Taming Poison Dragons (5 page)

‘Nothing, Father.’

‘Then they will not arrive today. Perhaps we should expect them tomorrow. Order new watchers so the others may rest.’

I return to my chamber and what’s left of the wine jar.

Swallows flit around the eaves of Three-Step-House just as when I was a happy boy. I could be that boy again in a moment, if his heart had not flown away, season after season.

I wake at sunrise with my own words echoing from a dream:
Bring relief to those so sorely pinched
. I said them once, when I was young and earnest. At once I sense a bad day brewing. I have always been sensitive to energies patterning around me. Today, I am sure the soldiers will come.

When I appear in the hall Eldest Son is taking breakfast.

‘Father!’ he cries. ‘You look. . .’

Indeed I do. For the first time since his wedding I wear the uniform of a man on the Emperor’s Golden List, the vermilion girdle and tortoise-shell chest plate, the hat of black silk hung with four jade pendants. My cheeks are shaven and flecked with blood from the razor. On my feet, high-soled shoes, curling at the front. I am gratified by the impression my uniform makes. This bodes well. The outward and the inward in harmony with each other.

‘Does Honoured Father require me to send for wine?’

he asks, timidly.

Perhaps he thinks I have dressed so splendidly in a drunken humour. His offer is certainly tempting.

‘No, send for the headman and command the servants to prepare a fine breakfast.’

I sit on Father’s chair, hands tucked in my sleeves.

Half an hour later, Wudi arrives. He is as surprised as my son to see me. For a moment his resentful stare softens, but only for a moment.

‘Ah, Wudi. Be seated.’

He obediently takes his place on the mat. Eldest Son hovers uncertainly beside him.

‘I have concluded,’ I say. ‘That the troops we expect may arrive today.’

They watch me through narrowed eyes. I hate my confusion. Wine might make me bold, but if I started, who knows when I would stop?

‘Are the watchmen at the head of the valley as I directed?’ I demand.

Wudi nods.

‘They understand their orders?’

‘Yes, Lord,’ he intones.

‘Good. I have commanded that an awning be placed near the entrance to the village square. That way I shall be the first the soldiers meet. Then I shall welcome their officers.’

They watch me sullenly.

‘Ensure the chair I am sitting on is taken down to the awning,’ I say. ‘Tell Lame Fui to set aside five jars and a dozen decent cups. Tell him I will pay.’

I turn to Eldest Son.

‘You shall remain in Three-Step-House. At the first sign of fighting, you are to leave the valley and join your wife.

I say this before Wudi, as my witness. It is my command.

You are my sole heir and your safety is worth more to me than senseless heroics. Is that understood?’

‘Yes, Father.’

I can sense them both quickening. For all my anxiety, I feel a flush of excitement.

‘Wudi,’ I continue. ‘There is another matter on which I have given much thought.’

He stiffens.

‘I refer to the loss of your son. Whatever happens I am determined he shall be remembered well. For that reason I have decided you should be allowed to construct a small family shrine on the outer perimeter of our ancestral shrine. Let your son’s bones be placed within sight of my own, and my father’s. By this means his soul shall mingle with his betters.’

Wudi looks at me calculatingly.

‘Does Lord Yun Cai mean within the perimeter or outside its limits?’ he asks.

‘I mean, separate but adjoining. An intelligent man like you is well aware of the significance of this.’

A look of puzzled satisfaction crosses his weather-beaten face. He bows deeply.

‘My son’s spirit will rejoice to hear these words,’ he says. ‘We are honoured.’

So his family should be. One could imagine marriage growing from such proximity. Certainly he owns enough land to make his granddaughters worthy of my youngest grandson. In addition, Wudi possesses several farms in unexpected places, all of them fertile, as well as a water-mill and tannery.

‘First we must survive the coming days and weeks,’ I say, lest his imagination run away with him. We have a saying in Wei: a dream at morning is forgotten by evening.

‘Wudi, instruct the people to go about their business as usual. And Eldest Son, draw up an inventory of grain supplies in the village and their value, in case we need to bribe the soldiers. Now I must descend to the village square.

Only Wudi shall accompany me.’

