Of the next tenday there is little to say. The Wanderers spent a pleasant interlude at the Cherry Blossom Kirusi, recovering from the injuries incurred during the fight with the phase spider, her minions… and Sujia. Under the wise and skillful care of Madame Wei most injuries healed well and surprisingly quickly. Sujia especially benefited from the old woman’s long talks, for while the magic of the dragon’s pearl had cured her of her addiction to the terrible Soulsbane, scars still remained on her soul. Only Snow Crow seemed slow to fully heal, sleeping long into the day and retiring early most evenings. Although he did manage, with distressing regularity, to find energy for practicing on his zither…
But all good things must come to an end, and eventually the companions knew it was time to resume their travels. Edain was anxious to visit the Great Observatory in Bako, the fame of which they had all heard. The day before their planned departure, however, a small merchant train from Kirai’an stopped to spend the night at the Cherry Blossom Kirusi. This chance meeting would prove to be a most fortuitous one for everyone involved.
The two groups enjoyed a long and very enjoyable dinner that evening, under the gracious hand of Madame Wei and her amazing staff. The prosperous merchant-scholar Ming-Hao was taking a load of various trade goods, including several barrels of a particularly good plum brandy, to sell in the great markets of Bako. He was also taking the opportunity to escort his 19-year-old daughter, Ming-Li, to begin her studies at the Academy of Virtuous Wisdom in that city. Her 24-year-old brother, Ming-Jin, travelled with them. A pleasant youth, and his father’s apprentice in matters of business, he seemed not to share his father’s, and sister’s, taste for intellectual pursuits.
“Yes, I have always had a penchant for knowledge,” the older man said to Edain, who was seated next to him at the great table. Pleased to recognize the Pona Hanni, having seen him from afar in Kirai’an during their stay there whilst sorting out the problems of Libeo Wan, he had insisted on sharing a bottle of his plum brandy with the table.
“The family business must come first, of course – five generations of my ancestors would never forgive me should I let it fail – but still I have always found time for my scholarly endeavors. In fact, just this past autumn I had a small treatise on the similarities between certain tenets of classical Harutanism and Zhoanzinism published by the Philosophical Academy…”
Khatia was more than happy to leave the older man and his philosophical and scholarly conversation to Edain and Viroj, who actually seemed to understand it. She turned her attention to the daughter… not least so as to head off the attentions which Snow Crow seemed determined to lavish on her. Still too exhausted to help much with the packing today, she thought sardonically, but apparently not too tired to pitch some woo. However inappropriate that might be in the circumstances. Ruthlessly blocking his attempts to catch the girl’s eye, she smiled brightly and poured some more brandy.
“Do you plan to follow in the family business yourself when you have finished school?” she asked as the girl waved away her attempt to refill her cup. Ming-Li had impressed Khatia as the very model of a modest maiden – shy, retiring, eyes downcast. But she looked up brightly at the question, and there was a spark of fire in those hazel eyes.
“Oh no, I am afraid I have very little head for business matters,” she admitted with a demure smile. “That I will gladly leave to my older brother! My interests are rather amongst the stars, and the study of the heavens. My mother doesn’t find that very lady-like, but fortunately Father understands. I’m very excited to have been accepted into the Astral College at the Academy of Virtuous Wisdom!”
She was also very clearly excited to be beginning a new, adult, phase of her life, Khatia thought, and asked another leading question in an effort to draw the girl out further. Let Snow Crow pursue the elder brother if, after all, he had energy for such activities…
Once the fire archer began enthralling the girl with tales of her military adventures Snow Crow realized the futility of his hopes in that direction. With a shrug he did indeed turn his attentions to the son, only to find himself once again late to the game. Sujia had managed to seat herself next to Ming-Jin, and was monopolizing the young man’s attention… and making the most insipid cow eyes at him! He seemed an earnest fellow, a bit idealistic… and completely oblivious to the girl monk’s clear interest, as far as Snow Crow could see.
After a few minutes of trying to insert himself into their conversation, and getting no further than learning the fellow was very fond and proud of his little sister, was less fond of being his father’s apprentice in the merchant business, and that a certain tension existed between father and son over the latter’s interest in soldiering, of all things, he tuned out and accepted Shingli’s offer of a game of gwon-mi with a resigned sigh.
When the hour finally grew late, given that both groups planned an early start in the morning, the party wound down. As everyone rose to find their beds, the merchant-scholar drew Edain and Viroj aside in the main hallway. “It occurs to me that we are all traveling in the same direction, indeed, toward the same goal – the great city of Bako. I have greatly enjoyed our conversation this evening, most honored Pona Hanni, worthy monk. I would continue our intersourse, if you also would find it pleasing. May I therefore offer you and your party the company of my train, and the protection of my guards, between here and there?”
“Is the land so dangerous, then?” Edain asked, frowning. “I had understood the problems with bandits in the west had not spread this far.”
“No, no, there is no great danger,” the older man assured him. “But for many miles the road passes through rough, little-peopled lands, before reaching the great city’s hinterlands, and there is always greater safety with many than with few alone. But it is primarily for your conversation and the pleasure of your company that I extend my offer.”
“Then, in that spirit, I accept your kind offer Scholar Ming-Hao,” Edain said, bowing.
Viroj followed suit, adding “In which case, learned sir, might we beg a bit of space on one of your wagons?” He grinned. “You see, we have this giant spider carapace, not to mention the creature’s head, and it promises to be an awkward burden for our mules…”
• • • • •
Later, as she was preparing for sleep, Khatia was surprised to hear a light tapping at her door. Pulling her robe about her she slid the door aside to reveal an embarrassed-looking Sujia in the hall. She had a pretty good idea of what the younger woman wanted, and motioned her in with a grin.
“So, what can I do for you, my dear?” she asked, pouring them both a cup of the good rice wine she’d snagged from the dinner table. Sujia took her cup and sipped without seeming to even notice what she was doing.
