King Qinguang fanned the pages of the Blue Ledger, eyes growing wider with each turn. “Impossible,” he whispered. “They only issue the thin soft covers in this court.” He gestured to the battered ledger on his own desk: a floppy, thread bound thing, pages already curling at the edges.

  Briar said, “I didn’t steal it. She gave it to me.” She nodded at Calanthe, who gave a half-hearted shrug.

  “My apologies,” Qinguang said, an ingratiating smile now filling his face. “You should have signaled your status sooner. It’s best practice in these halls even for Hell Inspectors.”

  He reached out and placed a bony hand on Briar’s shoulder, steering her gently away from the others. “If you’ll allow me a moment, Miss…?”

  Briar blinked. “Briar.”

  “Ah, I understand the reference—a thorny wild bush. Quite appropriate for someone attuned to the intricacies of torture.”

  His attention was on the Blue Ledger which he handed back to her. “The resemblance is uncanny. You’re the very image of the late Empress’s best inspector.” He lowered his voice: “I would never have guessed. The demon guards, too. Exquisite work.” He motioned gently towards Tanith and Zhao. “The redhead less so. She still has a demonic air about her.”

  Briar blinked again and nodded solemnly. “A fine point. Some corrections will be in order.”

  Qinguang grinned, and with a conspiratorial air, leaned close. “Let’s make this brief. My audit metrics are the best in three reigns. Not a single bribe in ten years. We average 857 flayings per hour, 211 tongue removals, and at least 101 dismemberments. All per regulation.”

  He beamed, clearly delighted to have someone who could appreciate the numbers. “Our average throughput beat all other earthly hells combined, and we maintain a minimum complaint ratio, Almost all appeals are rejected.”

  Briar nodded. “That’s moderately efficient.”

  Qinguang’s eyes glittered with something like pride. “Indeed, indeed. This is why we need women in compliance.” He clapped his hands together in pleasure. “Now, the true business. You want the audit, don’t you? A copy of the full First Court ledger?”

  Briar held herself with what she hoped was unalloyed authority. “It would help my work. And the main office prefers full transparency.”

  He drew the soft, battered ledger from his sleeve and placed it between his palms, chanting a line of code in a dialect Callie did not recognize. The book shimmered and the contents reconstituted instantly in the Blue Ledger tucked under Briar’s arm.

  Briar blinked, then flicked the book open. The entries were all there: names, dates, crimes, penalties, and enough footnotes to choke a law school. She closed it, hugging the book tight.

  Qinguang exhaled, satisfied. “You can tell your supervisor I run a tight ship,” he said, his voice almost tender. He reached for a drawer and produced a thin slip of black lacquer, etched with a seal. He handed it to Briar. “This is a passage token. It will get you into the other courts, and back again.”

  Briar nodded, tucked the token away, and returned to the group. Qinguang gave a polite bow to the party, then swept back to his tribunal, already shouting for someone to bring more ink.

  Tanith’s eyes were wide as saucers. “What did you just do?”

  Briar shrugged. “He thought I was an inspector. He gave me his full audit.”

  Tanith laughed. “This world is broken in the weirdest ways.”

  They moved down the corridor, the sound of abacuses echoing in the distance.

  Callie waited until they were through the next set of doors before turning to Briar. “Why did you ask for a copy of his ledger?” she said. “You could have just taken the pass and left it at that.”

  She grinned. “A little knowledge never hurt anyone, right?”

  Callie leaned against the wall, staring at the ledger in Briar’s arms, then quoted something from her past: “‘A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again.’”

  Briar considered this, then shrugged. “I plan to drink it all.”

  They headed toward the Third Court, the Blue Ledger weighing heavier in Briar’s hands than it ever had before.

  ***

  The walk from the First to the Third Court took them through a succession of courtyards.

  Ox-Head led the way, swinging his chain of office in long, even arcs. For all his size and threat, he walked with an oddly thoughtful cadence, pausing at every third or fourth intersection as if checking for traffic, or perhaps the moment when a suitable tragedy would befall their group.

  At the next gate, Ox-Head stopped, rapped on the lintel, and turned to face Briar. “Court protocol requires you to hold your pass as you transit,” he said.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  Briar took out the thin slip of black lacquer provided by King Qinguang of the First Court and held it in her palm. She felt a jolt of heat, and the lacquered token burrowed against her palm, then vanished into the lines of her hand.

  Briar jerked, but before she could voice her irritation, the bailiff rolled his yellow eyes and said, “That’s normal. In case you want to make any return trips to Hell. A friends and family thing.”

  Tanith muttered, “Fascinating. There’s no residue. How does it persist?”

  Ox-Head shrugged, then swung the gate open. “Welcome to the Quarrelsome Village.”

  ***

  Hell’s Third Court was not what Calanthe expected.

  Instead of a charnel house or a field of writhing souls, Callie stepped into a village that was, for lack of a better word, perfect.

  The air was warm and clear, the sky a watery blue, and the street was lined with a mathematical symmetry of whitewashed cottages, each with its own flawless stone path. Bodhi trees arched over the walk, their branches hung with ribbons and prayer slips in every color. Each intersection was marked by an ancestral shrine, tiled in green and capped with fresh flowers.

  Elders in clean hemp tunics sat on low stools, weaving baskets or shelling peanuts, while children in pale pastel robes flitted between the houses, pausing to bow in eerie silence whenever Callie’s group drew near. A stream ran parallel to the main lane, so densely stocked with koi that their backs heaved above the waterline. Periodically, a stooped old man would scatter a handful of food, and the fish would churn the surface to froth.

