Legend of The Young Master

Chapter 195: Responsibility

Present King Zhao and his Qi warriors were ready for war, though not as prepared as he would have liked. His father, King Zhuan, had reportedly commanded at least five times as many men, possibly even ten times as many when he fought against the demonic Wild. The signs of their diminished strength were everywhere.

Abandoned farms and shops lined the road, evidence of a once-thriving town now in ruins. This stark reality gave King Zhao pause.

However, on this day, as the sun rose behind them and gilded their spear tips, the enemy melted away before them, abandoning the siege as if Xiang Stronghold had never truly been under threat. The army halted at the edge of the great river, and the Royal Huntsmen finished off any swamplings too slow to descend the great earth cliff to the beach below.

Heralds counted the dead and debated whether to consider the destruction of the small enemy force as a battle.

While huntsmen debated, Li Zhuang answered his cousin's summons and saluted, expecting tantrums from him. His sword remained loose in its sheath, anticipating the possibility of immediate pursuit across the river, even though it seemed strange for the enemy to retreat eastward. However, Li Xian handed his armor to his attendant and shook his head.

"A royal council," he snapped. He was angry. It seemed his cousin was always angry these days.

Followed only by a handful of retinue warriors and a herald, they rode across the field, covered in summer flowers, towards the king.

"We are letting the enemy escape," Li Xian said.

"There was to be a great battle. Today." He spat.

"My soul is in peril because I begin to doubt my righteous heavens. When will we fight? By the five blessings of Heaven, I hate this place. Too hot – too many trees, ugly people, bestial peasants—" He suddenly reined in his horse, dismounted, and knelt to pray.

Li Zhuang, for once, joined him. In truth, he agreed with all of his cousin's pronouncements. He wanted to go home too. He hoped maybe he will meet this master of his cousin who had special command for him.

A herald rode up – a king's messenger, Li Zhuang saw. He went back to his prayers. After a while, only when he was certain that his cousin's master was in no way going to visit him, Li Zhuang raised his eyes to the king's messenger who had been patiently waiting for them.

"The king requests your company," he said.

Li Zhuang sighed, and he and his cousin rode the rest of the way to the royal council. It was held on horseback, and all the great lords were present – every noble or lord with fifty warriors or more. The Earl of Qian, the Count of the Border, Master Zhang of the Lotus Sect branch Leidian, who commanded the special orders, and a dozen midlands lords whom Li Zhuang didn't know.

Wang Guozhi, a monk of Liangcheng, Chen Rong, the leader of the guards, rumored to be the old king's illegitimate son.

The king was conferring with a small man with a grizzled beard, who rode a small horse and looked like a dwarf when every other man present was mounted on a warhorse. He was sixty years old and wore a plain harness of munition armor – the kind that armorers made for their poorer customers. He had dark circles under his eyes, but his eyes still had fire in them.

"They were over the outwalls and into the suburbs after three assaults," he said. "They could run up the walls." He looked at Zhai Jiang. "But you must know the story from this good warrior."

"You tell it," said the king.

"The mayor wouldn't send the women to the fortress. So I sent out my best men to force them in." He shrugged. "And they did. And by the grace of the righteous heavens, I took twenty warriors and held the gate to the fortress." He shook his head. "We held it for an hour or so." He looked at Zhai Jiang. "Didn't we?"

The Huoyan kingdom warrior nodded. "We did, Master Yinhua Han."

"How many died?" the king asked gently.

"Townspeople? Or my people?" the old man asked.

"The town itself died, my lord. We saved mostly women and children – a few hundred of them. The men died fighting or were taken." He grimaced as he said it. "We kept two posterns open the next night – a dozen spearmen by each – and we got another fifty refugees, but they burned the town to the ground, my lord." He bowed his head, slipped from his horse, and knelt before his king.

"I beg your pardon, my lord. I held my fortress, but I lost your town. Do with me as you will."