“Khatia, how do you go about letting a man know that you are… interested in him?”
“Oh, I think you were doing a pretty good job of it tonight,” Khatia laughed.
Sujia turned pink and tossed back the wine. “Was I that obvious?” she squeaked. “He didn’t seem to notice, so I thought… do you think he just doesn’t like me, then?”
“No, no! I just think maybe Ming-Jin is… a little slow on the uptake, as my mother is fond of saying, that’s all.”
“Oh.” Sujia frowned, and didn’t object when her friend refilled her cup. “But he’s very smart, I don’t see how he could be slow…”
“There are many different kinds of smart, Sujia. And many kinds of slow. I think you just need… um, are you a virgin, if you don’t mind my asking?”
To Khatia’s surprise, the monk didn’t blush again, but gave her a serious look, shaking her head. “No, I am not. But it has been… quite some time since… well, and few of my limited experiences were, um wonderful, exactly. Also, I’ve never been the one who, um, asks?”
“Ah, I see,” Khatia murmured, tremendously curious but absolutely refusing to indulge that curiosity. None of her business! But that didn’t mean she couldn’t help, especially since her friend was asking. After the dire events of the last few tendays she was glad Sujia felt comfortable coming to her, and didn’t want to let the girl down. She did owe her, after all, for the wonderful, if faint, battle scar now gracing her cheek… finally!
“I may know a few tricks for getting through the obliviousness of men,” she laughed. “It’s surprisingly common, really, even in the best of them. So, let’s start with a few simple strategies…”
• • • • •
The next morning dawned bight and clear, the faint smells of the growing spring floating on a warm wind. While Ming-Hao wanted to make an early start, he was not fanatical about it, and graciously accepted Madame Wei’s formal invitation to a farewell tea ceremony. Almost everyone was gathered in the courtyard, only Snow Crow and Shingli absent. The former was drawing out his enjoyment with one last soak in a hot tub, and the latter had slippied away, as soon as he’d realized what was happening, for a last invigorating skinny-dip in the pond.
“It has always been my calling to mend that which is broken, whatever or whomever that may be,” Madame Wei said, once everyone present had received and sipped their tea, a delightful cherry-infused blend of her own creation. “In that spirit, Nong Sujia, and in honor of your own miraculous recovery, I offer you this parting gift.”
She lifted a green cloth which had overlain something on a small table to her right, to reveal a small teapot of a pale jade-hued porcelain. It had apparently been shattered at some point, but its pieces had been reassembled and gold had been used to fuse them together, making a beautiful, fine tracery over the whole.
“It’s even more beautiful than before,” Sujia gasped, recognizing her own “special” teapot, which she had smashed in a rage back in the phase spider’s lair. “But how—“
“Your friend gathered the pieces,” the old woman said, gesturing at Khatia, who blushed. “I have used the art of kintsugi to repair it. Let it remind you to embrace imperfection and impermanence, and that beauty, strength, and uniqueness arise from repairing, rather than discarding, broken items. Or broken people. For such we all are, each in our own way…”
Tears rolled quietly down Sujia’s cheeks as she lifted the precious teapot, and bowed to the older woman, and then to her friends, especially Khatia. The teapot had once meant something very special to her, and she had thought she could never look at it again; now it meant something different, but equally special, to her heart. She could look at it again without shame or guilt… or at least not with those feelings alone.
She bowed again, very low, to Madame Wei. “I accept this gift, and with it I accept the cycle of endings, change, and transiency that is our lives. Thank you.”
• • • • •
The departure from the Cherry Blossom Kusiri was a sad one for the Wanderers, for they had all come to appreciate its comforts, and to respect its amazing proprietress, during their long stay. Promises were made to visit again, as life and circumstances allowed, and their future welcome was affirmed. But the day was fair and bright, the signs of spring everywhere, and they were all energized after their sojourn with Madame Wei. Even Snow Crow felt well enough to stride along at the easy pace the heavily laden carts set. Shingli in particular was exultant in his health and youth, to be out and moving again, the pain in his hip entirely gone.
Edain and Viroj took turns riding in the main wagon with Ming-Hao and discussing whatever philosophical, spiritual, or scholarly topic their host offered. Ming-Li mostly rode in that wagon as well, but her brother moved along the string of wagons and carts often, as did the mercenary guard captain, checking that all remained in order. Sujia somehow managed to spend an amazing amount of time wherever Ming-Jin happened to be, assiduously practicing the “wiles” Khatia had suggested to her the night before.
They halted before dusk to make camp, for there were no inns to be found in this un-peopled stretch of the countryside, and Viroj offered to prepare the evening meal. Using a bit of that extraordinary plum brandy which was the Ming family hallmark, he turned out a repast that everyone agreed was exceptional. Around the campfire that night Sujia found herself somehow seated next to Jin, and she thought maybe he had finally begun to actually see her.
“Ming-Jin,” she said at one point, “a wise man once said, In a deep relationship, there is no longer a boundary between you and the other person. You are her and she is you. Do you think that is so?”
“Umm… I, well, umm…” the youth looked a bit bewildered, and across the fire Khatia winced. Then the boy grinned. “Actually, I’ve never been in a deep relationship, Sujia, so I cannot have a valid opinion. Not yet, anyway.” He smiled, his white teeth flashing in the firelight.
Khatia relaxed and turned her attention back to her current game of deftly blocking every attempt by Snow Crow to get near to Ming-Li, who fortunately seemed as oblivious as her brother to overtures of romance. The girl was fascinated, however, by her new friend’s tales of battle and adventure, so maybe that explained it. Finally admitting defeat, and truly exhausted after a day of walking, the troubadour retired early to his sleeping roll, grumpy and horny.
