Taming Poison Dragons (33 page)

‘Clerks!’ I announced, in my gruffest voice. ‘You are aware of my orders. It is the duty of all to obey their superior without question. I have been instructed by Lord Xiao to station myself in that wretched trench over there and record all losses as they occur. You will stay under cover here and compile the numbers I bring.’

I staggered towards the siege works behind my outlandish shield. Almost at once I was rocked by the thud of a crossbow bolt piercing the edge of the wood. How I ran!

A minute later, I was cowering in the ditch while shafts and rocks fell around us.

Aside from the bodies, the trench reeked of excrement and urine. Positioning my shield as best I could, I drew an abacus from my belt and began to slide the beads, each click a wordless prayer for a man’s soul, just as a Buddhist prayer wheel ceaselessly clicks and revolves. Every few hours I retreated like a crab to my clerks and they duly recorded the numbers of fallen. Needless to say, both soldiers and labourers viewed my antics with complete incomprehension.

Several days passed in this way before I could skulk in the ditch beneath my shield no longer. The constant sight of blood and corpses had begun to gnaw at my sanity. I found myself chuckling or singing unaccountably. I conducted lengthy debates with myself about all kind of topics, or simply curled up in a tight ball. Each night sleep came hard; harder still to drag myself back to the siege lines the next day. Yet disobedience would be mutiny, instantly punishable by death.

By now the ditch was littered with decaying bodies.

Rats scurried and crows stalked from corpse to corpse.

Flies and maggots feasted. And still our rampart rose.

That morning I borrowed a wheelbarrow from my friend the captain, filling it with a water cask and strips of rag made from the uniforms of the fallen. Instead of advancing behind my shield, I charged over to the earthworks, pushing the barrow. Arrows skipped around me.

Once in the scant safety of the ditch, I doled out water to the wounded, who lay groaning in the dirt, waiting for night to bring a chance of escape. When the water ran out, I went back for more, and so more days passed.

My tendency to shiver and mutter faded. No pleasant thing mopping the brow of a man writhing on the ground, yet it was preferable to inactivity. Now I had no time to be afraid. As I worked, I recollected the beneficial effect of good deeds on my next reincarnation. Surely I would be reborn nearer to Nothingness, a blessed abbot or hermit, untroubled by the misery and illusion of this world. Never again a love-deluded poet. Never again a weary scholar with ink-blackened fingers, striving for knowledge when the Way may only be inhabited without thought.

All the while dying men surrounded me, crying out for their mothers. How hard it was to tear soul from body, to step from one room to the next. Some faces carve themselves on the hillside of one’s spirit, like giant stone Buddhas.

One day, as I pushed my empty water cask wearily back to Mi Feng, I noticed His Excellency Wen Po in the distance, watching my progress from his horse. He followed me like a tiger anticipating the heart and liver of its next meal. Impudently, for by now I was past caring, I stared back, until a flight of arrows sent me scurrying forwards.

Then, almost unexpectedly, the ramparts were complete. We retreated for the last time as twilight fell and I found my path blocked by a dainty youth in yellow silks.

He was so out of place in dreary Pinang that I almost took him for an Immortal. He smiled at me.

‘Come with me, Honourable Yun Cai,’ he piped in a dreamy, mincing voice. ‘You are invited to dinner.’

The youth led me toward Wen Po’s headquarters, situated in a village above Pinang. At first I feared punishment. My crime? That was obvious. I was still alive. Yet it seemed strange that an austere man like Wen Po would send a catamite as his messenger, unless he intended it as a joke.

We were an odd pair. My guide anxious to avoid dirtying his silken clothes and slippers, all the while eyeing the soldiers we passed like a less-than-coy girl. And then myself: Yun Cai, pitiful Yun Cai, stinking of sweat, dried blood and soil. As I staggered through lines of marching men, a few bowed or called out my name, for my wheelbarrow of water had made me a curiosity among the besieging army. A few even seemed to know the reason for my presence in Pinang. Why should they not sympathise when most had been conscripted against their will?

Besides, I flattered myself that my poems were known even here. At least I wished to believe so.

‘How sad you look!’ tittered the youth.

I peered at him. His elation was too brittle to be natural. It made me think of the drugs used in the decadent days of the Han to make one impervious to sorrow.

‘I have every reason to be sad,’ I said. ‘That’s natural sometimes.’

