Five Kingdoms (17 page)

Passing through the corridors of the administration palaces, Song Da-Xiao noticed her Fortress General. Jiao Ren stopped customarily before their paths crossed, and bowed while her entourage passed. She looked behind her afterward, and noticed the young general making his way in the direction she had come from, perhaps to meet with Han Quan. If her station permitted her to entertain impulse, she’d have followed him. She was curious to know what was said among her officers in private, particularly after the sequestering. However, she did not doubt or distrust them, and did not wish to seem as if she did. For that reason, she refrained from halting Jiao Ren and inquiring of his destination.

The White Tiger of the Mountains

M
orning came without
incident beyond what Xu Liang faced most nights since his exposure to the Phoenix. He and the others were preparing for departure when Xiang Wu entered the courtyard, trailed by his personal bodyguard. In his hand was a sealed scroll, which he offered to Xu Liang.

“My regards and my reply for the Empress,” he announced.

Xu Liang accepted the letter with a momentary bow of his head.

Xiang Wu did not relinquish the item immediately, and for a small space they held the scroll together. “I delayed this,” the lord of Dhong Castle said privately to his eldest surviving child. “Now that you have returned, I feel that I may continue to pledge my support to the Song.”

Xu Liang inclined his head once again, in acceptance to the terms of the Ying Governor’s loyalty.

“Though some would try to pry the Empress’ young trust from you, in an attempt to seize control for themselves, there are still many who have invested their faith in you,” Xiang Wu said next, and the words seemed to hold a certain amount of familial intimacy.

Xu Liang had not expected it, and lifted his gaze to meet his father’s.

In that precise moment, Xiang Wu said, “I am among them.”

Though the tone was something Xu Liang had longed for, the implications nearly offended him. He said neutrally, “We must all put our faith in the Empress. In doing so we also place trust upon those who serve. Your continued support does not go without notice or appreciation, Governor.”

Xiang Wu released the scroll, and Xu Liang set about placing it carefully within his personal pack. In the process, he took note of the young boy and a woman beside the child, both observing the exchange from a balcony overlooking the courtyard. Each of them possessed the abundantly fair features of the Peacock of Ying. Xu Liang knew that they were his siblings.

Xiang Wei and Xiang Bozheng appeared to be aware themselves, at least of Xu Liang’s station, if not of their shared blood connection. They watched him blatantly, the daughter of the governor deciding first that they should retreat indoors. Xiang Wu’s adolescent son continued to look upon the individuals in his father’s yard. He had concentrated almost solely on Xu Liang, but in departing he seemed to take sudden notice of those in Xu Liang’s company as well. The boy craned his neck in order to see the elves, dwarves, and western human standing in open defiance of Sheng Fan’s culture.

Xu Liang raised himself into Blue Crane’s saddle, aware of the look he had also been receiving from Alere. The mountain elf seemed—as was expected—to hold a certain lack of trust in those he did not know, or whose virtues he had not witnessed in uncontestable performance. It was a volatile seed Xu Liang had planted by bringing outsiders into Sheng Fan. He could only hope that what grew from it would not bear ill fruit.

Though there was
a fast-growing state of civil unrest within Sheng Fan, it became apparent to Xu Liang that the reactions to unrest had remained at a slower boil. At the time of his departure to seek the Swords he had only come upon one incident of notable danger, and that—he had later learned—was not an act of defiant unruliness or spontaneous banditry. Xiadao Lu and his men had been sent in pursuit of Xu Liang. It had been an act of betrayal. While that concerned Xu Liang a great deal, he could see that the roads and forests, fields and river paths were still safe for the citizens of Sheng Fan. When war grew to a fuller scale, that would undoubtedly change, but it was Xu Liang’s hope that the flames of war would not be so fanned. For the time being, fire was Xu Liang’s most paramount adversary; the fires of war, the fires of malcontent, and the fire of the Phoenix.

“Was that fortress the home of your family?”

Xu Liang had not noticed the arrival of Alere, until the mountain elf was riding alongside him, asking his question. “What would have you ask that?” he inquired, not through any hope to deny, but merely out of curiosity.

“It had the atmosphere of a place you had returned to, after a long absence,” Alere stated in his customary manner of plainly offering information.

Xu Liang looked to the road ahead, which wound gradually out of the mountains and into warmer forests. “Yes, it was,” he eventually said in answer to Alere’s question. He felt it important to add, “However, they are not my recognized family.”

“Why not?” Alere asked.

It was a secret Xu Liang had long held onto, whether the resemblance might have been as easy for others as it evidently had been for Alere, or not. Xu Hong had claimed him as his own son, and he had done so within his rights, under Imperial law. To publicly recognize Xiang Wu as his father would be considered an attempt to disown Xu Hong, something that—without due cause—would be viewed critically by Xu Liang’s peers. He had no desire to shame or disregard Xu Hong, but at times he felt as if there was little point to attempting to hide what was plainly obvious. Regardless, he also felt that Alere would have no interest in promoting rumors regarding Xu Liang’s family, and likewise was not equipped to do so linguistically, even if he did harbor such an ambition.

