At the bottom of the Ten Thousand Furnace Pit, Pei Duan was hauled up with an iron hook driven into his shoulder blade and dragged to the Lamp Inspection Platform. The lamp inspector jabbed a copper awl into his left chest to test his life-lamp flame. The tip came out clean, without a single spark. After pouring lamp oil over his tattoo, the inspector said, "You have no flame to kindle. You're fit only to be kindling." The group was branded with iron tags reading "Kindling Three-Seven" and marched toward the Ashen Ravine. Halfway there, the wind suddenly turned damp and smelled of rust. A patrol lamp's flame leaned outward, and gray-black fog poured soundlessly from the ditch, like ink spilled across the ground. The escorting official cradled his lamp against his chest, curling up to protect its tiny light. This was the only way the people of Jiugai had learned to survive in three hundred years: protect the lamp, protect your life. But it was useless. The flame turned from white to blue, then dimmed to a pinprick of white. When it went out, it made no sound at all. The escorting official remained bent over, holding the lamp for a moment, then crumbled from head to toe into a heap of ash. One after another, the thirteen other kindling slaves chained beside him fell. Of the nineteen men, only Pei Duan remained standing. Black fog flooded into his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, as if shards of ice were being shoved into every opening. It pressed against his chest, trying to extinguish that bit of warmth. Deep in his chest, the three strands of something shrank under the pressure, shrinking until they were almost impossible to sense. They stayed that way for a breath, then opened again.