‘You need someone to make you glad,’ he replied, coquettishly.

I glowered at him.

‘Who exactly has invited me to dinner?’ I asked. ‘It is evidently not His Excellency Wen Po for we have just passed the way to his headquarters.’

‘Yun Cai will see!’ cried the youth, covering his face with perfectly manicured hands and peering through the gaps between his fingers.

We reached an encampment constructed beside fetid marshland on the south side of the city. A small village of tents and pavilions stood in the centre of the camp, lit by red and blue lanterns. Soldiers in the white uniforms of a penal battalion, wearing death’s colour because their lives were forfeit, guarded the entrance. Beyond a low palisade of reeds gathered from the marsh, huddles of men lay on the chilly ground. Here thousands of conscripted peasants were bivouacked, those who raised the earthworks each day, cheap fodder for war’s senseless teeth to grind.

As we weaved through their silent ranks, my guide hummed a dance song I recollected from the capital. By this means he hoped to forget the miserable wretches around him. I could not resist a cruel urge.

‘You are afraid you will join them, aren’t you?’ I said.

He twirled on his heels like a dancer.

‘That will never happen!’ he cried.

Then he sang in a high, clear voice:

‘
Oh, never will the wind part the rushes, my love!
’

‘Who is your master?’ I demanded again.

‘
Never will the wind part the rushes
,’ he sang. ‘
Never
will the wind blow east, or west!
’

A low, restless murmur rose from the conscripted peasants hidden in the darkness. I, too, found his song disturbing. I shivered as the wind unfurled its icy breath.

We picked a way through to the pavilions, protected by a ditch and an earth wall six feet high. I was inclined to think these defences were not meant for Wang Tse’s rebels, but to keep the conscripted peasants from murdering their overseers. Certainly a large contingent from the penal battalion guarded the gates.

I was led to the largest of the pavilions and my guide bowed low, evidently relieved to arrive home.

‘Enter!’ he said. ‘You are welcome.’

I stepped inside. The tent was carpeted with dozens of thick rugs of the kind one finds among the nomads. A small charcoal fire glowed in the centre, roasting a stuffed piglet on a spit. A piglet! Roast pork! At once my mouth drooled shamelessly and I felt light-headed. Incense burners scented the air with pleasant perfumes. A lute accompanied by wisp-like bells tinkled lulling melodies from a darkened corner. Was I dreaming? I screwed my eyes shut. When I opened them again I saw Cousin Zhi lolling on a wide bed of furs, watching my confusion with evident enjoyment.

‘Cousin!’ he said. ‘Welcome to my humble home!’

He was still wiry and delicate although he had acquired a dainty, waxed moustache and goatee beard. I looked round and laughed.

‘Not so humble,’ I stammered.

‘Perhaps not, perhaps not.’

He rose and hurried over. Taking my hands, he patted them earnestly. His touch felt hot.

‘What a terrible time you are having!’ he cried. ‘Sit down! Rest! I insist on it.’

He clapped his hands and half a dozen servants appeared from the shadows. Two began to turn and baste the roasting piglet. Others brought me a cup of warm wine. How I gulped! I had thought to never taste such a pleasure again.

He motioned that I should sit on a divan beside his bed and I obeyed in a daze. Smiling, he took up his former position.

‘You do not look quite as you used to,’ he remarked.

‘Neither do you,’ I replied.

His robes were splendid. As fine as when he had followed the life of a foppish rake in the capital. He possessed a new confidence and, yes, power, for strength may shine from a man’s face. Cousin Zhi waved at the gorgeous tent, its statuettes and wall-hangings, with feigned embarrassment.

‘I must beg forgiveness for my poor hospitality,’ he said.

‘But in times of war. . . Well, what can one do?’

Where had he learnt such fastidious manners? Frankly, I preferred the old, resentful Cousin Zhi of my youth. At least I’d known what he was thinking. More wine appeared in my cup and disappeared down my throat.

‘How did you gain. . .’ I gestured around me. ‘All this?’

His smile widened and he curled up his knees.

‘Through my own merits,’ he said. ‘How else? Actually, I inherited my position from my predecessor, who found me useful in all sorts of ways. Regrettably, he had an accident involving some of our labourers and I was appointed in his place. I’m surprised you have not heard of the incident.’

‘What exactly
is
your position?’ I asked.