Still, his response was not delivered without some tailoring on Xu Hong’s behalf. “I was adopted by the governor of a different kingdom.”

Whether or not Alere understood, he accepted the answer in silence.

By evenfall,
camp had been established in the as yet snowbound lower reaches of the mountains of Ying. Their path had them currently aligned to pass between Ti Lao and Li Ting, which was precisely the direction Xu Liang desired to be headed in. They would save time by crossing the Jung Ho Bridge at the point where the kingdoms of Ying and Du connected at the Tunghui River. From there they would skirt north of Yan Xing, through the green hills of Ji, and proceed directly into the Imperial City.

Outside of the tents, which fluttered in the crisp breeze of a semi-permanent winter, Xu Liang looked to the lower lands along the darkening horizon. He envisioned the evening he and his guards had passed through Li Ting, the evening he had been confronted by Xiadao Lu, a man of might but not of scruple. The rogue warrior—claiming no kingdom’s color or banner—had challenged Xu Liang in open defiance of the Empire and the Empress, and under the employ of a traitor. That traitor would have to be exposed upon Xu Liang’s return.

In reminding himself of Xiadao Lu and his unidentified master, Xu Liang remembered also the pyromancer in league with him. There had been no sign of the other mystic yet, none that even Alere had descried. Did that mean their pursuer would not find them, or that he was no longer looking?

Xu Liang looked to the west, in the direction such an enemy would likely have been approaching from. In the process, his gaze caught on Alere. The elf was sat on a felled tree some distance from the tents. He perched there as still and silent as a hunting owl. Were an enemy to come, they would perhaps be swooped down upon with similar grace, and a lethal silence. Xu Liang would not argue the value of a Verressi hunter as an ally. If only the hunter were not of Verressi origin. Again, Xu Liang was reminded of the task ahead of him.

“Time for supper, lad!” Tarfan announced from within the large, circular tent they had been provided by the governor of Ying.

Xu Liang looked over his shoulder, catching a sudden whiff of the food that had been smoldering within their canvas enclosure. He found the scent less desirable than he might have at a time well before his departure from the Imperial City and the start of his journey toward many unexpected events and individuals. The fasting he had done in order to stay connected to the Empress on a spiritual level would have left him without appetite on its own, but since his encounters with both the ice giant of the Yvarian Flatlands and the Phoenix, he struggled to regain a proper disposition for food.

“I will go and tell Alere,” Xu Liang volunteered, if only to avoid the meal of rice and hare for a few moments longer.

“Off with you, then,” Tarfan replied, throwing one arm out toward the periphery of their camp. “And hurry back, lad. You’re waning!”

Xu Liang paid the dwarf’s comment no special attention, and proceeded toward the white elf. The snow underfoot was firm beneath a shimmering and lightly shifting surface. The wind formed patterns, as if a rake through white sand, and lifted thin veils that swirled gently toward the sky, as if the earth itself were the source for the stars. The thought reminded him of a painting of the Goddess Mei Qiao, knelt beside a shining pool, scooping the stars out from it and pouring them over her hair, which formed the panorama of a night sky, her face pale and beautiful as the moon.

It was not so long ago that Alere had shared his perception of the Moon Goddess with Xu Liang. To the mountain elves, the glittering sky was represented by the goddess’ veil. It was a protecting veil; perhaps that was why Alere felt so secure beneath the open night sky. And perhaps it was his loyalty to the moon which had led to his being chosen to bear the Twilight Blade. Alere’s loyalty was a force in its own right. Xu Liang recalled the feeling of personal failure at the possibility of having compromised it.

“Come no closer,” Alere said just then, halting further thoughts on the matter before they could manifest.

Xu Liang drew himself to a stop, his eyes on Alere, who looked directly ahead from his perch. Following the elf’s steady gaze, Xu Liang observed only the deepening darkness of the forest…the mountains losing their staunch shapes beneath the falling curtain of night…and particles of ice drifting erratically across a canvas of shadow and light. It took some amount of deliberate searching for Xu Liang to finally spot the animal in the snow. When he did, he felt a mild but pronounced start. Alere had spied a tiger.

The beast crept low through the shade-mottled snow, its black and white pelt blending so precisely that it was no wonder at all how the unwary traveler might fall victim to such a creature. Dangerous, though it may have been, it was also an animal of tremendous beauty and auspice, particularly this one. The white tiger of the mountains was renowned for being as patient as it was fierce, and also for appearing at the resting places of fallen warriors. The tiger of legend would appear at such places to collect the scars of the warrior who had passed, when his deeds were especially worthy. The scars would manifest on the tiger’s white body in the form of its stripes. It would then take the markings—the glories of one warrior—and bring them to another. The warrior who was visited by the tiger was said to be divinely blessed. He would walk a path of glory.

Xu Liang considered the legend, and whether or not the creature before him had arrived merely to investigate the scent of roasted hare and the bodies passing through its realm. He considered also that moments ago he had likened the elf to an owl, but perhaps…