  The effect was almost… soothing.

  They made their way down the lane, following Ox-Head past immaculate courtyards and shimmering fountains. Every villager seemed to know their part. If a conversation grew heated, it was resolved by a quick, awkward laugh, or a sudden, elaborate apology; followed by a bow that seemed to last just a second too long. If not for the demon, Callie could have believed she’d stumbled into some ancestor’s dying memory.

  She caught up to Ox-Head, who waited at a crossroad beneath an especially massive bodhi, its roots buckling the flagstones in extravagant swells.

  “Is this really the Third Court?” Callie asked.

  Ox-Head huffed. “Looks nice, doesn’t it? It’s Hell, all the same. We’re doing some renovations. I’m not enthusiastic about it, but we all have to change with the times.”

  He jerked his chin toward the main square, where a row of children sat on the temple steps, their faces composed and utterly still.

  “They’re waiting for discipline,” Ox-Head explained. “Their parents will be summoned after the midday meal, and the reconciliation begins. No one eats until it’s resolved.”

  Callie nodded. “The punishment is hunger?”

  “I know. Tedious isn’t it? ” He said with a distinct edge of boredom.

  Briar drifted closer, surveying the children with a mixture of skepticism and awe. “Does it work?” she whispered.

  Ox-Head rumbled, “It varies, but they have time. Forever, if they need it.”

  ***

  They reached the center of a garden which acted like a nexus from which various activities could be surveyed. Impish children in pastel robes circled around reciting nursery rhymes with slightly altered lyrics.

  “Zhao forgot his father’s birthday… Tanith rolled her eyes at Grandpa’s tales…”

  Ox-head directed their attentions to each administrative area with the rehearsed speech of a tour guide.

  In the Endless Apology Tea Ceremony pavilion, Callie watched a soul proffer tea on her knees, her fingers trembling with the effort. The service would not end until the correct words of apology were uttered and the proper regret was registered in her soul. If the tea was rejected, she would have to drink it herself.

  The woman set the cup down, and the scene reset. In a blur, the pot refilled itself, and she began again. On the next round, the woman managed to utter a single word—sorry—before the world twitched, and the cup jumped back to full. Her shoulders slumped, and the cycle resumed.

  Calanthe frowned. “That’s the punishment?”

  “Too merciful for your taste?” Ox-head mused. “The old version used hot oil. This is better for the carpet.”

  ***

  At the Ancestral Reflection Ponds, penitents stared into waters that reflected their parents’ disappointed eyes, their legs growing increasingly leaden until they collapsed into a kowtow. Willow branches lashed out any unrepentant soul who walked through the park without a bow, inflicting shame instead of wounds and demanding public acts of filial service for relief.

  As Calanthe watched, one soul leaned closer to the pool and started to weep. The tears dripped into the water, but the surface didn’t ripple. Instead, the pond’s reflection sharpened, and the face in the water shifted: a stern father, a disappointed mother, sometimes both. The visitor’s knees buckled, and they slid off the bench into a kneel, pressing their forehead to the stone.

  Ox-Head tilted his head. “They stay until the shame subsides. Or until their parents forgive them. Which might be never.”

  Tanith, ever the academic, fished a notebook from her sleeve and began making hasty, cryptic notes. “Is the system punitive or reformative?” she asked Ox-Head.

  “It’s both,” he said. “We try everything once. Some people respond to the carrot, others the stick. If the village doesn’t suit you, you’re remanded to the Mountain of Knives.”

  He glanced at Zhao Tong. “Your sister is in the Reflection Pavilion.”

  At the end of the lane, a painted gate stood half-open, and the faintest drift of incense curled out to meet them. Ox-Head bowed, then motioned for them to enter.

  ***

  The Reflection Pavilion was a courtyard surrounded by screens, its floor inlaid with pale marble with a shallow pool at the center.

  Zhao Tong’s sister waited at the far end of the pool, seated on a low mat, her back to the group. She wore a plain blue robe, her hair loose and dark, though Callie could see the subtle glimmer of scales at her nape and the beginnings of a narrative fracture pattern running down her right arm.

  Zhao Tong knelt beside her, his hand hovering near his sister’s cheek, gently brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

  Her eyes, so normal at first glance, caught the light and split it into a thousand colors. Callie blinked, and for a second, she saw through Zhao Lu’s pupils into a spinning storm of images: a battlefield, a clan gathering, a family dinner. The effect lasted less than a breath.

  Callie approached slowly. “I’m Calanthe,” she said.

  Zhao Lu’s mouth ticked at the corner, but she didn’t smile. “I know who you are. She said you’d come.”

  “May I?” Callie asked, gesturing to the exposed flesh at Lu’s neck.

  Zhao Lu’s gaze flicked to her brother, then to Callie. She nodded.

  Callie leaned in carefully. She examined the scales; so fine they were almost invisible, but in the right angle of light, each one gleamed with shifting color. She pressed lightly along the line of Lu’s spine and felt the muscles tense, then release.

  As she worked, Briar hovered just beyond, sketching the pattern in her notebook, eyes flicking between subject and page in quick, greedy glances.

  “Can you tell me what happened?” Callie said.

  Zhao Lu lifted her chin. The movement was small, but it carried the dignity of someone who had nothing left to lose.

  “It started with a prophecy about the Demon Blood Plague,” she said. “They told me I was special… “