"Qian Jun, save our child!"
Liuli broke the surface coughing, salt and river mud in her mouth, water streaming from her hair like a second skin.
"Over here!" someone shouted. "Hold him! Don't drown him further!"
She kicked, arms burning, kept her head down against the current and reached the boy's shoulders. He was limp and heavy. A scrap of fine cloth caught on her fingers—a sleeve no peasant child would wear.
"Let go!" a matron barked from the bank. "You're ruining him!"
"He's drowning," Liuli said, voice raw. "If you want him whole, clear a space."
The matron shoved forward, hand outstretched. "You're a child. What are you doing in the water?"
"I'm not a child," Liuli said. The words came sharper than she meant. "Get your hands off his sleeve or I'll cut them."
Silence hit the bank like a thrown stone. The matron blinked, then the crowd hummed louder.
"Don't be insolent with Qian Jun's people," someone muttered.
"Qian Jun's people?" Liuli spat. "Since when did a village get a private drowning squad?"
A man shoved through—quiet authority in his gait. Qian Jun, the schoolmaster, tall and steady even with his sleeves rolled and mud on his boots.
"Liuli," he said. His voice held a question and a question turned to relief when he saw her. "What are you—"
"Save the boy," Liuli panted. "If you want to rearrange who gets to pull bodies, do