The next morning, insisting the previous day’s exertions had left him too weak and tired for another day of walking (no doubt the lingering effects of the spider venom, he mumbled), Snow Crow chose to ride in one of the wagons. He picked the one at the center of the column of five vehicles, the mercenaries’ supply wagon, where two of their number guided its horses. One of the soldiers had seemed open to a bit of flirtation the day before, and it was another beautiful spring day…
• • • • •
After breakfast, which he had also prepared, if not to as many accolades as dinner the night before had won, Viroj set himself apart to cast his Moonstones. It was a disturbing reading, however — as much for its ambiguity as for what it actually said…
“I sense an impediment on the road ahead today,” he said quietly to Edain and Khatia as they were packing their gear. “Perhaps danger, although that is less clear to me, less certain. All I can say for sure is that I do not believe today will be as uneventful as yesterday was.”
The others noted his warning, and passed it along to the other Wanderers, as well as to Bao Luhen, the mercenary guard captain. He seemed more bemused than worried, but at least he didn’t openly scoff at the notion. Really, without something more specific, what could he be expected to do, beyond what he and his men were already doing?
It was an hour before noon, the road winding up into another range of lowish hills (after which, Raoli the mercenary assured Snow Crow, it would drop down into the fringes of the settled hinterland around Bako), when a sudden sharp “crack” to their left made the three men in the wagon start. They only had time to look up in confusion before a large oak tree was crashing through the canopy, shattering the wagon to flinders. Snow Crow felt Raoli pulling him down as the wood splintered around them, then everything went black… oh not again was his last clear thought…
• • • • •
Sujia had been walking with Khatia, who had charge of one of the mules, discussing how she thought things were going with the dreamy Ming-Jin, when a sudden crack brought them both to attention. A dozen yul ahead on the left, a large oak tree was falling across the road, both slowly and with amazing speed. With a sharp report of splintering wood, it came down directly on top of the wagon that she knew carried most of their gear, the mercenaries’ extra weapons, and… Snow Crow!
She saw one mercenary leap free of the smashed wagon, although a whipping branch caught him a glancing blow, staggering him. But she had no time to worry about him or her friend, for at that moment a swarm of men began to pour out of the woods a few score yul north of the road, shrieking and waving spears and nasty-looking curved blades.
No, not Umantari, she realized – they were smaller, in crudely made armor, and seemed half beast-like… it suddenly dawned on her that they must be Hafuito, the so called Beast-men of the Wild. She had read of them, but seen only a few, exiles living singly in the great cities. Now it seemed she was going to see a great many more of them, and up close…
She had her shuriken out almost without thought, and the nearest Hafuito took one full in the chest. He went down shrieking, but a comrade leaped over him and rushed on! Beside her Khatia had drawn her sword and leapt forward to meet another of the beast-men… they exchanged blows, while to her right and behind she heard Viroj bellow as more of the screaming creatures poured out of the trees south of the road!
She saw the Moon Monk sweep his own sword up, a beast-man tring to block… with a sudden twist he sent the creature’s spear flying across the road. Nearby him Shingli brought his guandao around and stamped forward with a grunt of “hai!” gutting the Hafuito rushing at him and tossing the body aside with a flick…
• • • • •
Edain’s first thought as the swarming half-men rushed from the woods on either side of the road was, as always, one of peace. Fighting was never his first inclination, and he honestly hoped it never would be. Instead he tried to focus on his inner chi, to invoke the ritual Peace of Inspiration… if he could make everyone just stop, take a breather, he was sure they could—
Before he could finish the invocation, one of the little beast-men was on him, swinging a wicked-looking mang at his belly. With a sigh Edain whipped his sword out in a blur. In one motion he blocked the attack and drove his own blade deep into the creature’s leg, crippling it. He might prefer peace, but he was more than capable of dealing with the alternative, if others insisted!
As the shrieking creature went down he risked a glance around. To his left three of the… Hafuito, he realized they must be, not the gülvini native to his own land… were attempting to pull a mercenary from a wagon. But the man had the high ground and was holding them off, while behind him another mercenary in the last wagon blocked a thrusting spear with his sword. Edain glimpsed Sujia trading blows with two of the creatures, and beyond her Khatia taking a heavy blow… but the flare of light told him her dragon amulet was doing its job of protection. She drove her short sword into her foe’s groin, but still the beast-man fought on, if haltingly.
Then another of the raiders was on him, and Edain’s attention was forced back to his own defense. As he turned aside a spear thrust with the Sky Blade he suddenly stumbled forward, almost into the surprised Hafuito – one of the cursed horses, spooked, had bumped into him! He managed to turn his fall into a full body check, slamming into the smaller creature and bringing them down together…
• • • • •
Sujia’s heart was in her throat as she glimpsed the Pona Hanni going down on the far side of the road. She couldn’t fully see what was going on, her view blocked by wagon and horses, and anyway she was too far away to help… in desperation she summoned the Iron Hand, and slammed her glowing fist into her opponent’s chest, stopping his heart instantly. But before she could move, another of the cursed things was on her… her frustration gave way to a wave of relief as she saw Shingli moving to where Edain had gone down…
• • • • •
Viroj blocked, parried, and drove his bastard sword cleanly into a Hafuito thigh. As he whipped the blade back out the tremendous spurt of blood told him he’d severed the femoral artery. Another one bites (and bleeds all over) the dust, he thought. Ahead of him, across the road, he saw Khatia block and then counterstrike her foe, and he laughed – she, too had severed an artery, apparently, and another of the swarming raiders was down and bleeding out…
• • • • •
The Hafuito managed to disentangle himself from Edain with surprising speed, and was leering down at him far too quickly, spear poised to stab down into his gut… then Shingli loomed suddenly up behind the little beast-man, his guandao sweeping around to sever a tendon in the creature’s leg. With a shriek it went down just as Edain’s own blade swept up, impaling it through the heart.
