Iron Jaw and Hummingbird

by Chris Roberson

  Had Wei been right all along? Were there powers who spoke to and through her, and who shielded her when her cause was righteous?

  Her train of thought was interrupted when the hatch opened, admitting a shaft of blinding light and a cloud of dust. Then Temujin stumbled in and closed the hatch behind him.

  “Drunk already, old man?” Gamine said, a touch of scorn in her voice.

  Temujin shook his head, and a smile peeked from behind his mustache. “Not yet, more’s the pity. I’m sorry to report that one of the casualties of the recent unpleasantness has been our supply of wine, inexpertly stowed in a rush by lackwits and nick-ninnies who wouldn’t know a good job of packing if it crawled up and bit their privates clean off. So in our mad dash from ravine to canyon, the jars were jostled and tossed rather too violently, and as a result the whole of our wine supply ended up as nothing but a few bits of broken crockery and a mess of soggy straw.” He slumped his shoulders and let out a ragged sigh. “Oh, by the Eternal Blue Sky, what I wouldn’t do for a drink.”

  Gamine pointed to the pot of tea cooling on the far side of the table. A cup sat before her, untouched.

  “No. No, no.” Temujin shuddered. “Tea is one thing, but this stuff? It must be down to the water we carry, but I swear that every pot of tea I’ve touched for weeks has smelled of nothing but sweaty feet.”

  Gamine grinned. “Where do you think they get the water from?”

  Temujin cocked an eyebrow, momentarily horrified, and then chuckled. “Very funny, my little sprite. Mock an old man in his dotage. See if you don’t get your just rewards when you reach my venerable age.”

  Gamine’s smile faded slightly. Then, after a pause, she said, “Sometimes I wonder if any of us will live so long.”

  Temujin regarded her thoughtfully for a long moment. “You thinking about them as died the other day, facing the soldiers?”

  Gamine was surprised. “Well . . . no, actually, I wasn’t. Just that this sort of life doesn’t seem well suited for longevity.” She paused. “But . . . should I be thinking about them?”

  Temujin narrowed his eyes. “Shouldn’t you? I mean, don’t misunderstand, we’re all very grateful that you lot kept those soldiers off our backs—and their swords and bullets out of us, for that matter. But listen, hop-o’-my-thumb. Don’t you feel the least bit bad about the fact it was your own words that led those boys and girls to their deaths?” He shivered again and hastened to add, “I’m not saying you should have done a single thing different, mind. And I know I’ve always taught you to keep a nice distance between you and the marks, and not to get too invested in their fortunes and misfortunes. But still . . . one hundred people, girl. That’s . . .” He trailed off, holding his hands palm up in a shrug, a helpless gesture.

  Gamine thought it over. “I suppose so. But if you think about it, all those people met their deaths knowing that they’d be rewarded in the next life, so really we should be happy for them, shouldn’t we?”

  Temujin’s mouth fell open, and the whites shown around the corners of his eyes. “Happy for them, is it?” He sounded shocked, even horrified.

  Before Gamine could answer, the hatch opened again, and Ruan and Jue trundled into the crawler, followed closely by Mama Noh.

  “Anything to drink in here?” Ruan asked, kicking off his shoes and putting his bare feet up on the table.

  Gamine smiled at the bandit’s inadvertent joke, and then glanced to Temujin to see if he had caught it. But the old man only fixed her with a hard stare, then looked away.

  Huang was the last to arrive at the command center. This was the first time all of the inner circle had gathered together since they’d arrived in the box canyon, the first time since they all stood together beside the caravan as the soldiers approached.

