Shadows on Water

"Put the scrolls in the fire," you tell Ling, and you both go to work. Ling can't read, so he throws them in as if they were kindling. You can't help but read as you work, and notice some strange details. No political rants here, no radical philosophy, but little stories, fragments, connected or disconnected, it's difficult to tell. One scroll tells of an army marching to battle across a desert and a glorious victory. You pass it into the flames. Another scroll tells a similar story, but it also tells of a banquet before the battle. A different draft of the same story perhaps. You pass it into the flames.

The scrolls are all ash. What now? What does one do in these circumstances? You might try and contact the local magistrate to inform him of your deed, or perhaps the honourable thing to do would be to inform the half-brother Huan Tan mentioned before...