by Zoe Marriott
I nodded, wet my lips, and stepped back from Yulong a little before letting out my best version of a hwamei’s call. I repeated it twice, and we both looked around, fruitlessly searching the sky for a sign of the little bird.
Just as Yang Jie’s shoulders began to sag, there was a sweet, liquid trill, and a reddish-brown flash zipped past my face and landed on his shoulder. He stroked the hwamei’s head tenderly with one finger. “Good girl, Bingbing. I’m glad you’re all right.” The look he gave me was glowing. “Thank you!” he said, sounding almost more grateful to have the little song thrush restored to him than he had to be rescued.
I cleared my throat and scratched Yulong’s poll absently. “My horse needs rubbing down – will you help?”
By the time we had attended to Yulong and shared a canteen of water and a small packet of preserved lemon peel that Yang Jie had in his pocket, we were well on the way to becoming friends.
“So you’re headed to the army camp, too?” I asked, trying not to wince as I swallowed the last lukewarm mouthful of water. My throat was still horribly sore from the tincture. “How long have you been travelling?”
“Only a day. Our lands are just over that last hill, see? My father wouldn’t even give me a horse for the journey – he said the army ruins them, and it would be a shame.” Yang Jie cast a frankly envious look at Yulong’s gleaming lines.
“So you fell in a hole on your very first night away from home?”
“Don’t say it like that!” he protested with a sheepish laugh. “I’ve crossed this part of the forest a dozen times before. There was no sign anything had changed until it was already too late. It could have happened to anyone. I’m really not helpless.”
I eyed him doubtfully. I was slim for a boy my age, and a little below average height. But not remarkably so. Yang Jie was nearly two inches shorter, and even slighter than I was. His perfect complexion told me that he hadn’t yet attempted to shave. Of course he, unlike me, would probably grow taller and fill out as he aged … but still…
“How old are you?” I asked casually.
“Sixteen,” he said candidly, showing no evidence of a lie. “You?”
I cleared my throat. “The same. I’m the oldest boy in my family – what about you?”
“I have two older brothers. But they’re both married, and busy running things for my father. Mother thought I was too young to go, but Father said I was the one who could most easily be spared. He says the army will toughen me up, ancestors willing.” He spoke without any resentment – or any particular emotion at all – but I felt my jaw tighten.
“Did you have a camp somewhere?” I asked him. When he looked at me blankly, I added. “You don’t have a pack or a sword or … anything with you.”
He stared at me for a second in dawning horror. “I was carrying my pack when I fell into the pit. It … it must be at the bottom.”
I smacked him lightly on the shoulder in a mannerism I had seen local boys use with their friends. “Don’t panic. We can go back and fish it out.”
He blinked, one eyebrow creeping up. “We?”
I nodded firmly. “We.”
We crested the hill above the camp and stopped by unspoken agreement, staring. I barely managed to stifle my instinctive noise of disgust and took comfort that Yang Jie didn’t bother to hide his own horrified expression.
“Not … much like the ballads, is it?” Yang Jie said faintly, leaning around Yulong’s shoulder to get a better look. Bingbing fluttered up and perched on the horse’s head. Yulong flicked his tail, but didn’t try to shake her off.
The delay of helping Yang Jie, followed by our need to test the ground ahead for traps until we hit the main road, had brought us to the camp in the late afternoon rather than before the midday meal, as I had planned. I had spent the time observing Yang Jie’s subtly swaggering walk and trying to learn to make my own movements a little more masculine. I’d thought I was doing rather well.
Staring down into the valley, I felt that sense of optimism drain away.
Crimson tents with gold insignias were neatly pitched in military formation, interspaced here and there by rough wooden buildings flying the emperor’s flag. In between was a churning mass of barely organized chaos: grim-faced men and foam-flecked horses stamping, bellowing, marching, running. Even from the top of the hill, the stench was overwhelming: the eye-watering tang of urine and dung and a musty fug of sweat, wood ash and burned food. It hadn’t rained in three days, but the floor of the valley was thick, black mud. I could feel the damp of it, moisture hanging in the air like an invisible fog.