  Since they reached their new hiding place, Huang had been working almost tirelessly. It was the only way he’d found to escape the thoughts that plagued him, but only for a moment here or there. No matter how hard he threw himself into the task at hand, memories of that day in the defile always came back, clinging to him like persistent ghosts not prepared to leave this life behind. When he slept, it was fitful and brief. Those hundred Fists paraded before him, followed by the eighty soldiers, then all the others who had fallen before his blade. And Zhao, and the drivers and guards of the convoy that had carried him away from Fanchuan years before, and all the other men, women, and children he’d seen die over the years since—those whom he had killed, and those who had died because he had been unable or unwilling to help them. Which was worse, to kill or to stand by passively and watch another die? And if he murdered to save another, what did that make him? Savior, or murderer? Or both? Or neither?

  Huang had been troubled enough by his thoughts in silence. He had decided it was time to share his troubles with the others.

  “I can’t help but think that these victories might not be worth the price we’re paying,” he said as soon as the hatch swung shut behind him, not bothering with pleasantries.

  The others exchanged confused glances—all but Gamine, who met his unwavering gaze.

  “All this killing, all this dying, and for what?” Huang leaned on the table, his hands balled into fists. “We started this uprising because we were tired of running, because Ouyang and his cronies had made life difficult for us and ours, and we were going to stand up and fight back. But what have we gained? The workers at some mine or other might be spared a brutal reprisal by strikebreakers for a time, and get better working conditions, maybe even better wages. And perhaps a few farmers get enough water to irrigate their crops when the Combine plantations are pushed back inside their boxes a little, without the army to help them drain the reservoirs dry. But in the long run, will any of it do any good? We stop a supply convoy, and there’s going to be another one along, sooner or later. We keep the army from beating down one group of striking miners, and they’ll be taking it out on another group going on strike somewhere else the following week. We can’t be everywhere, all the time. The only way we’re effective at all is in hurting Ouyang and his people, and that means killing them, which means us dying as well. Is all of this—these tiny gains and minor, momentary victories—worth all of that death, on their side and ours?”

  The others muttered to one another, and then one by one glanced from Huang to Gamine.

  “What about your oath of vengeance against Zhao’s killer?” Gamine finally asked, her tone level, conversational, her hands folded in her lap. “Is that, too, no longer worth the price?”

  Huang’s cheeks flushed red, and his eyes flashed. “That’s different,” he barked. “That’s a matter between him and me. No one else has to die or kill to pay that debt.”

  Gamine pursed her lips and nodded thoughtfully. “All right, fair enough. So what are you saying? That we should abandon the uprising and simply give up? Just go home and let the governor-general and his forces do as they will?”

  Huang slumped in his chair, scowling. “I . . . I don’t know. I’m not saying that exactly . . . but perhaps.” He straightened fractionally, holding his chin up. “Perhaps we should, at that. Maybe everyone would be better off if we did.”

  “And shirk our holy responsibility?!” Gamine exploded out of her chair, pounding her fists on the table. “We have been given a sacred duty to accomplish, or had you forgotten?”

  Huang looked up at her, raising an eyebrow. “Given by whom?”

  “You know damned well, Fei!” She bared her teeth. “You might not believe, but the others do, and I’m telling you that if the powers demand that we pay a price, we will pay it, or be damned for the disobedience.”

  “Damned?” Huang repeated, looking almost bemused. “Gamine, have you forgotten that you and Wei simply made all of that up? You don’t actually believe that nonsense, do you?”

  Temujin kept his gaze fixed on the table, while Mama Noh looked daggers at Huang, but Ruan and Jue looked to Gamine, seeming eager to hear her response.

  They were disappointed
if so, since Gamine’s only response was to throw open the hatch and storm outside into the sunlight and dust.

  The long silence that followed was finally broken by Jue. “Hummingbird, are you saying . . . ?”

  “Not now, Jue!” Huang shouted, cutting him off. Then he, too, jumped up and stormed out, though instead of through the hatch he exited into his sleeping quarters, slamming the door behind him.

  The others in the inner circle were left at the table, Ruan and Jue on one side and Mama Noh and Temujin on the other, exchanging uneasy glances.

  “Well,” Ruan said, lacing his fingers behind his neck and leaning back in his chair, “that went well. . . .”