“Kill stealer!” Shingli grunted as he pulled the little fighter off the sword and offered his companion a hand up. But before Edain could take the proffered hand another Hafuito was rushing in, mang raised high… the Sky Blade slashed out, almost severing a leg, and the creature shrieked as it went down. Shingli stepped over the prone Pona Hanni and brought his guandao around to shatter the beast-man’s spear while severing its right arm at the elbow.
“OK, we’re even now,” Edain grunted as he climbed back to his feet…
• • • • •
Sujia sighed in releif as she saw Edain back on his feet, apparently uninjured. Her current foe tried to block her Iron Hand with his spear, and her glowing fist shattered his weapon to flinders. But it absorbed enough of the blow’s energy to save its wielder’s life… the creature staggered back, injured but not down.
Viroj had moved up closer to Sujia and Khatia, locked in a duel with a particularly large and tough opponent, and both were attacking and blocking, grunts and curses beneath the ring of steel on iron.
Khatia, having dispatched her last nearby foe, leapt up onto the nearest wagon and strung her long bow. Bending it upon the nearest Hafuito, who was fighting one of the mercenaries, she loosed a shaft — another artery severed, blood spurting everywhere, the soldier leaping back from the splatter with a curse, and then a grin and a wave of thanks.
The eerie sound of a horn arose suddenly to the south, and the ambushers appeared to have had enough, gladly turning to run at its command – Sujia tried to Iron Hand her last opponent, but the creature dodged and fled, dropping the remnants of its shattered spear and vanishing into the woods with shocking speed.
Viroj took a slice out of his foe’s face, thanks to the horn’s distraction, but the creature still managed to disengage, turning to flee as well… only to have Shingli slice his right leg off with a sweep of his guandao. For good measure Edain stabbed him after he was down (and suspiciously still). Khatia, on the other hand, chose mercy and declined to arrow any of the retreating Hafuito in the back…
• • • • •
While the three mercenaries saw that no living enemies lurked among the fallen, Sujia and Shingli pulled an unconscious Snow Crow, wrapped in the protective arms of an equally unconscious mercenary, from the wreckage of the supply wagon. Edain and Viroj, with Khatia close on their heels, went around the great crown of the fallen tree to see how the other half of their convoy had fared.
Less well, as it turned out. The brunt of the attack had fallen on them, apparently, and two mercenaries were dead, another seriously wounded, as was the honorable Ming-Hao. Neither’s injuries seemed mortal, however, and if that had been the worst of it, they might have considered themselves lucky… but that was not the worst news.
“They’ve taken my sister!” Ming-Jin howled in outrage, tinged with no little amount of fear, Edain thought. The youth had apparently acquitted himself well in the pitched battle, escaping with only minor injuries, and was now hot to pursue. “We must go after them at once!”
“Calm yourself, my son,” his father said from where he lay on the ground near the lead wagon. One of his men was tending a nasty gash on his head, and his left arm looked like it might be broken. Ming-Hao tried to sound stern, but his voice was weak, and he was clearly in considerable pain.
“They have also taken two of my men,” he explained to Edain as Viroj knelt to add his own healing skills to the mercenary’s, “one of them Captain Bao. It is clear they want hostages, so it is only logical that they will not harm them, not soon—“
“Logic?!” his son said, incredulous, his voice rising an octave. “How can you speak of logic, Father? We must go after them at once! Why are we wasting time talking?”
“Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win,” Sujia said quietly, having come up just in time to hear Jin’s outburst.
“What? What does that even mean?” the frantic youth asked, his wrath momentarily overwhelmed by confusion.
“What my young friend is saying,” Viroj offered gently, “is that planning is never wasted time. Rushing off, without even a moments thought, possibly into yet another ambush, will certainly not help your sister. Compose yourself in patience, lad, we do not forget your sister.”
“And this was a well planned ambush,” Sujia continued. “I have examined the tree, it was skillfully hacked almost all the way through, the marks covered by brush, and then given a final push at just the right moment to divide our forces.”
“And remember, Master Ming-Jin,” one of the mercenary’s added, “they have also taken the cart with all the brandy. It’s a small cart, yes… but heavy, and there are no roads, likely nothing more than animal tracks, in those woods. They will not be moving quickly, while we, once our plans are made, will move swiftly indeed.”
• • • • •
It was just a quarter turn of the glass past noon by the time the rescue party set out. In the end it had been agreed that the Wanderers, with Ming-Jin at their side, would pursue the fleeing Hafuito and their captives, while the remaining mercenaries would escort the wounded, especially Ming-Hao and the more seriously injured of his men, on to Bako, taking the still-unconscious Snow Crow with them. Sujia had spent the hour or so of preparation giving young Jin loooong back rubs and reassuring him that, with the Pona Hanni and Khatia leading them, his sister was as good as saved already.
Shingli had no trouble finding the Hafuito’s trail once they had entered the woods, despite Viroj’s help. While the little beast-men were skilled in their woodcraft, the mercenary had been right — the brandy cart made it impossible for them to maintain their usual stealth. His prediction about their speed, however, had been less good.
While the group moved quickly, the hour or more head start the Hafuito had gained proved difficult to overcome. The clever buggers, even burdened as they were, managed to cover their tracks for awhile in several spots, forcing Shingli to hunt about to pick up the trail again. He always found it, but time was nonetheless lost in the process.
“It is strange, that the Hafuito should do this,” Ming-Jin said an hour or so into the hunt. Now that they were on the move, taking action and actively seeking his sister, he was calmer. Sujia’s massages and quiet words had helped, apparently, and he had begun to think again. “They have had a small, fortified settlement in this region for generations, and have never been aggressive. They have kept to themselves, mostly, but the truth is that, over the years, there has even been some trade with the Umantari settlements at times, few as they are hereabout.”