“Where are we supposed to go?” Yang Jie asked. “It’s so…”
“I’m sure we – we’ll get used to it” – if I’m not discovered and killed within the day – “soon enough.” I tried to pull myself together. “For now, I need to stable Yulong, and then we should report to the censor. Someone ought to be able to direct us.”
The stables, logically enough, were situated close to a narrow stream, upwind from most of the camp but still protected by the bulk of the valley’s north ridge. After all, most generals would freely admit that a trained warhorse was worth the same to them as about half a dozen green, untrained recruits. Bringing a mount of Yulong’s calibre would increase my status as a conscript, but I would be expected to care for him myself, unlike the recruits who were assigned army mounts, and that would add to my workload.
Handing Yulong over to the brusque and competent grooms was the work of a few moments. I retrieved my sword and fumbled through fastening it at my side. Yang Jie, to my surprise, managed it twice as quickly. I noticed with a pang that his sword was brand-new … and of questionable quality.
The weight of my blade made me very conscious of the way I moved as I said a temporary goodbye to Yulong. No one so much as glanced at us as we headed out into the camp, dodging other men, the sucking mud and steaming piles of horse dung – after all, new young men would have been flooding in from all directions for weeks now. But I felt as if my skin were ill-fitting, prickling and chafing, a size too small. My walk was all wrong. My arms were awkward as they swayed uselessly at my sides – I was used to clasping my hands before me, inside my sleeves. I checked my shadow mask three times before I could force myself to stop.
Yang Jie also became quieter and quieter as we approached the centre of the camp. There, where the stable boys had pointed us, was a large, grand tent, with a wooden sign painted with the censor’s name, governmental rank and noble titles. It seemed like bad strategy to give away such good information to potential spies or assassins. But, well, no one wanted my opinion.
“Do you have your scroll?” I asked Yang Jie, gesturing with the slightly crumpled roll of paper that my father had entrusted to me.
“Yes, here,” he mumbled, pale-faced, pulling it – pristine – from a stiff leather pouch on his belt.
The tent’s front flaps were drawn back to create a wide entrance, and scented smoke and the steady light of good oil lanterns warmed me as we stepped inside. I stopped to allow a trio of other young men – as dishevelled and travel-stained as I felt – to pass by on their way out, and then took a place one polite step behind Yang Jie, who had already reached the great wooden desk that dominated the tent.
The censor was a small man huddled in a grand sweep of crimson-gold-and-black silk, wearing the black hat of a government official. His desk was covered with neat piles of ledgers, and a fine writing brush was poised in one hand, ready to leap into action. He lifted his head, revealing a snowy white moustache and brows, and a face that was as brown and wizened as a walnut.
“Brothers?” he asked, eyeing us.
“Er – no, sir, sorry,” Yang Jie stammered, clearly thrown. So was I, a little. The two of us looked nothing alike.
“No need to apologize,” the censor said, with a hint of amusement. “Name and scroll.”
Yang Jie looked at the paper in his hand as if he’d never seen it before, then dropped it before the censor.
“Oh – I – I’m Yang Jie, third son of Yang Wei, of the village of Nine Rivers in the prefecture of…” And then he was off, listing every fact and figure down to what seemed like his great uncle’s birthdate, and finally finishing with: “And this is Bingbing!”
As if she had been waiting for her cue, the little bird let out a soft trill and ruffled up her wings. I hoped, for Yang Jie’s sake, that birds were allowed in the camp.
“That is … quite an introduction, thank you,” the censor said. He flipped a page in his ledger and made a brief note, setting Yang Jie’s scroll to one side, then turned bright eyes on me. “And this is?”
Before I could think how to stop him, or even damn myself for forgetting until this second the confusion over my name, Yang Jie leapt in to proudly announce, “This is my friend Hua Zhi.”
The censor’s brow wrinkled a little. “Hua? Of which prefecture and town?”