  Huang was pacing the small confines of the sleeping quarters, still seething, when Jue let himself in without knocking.

  “What is it?!” Huang snapped, whirling on him.

  Jue gave him a lopsided grin and held up his hands palms forward, an attitude of conciliation. “Just wanted to have a quick word, Chief.” The grin widened, and the scar up the side of Jue’s face flushed slightly red. “If you want to spar, though, that’s all right by me.”

  Huang’s expression softened fractionally, and he shook his head. “Sorry, Jue.” He sat on the edge of the bed, elbow resting heavily on his knees. “It’s just . . .” He trailed off and gestured toward the door. He didn’t need to say any more.

  Jue nodded. “It’s a tough business.”

  “Well, I suppose no one said an uprising would be easy.”

  The scar-faced man chuckled and shook his head. “Oh, that’s tough, too, Chief, but I was talking about women.”

  Huang leaned back and looked up at him, confused.

  “I had a wife once, you know. Long time ago, now. Back before I got this”—he pointed to the scar lining his cheek—“when I still worked down in the mine. Married a local girl, father was one of the loaders on the job. She’d been around miners all her life, so she didn’t mind my rough manners and rougher look. But it still seemed like we’d make a row damn near ever day, for one reason or another. Little things, too, like whether I’d left the teapot lid on or off, or closed the curtain when I left for the mine in the morning, or fed soupbones to a stray dog in the yard. Day and night we’d fight, it’d seem. But you know what? It was never about anything that mattered. It was always little things, you see, the mindless trivia of our waking lives. But when it came to the things that really mattered, the really important stuff? On those we never fought, never a once. Always of one mind, one accord, we were. That’s how I knew we were meant to be together. Two people can disagree about every little thing they want, but if they agree down to the core about the things that really matter to them, they can weather anything.”

  Jue left off talking for a moment, looking into the middle distance.

  “Where is she now?” Huang asked, finally breaking the silence.

  Rubbing the corners of his eyes and licking his lips, Jue gathered himself before answering. “With the ancestors, I expect. Or with the powers, if your lady’s to be believed.” He turned to meet Huang’s gaze. “Died in childbirth, Chief. Lost her and the baby, all the same day. Afterward, there was nothing for me but to work. Then I took it in my head to complain when an accident killed five loaders, my wife’s father with them. I agitated, kicked up a strike, and when Ouyang’s thugs came to break up the party, they decided to widen my smile before leaving me for dead.” He reached up, and absently ran his finger along the line of his scar. “Some of the others found me and patched me up. It didn’t take long to decide I’d had enough of mining and might want to try my hand at a different trade. I hooked up with Zhao, learned to use a sword and fire a rifle, and then . . .” He shrugged. “The rest you know.”

  Huang regarded his friend, wearing a pained expression.

  “Tell me, Jue, do you think I’m wrong? Is the prize worth the cost we’re paying? Should the uprising continue, and my guilt be damned?”

  Jue sucked at his teeth thoughtfully. “Well, I don’t know so much about prizes and costs, I suppose. I’m a simple man, Chief. Someone takes something from me, I take something of theirs. Someone hurts me or mine, I hurt them. But it seems to me that if we’re not in it, there’ll be a lot of folks paying all sorts of prices—pain, suffering, death—without getting anything back in the bargain. If we’re in there swinging, the regular folks at least have some chance of making a go at it, without Ouyang and his thugs getting in the way.”

  Huang nodded but didn’t speak.

  “Anyway,” Jue said, shrugging. “That’s not what I wanted to tell you, Chief. See, I’ve got this idea how we could put a hurt onto Ouyang, without our people taking much risk.” In response to Huang’s raised eyebrow, he continued. “Well, you know how important the Grand Trunk’s supposed to be, right?”

  It took nearly a week to turn Jue’s plan from bare notion to reality.

  It was simple, really. Almost deceptively so.

