Li Zheng felt his legs give out as he collapsed to the sandy shore. The river collapsed as it smashed four thousand men in its haste to return to its natural state. The tornado of flame diminished and almost flamed out. The water suddenly rebounded, sending a forced tide-like surge across the way, washing up on the remaining two thousand men who sat in silent shock at what had just killed their fellows. The tornado again burst into the morning skies and then steadied. Then Li Zheng collapsed to the sandy shore of the river’s edge.
As his enemy collapsed to the sand, General Kang saw his moment. He withdrew his sword and this time he would lead the final charge. The clouds overhead dissipated as if they had never been, and the river once more flowed as if it had been as normal as the day before. The fire storm of tornado dwindled to nothingness.
Li Zheng looked up as the last of the general’s army started their charge to kill the Elemental. Again, his hands turned up to the sky, then they both came down. He once more reached into his robes and brought out the last nugget of his strange powers. This one was larger. This was the last of the ore he had brought from his travels back to his birth place. Once more he prayed to the heavens as his fingers, with the large silverish nugget in his right hand, dug deeply into the soil. He never felt the sand and rock as it scraped his fingernails to nothing, as he clasped the earth into his now balled fists. Sand and rock flowed from his fingers over and around the silver rock-like ore.
“Forgive me, my people. Your life will now start amidst your enemy’s deaths.” His hands left the earth and shot skyward. The sand of the riverbank and the ore flew high into the sky just as the stone and river sands left the fingers of the Master.
General Kang and his last two thousand men were only fifty feet from the far shore as arrows flew. Five of them struck Li Zheng, but still he held his hands even higher than before as the fists emptied of the damp earth.
Before the charging cavalry knew what was happening, it was as if the earth exploded. The water from the river shot once more into the skies. This time however the riverbed came with it. Earth and water joined the remaining flame from the firepit as it too rose. The cavalry was lifted with the natural elements of the world, and once more men, horses and equipment flew into the air. The first of the rising waters caught General Kang and threw him and his mount into the air. Kang felt his body swirling through the air and water, and then jarringly falling, crashing back onto the river bed that had once been the base for that water. He came to his senses in time to see his last two thousand men and their animals tossed a thousand feet into the sky with the exploding earth battering them to pieces. Then, as the earth and water were lifted totally free, he sat and watched as Li Zheng, who had finally become visible, slowly lower his hands, and with the arrows buried deeply into his chest and stomach, collapsed onto his face.
“We have met the Devil, and he has sent us all to the hell we deserve,” Kang moaned aloud, just as the river and earth, followed by the remaining flames of the fire, crashed back down, covering Kang and his dead ten thousand.
* * *
The skies cleared as if nothing had happened. The sun rose higher into the sky and the river was once more calmed. It flowed to the far shore and its waters slowly lifted the lifeless body of Li Zheng. The body swirled gently in the current for the briefest of moments and then it joined that of ten thousand of the emperor’s best soldiers, along with their General, as they started their long journey southward.
* * *
The Last Air Bender, the Great Elemental wizard of the great desert, bereft of the power of life, was now relegated to the annals of myth and legend.
* * *
Fifty miles to the North, General Chang watched as the last of the men and women of Li Zheng’s tribe crossed over the bottom row of giant stone blocks. There had been a brief battle with the soldiers guarding the unfinished portion of wall, but his men dispatched the Emperor’s killers with little effort or loss of life. The soldiers were buried in hidden places inside the wall for their witnessing of the great exodus of people. They would be buried in the wall for all of eternity.
The last two people he assisted up and over the low wall were the wife and child of Li Zheng. He felt the woman’s sorrow as he too knew they would never see the Master again. As he watched Zheng’s wife and infant man-child join those who now started North into the unknown lands, he looked in that direction. He knew what kinds of danger awaited them, but he knew that the Master had given them this once chance at life and freedom. He swore he would take these people to safety into the lands of the Master’s birth—the desert and rugged mountains of Mongolia.
* * *
The people of Master Li Zheng crossed the Great Wall and would vanish from history for over two thousand years.
* * *
Altai Mountains,
Mongolia, 1182 A.D.
The line of horses was packed full of the trade goods that were bartered for, near the Great Wall. The trip had been a long and arduous one for the thirty-six volunteers from the village of Hanshu, near the Gobi Altai Mountains. They had traded the spices drawn from the plants found only in that region for the seeds and poultry they now carried. They had also traded small ingots of gold and the silverish mineral they sourced from the mountains for the more expensive livestock. The silverish ore was found to be an excellent source for producing harder than normal steel and they used this to barter for the trade goods that were hard to come by in the forbidding mountains that protected the village of Hanshu. These long trips were made once every five years so as to avoid any observant eyes of the Empire of China.
The campsite they had chosen this night was a protected canyon where a small trickle of water was to be had from a creek that coursed its way down the rugged and rocky mountain. The camp was jovial as each man knew they would not have to set up another camp as they were only ten hours away from the borders of their hidden village. The horses had been unpacked and were now standing and feeding on the last of their grain supply. All in all, it had been a good trip to the enemy’s homeland, and the joviality came from the fact they had come and gone without spies from the empire catching on that their greatest threat had been amongst them.