“Yes,” Khatia, who had been walking with them, said. “They must always have known that to prey on the traffic of even a secondary Imperial road must soon enough bring down an Imperial retribution upon them which they could not hope to survive.”
“Has something changed then?” Sujia wondered. “Could they have had a sudden population explosion, maybe, or have other Hafuito moved in from elsewhere?”
“Possibly,” Ming-Jin allowed. “I suppose we’ll find out soon enough…”
• • • • •
The sun was sinking in the west when they finally came within sight of the Hafuito settlement, stopping several hundred yul away in the shelter of the trees. The place sat on a low, three-lobed hill, rising bald from the fringe of scattered light woodland around it, and was crowned with a large wooden palisade and two great watch towers rising above the walls. There was no gate that they could see – no doubt it lay on the northeast side of the prominence, opposite them. But strangely, the log walls of the palisade were broken by gaps of various sizes in several places… the buildings within could actually be seen in spots.
“This is very odd,” Khatia muttered, staring intently at the inexplicably incomplete fortifications. “And what is that stench?!”
The wind had shifted and they were all suddenly aware of a terrible smell, as of rotting meat, wafting over them. Gagging, covering their mouths with scarves, Shingli led the group to a spot about 50 yul south of them. There a large pit had been dug, and within it lay a great many bodies… not of men, but of the smaller Hafuito folk!
“What could this mean?” Edain asked, dismayed at the carnage, not to mention the apparently causal disposal of the dead. “There must be three score or more in there! Do you think an illness spread amongst them…?”
Everyone except Sujia took several steps back. “I don’t see a single body that appears to have died of anything but wounds,” she said, staring sadly into the charnal pit. “From what I can see, they all died violently. I… I can’t be sure, but the ones on top seem… fresher hardly seems the right word…”
“No, you are right,” Khatia agreed, stepping back up to stand beside her friend. “It looks like bodies have been added over time, months probably… the ones on top are certainly the most recent killed… blade-work, to be sure, but many broken bones as well… and so many crushed skulls…”
“If it had been a contagion, surely they would have burned the bodies,” Viroj added, sending up a silent prayer to Kai Yi.
“Some great evil has passed here,” Sujia shuddered. “And I fear it sets its will against us now.”
The party retreated from the burial pit, up wind this time, and considered their options.
“We have less than half a turn of the glass before the sun goes down,” Viroj said as they crouched in a circle within the concealing shadows of the wood. “If we are going to attempt to penetrate that oddly porous defense, it might be good to move quickly, while the setting sun will be in the eyes of any watchers…”
“Or we wait until nightfall, and go in under cover of darkness,” Khatia countered. “Either way, I hate to go in knowing so little about what’s in there. How many of the creatures are there? What’s the layout? To do this right, we really should wait and scout the place for a day or two, learn what we can, maybe capture a lone forager to question—“
“Wait? Days?” Ming-Jin sprang up, his agitation suddenly bubbling over again. “Are you mad?! Kai Yi alone knows what those animals are doing to my sister while we sit here! We can’t wait! We must act now! And besides, don’t they see better at night than us?”
Sujia soothed him, and he reluctantly settled back down, although his eyes remained wide and desperate, and his hand clenched convulsively on his sword hilt. The party seemed pretty evenly split on which course to follow, until eventually Sujia turned to Ming-Jin and offered him the deciding choice.
“She is your sister, Ming-Jin. The decision is yours, then. Do we venture forth now with the light of Lord Quontai to possibly blind our foes, or do we wait for the night, and trust the Dark Lady to shield us from their sight?”
“We go now!” he said without hesitation, and the others nodded agreement.
• • • • •
It was a slow and tedious process as the Wanderers and Ming-Jin made their careful way up the hillside toward the nearest gap in the log palisade. There was little cover once out of the woods, mainly scrub brush and occasional rock outcroppings, but combined with the glare of the setting sun it served. The guards atop the watch towers could be seen in the golden evening light, and the group moved only when all hostile eyes seemed turned toward other areas.
But at the last there came a wide open stretch, just before the breach, and the possibility that they would be seen grew much greater. There was further debate, with Khatia urging a cautious approach, and eventually Shingli grew impatient. When he was certain all the tower watchers were facing in other directions, he dashed out from the rock behind which they hid and ran for the gap.
“Void take him!” Khatia hissed, furious. But she kept her eyes glued to the towers, and after a moment she relaxed. “The lucky fool made it, by the grace of Kaya Kwen! Now let’s just hope he doesn’t walk into a troop of patrolling guards inside the walls…”
• • • • •
Inside the walls, Shingli almost immediately ran into, not a troop of guards, but a lone woman. She was coming out of a small hut, carrying a basket of what looked like small gourds, and seemed as startled to see him as he was to see her. They both froze, staring at each other. Slowly Shingli shifted his guandao back, away from the beast-woman, as unthreateningly as possible, and held out his right hand, very open and friendly.
“Please, don’t make a sound,” he said, as quietly and gently as he could. Did these little half-man, half-beast folk even speak Kyenshi? “We are not here to hurt anyone, only to rescue our friends.”
She hesitated, looking deeply suspicious, but he thought he saw something else in her black eyes… hope, maybe? But before he could pursue this idea, Edain appeared suddenly in the palisade gap, crouching and keeping one eye on the towers above them. He froze as Shingli had, surprised to see the Hafuito woman.
She, on the other hand, dropped her basket of gourds and stepped back with a strangled squeak. Instinctively, Edain held out his own empty hands, and spoke very low. “Please, it’s alright, we’re not here to hurt you, we just want to take our friends and go.”
For a moment, he thought he’d got through to her… then she turned and darted back into the hut. “After her!” Shingli hissed, and ducked under the low lintel, guandao leading the way to forestall any ambush, unlikely as that seemed. Edain was close on his heels, and they were just in time to see the creature’s head vanishing, seemingly into the floor.