I told him, swallowing dryly as I stepped forward to hand over my own paper.
“But that would make you – we were expecting your father. There is no record of a son of fighting age.” He had laid his brush down to examine my scroll carefully, thin fingers massaging out the creases. Apparently satisfied with it, he began to page distractedly through the ledger, the wrinkles on his face deepening. “Zhi, you say? There is a girl here, sixteen last year—”
Why did I think this would work? Why? I had a plan, didn’t I? Dear ancestors, what was my plan?
“Sir,” I interrupted as politely as possible, “I – I believe that is … my … twin sister. Zhilan?”
“That might be, but your birth was never noted.” He gave me a searching look – not yet suspicious, but … uncomprehending. As if an unregistered person were an impossible, mythical creature. It wouldn’t be long before he decided that if the record showed only a girl, then it must be a girl who stood before him as well. “Surely your father would have ensured his son and heir was correctly entered into the records!”
That … was an excellent point. Now what did I say? My mind spun madly, and then, like the sun breaking through storm clouds, an answer came to me. It was shameful. Wicked. Cynical.
It was perfect.
“My birth was a time of great sorrow and upheaval,” I said, lowering my tone gravely. “My sister died at birth. My mother nearly lost her life also. And my father…”
“Yes?” the man urged.
“If you will examine the date of my birth, I think things will perhaps become clear.”
His head bent. There was a long moment of silence. Then he breathed, “The Battle of the Thousand Steps! Yes, yes – I see. I remember – I met your father once, you know, when I was a junior censor. A remarkable man. We all prayed for him in his convalescence. I believe he was unable to return home for many months, and why then check the records? A very understandable mistake, with the similarity in names, and with one child living…”
He picked up his brush, rewetted it, and made a note in tiny, meticulous characters. When he raised his head, his eyes were bright and clear again. “And so, the great Hua Zhou sends us his son! You have – I notice it now – something of the look of him. He was a little taller, perhaps, but you still have growing years ahead of you. The son of the Wild Tiger, in our regiment! It is an honour to have you, young man.”
Yang Jie was staring at me, wide-eyed. Reeling with the knowledge of what I had done, I clasped my hands behind my back to hide the tremors. “Thank you, sir.” My voice cracked and broke on the words, just as the voice of any boy my age might do.
The censor cleared his throat, drawing his professionalism around him along with a handful of his heavy silk robe. “You’re among the last to arrive. Training will start tomorrow – the great gong will wake you. Report to the east barracks now with your friend.”
“Sir?” Yang Jie piped up unexpectedly. “Hua Zhi and I need to report a hazard we encountered on the way to the camp. So it can be marked on any maps and passed on to army intelligence.”
I quickly nodded in agreement, trying to conceal my flash of chagrin. I had forgotten about the trap field.
“A hazard? Very well, but you’ll need to talk to one of the captains about – ah, here is Captain Lu! Captain!” I turned to see a man who had apparently been passing by the tent stop and then shoulder his way through the entrance. He was in his late twenties, very fit, handsomely moustached. His expression was one of barely concealed impatience.
With his nose already back in his papers, the censor was apparently oblivious to the other man’s mood. “These young men have to report something to army intelligence. Take them away, would you, and see that they find their way to the barracks. Good man.”
The captain’s face darkened even more as he took in the pair of muddy, undistinguished young recruits he had been assigned to babysit.
Yang Jie let out a tiny, almost soundless noise of dismay.
“Of course, honoured sir,” the captain said quietly, voice containing no hint of the resentment in his eyes. He jerked his head at us and stalked from the tent.
Yang Jie and I scrambled after him.
He strode a few feet away from us, then turned and crossed his arms. “Well?”
Yang Jie’s face had gone grey with nerves. He cast me a helpless look, and I gulped. All right then.
“Sir, on the way to the camp this morning my friend and I were travelling through the forest in order to avoid the main roads—”
“How fascinating,” the captain said with a sigh.
