by Zoe Marriott
Keep him distracted. Keep him away from the general. Just keep him busy…
The general surged up off the floor, a short knife glinting in his hand. He lunged at the captain’s unguarded back. Lu somehow caught the movement from the corner of his eye. Shock crossed his face and he whirled to meet the Young General’s attack.
I darted into the gap in his defences and drove my blade into his right side. The sword hit his lower ribs. I twisted the blade upward as my father had taught me, forcing it under the cage of bone into his chest cavity. There was a telltale, sickening pop as the tip of my sword pierced his heart; a shudder in my blade as the muscle tried to beat around it.
Lu let out a tiny, choked gasp, face twisting into an absurd expression of betrayal.
Then he toppled sideways, ripping my sword from my grasp as he fell. Blood spurted out of the wound, coating my hands and gauntlets. It steamed in the chill air: hot and iron-stinking. The captain hit the ground, twitching and kicking in his death throes.
The overpowering metallic stench of blood and waste, the impact I could still feel in my arms … it was too much.
Without even stopping to check if the man was dead, I turned away. My head was filled with distant whooshing sounds and my stomach flipped and shuddered like a landed fish under my ribs. I was going to faint. I was going to be sick.
I braced one bloody hand against the stockade door, gulping air and desperately trying to swallow back the bile that wanted to rise in my throat. Water trickled from my eyes, almost burning my damp, cold cheeks. I coughed, spat, unthinkingly swiped at my face with my spare hand, and realized I’d only covered myself with more blood.
“Steady.” Wu Jiang’s voice made me jump violently, and he kept me in place with one big hand braced firmly against my back. “Steady now, you’re all right.”
“Apologies,” I managed to whisper.
“First time?” he asked with rough kindness.
It wasn’t. It wasn’t. I shouldn’t be reacting like this. But I had only been a child before, and the man I had stabbed had been a stranger whose face I had never seen. This was the first time I had really known what it was to take another’s life. That pop and the way the blade had moved my hand… I didn’t have the words. I jerked one shoulder in a shrug.
“I was sick my first time.” He thrust a square of cloth – silk, embroidered with gold and red peonies – at me. “Wipe your face. Take a deep breath, blink and swallow. You’ll stop shaking in a moment.”
I stifled my protest about the cloth being too good to ruin – really, if he didn’t care, why should I? He probably had five hundred more like it – and hid my face in it, scrubbing it roughly as I obeyed his instructions, forcing myself to breathe as if I was meditating. I blinked my gritty eyes twice, and swallowed three times.
It worked. I felt the shaking ease from my hands. My stomach still felt raw, but it stopped churning. I cleared my throat, clenched my teeth and straightened up, pulling my other hand away from its scarlet imprint on the wall. “Sorry,” I repeated, more loudly this time.
“No apologies – you saved my life. Now, are you with me? We need to get out there.”
I nodded jerkily. Of course. The attack. Captain Lu and the truth of who he was, how this had happened – it would all have to wait. We were needed.
Fourteen
eneral Wu handed me my sword. He must have pulled it from Captain Lu’s side – and, I noted gratefully, he had wiped it clean as best as he could. The grip was still sticky and uncomfortable in my hands. Blood was already browning under my fingernails. It would take a lot of scrubbing to make either my weapon or myself entirely clean again.
Blood clung to everything it touched. I’d found that nothing more than a nuisance during my monthly bleeding. Now it seemed more like a judgement…
“Your head, sir,” I said abruptly. “You – you were injured…”
“Nothing serious. He just stunned me,” he said, turning businesslike now that I seemed to be pulling myself together. “You stopped him before he did any real damage.”
I peered up at him, seeing that, despite the gory smears decorating the right side of his face, the cut had already stopped bleeding. It was hard to make out in the dim light, but I thought that the colour in his cheeks looked healthy enough, and his eyes met mine evenly, without any sign of pain. That was as far as my limited knowledge of healing took me. I would have to accept his word.