It took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the dimness inside the hut, but as they did it became apparent that what they’d thought was the floor was actually an opening down into darkness. They could just make out crude stone stairs curving to the right, and were starting down them when Sujia and Ming-Jin ducked into the hut.
“Jin, stay here and watch for the others,” Edain called quietly. “Follow as you can once they’re here. Sujia, come with us, we’re following a female Hafuito and need to stop her before she rouses the whole fort!”
The stairs curved down into darkness, which was gradually relieved by the dim, flickering light of torches. These lined the walls of a circular chamber about four yul across, with a rough domed ceiling three yul above them. Before the three Umantari were a line of five Hafuito hunters, spears held low and toward the intruders. The panting female stared from behind their protective wall, and with her was another male, dressed as the hunters, but without a spear.
“Listen, we’re not hear to fight,” Edain spoke as earnestly as he could, resisting the temptation to draw the Sky Blade and pushing up Shingli’s polearm from his naturally-taken defensive postion beside him. “We really just want our friends–”
There was sound from the stairs behind them, and the Hafuito tensed as Khatia, Viroj, and Ming-Jin appeared. The unarmed hunter said something to the spearmen and they relaxed fractionally as he stepped between them to confront the humans.
“Yes, Weshi has said as much just now. If we were not desperate… but we are, and so we must take a chance. Is this really all of you? Are there no more Umantari fighters waiting for your summons?” He seemed disappointed, Edain thought, and actually hopeful that there really were more of them.
“For now, this is all,” Khatia said from the steps behind and higher than Edain, and visible to all. She held up a hand and muttered a word – flame burst forth and flickered brightly above her palm. The Hafuito gasped, and all took a step back before their resolve hardened and they raised their spears again. But the leader, if such he was, smiled and nodded.
“Well, if you wield the Power, maybe you will be enough after all… my name is B’ku, and I am the last jeku-fa of my tribe… story-teller, I think, in your tongue, or maybe… history reader? If you are truly not here for vengeance, but only to retrieve your own, will you listen to our tale? And perhaps afterward we might prove useful to one another, in this season of fear.”
A brief, muttered conversation, and the Umantari agreed. B’ku spoke to his spearmen, and they lowered their weapons, although they did not lay them down. The female, Weshi, came forward to stand beside the story-teller as he began to speak…
• • • • •
“This place, Gui’ki, has been ours since our grandmother’s mothers came into this part of the world. They were fleeing the great turmoils of the Fire Times, and wanted only peace to live as they would. Since then, we have kept to ourselves, causing no trouble to the few Umantari nearby, as long as they caused us none. We grew comfortable here, and rich in our own way, and we had no thought that this should ever change.
“Unfortunately, we did not count on the terrible ogre Ho’kin.” B’ku shuddered as he said the name, and all the Hafuito looked furtively about, as if even the whispered utterance of it might summon the monster himself.
“The brute came upon us suddenly, in the middle of the winter. We had grown lax and unwary in our guard, it must be admitted,” he sighed ruefully. “He was past our defenses before we knew what was happening. But maybe more vigilance would not have saved us, for he is strong – he tore down whole sections of the palisade with his mighty club and bare hands, and he slew a great number of our most fierce fighters. Very soon he had cowed those of us who survived into submission.
“He spent the winter months, and the early spring, tightening his terrible grip over us, leaving us just two choices: to become corpses or slaves. When the sun began to grow warm, and the days to lengthen, he commanded what few fighters remained, along with many of the hunters, to make raids on lone travelers or small groups upon the road. He would allow no survivors, but we knew eventually the Umantari would notice. But the few who tried to counsel the Beast on this were quickly killed. My father amongst them.” He paused in bitter silence for a moment before going on.
“There are so few of us now… we were 120 last summer; now there are perhaps half that left, and more than half those mothers and children.”
“No, B’ku, only 52 now remain,” Weshi said, shaking her head sadly. B’ku’s shrug was eloquent – 52 or 60, what did it really matter?
“Our best fighters and hunters, and the guiding Mothers, now lay in a mass grave which the Beast forced us to dig beyond the foot of our hill. And every tenday he kills more, and we must carry out our friends and family and toss them atop the rotting pile…”
“The People that remain are dispirited, resentful, and utterly terrified. We greatly fear the vengeance of the Umantari, and yet He makes us raid, and now this last one, the greatest yet, has indeed brought retribution! But Ho’kin seems to welcome it, as if giving notice that there is a new power in the land. He is a fool, and will one day die as such, but I fear he will take the People with him into the darkness.”
“How did he come to order the raid on our train?” Khatia asked. “It seemed a well-planned maneuver, something I would not expect of such a brute as you describe.”
“He has news from spies along the road for many days west, and they told him of the merchant, of his wares (especially the brandy) and of his beautiful daughter. It was our few remaining fighters who conceived the details, for He could never have done so – He would have us throw our lives away like water. If we wished to survive, skill and planning were needed.
“The Beast intended to hold the girl for ransom, but upon seeing her… it is passing strange, but he has developed a desire for her… more, it seems than his usual lusts. He has been struck by what he imagines is love for the maiden. I think he refrained from rape at first only to maintain her value as a hostage… but now I think he refrains out of a desire to… “woo” her, is that the word? He desires that she should become his bride.”
Shingli gave a strangled cry of outrage at this, and only Sujia’s grip on his arm kept his from leaping forward. B’ku saw the reaction, and nodded grimly.
“She is repulsed, of course, and has bravely refused him. We greatly admire her, especially our women-folk, but fear her defiance cannot last long. He keeps her near him, in a cage, and is constantly beseeching her to relent and love him as he “loves” her—”
“Wait, what is going on out there?” Sujia interrupted, pushing past the Hafuito conspirators and out into the wide corridor beyond.
