi told him to stop flirting while injured.

He asked if concern meant she liked him.

She kicked him where he was already wounded.

By dawn, Lin had enough to break the conspiracy.

But Tang’s false identity had also been exposed.

The counterfeit badge and cheap sword had been recovered in the shipyard.

Li Sheng took them straight to Magistrate Zhou.

The next morning Tang Zheng walked into court carrying evidence of corruption.

He did not know that the court was waiting to arrest him.