  The Grand Trunk was the principal artery that ran from one end of the Tianfei Valley to the other, the line upon which the three valley provinces were strung. All vital trade, travel, and commerce in the valley happened along its length, with people and goods constantly moving back and forth. The designers of the road had planned well and positioned it far from the valley walls on either side, clearing the largest of the nearby rock formations and outcroppings, leaving no convenient hiding places for a raiding party to wait in ambush. As a result, the road was virtually impregnable from attack by bandits or revolutionaries alike.

  But one point along the Grand Trunk was not quite so well protected, and while it was not as vital a part of the roadway as those stretches between the cities of Fuchuan, Shachuan, and Fanchuan, it was still absolutely essential, being the primary link between the Tianfei Valley and the north. The only other avenues out of the valley were by airship, which was prohibitively expensive for most commerce and casual travelers, and the far end of the Grand Trunk, where it terminated beyond Fuchuan, near where the northern plains began. But Fuchuan was many, many days’ travel away at the best of times. The main conduit for goods, produce, men, and materiél between the valley in the south, and the highlands, mines, and military garrisons of the north and east, was through a passage that connected the terminus of the Grand Trunk with the eastern end of the roadway leading to the Forking Paths.

  At this junction, the cliff walls closed on either side, towering a mile high, but less than half a mile apart. Since the onset of the uprising, the narrow pass would likely be well guarded, patrolled regularly by military forces. A direct confrontation on the ground would no doubt be a costly one for the Fists.

  However, Jue wasn’t a soldier, but instead thought like a miner. And from a miner’s perspective, there was a simple solution to the problem, not from below, but from above.

  Two teams had set out from the Fists’ hiding place in the Forking Paths, heading east toward the junction. But rather than approaching on the roadway, the teams split up, one scaling up and out of the canyon maze to the north, and the other to the south. They would travel on foot and approach the cliff walls of the Grand Trunk junction from above.

  The journey was almost two days of hard slogging. The teams didn’t communicate by radio—for fear that their transmission would be intercepted—but at set times of day signaled each other with mirrors that reflected the light of the sun for dozens of miles, and at night employed lanterns for the same purpose. Even with binoculars they were just able to discern the flashing lights and pick out the sequence of flashes that they’d agreed upon.

  By the evening of the second day they were in position—Huang with his team atop the northern cliff wall, Jue and his on the southern.

  All those selected for this mission, except Huang, had been miners before they joined the Harmonious Fists. And they were well familiar with the heavy equipment they had lugged on their backs these last two days. Huang had only to give the order, and they went to work.

  The drill was first. With one man to s
teady and two more to turn, the bit gradually bore deeper and deeper into the rock atop the cliff face, making only a low, barely audible hum. When the bit was fully extended, the bore went down almost six feet. Then they retracted the bit, moved the drill a few paces down, and started again. Finally, when the night was half gone, there were a dozen holes, each as deep as a man was tall, in a perfect line a half dozen paces from the cliff’s edge.

  Then the explosives were carefully unpacked and moved into position. They had been the most harrowing aspect of the two-day trek from the Fists’ camp, with Huang always fearful that one of the bearers might slip and jostle the explosives too hard, and then they would all go up in one enormous blast. But they’d made it this far without incident, and with great care the former miners managed to get the explosives lowered into each of the bored holes and carefully packed into place.

  Next the miners ran wires from each of the packed explosives, up the height of the bore hole, and then across the top of the cliff, a hundred paces to a rocky outcropping behind which the detonator had been positioned. Then, with precision and care, they wound each wire to the detonator contacts and carefully locked the trigger in the safety position.

  When the last of the wires were attached, all that would remain would be to wait for Jue’s signal that his team had finished the same work on the opposite wall, and they could retreat to safety and blast. Carefully placed, the explosives would shear off the front of the cliff faces and send them tumbling down to cause an avalanche. Rock falling from one side or the other would not be sufficient to block the roadway, cutting off the Grand Trunk from the Forking Paths and the highlands beyond—but an avalanche falling from both sides would do the job nicely.