“Do we have a plan?” I asked, hoping that if I acted unshaken and competent, it would force me to be unshaken and competent.
“Our first duty is to find the commander and seek orders from him. We must suppress any resistance we encounter and render help anywhere it’s required along the way.”
“Understood.” I hefted my sword and followed him in a generous circle that took us away from … from the mess, back to the door. I left a trail of wet, crimson footprints as I went.
Perhaps my pretence was working, or maybe it was an effect of too many shocks in one day, too little food, the cold … or some combination of all those. Either way, a strange feeling enfolded me, a kind of numbness. I felt as if I was watching everything from the outside, at a slight remove from my own body and actions. It was nothing like my father’s descriptions of mindless, hot, battle fury. I was vaguely grateful that Wu Jiang was there to give me orders. Otherwise, I might have sat down on the floor and stared at the wall until someone came along and kicked me.
The scene outside was one of total chaos. Trampled tents in ankle-deep mud; thick, drifting fog – a combination of mist and smoke from the fires I could see in the distance and the cannons I could still hear booming erratically somewhere nearby; men running back and forth so quickly that my eyes could not distinguish friend from foe before they had already passed. The corpse of a shaggy, palomino pony lay half-buried in the mud, nearly blocking the exit to the stockade. Its back and neck bristled with arrows. The battle had already swept through here and moved on to a different part of the valley. This was its graveyard.
A frenzied scream on my left. A man clad in dark armour that had been clumsily painted with golden spots – leopard spots – charged us, sword bared. Before I could even shift my grip on my weapon, the Young General was there. His sword flicked twice, deceptively leisurely, and the enemy fell.
The general looked back at me as if to say something – and I reacted to a flash in my peripheral vision, leaping at Wu and dragging him down to his knees. The arrow whistled over our heads and embedded itself in the stockade door, still vibrating.
“That’s twice,” the general said, staring up at the arrow. He gave me a slightly sick smile. “Slow down a little, would you? It’s starting to look like showing off now.”
Another cannon blast shook the air, closer, almost deafening. A wild cheer of triumph went up somewhere on the other side of the stockade. Two men – no – three … four men in the dark, gold-spotted armour of the enemy fled past in the other direction, not even noticing us.
Wu Jiang grabbed my forearm and heaved me out of the sucking mud, then took off running in the direction of the cannon fire. I laboured after him, tripped over a body lying face down in the dirt – a man I thought I had known slightly, from south barracks – scrambled to my feet again and caught up just as he reached the centre of camp.
At the officers’ practice field, the place where I had sparred with the general, someone had made a rough but effective barricade from two overturned wagons. Who? The enemy or our people? The ground before the barrier was littered with fallen from both sides.
The general did not stop to check. He charged around the closest wagon and stopped dead. A spear-point glinted at his neck. I dived past him with a cry of defiance, already bringing my sword into position, and was confronted with a hundred or so imperial soldiers. It was Captain Sigong who held the weapon to the general’s throat.
He let the weapon fall. “Praise the heavens it’s you, sir,” Sigong said fervently.
The others let out
a ragged cheer. As if that had taken the last energy they had, some of them slumped down to sit in the mud, exhausted. I wished I could join them. I let my sword point fall but forced myself to remain upright.
“Situation?” Wu Jiang barked.
“We’ve sent them packing. They weren’t expecting us to be so good with the new fire lances, I don’t think. We’ve taken losses, but at this point I believe not as many as might have been expected. A few of my men went to harry the last stragglers from the camp, but only a handful of them escaped us. We’ve already started treating the wounded and gathering the dead.”
“Where’s Diao?”
“I haven’t seen him since the battle started,” Sigong admitted. “I was forced to take command.”
“And a very good thing you did, from what I can see,” Wu Jiang said sincerely. “But we must find out where the commander is.”
“You think he may have been taken?”
“Unlikely. If the rebels had intended kidnap, either for ransom or leverage, I would have been the best possible target for them,” he said matter-of-factly. “But instead, as soon as battle began, a Leopard spy attempted to murder me outright.”