So I take my place beneath the awning. Children and women gawp at me until I glare at them angrily. Flies buzz round the jade pendants hanging from strings on my hat.

My silk robes are hot and uncomfortable. Indeed, they smell of mould. There is no help for that. The morning passes pleasantly enough. I read the poems of Po Chu-i to remind myself of a just man’s courage. His voice strengthens my own. Eventually I fall into a doze.

By midday, still no sign of General An-Shu’s men. A few of the village dogs adopt me, attracted by my lunch, which I share with them. I ask Wudi to send scouts to find out where the Imperial cavalry who rode through the village yesterday are hiding. Such information might give me power, and even avert a massacre. Women dragged from the houses, held down while raped. Man after man executed, the most senior first. Every store broken open, carried off by competing platoons. And the peasants beaten or simply stabbed should they protest. Finally, the smell of burning, smoke billowing up the valley, while drunken soldiers cheer. I saw such things in my youth. They are not unusual. They flow from war like dung from a sewer.

The sun reaches its zenith and I order cup after cup of tea, every sip scrutinised by the peasants.

An hour later, my test begins. One of the watchers runs into the village.

‘Lord Yun Cai!’ he cries. ‘They are coming!’

‘How many?’

He spreads out his hands in a gesture which means more than he could count. So we are taken seriously by General An-Shu. This is worse than I expected.

‘How many are there?’ I repeat.

He looks behind him nervously.

‘They are coming,’ he says, once more.

‘Wudi!’ I bellow.

The headman trots over from the well, where he was bathing his head with a bucket of water.

‘Instruct everyone to remain in their houses, as should you.’

He dries his face on his sleeve.

‘Perhaps I’ll stand behind you,’ he says. ‘It won’t look so good if you’re by yourself.’

He’s right, of course. And I’m grateful for his loyalty.

Already in the distance I can hear the beat of drums, cries of command.

‘This is not hunting crickets, Wudi,’ I say.

He looks at me and grins, as he did when we were boys.

‘My Lord is himself again,’ he says.

That is when I grow afraid. For I know it is my destiny to disappoint him, and all who trust me. The marching feet grow louder. An officer shouts unintelligibly. Finally a column of men, five across, enters the village square.

Their armour is burnished leather and they bear sword and halberd. These are not the rabble I expected, but superior, well-drilled troops. For a long moment everyone in the square stands still, assessing one another. I hear more tramping feet and the gallop of horses.

An officer on a fine, white charger rides into the square, his horse prancing. He is followed by a dozen cavalry bearing flags and drums, long lances tipped with pennants.

I peer short-sightedly. The heat haze blinds my old eyes.

Horsemen trot toward me and I rise, puffing out my chest.

The captain’s helmet is crowned by a jaunty red plume.

Bronze armour covers the horse’s head and flanks. Iron discs sewn upon the captain’s blue leather coat glitter like angry eyes. His cloak is blood red. At his side a sword and bow. In his right hand, a double-pronged lance, trailing scarlet and yellow ribbons.

A dozen feet from me he reins in his horse. The beast snorts. My eyes are fixed on its rider’s face, one whose changes I charted from birth. My soul lurches. Youngest Son.

Momentary balance, like a huge standing rock, its support of earth and shale eroded by seasons of rain. It could fall in any direction, crushing the unwary, or merely roll down the hillside to settle with a crash, throwing up clouds of dust. So it is in the village square. The rock of war could fall any way.

Youngest Son’s face! I cannot help staring. I recognise the colour of those eyes, his grandfather’s eyes, but not the haughty, military way he narrows his eyelids as though perpetually angry. That is something he has learnt from others. I know the shape of his cheeks, not the scar disfiguring one side, the battle which gave it birth. He is familiar, and undiscovered.

He sits on his white charger, still as a statue. I watch him, frozen by conflicting emotions. We share one thing, at least. In all the years of his boyhood, neither of us anticipated this.

My glance passes to the soldiers rapidly filling the square. A desperate lot, and hungry by the look of them, their uniforms faded and tattered. Veterans ready for anything, looking no further than the next fight or meal. I pray they are still capable of discipline.