They shrank back and let her pass, but the leader of the hunters hissed at her. “The male prisoners are being brought to the Pit, for Lord Ho’kin to make sport of – they are doomed, I am afraid, though we have done what we could for them.” He and his companions looked frantically at one another and followed her out.
A crowd of maybe thirty of the Hafuito, more than half the remaining population of the settlement, if B’ku and Weshi were to be believed, were gathered at the edge of a stick-lined ledge overlooking a large circular cavern, its floor four yul below them. With all their attention fixed on the sight below them, none of the beast-men noticed the Umantari behind them, peering over their heads from the shadows.
In the pit below, pacing back and forth, occasionally raising and shaking a truly massive spiked club, was the largest ogre Sujia had ever seen. Well, to be fair, she had only ever met the one other ogre… at the time, however, she had thought that Jian Li, the Ogre-Scholar of Yanduvai Gorge, was the most impressively large humanoid she would ever see. But the monster below made the seven-foot tall, muscular, red-skinned Jian Li look almost effete!
The blue-skinned Ho’kin towered more than eight feet tall, and bulked almost twice the mass of her Yanduvai Gorge acquaintance, while the savage, dull features on his wide, tusked face were the polar opposite of Jian Li’s intelligent and lively ones. About the only thing she could say they had in common was a deep, rumbling bass voice. Ho’kin’s was now calling for his playthings to be brought forth…
“Bring me my supper,” he roared, slaver flying from his yellowed tusks, and his laughter seemed almost to shake the cavern walls. From a shadowy opening on the far side of the arena-pit two Umantari men stumbled forward into the torchlight, prodded out almost apologetically by four spear-wielding Hafuito. The bleeding, bruised mercenaries were naked save for loin clothes, and armed with nothing more than daggers. That last fact seemed to amuse the ogre.
“Oh, so you stinking rat people have given my prey little stings!” He laughed uproariously, and slammed his club down on the ground several times. “Do you think they can hurt me with them? Do you hope for that, my cowering little slaves?”
While the ogre glared up at the milling Hafuito the first mercenary, the one Sujia only vaguely recognized, leapt to the attack, despite his fellow’s hissed warning. Ho’kin turned with surprising speed, and brought his spiked club around in a two-handed swing. The poor man was hurled across the arena by the terrible blow, his body slaming into the wall with an audible crunch of breaking bones. He crumpled down to lay unmoving on the sandy floor, blood slowly pooling beneath him.
Captain Bao was more cautious, keeping his distance from the now leering monster and feinting, then leaping back again. A few moments of this, and several wild swings-and-misses had the ogre growing increasingly enraged. As Bao danced and dodged, Ho’kin’s swings became more erratic, until at last the captain was able to dart in under a particularly wild swing. His dagger scored a line across the behemoth’s left calf… trying to cut a tendon, perhaps, Sujia thought… but the thick, rubbery skin resisted the blade, which left nothing more than a scratch. Bao barely avoided the next swing, staggering back and almost stumbling.
Sujia could bear no more. She pushed forward through the surprised Hafuito and, with a quite decent acrobatic kick off a rock, leapt down into the pit behind Ho’kin, unleashing three shuriken as she dropped. All three took the ogre chieftain in the back of his left knee as she came down in a perfect three-point-landing. The monster gave a tremendous roar of pain and surprise as he half-collapsed, the injured leg buckling beneath him, blood flowing freely from three wounds.
At the same moment Viroj, from the ledge above, invoked the Curse of the Reluctant Warrior, only to mutter a different kind of curse when an amulet on the ogre’s neck flared red, deflecting or absorbing the curse. Ho’kin craned around from his half-kneel, his glaring face a mask of twisted rage.
“Which of you cowards dared–“ he bellowed, thinking it must have been one of his terrorized subjects who had attacked him. But then he saw Sujia behind him, and Viroj and Edain above her, and his face went slack with shock. “You traitorous vermin! You think humans will save you?! I’ll kill you ALL this time!”
Despite a grimace of pain, he surged back to his feet, raising his massive club, obviously intending to bring it down on the tiny Umantari female before him. Before he could do so, however, a flaming arrow streaked out from the darkness beyond the confused, milling Hafuito crowd. The missile struck him full in the left breast, sinking deep into the muscle and beyond, into the lung. With a look of utter surprise the ogre dropped his club and pawed frantically at the shaft. He only managed to break off the end, and as his hand fell away he slowly toppled over backwards.
His fall nearly crushed Captain Bao, who leaped aside only just in time, and in the silence that followed, only the man’s heavy breathing could be heard. Then the Hafuito burst into raucous cheers of amazement and delight, and B’ku and his friends were trying to explain to the crowd what was going on.
By the time Viroj and Shingli had made it down into the pit Sujia and Captain Bao were kneeling by the badly injured mercenary, and the monk was attempting to render aid. Viroj could see that it was pointless – the poor man’s ribs were shattered along one side, his skull clearly fractured – and gently moved her aside.
“Sujia, why don’t you go and help young Ming-Jin search for his sister,” he suggested, and she reluctantly departed. The mercenary captain was too experienced not to have realized the truth, and seemed grateful to have the Moon Monk there if only to comfort his comrade as he died, rather than trying to prolong his suffering…
Shingli, meanwhile, had moved to check on the fallen ogre. The monster still breathed, with a deep, wet rasping sound, but it didn’t seem long for this world. Ho’kin’s former subjects, however, did not seem content to wait on nature to take its course (or perhaps they feared a miraculous recovery), and their calls for his death became insistent. With a shrug the young soldier nodded and stepped forward…
For a moment he contemplated using his dagger to simply slit the creature’s throat, but a closer look at the muscles-on-muscles that protected it, made him decide on something that didn’t require so much sawing. And let’s be honest, he thought, it’ll be a lot more dramatic. With a deep breath he raised his guandao, held it poised over his head for an instant, then brought it down in a powerful arc, beheading the ogre with a single stroke. The audience oohed and aaahed appreciatively, then broke into wild cheers. Shingli took a bow… and used the motion to pull an interesting looking amulet from around the stump of the ogres neck…
• • • • •
Sujia and Jin found Li in a large cage in a sort of “throne” room the ogre had made for himself out of what looked to have once been a dining hall. After a hurried look for a key proved fruitless, the monk invoked her Iron Hand and smashed the lock to free the pale, shaken girl. Li fell into her brother’s arms, but didn’t burst immediately into tears. Sujia was impressed.