‘Why, I am in charge of this labour brigade! Come now, you must know that. I cannot believe you have not heard my name mentioned!’

He seemed piqued.

‘And what is
your
position?’ he asked, more in his old style.

‘Chief of the Bureau of Fallen Heroes,’ I said. ‘A more melancholy duty than you can imagine.’

He sipped his wine.

‘Oh, I can imagine,’ he said.

‘But Zhi! Look at you! You have become a great man.’

‘Of course,’ he said, wagging his finger as though chiding me. ‘In a normal battle the labour brigades are little regarded. They transport stores, dig a few ditches, all the glory belongs to the fighting men. But in a siege, Yun Cai, in a long siege everything is different. Take the earthworks I have constructed: who could raise them for His Excellency except I? No one. You may wonder how I achieve this, but the answer is simple. The peasants out there,’ he gestured beyond the tent, ‘either dig or die. You see, Yun Cai, you need to know how a man thinks.’

He tapped his forehead significantly and peered at me from his elevated couch.

‘Of course, I know why you’ve been sent here,’ he said.

‘So don’t bother to pretend. I know
everything
. Oh, Yun Cai, how could you cast away all those years of study, even your honour, for the sake of a worthless girl?’

I gulped another cup. It coursed right through me.

‘It is strange how things end up,’ I said.

Cousin Zhi gestured impatiently to the servants and at once his own cup was filled. It seemed better to change the conversation.

‘How is Honoured Aunty?’ I asked. ‘I take it she prospers?’

‘Never mind her,’ he said, his voice slurring. ‘Actually I never think of her. Do such unfilial sentiments shock you?’

He obviously wanted me to be shocked.

‘No,’ I said.

‘Well, I don’t. Honestly, I don’t.’

‘Yet she is your mother.’

‘Why should I think of her?’ he demanded, shrilly. ‘Do you know that if I succeed here, I have been promised a Sub-prefect’s position? Oh yes, even though I have not passed the necessary examinations! Mother will be proud of me then! I might even allow her to live with me.’

He threw down his cup and began to pace before the roasting piglet. For the first time I wondered if he was entirely sane.

‘You haven’t changed at all,’ he said. ‘Still as arrogant as ever! But this is no monthly examination you can cheat at. Your life hangs on a thread, Yun Cai! A single thread!

Tomorrow His Excellency will launch our final attack on the walls and Pinang will fall. A victory I alone have made possible. You realise, of course, that you will be expected to accompany the first wave of troops.’

The possibility had not occurred to me.

‘Casualties will be high. Very high. It is likely you will be among them. But dear Yun Cai, I could prevent that!’

I listened carefully, drunk as I was.

‘How?’

‘Never mind how. Just trust that I can. You see, I can have anything I want here. That is the beauty of this place.

Your life is in my hands, Yun Cai! But there is a price.’

He returned to his bed and lolled, snapping his fingers for more wine. I watched him, appalled. Had I really treated him so badly that he could play with me like this?

I was family, his own blood.

‘What is your price?’ I asked, dully.

He patted the bearskin rug where he lounged.

‘I have waited for this moment. Can’t you guess?’

For a moment I was confused. Then I noticed the catamite who had led me here, grinning in a corner. And the final triumph Zhi craved became obvious.

I imagined his crab-like body on my back, thrusting and yelping. His hot breath on my neck. A revolting prospect.

Yet for a moment I hesitated. How precious is life! To dine on succulent meat and giddy wine, to sleep on a soft bed when I was tired, so tired. Surely life itself was worth a little dishonour? I wavered only for a moment. No longer.

Just long enough to sow seeds of self-disgust. They have been rotting in me ever since.

I rose unsteadily and swayed.

*

‘Cousin,’ I said. ‘If Uncle Ming could see us now he’d be glad to find us talking like old friends. But I really must go.’

Cousin Zhi rose, too.

‘Tomorrow you will die,’ he said. ‘Think! I have great influence with His Excellency.’

I turned toward the exit.

‘Yun Cai, come back. I should have given you the pork, then you’d have. . . It was stupid of me. Stay a while!’

By now I was walking and soon found myself in the cold night air. Somehow I made my way back to our hut, though the siege lines were dangerous after dark. Mi Feng was waiting by the door. I lurched past him and collapsed onto my bed where I dreamt of Honoured Aunty, cooing as she felt around beneath my clothes.