The cooked chicken and rice was passed from eager hand to eager hand as the men talked and joked of their successful trade expedition.
Wei Mei, the oldest of the travelers, was sitting cross-legged by the fire as his men laughed. He felt the tension of the last four months of dangerous travel slipping from the men as if it were an important bodily discharge. He could not help but allow his own guard to lag as they neared their hidden home of over a thousand years.
“Wei Mei, this is the first time in the months that we have been traveling that I have seen your sour face smile,” said one of the men, who was removing one of the small chickens from a spit over the fire. The man reached out and slapped the leg of the man next to him, “I told you he was human.”
The men laughed, and Wei Mei finally nodded and also smiled. Suddenly he lost that smile as he held up a hand for silence. The men automatically lost their joviality, and each cocked an ear to the dark night. Wei Mei placed a hand on the sandy soil and felt the earth.
“Horses, five of them.”
The men, as experienced as they were of the dangers of their travels, automatically reacted. Each stood and retrieved their choice of weapons. Fifteen gathered bow and arrow, the other twenty-one, swords. Archers to the rear, swordsmen to the front. They circled the campfire, each wishing for the darkness that fire magnified.
Wei Mei slowly withdrew the sword that had been handed down to him by his great-great-great-grandfather. He heard their own mounts as they nervously pawed the ground as the five horses and the sound of hoof falls came closer. Suddenly, the noise stopped, ceasing just out of sight cast by the cooking fire.
“Greetings the camp,” came a voice from the darkness. “We are travelers in need of assistance. We mean you no harm.”
Wei Mei stepped forward, partin
g the swordsmen to their front. “How many are you?” he asked, knowing full well the visitors were outnumbered by his own men.
“We are five. We have two wounded men. May we approach the camp?”
“The speaker alone, come with hands outstretched into the light. There are many arrows ready to judge your actions.”
As the men watched, a single man came into the flickering firelight. His hands, complete with the battle gloves of a soldier, were held straight out in front. The clothes he wore were rough animal skin, his armor thickened leather. He was helmetless, and he looked to be himself one of the wounded he spoke of.
“We mean you no harm, brothers. My companion has taken many an arrow, all we need is clean water and the light and warmth of your fire. Perhaps food if you can spare it.”
Wei Mei gestured for ten men to leave the camp and gather at the base of the mountain trail, hidden from view. They would assure the newcomers would remain well-behaved.
“Bring your men forward, we will do what we can.”
They watched as the grateful man turned and vanished into the darkness. Wei Mei and his men tensed. They relaxed when the five men reappeared entering the circle of firelight as if ghostly specters from the desert beyond. Two men were holding another up and the last two had their loosed equipment. Wei Mei could see the group was heavily armed.
“Bring the injured man closer to the fire.” He stepped closer to the visitors from the Gobi. “I feel you will find no complaint if my men hold your weapons for you?”
The five men stopped short of entering the camp. “You are not men of the Gobi?” the man who had initially spoken asked.
“If a people who have called the Gobi home for over twelve hundred years are considered not of the desert, then yes, we are strangers in a strange land.”
Wei Mei saw the broken shaft of an arrow as it protruded from the speaker’s thigh. He handed off his burden to another and then stepped forward, heavily limping.
“We have heard the rumors of an ancient tribe that hides in the Altai Mountains. We thought the tales only myth, as no one can live in such desolation.”
Wei Mei remained silent. He watched as the man nearly collapsed from his thigh wound. Wei Mei sprang forward and caught the boy before he struck the earth. “Come, assist this man to the fire,” he ordered.
As seven men came forward and helped the wounded men and their three companions, they all saw who it was who came in from the dark night. One of Wei Mei’s men turned and looked at the older man. “They are Mongols, General.”
The visitors, even the man with three arrows in his leather covered breast, reacted to the word ‘general’. They looked up in fear, or was it killing anger.
“They are but men. Bring them in.”
With trepidation attacking the normal kind hearts of the traders, the visitors were allowed in. The severely wounded man was brought to the fire and the speaker of the group knelt beside him. The broken arrow was causing him much pain as he leaned in close to the man who looked to be dying.
“We are safe for now, my old friend. These men will help…”
Wei Mei watched as the man collapsed onto his dying friend. He moved to take the weight from the silent man lying near the fire. He gestured to his men. “Get these men food and drink.” He helped the wounded man to sit up. “We need to get that arrow out of your leg, my son.”
“No, I am not important, please help my friend.”
Wei Mei looked back at the boy by the fire. He shook his head as he placed a hand on the wounded man’s shoulder and forced him to lay down. “I fear your friend is beyond our help. You, we can assist, but this man will soon join his ancestors.”
The man fought to sit back up.