“Oh, I didn’t know if you were alive or dead,” she said, hugging Jin fiercely. “But what of Father? I saw him struck down, and I feared the worst… for both of you…”
“Father is fine,” her brother reassured her, sitting her down at a table along the wall, as far from the cage and crude throne as possible. Sujia poured them both what looked to be some of their own family’s plum brandy, but refrained from taking any herself. “He was injured, but he will recover. The men have taken him and the other wounded on to the villa in Puyi, where we will meet them as soon as possible.”
“But how did you even come to be here?” Li asked, giving her crude cup a dubious look, but then shrugging and taking a gulp.
“Oh, Ming-Jin insisted on leading us to your rescue,” Sujia interjected smoothly, before the youth could answer. “He was instrumental in getting us here in time, and in infiltrating this place.”
Ming-Jin looked both grateful at this gloss on his participation in the sortie, and slightly embarrassed… but he didn’t contradict her version of events, Sujia noticed with a smile. While he questioned his sister on her ordeal and answered her questions in turn, the monk moved to keep the curious Hafuito, who had begun peering into the chamber, from disturbing the siblings’ reunion.
In time Shingli and Edain showed up with the recovered brandy, which the former had discovered in a nearby storeroom. He had also liberated a pocketful of uncut gemstones, and would have looted the place down to the walls if Edain hadn’t gently stopped him. “We are guests here now, not conquerors. The Hafuito have lost enough recently, let us not add to their misery. And you might consider that they still outnumber us almost ten-to-one, yes?”
Shingli had made to replace the gems, but the Hafuito at Edain’s side was one of those who had watched the young soldier dispatch the hated ogre, and he insisted that the youth should keep the stones “as a token of our great gratitude to you for slaying the Beast!” Edain shrugged, and didn’t object, but his warning glance told his companion not to push it.
Despite the Ming siblings’ wish to leave as soon as possible, they were convinced to accept the Hafuito’s invitation to stay the night. The sun was long down by then, and the journey to the outskirts of Bako would take the better part of a day, under the best conditions. In the dark… well, the candle wasn’t worth the game, as the saying goes, Khatia thought.
A celebratory feast was prepared and, to the surprise of some, new friends were discovered in the course of the evening. Eventually Ming-Jin opened one of the remaining barrels of brandy, and over it he and Captain Bao actually laid the groundwork for possible regular trade with the Hafuito in the future…
“I’m glad for it, of course,” Edain said quietly to Viroj. The two sat at the far end of the long main table, mostly watching the others partying (and deal-making). “But I’m surprised. Maybe not so much at Jin, since his sister is safe and relatively unscathed, and he is a merchant. But Captain Bao… with the death of his man… I understood he himself was captured only because he tried to save the other fellow.”
“Oh, he doesn’t blame the little beast-folk for that, or for any of it,” Viroj replied, equally quietly. “We spoke after Fenyn Har died, and he explained that it quickly became obvious to him that the Hafuito lived in terror of the ogre, and that all had been done at that monster’s bidding. And it was two of the little folk who slipped him and Fenyn those daggers, just before the arena, at considerable risk to themselves. No, Bao is a reasonable man, who won’t let a grudge, especially an unearned one, kill future chances at peace. Remarkably forward-thinking for a mercenary, really…”
• • • • •
The group set out early the next morning, into a day that promised to be fair and clear after a morning fog. They made good time, despite the now half-empty brandy cart (Jin had insisted his sister ride, but five jarring minutes were enough for her, and she’d insisted she’d walk, thank you very much). They arrived at the Ming estate just as the sun was sinking behind the western hills, and were welcomed with great exclamations of joy and excitement by the servants.
Ming-Hao was, by the strict commands of his physician, confined to he is bed for all least another day, but he would not be kept from seeing his children no matter how the old healer tried to keep them out. He also insisted that the Pona Hanni and his friends must stay at his home, at least until he was well enough to receive them properly.
“Bako is near, and that great city will await you, my friend,” he assured Edain. “It is also… a chancy place, at best, and I would not have you visit it unprepared. Will you await my better recovery?”
Edain agreed, much to everyone’s delight, and the Wanderers prepared to settle in for a few days, at least. Snow Crow was conscious again, little the worse for his abrupt encounter with the oak tree, and glad to see his friends.
“No, no, just a few bruises and scrapes, thank Mien-Jai,” he assured Edain’s concerned questions. “I was more concerned about my poor zither, but once again fate has saved it from destruction!”
“Hmmm, I was a close vote,” Khatia muttered. “A very close vote.”
“Music is not property,” Sujia pronounced solemnly, before Snow Crow could ask for a repetition. “It is art, and it is love.
“That said, Snow Crow,” she went on, “what happens when you tune your zither too tightly?”
“Um, the strings are likely to break,” the troubadour replied warily.
“And what happens when you string it too loosely?” Sujia continued.
“Well, no proper sound can be made, of course…” his eyes narrowed in suspicion at where this was going.
“The string that produces a tuneful sound, then, is not too tight, and not too loose – it is a child of the Middle Path.” Sujia looked serenely pleased, Snow Crow just looked confused.
Edain stared at Kahtia and they both shuddered. “She’s expanding her quotes into entire stories now!” the fire archer said in a strangled whisper, and the Pona Hanni could only shake his head in dread…