“A spy? Here?”
“I’m afraid so. Captain Lu.”
Sigong’s eyes bulged. “Captain – our Captain Lu?”
The general pointed to his blood-streaked temple. “Gave me this, and would have run me through without Hua Zhi’s timely intervention.”
Sigong’s eyes flew to me as if noticing my presence for the first time. He gave me a nod. I saluted, for want of anything better to do – then sucked in a sharp breath, a sudden horrible thought bringing me out of my half-stupor.
“Something to add?” Wu Jiang asked, eyes intent.
“You said you’d left Lu with Diao … trying to convince Diao – about me…”
General Wu unsheathed his sword. “They were in my tent. Hua Zhi, Sigong, come on.”
Slightly bewildered as to why I was required, I followed.
The general’s tent was still standing, as were most in the central region of the camp. Sigong reached the entrance first and flung back the tent flap, then cursed: a single, short word under his breath. I’d never heard him swear before, not in all my advanced training sessions. As soon as I stepped inside, I realized why.
Diao and his aide-de-camp Sergeant Yun were still there.
I clamped my jaw shut against another surge of nausea at the stench of death in the small, enclosed space. Diao’s body was slumped in a camp chair, a dark wound gaping horribly at his neck. It was a clean, skilful cut. He would have been dead before he even had time to gain his feet. I guessed that he had been the first to die. Sergeant Yun had managed to get up, tipping his own chair over in the process, and his sword was half-drawn. He lay on the beautiful, ruined rug near Diao’s feet. He had been stabbed in the chest.
Sigong crouched beside Yun. “They’re warm, not beginning to stiffen yet. The blood’s going tacky, though.” He gently closed the dead man’s eyes.
General Wu nodded grimly. “So they were killed at the start of the attack.”
“Or their deaths immediately preceded it,” I put in, surprising myself. I had not intended to speak – but once I had started, I found it impossible to stop. “Lu was a traitor and he had a contingency plan, in case he was ever discovered. Kill anyone in his way and signal somehow to this raiding party so that he could escape in the confusion of the battle. This happened because I let myself be caught in here. Lu realized what I’d seen and panicked. I panicked him. I caused this.”
“Did you also cause Lu to sneak into my tent and try to poison me?” the Young General retorted. His voice was flat, but there was understanding in his eyes. “Don’t be ludicrous. The fact that you caught him at it and prevented my assassination merely accelerated his timeline. By forcing Lu’s hand and causing him to act before he was prepared, when only a small party of the enemy were near by to assist him, you may have prevented a much worse slaughter later on. And – I cannot emphasize this enough – saved me from a highly unpleasant death from whatever he’d dosed my wine with. That’s three times now, in fact.” His dimple flashed. “Didn’t I tell you to slow down? You’re making everyone else look bad.”
I looked down, blinking hastily, even though a careful check reassured me that my illusion was hiding the wet gleam in my eyes. As if anyone in the whole world had a chance of making General Wu look bad.
“Sir, I don’t know if this has occurred to you yet,” Sigong said, after a moment, “but Commander Diao’s death makes you our ranking officer. You’re in command here now.”
I glanced up again to see Wu Jiang regarding Sigong with almost no expression on his face. “Surely, as Diao’s remaining second in command, it would be more fitting for you to step into his place,” Wu Jiang said slowly. “My visit here was entirely informal and though I still hold the rank of general, I do not currently have command of any active troops.”
“With respect, General, you now have command of what amounts to a battalion. Nearly a thousand men.” Sigong paused. “Depending on our losses here, of course. It would fly in the face of protocol for a mere captain to lead them when we have a general present.”
General Wu bowed his head. When he straightened again it was with tense shoulders, as a man who is forced to stand under the weight of some great burden. “Very well. Then if I am to be commander-general, my first act will be to clear Hua Zhi of any suspicion of wrongdoing – and promote him to corporal.”