I cleared my throat. “Sir, we found traps in the wood. In at least two different locations. Bear traps and bear pits with spikes. We think the Leopard is trying to thin the ranks of conscripted soldiers arriving here – he knows most of them will avoid the roads. And his men must return to them frequently because none of the traps had been sprung when we found them, and the pits were newly covered up so they couldn’t be detected.”
I ran out of breath and snapped my mouth shut.
The captain stared at us both for a moment, impatience fading into something more difficult to read. “And you two … you avoided these traps successfully and arrived here unscathed.”
Best not to go into Yang Jie’s adventure in too much detail. “We had some trouble. We were able to help each other out of it.”
“Oh, were you?” Now his lips twisted into a smirk, and I was sure I wasn’t imagining the innuendo in his voice. “Thank you for this … intelligence. However, if the Leopard had any such organized campaign, we would have had word of it by now. Nor do I believe that two such … unseasoned boys could have navigated a trap set by the Leopard’s men. It’s more likely that some locals have fallen on hard times and are over-hunting the forest.”
I unclenched my teeth with an effort. “There was imperial armour at the bottom of one of the pits, and what looked like a human skeleton.”
“Unfortunate,” Lu said without blinking. “In any case, you can be assured that I will treat your intelligence with the attention it deserves. Dismissed.”
“But—” I blurted, helpless to prevent myself.
Fast as a snake, the captain unfolded his arms and took a step forward. “But what, recruit?”
Yang Jie took hold of my arm in an iron grip and bowed humbly, keeping his face firmly aimed at the ground even as he began to back away. “Nothing at all, Captain – thank you so much for your time, sorry to bother you!”
The captain bared his teeth. Before he could say anything else, Yang Jie clucked his tongue, and Bingbing shot up from his shoulder, fluttering directly past the older man’s face and momentarily distracting him with a flurry of wings. He fell back a step.
Before he could recover, Yang Jie was off at a near-running pace, hustling me out of sight behind the censor’s tent and then away. A few breaths later, Bingbing landed back on Yang Jie’s shoulder, chirping smugly.
When Yang Jie’s grip on my arm finally loosened, I stumbled to a halt, looking around in some surprise to find us just where we ought to be: by the east
ern barracks. He’d dragged me half the length of camp and found the place unassisted.
“Thanks…” I began sheepishly.
“Hua Zhou is your father? Why didn’t you tell me?” Yang Jie demanded.
I looked at him in some surprise, taking in his heaving chest and tight lips. “I told you my name. I don’t usually introduce myself by bragging about my father. Why does it matter?”
“Because it’s going to get out! Everyone will know who you are, and everyone will be watching you, and if I’m near you then they’ll be watching me, too, and that’s exactly what I didn’t want! It’s going to be hard enough here for someone like me!” He gestured down at his slim form. “Most of the men here are going to assume they could snap me in half with one hand! And that’s without – without the sort of thing Lu was implying just then, too!”
I wasn’t imagining that, then. I took in a deep breath, then let it out as a sigh, feeling my shoulders sag. I hadn’t really thought of how this would look from someone else’s perspective. I’d just been glad to have found someone to … to blend in with so quickly. Another form of disguise. But not only that. A friend. It was selfish of me. He didn’t even know how selfish – how much of the wrong kind of attention I could attract.
I should have known better.
I rubbed both hands tiredly over my face. The thin skin of qi that concealed my real skin thrummed warmly under my fingers. “You’re right,” I admitted. “I – I really – don’t know what I was thinking. You don’t owe me anything, Yang Jie. If I could swap my name with someone else’s, I would. I can’t. So if you want to find other friends, I’ll understand.”
There was a taut pause, during which I waited with painful certainty to hear Yang Jie’s departing footsteps. Then his hand returned to rest – gently now – on my shoulder.
“I don’t want to. I like you. I just wish you’d thought this through and told me.” He pulled a wry face. “Though if you had stopped and thought things through before you came to rescue me from that pit, then perhaps you’d have left me there… So maybe I like your reckless streak. Just a little.”
