Legend of The Young Master

Chapter 184: Go to Bed

And then there was a wall of gray light across the sky, and the ballista tower exploded in sparks and a shower of stars. One long scream rang out across the night—then the top of the tower leaned outward and fell into the darkness, taking the ballista and four men of the group with it. It crashed to the floor of the valley four hundred feet below, sounding like a long rumble of an avalanche.

And then there was only silence.

Meiying had made it to the courtyard when the gray fire hit, and she was standing close enough to the gate to be hit by stone chips from the curtain wall. A stone slammed into her shoulder from the broken tower. Up on the main donjon, she could see Xilai as he leaned out over the wall, with blue Qi fire coursing over his hands.

The gate had taken a glancing hit and whole chunks of the crenellations had fallen on the covered way, crushing part of the roof. Inside, men and horses of Baijian's group were trapped in pitch black, and there were horse screams of anguish and human shouts.

"Get torches! Lanterns! On me!" Meiying shouted.

Just under the back end of the covered way, Quanbo, one of the warriors, was lying under the ruin of his horse, and his leg was broken. Meiying went with a pair of archers—Yiluo and Fengtu—to get the horse off him. The archers used spears to raise the carcass, and Quanbo worked not to scream.

The roof of the covered way had taken most of the gate's collapse, and it hung askew, with the beams creaking ominously. It was pitch black under the roof, and men with lanterns appeared at last as the first Qi warrior emerged, leading a bucking warhorse whose off-left foot almost killed the just-rescued Quanbo had he not protected himself with his Qi.

The horse was wild, and more archers grabbed for his reins to hold his head, and then off-duty attendants were pouring out of the main tower.

"Where's Baijian?" she asked. She plunged deeper into the gloom, and Fengtu, usually not a man with any warrior's will whatsoever, followed her. The lantern lit a dozen horsemen fighting their mounts for control in the enclosed space.

All of them were dismounted, hauling at their horses' heads, and the horses would calm for a moment and then go off again as another horse continued to panic in the darkness and the noise. Quanbo's dead horse was not helping—it smelled of blood and fear.

"Get them out!" Baijian roared.

Hooves were flying. The men were in full armor, but the horses were not calming, and soon enough they'd kill their riders if the riders were not using Qi to protect themselves.

Baijian arrived soon but with a whoosh, the gate behind Baijian exploded in flame. It illuminated the narrow space and the plunging horses, the men's armor, like a foretaste of hell.

Almost as one, the horses turned and ran from the fire. Most of the Qi warriors were knocked from their feet.

Fengtu flattened himself against the wooden wall and Meiying tried to cover him as the great brutes pounded past, leaping the corpse of the dead horse.

Out in the courtyard, the attendants were ready, and they lunged for reins, threw sacks over the horses' heads, and spoke to them calmly and authoritatively, like lords speaking to their serfs. They took control of the horses quickly, kindly, and ruthlessly.

The warriors began to get to their feet.

Meiying realized that the fire at the gate wasn't generating any heat about the same moment that the Young Master stepped out of the darkness and raised his hands.

The flames went out like a candle in the wind. Wuyi walked around if he was walking in park not in fort being sieged by demonics.

"Baijian? Let's get a head count. Anyone missing?" he shouted, walking past her. It was dark again, but he seemed to know she was there—he turned unerringly to her. "We lost a dozen men in the ballista tower. Go and see if anyone can be saved."

His eyes glowed in the dark.

"Young Master," she nodded in the pitch black and went back into the relative light of the courtyard, past a dozen angry war horses and the men trying to calm them. Farmers and their wives and daughters were crowding the door yards and windows.

The ballista tower looked like a broken tooth. About a third of the upper floor was gone, and Meiying thought the only blessing was that it had fallen out—away from the courtyard—and not in.

The second floor roof had collapsed inward though, showering stones and roof beams on sleeping soldiers. Lejin—the youngest archer in the group—lay dead, crushed under a beam, his broken body horrible in the flickering fire of the fallen floor. Zuoan—another of the youngest—was trying to get the beam off him and was crying.

Meiying put on her best command voice, walled off her panic, and shouted, "I need some help up here!"

Archers poured up the ladders to her. Men she knew—Lejin, her own archer, and Qinujian, perhaps one of the best archers in the group, and Jingtu, perhaps the worst; Yinhai Hu, moving like a dancer, and Peilun, another big guy who was as big as a house. They got the beam up off the dead boy and discovered Kanji pinned under it, unconscious and with a lot of blood under him.

And behind him, wedged into a safe space made by a window ledge, was Qingze, the fattest man in the company.

More men continued to arrive—Huan clansmen, already under training by Wuyi's warriors, joined forces with the Weixu boys, also from a local clan, who emerged from the courtyard. Together with other farmers, they quickly cleared away the heavy timbers and debris. Meanwhile, one of Master Zhenying's men, previously collaborating with the old advisor, set up a ballista mechanism.

By the time dawn was breaking, they had managed to salvage and lift the heavy arrows from the rubble, arranging them neatly in the courtyard.

The Young Master stood there looking around, hands on his hips, watching the work. He didn't turn his head. "Well done, Meiying. Go to bed."

She shrugged. "Lots left to do," she said wearily.

He turned to her with a smile. Very quietly, like a lover, he leaned into her ear. "This is the first bad night of a hundred to come," he whispered. "Save your strength. Go to bed."

She sighed and looked at him, struggling to hide her adoration. "I can do it," she said fiercely.

"I know you can do it," he said, rolling his eyes. "Save it for when we need it. I'm going to bed. You go to bed. Yes?"

She shrugged, avoiding his eyes. Walked away...

...and realized that her bed had been in the ballista tower. She sighed.

In the end, they lost six archers and one Qi adept. It was a hard blow. Wuyi looked at their names, crossed them off the list, and shook his.

On the other hand, he had the Weixu boys, the Huan boys, and Baoxin. And a likely goldsmith's apprentice named Dujuan who was a painter and a lanky youngster called Wenxu. But they already had started training in Qi.

He handed the list to Baijian. "Fix the list; now we have some new warriors. We have another adept, I believe, who was in the watchtower—"

"Dead as a nail," Baijian said. He shrugged. "Gone with the tower. Didn't even find his body."

Wuyi sighed. "We're down an adept group, then."

Baijian nodded and chewed on something. "I'll find you another adept group," he said.

Wuyi gave another sigh. What had he gotten himself into? By the end of it, he was going to lose a lot more warriors. But he had to see it through now. When he came here, he was in for only one goal; he achieved it very soon. At first, he thought he did not have to stay, but he was staying out of curiosity; now things had gone beyond control.

He wanted to leave, but they were surrounded. He learned a few more things that had made him stay and see the mission through. The brotherhood medallion they had received—if they left without completing the mission, it might make the brotherhood take away their outer faction medallion. Unless someone with a pavilion seal approved his mission, it would not count as completed.

Not that he could just steal the seal and get done with it. But knowing how mysterious this world was, where the enemy was summoning meteorites, he did not want to create more complications before he understood how things worked. The brotherhood was very strict about these things. Not only would he lose the medallion, but he would also lose his future opportunities.

He might have to start over again with a new clan and title. Besides, his statue of knowledge had told him his chances were not lost here; he still had a 60% chance with the arrival of the Royal advisor.

Wuyi still did not know what was going on about the entity outside the chamber. If he had a chance to win, he was going to capture the specter and find out what was exactly going on.