I felt my jaw drop, and quickly closed my mouth again before anything foolish could fall out. That was an unprecedented promotion – a leap up three ranks, since I hadn’t even attained private status officially yet. I allowed my illusory face to glow with happiness and gratification. That this man, this astonishing officer, should rate my skills so highly! I saluted, swallowed and said merely, “Thank you, sir.”
“Oh, don’t thank me. There’s a price: with Yun dead I’ll need an aide-de-camp – secretary, servant and general dogsbody – and you’re the unlucky man I’ve chosen. It’s the worst job in the army. By this time tomorrow, you’ll wish I’d had you flogged instead.” He sounded remarkably cheerful all of a sudden.
Sigong’s weathered face creased into a rare smile and he gave me a nod, which I took to be approval. “Very fitting, if I may say so, General. What are your orders for me?”
Wu frowned, eyes going distant. “The Leopard knows we’re here. He held off from attacking because he had a spy in place who was presumably feeding him valuable intelligence. But now the spy’s gone and I’m still here, like a sitting duck just waiting to be plucked and roasted. Our recruits have proved themselves in battle and need no further testing – we’ll pack up and leave this valley with all possible speed, and put as much distance between us and it as fast as we can. Once we’re clear of the area, we’ll march to the City of Endless Serenity to reinforce my aunt’s standing army there for the time being.” He nodded decisively. “Every recruit who survived the battle will receive the rank of private, effective immediately. Training is over.”
And despite myself, despite everything that had happened … I felt a thrill of excitement.
My first act as a newly struck corporal was to locate the commander’s large tent – half-trampled into the dirt, but otherwise undamaged – and hunt out a group of able-bodied men to quickly clean and re-erect it. We carried out the broken furniture, rearranged what was left, and transported over General Wu’s own things from the guest tent where he had been sleeping. Luckily, General Wu’s chief body servant, a crisply efficient imperial eunuch named Shu Yuen, had survived the attack. After appraising him of the changed situation, he bustled into action, chivvying the rest of the general’s entourage along and quickly taking over the task of ensuring Wu Jiang’s comfort on his first night as commander-general.
“Fast work,” Wu Jiang said as he appeared at the entrance to the tent, surveying the sparse but cosy interior. Lamps were lit, a hip bath
of steaming water was waiting, and Shu Yuen was in the process of laying out dinner on the desk. Wu’s shining armour had become plastered in mud since I last saw him. There was even a dripping white mark – bird mess? – on his left shoulder.
General Wu was still talking. “I won’t need you again this evening, I don’t think. Go and get something to eat and get cleaned up, Hua Zhi. You’ve worked hard today, and I want us up an hour before dawn tomorrow.”
“Yes, sir. Good evening.” I saluted and backed out, barely noticing the friendly clap on my arm as I passed.
Outside, I allowed the tent flap to fall shut. I stood for a moment, blinking dazedly and barely aware of the hostile and appraising stares of General Wu’s two bodyguard-outriders, who flanked the tent entrance.
Yang Jie. Ma Wen. Yulong.
I spun on my heel and bolted.
The strange sense of distance which had taken over me in the stockade fell apart like paper in the rain. They had been under attack – fighting for all our lives – and I hadn’t been there with them, hadn’t even had the chance to try to help any of them. Yang Jie was injured, isolated in the infirmary without even his sword. So many awful things could have happened to him, to any of them. Fear and desperation burned in my chest like an ember, physically painful. I was surprised smoke didn’t belch from my mouth.
I sprinted past the stables on my way to the east barracks building, almost choking with relief when I saw they were intact – untouched by fire or any sign of attack. Yulong would be fine, then.
East barracks had escaped the raid unscathed, too, with no visible damage. Surely it must be a good sign? I hit the door with a bruising thud and flung it wide.
The room beyond was filled with smoke-stained, blood-spattered faces – exhausted, but familiar and alive. Many of them jolted at the thoughtless violence of my entrance. I mentally cursed myself. On a nearby bed, a young man I knew quite well was sitting slumped over his knees. He came to his feet in a rush and ran to me, grabbing me by the shoulders for a hearty shake.
