“Chain the demon up outside,” they told him. “The commander does not want the creature anywhere close.”

“Chain her outside, and anyone who sees her will know I came here and wonder why.”

They grunted, and settled on shoving her into a tiny storeroom. She sank down between two barrels, head resting against the wall. It was nothing more than a thin barrier of wood, and through it she heard Girish’s whine and the calmer rumble of a man speaking with the Qin way of chopping off k’s and swallowing r’s.

“This man said this, this man said that. . . .” Names and complaints rolled off Girish’s tongue as the Qin officer questioned him for details of the most incriminating and treasonous remarks made by the inhabitants of Kartu Town.

She shut her eyes. If she did not think, she would not hurt. How many days until he went back to Ramda’s? He usually could not afford to go more than once a month, so she had another passage of the moon to hunger for the smoke. She could still taste it in her mouth, but the warmth had drained out of her.

“Hei! Hei! Lazy demon!”

The leash flicked so hard against a breast that she gasped. Hurry. Hurry. She scrambled up, and he hit her a few more times as the Qin soldiers watched impassively. When he pulled her past them, they stepped back so as not to touch her. An open door revealed a man dressed in a golden tabard, sitting on a pillow as he sipped from a cup. He glanced up with his demon-scratched eyes. Seeing her, he made a warding sign and gave a signal, and an unseen servant closed the door.

Out on the street, folk stared as Girish strode past with her on a leash behind. The Mei demon, they called her. Girish liked their whispering and pointing. Today he hummed under his breath, always a bad sign. He rarely used her, and then only at night when he was particularly restless and couldn’t sleep. His brothers, and the other males in the house, eyed her when they thought he was not looking, and their desire pleased Girish, who dragged her everywhere with him on the leash so he could gloat that he held what others lusted after. Everyone knew what he was, but they stared as at the smoke on the ceiling and pretended not to see and hear, not as long as the blood did not touch them.

Despite its orderly environs, the slave and livestock market stank of piss, fear, manure, and despair. Giggling now, he strode to the open corrals behind his favorite warehouse.

“Master Girish! So nice to see you. Please, please, this way. What are you looking for?”

“Ah, eh, yes. My mother desires a few children, pretty ones, to decorate her chamber and wait on her. What do you have that’s fresh and new, nothing damaged.”

She stared at her feet, browned by the sun. Long sleeves covered her pale arms, and loose trousers covered her pale legs, the jacket buttoned up to her neck. A cap shaded her face; he whipped her if she forgot to wear it. But her feet and hands might turn brown, resembling the color of human skin. She wondered that if she were to turn brown all over, if she would become human, but maybe a demon could never be human, no matter what it once had believed it was.