“Here,” Wei Mei said as the men of both tribes gathered around the fire. The newcomers were drinking from bronze cups greedily, “bite upon this. It will not be pleasant.” He took hold of the broken shaft of arrow. The piece of rolled leather was placed into the man’s mouth and he bit down with his angry eyes still fixed on his dying friend near the fire. In a moment of pride, the Mongol spat the leather from his mouth. His concentration was only upon the boy. Suddenly he closed his eyes and swallowed as the pain engulfed his sun scorched features as the arrow and its barbed tip was yanked from his thigh. Wei Mei immediately placed a folded cloth on the spurting wound. “You did not cry out. Either it is because you suffer wounds like this often, or you are just too stubborn to allow strangers to see your pain. Yes, you are truly Mongol.”
The man tried to sit up. “My friend.”
“I have seen many battle wounds,” Wei Mei slapped the cloth holding the man’s blood flow at bay, and then took the man’s left hand and made him compress his bleeding wound. “Two of the arrows can be pulled free of his body without killing him. The third however is lodged too close to his heart. As I said, your friend will join his ancestors before the breaking of the dawn.”
The man reached out with his free hand and grasped the cold one of the dying man. “I have failed you. Before the dawn I will guide you to those ancestors. I will join my brother in death.”
“Mongols are so very dramatic. Foolish, but dramatic.”
The voice came from the darkness. “And as well trained as my General is at battle tactics, he does not fare as well as a physician.”
The men moved to their weapons for the second time that night. Soon they heard the ten men that had been sent into hiding run into the camp.
“Apologies, General, we heard no one approach the camp,” said one of the breathless bowmen as he stumbled into the fire lit encampment.
“Calm yourselves,” Mei Wei said as he tried to ease the minds of his scared men and their Mongolian guests. He knew the voice well. He stepped toward the darkness and the voice beyond. The Mongols wanted their weapons and Wei Mei’s men held them at bay. “How many times have I warned you not to venture from the village alone?”
“You fret as much as my wife, General,” said the voice in the dark. “Now, may I enter the camp without receiving a welcoming arrow from your frightened men?”
“Stand down,” Wei Mei said to his men. He turned to the wounded man he had just assisted. “Fear not, he is our Master.”
The Mongols did not relax as the other men did. They watched as the lone figure in the long robes of a monk entered the circle of light. Wei Mei stepped forward and then went down on one knee. The newcomer placed a hand on the man’s dark hair and then assisted him to his feet.
“Why are you so far from home?”
The newcomer lowered his hood and looked at the more relaxed faces of Wei Mei’s men, and then turned and looked at the apprehensive faces of their visitors. Then his attention went to the man lying nearest the fire.
“Not only do I like greeting the supply trains when they return from their long journey, I am here for him,” he said as he gestured at the boy. The small man slowly approached the fire. The three Mongols dropped their cups of water and surrounded the dying man. Even the man with the leg wound tried to stand.
“He will not live to see the dawn, Master.”
The man stopped and smiled at the men surrounding the wounded boy. Then he turned and faced Wei Mei. “You left these many months ago as a General, now I learn you have returned not only a commander of the home watch, but that of a healer as well?”
“Master, I have seen many wounds in my lifetime—battle wounds, and even those received in stupidity. This is a dead man.”
“Don’t say that again,” the man who had just had the arrow removed from his leg said as he struggled to sit up.
“Calm, my Mongolian brothers. No one is dying here tonight.” The newcomer smiled and then turned in a circle to face every man present, Chinese and Mongolian.
“Who is this purveyor of riddles?” the barbarian asked as he was assisted to his feet by his brother Mongolians.
“He is fire, air, earth, wind and water. He is Master Zheng.”
“This is a lie. The wizard you speak of d
ied a thousand years ago.” The man struggled in the arms of his men as he became angered at such a brazen falsity.
“Yes, he did die over a thousand years ago, but his bloodline lives on,” Wei Mei said as he turned to face the startled Mongolians.
“We all live, we all die. Our destiny has always been to rejoin the earth from which we all spring,” Zheng said as he lowered to his knees with the palms of his hands touching as he bowed his head in prayer. When he was done, he kept his eyes closed and, with his right hand, he reached for the boy. He placed the hand between the three arrows that protruded from the leather chest armor of the Mongolian.
“What is he doing?” the Mongol asked, favoring his wounded leg as his companions held him up.
“This boy, he fevers from far more than his wounds.” Zheng looked up at the men surrounding the scene. “I see the arrows’ feathers are of the same tribal colors as your own.”
The Mongols remained silent.
“Familial squabbles are usually the harshest of all.” Zheng placed his right hand on the boy’s fevered brow. He tilted his head to the left as he once more closed his deep brown eyes. “Do you wish to speak to the boy?” Zheng asked as he finally looked up again. He faced the man with the wound to his leg.
“I find it difficult to speak to the dying. He will not hear my words.”
Zheng smiled as he took the hand of the wounded man and placed his other upon the chest of the boy. Suddenly the doubtful man felt the electricity flow through Zheng as the feeling hit him as a lightning bolt. His eyes fluttered as Zheng closed his own. The memory was as clear as the man had ever remembered it being. Two boys playing on a plain of grass. It was himself and his dying friend. He was ten and the boy seven. They were stalking five wild horses that had wandered down from the great rift. That had been a good day as they had both caught two of their horses. They had made their small village proud that day. The man pulled his hand free and looked upon a smiling Master Zheng.
Empire of the Dragon Page 4