I turn my attention back to Youngest Son. He has followed my examination of his men, and perhaps reads my thought. He appears confused and resentful at the same time. His horse whinnies impatiently. It is thirsty and smells the water in the well. I wait, hoping my cap with its jade pendants sits straight on my head.

A flicker of vexation on his face. At last he seems about to speak. The officers around him are exchanging glances.

I sense the fate of the whole village depends on his first words, for if he willed it, a general massacre would begin.

Then I realise he has no idea how to act, that my presence in the village square, especially dressed in the trappings of the Golden List, has surprised him. Oh, I have seen that expression before! I remember how he played as a boy, always leading the other children, his authority inexplicable to his elders, bubbling up as if from a hot spring. Yet sometimes I noticed the same doubt on his face. The secret doubt of all who strive for control.

Memories of him gather, pinpoints of reflected light on a lake in summer. His mother passing him to me, a tiny, red wrinkled thing, both of us joyful she had survived a difficult labour. Later, a boy wrapped in the folds of my clothes against winter draughts, while I told tales of Grandfather’s brave deeds. His little face revealing tangled thoughts and desires – to be worthy of such an ancestor, to be important as any hero, and loved by me, how he longed for that. It touched my heart like a kind of grief.

And then admonishing him when he bullied his older brother, his attitude of contrition belied by a curling lip, coldness of eye. Or flying a kite from Wobbly Watchtower Rock while I composed verses, crying out ‘See, Father!

See! Look at me, Father!’, and my irritation at being interrupted, so the right word slipped away like an eel.

Teenage years when the troubles began. My anger at the sloppy, careless way he composed his characters. Every smudge of ink seemed ingratitude and defiance. Anger at so many things.

Now, in the village square, neither of us bend. I place my hands in my sleeves, a casual gesture, and entirely deliberate, emphasising my uniform and status, that I represent a higher authority, while he is a mere soldier.

Everyone knows no decent man becomes a soldier. It is a risk I must take, or choose to grovel before their gaudy flags, the dense, sweating weight of them. The officers around Youngest Son murmur angrily. He must do something now, or lose face before his men.

Still he hesitates.

Perhaps he remembers our last meeting. Perhaps that is what makes him pause. A hot night. Monsoon weather, the sky a lake of rain. He was on his knees then, full of excuses. I merely said, ‘Because you are my son I will disgrace myself, and abandon all the principles I hold dear.

Be content with that.’ The next day he left for the Military Academy and I journeyed to the Prefect of Chunming to ensure he would never become Lord of Wei. Did that make me complicit in his crime? Certainly I have spent many hours of doubt. Even now I have no clear answer.

But I wept until dawn on the night he left, and locked myself in my room for days.

Youngest Son is moving. As though dragged against his will, he climbs stiffly from his horse. A groom rushes forward to seize the bridle. Everyone in the square is alert.

He brushes the dust from his clothes, then steps towards me. Now is the test. I sense Wudi shifting behind me. My breath catches.

Youngest Son lowers himself stiffly, first one leg, then both, until he is on his knees, paying homage to his father, as is only natural and fitting. Yet it is a feeble homage, as all must observe, for he does not bow, his back straight as a rampart. It is enough. For now the village is safe. I risk a glance at his men. They have visibly relaxed, and some dare to yawn. Perhaps they are disappointed. But their captain honouring his father changes them from con-querors to guests.

‘Father,’ he says. ‘I have returned.’

‘Youngest Son, are you thirsty?’

He nods. There are tears in his eyes, for I have acknowledged him as my child.

‘Wudi,’ I say, gently.

He knows what to do. Pouring out a cup of wine, he advances, and offers it.

Youngest Son gulps it in one. Emotion makes it hard for him to swallow.

‘Ah!’ he says, at last grinning his old, mischievous grin.

‘Ah! I was thirsty, Father.’

‘Then take another cup,’ I say.

He drinks this solemnly.

‘Are your officers dry?’ I ask.

As far as I can judge, they seem a rough pair. One of them has the extravagant, bushy beard of a vain man. The other makes no effort to hide a sneer which, I suspect, is habitual.