Li Zhuang looked around. The Tianqin Nobles were in shock.

His cousin pushed forward. "All the more reason to pursue the enemy now," he said strongly.

The old lord shook his head. "No, my lord. It's a trap. This morning, we saw a big force – Nomads, with Kwimok or YingZhu, going into the woods to the east. It's an ambush. They want you to pursue them."

Li Xian coughed. "Am I to be afraid of a few broken demonics?" he asked. No one answered him.

"Where is the main force of the enemy?" the king asked.

The old man shrugged. "We've had messengers from convoys headed east, and from the pavilion mistress," he said. "If I had to guess, I'd say that Yushan is besieged."

He took the king's stirrup.

"The enemy leader. They say it's the fallen righteous elder who was advisor of the old king," he said suddenly. "Men claim they saw him while the walls were being stormed, smashing breaches in the wall with lightning."

Again, the Tianqin Nobles muttered, and their mounts started to grow restless. The king made a clucking sound, as if thinking aloud.

Master Zhang of Lotus sect order from Leidian pushed his horse forward. He wasn't a big man, and he was as old as the lord of Xiang Stronghold, but something shone from him – power of a sort, based on piety, humility. His black mantle contrasted sharply with the blaze of gold and color on the other warriors, even the monk.

"I would like to take my warriors and outriders east, my lord, to see to Yushan," he said. "It is our responsibility."

The Count of the Borders was at Li Zhuang's elbow. Despite the frostiness of their last meeting, he leaned over. "The Lotus Pavilion and its members are his people – at least at a remove or two," he whispered.

Li Xian raised his head. "I would like to accompany them," he declared.

Master Zhang regarded him with a smile. It was a weary smile, and it probably wasn't intended to convey insult. "This is a matter for the warriors of my order," he said. "We are trained for it."

Li Xian touched his sword hilt. "No man tells me my men are not trained," he said.

Master Zhang shrugged. "I will not take you, no matter how bad your manners."

Li Zhuang put a hand on his cousin's armor-clad forearm. In Tianqin, as in Lanxiang, a man did not threaten or challenge a Qi warrior of the order of major sects. It wasn't done. Or perhaps his mad cousin thought himself above that law, too.

✶ ✶ ✶

The king sent two messengers with the Qi warriors when Master Zhang took his men northeast from Xiang Stronghold's southern suburb. Master Zhang moved his men carefully over the ground, their black cloaks somehow blending into the undergrowth. His men rode easily through the densest stands of woods, through thickets of spring briars.

They halted frequently. Men would dismount and creep forward, usually over the brow of a steep hill, and wave them forward. Despite the halts, they made good progress. Individual warriors would ride away – sometimes at right angles to the line of march – and unerringly find them again.

The thing the two king's messengers found hardest to understand was the silence. The Qi warriors of the Lotus Sect Order never spoke. They rode in silence, and their horses were equally silent. They had no servants and no attendants. Forty spare horses – a fortune in war horses – followed the main body, packed with forage bags and spares, but otherwise without bridle or lead.

Yet the spares followed briskly enough.

It was, as the older messenger said, uncanny.

Still, it was a bold thing, to be riding through the forest with the Qi warriors of the Lotus Sect Order. Han one of messengers had been named at the temple in Tianjin of Lotus sect and felt he was almost one of them. His partner, Ji Feng, had been a professional messenger in the old king's day, a weathered man with more scars than a badly tanned hide, as he liked to say himself.

The messengers were used to a hard day riding and no company but their horses, but it was a hard day, even for them – fifteen leagues over the broken country that challenged their horsemanship every hour. The Qi warriors didn't seem to tire. Many of them were older than Li Feng.

Towards evening, one of the youngest of the warriors rode back to the main body and led them off to the right, north, and then up to a steep hill. Without a word, every Qi warrior dismounted. They drew their long swords from their saddle scabbards, split into four groups of fifteen, and walked off.