The Jongurian Mission (48 page)

Jurin nodded and they lapsed into silence as they trudged on along the river.
They ate salt pork for lunch while they walked and some berries that Trey found in some bushes by the river and which Jurin said were edible. By the time the sun was high in the sky they could see the Xishan Mountains looming in the distance, little more than specks on the horizon ahead of them. They were dark grey in color with spots of white at the top.

“Maybe Zhou has given up on us,” Pader said after they
’d eaten.

“I have to admit I’m surprised that we made it all day yesterday and well into today without any trouble,” Jurin replied.

“It could just be that they
’re laying a larger trap ahead of us,” Iago said.

“If they took the road to Waigo they
’d be traveling faster than us and could be waiting before the city,” Willem said. “They do have horses. What’ll take us three days they could accomplish in a little more than one.”

“That’s why it’s best not to let your guard down,” Jurin advised.
“One of the advantages of being in the open like this is that we’ll see an attack come. That’ll not be the case as we get closer to the mountains.”

By nightfall the mountains were towering walls in front of them.
Cracks and fissures could be made out in the immense rock monoliths while the sheer steepness of their sides was clearly evident, even from such a long way off still. Again they found a spot by the river that had a few trees and did their best to find a comfortable spot to sleep on the hard ground.

It was
the middle of the next day when they made it to the base of the mountains. The river had grown narrower as the mountains grew taller, eventually becoming little more than a small stream by the time they made it to its source. The hard grey stone seemed to grow straight up from the valley floor, rising hundreds of feet into the clear blue sky before receding back to rise even higher, but not so steeply. The river flowed from a small lake at the base of the mountains which was fed by a large waterfall that fell straight down for more than a hundred feet from the rocks above. Leaving the river behind, they followed the mountains north. Trees grew more abundantly and the air was cooler in the shadow of the large rocks. There was no way that these mountains could be climbed unless one had hundreds of feet of rope to somehow tie into the hard stone face of the rising cliffs. Bryn could understand now as he stared straight up why going through the mountains at any other location besides Waigo was such an impossibility.

“What most worries me now,” Jurin said as they walked, “is the approach to the city.
Two roads come together at Waigo, the one leading from the south that we crossed two days ago, and another coming from the east. If we can expect any kind of ambush, then that would be the most likely place.”

“Would Zhou’s men travel that far north?” Halam asked.

“Aye, they might. But it’s not just them that we have to worry about now. There are many different northern warlords that will have men wandering the roads looking for easy prey. Any one of them could attack us as well.”

“What about the garrison at Waigo?” Pader asked.
“If the city is anything like Fadurk on the other side of the Isthmus, then there’ll be a large contingent of troops stationed in the city for border protection.”

“Yes, they
’ll be there, but I don’t think we’ll have as many problems with them.”

“It’s not everyday that a large group of Adjurians come
s stumbling into the city travel-worn and tired,” Trey pointed out. “Our presence won’t raise any eyebrows?”

“I don’t think it
’d be wise for all of us to go into the city at first,” Jurin answered. “In fact, I think all but two of us should stay out of the city entirely. I’ve never been in the city before, so I have no real idea of what possible dangers there could be. If something happened within the walls, it would be better for everyone not to be there.”

“What could happen?” Halam asked.

Jurin thought for a few moments before answering. “While I don’t think that we would have any problems with the authorities, I may be wrong. It’s still forbidden for foreigners to travel in Jonguria without permission; has been ever since the war. While we can do our best to cover our faces with hoods, there is still the chance that we may be seen. A guard could spot us, a rebel could chance a look upon us, or even a beggar may decide there might be a few coins involved in reporting us to the city watch.”

“I thought that we wanted to report ourselves right away,” Bryn said.

“To the right people,” Jurin answered. “With enough coin we can secure passage on a fishing boat to Yanshide Island, and from there it would be easy for you to get on an Adjurian vessel.”

“We have plenty of Adjurian coins,” Conn pointed out.
Edgyn had been smart to keep a small pouch of gold with the other supplies that went into the lifeboats. “They may not be what they use in Jonguria, but I’m sure that they still appreciate gold.”

“But what about reporting our attack to imperial officials?” Halam asked.

“The more I’ve thought about it over the past few days the more I think that may not be the best idea,” Jurin answered. “While there may be some honest officials in the city, just as many could be taking bribes from any number of warlords. They’d listen to your story with a sympathetic face and assure you that all of your problems are at an end, then report you to the rebels the first chance they got.”

“All of the officials
can’t be like that,” Halam replied. “You said the emperor still had a firm hold on the city.”

“To the best of my knowledge, he does.
But my best knowledge is not much. I live in the south and Waigo is in the north. Any number of complex situations could be happening in the city that I don’t have the slightest idea about.”

“If that’s the case,” Pader said, “then we better just
book passage on a ship then get out of the city as fast as we can.”

“By getting passage I’m sure that we can also get a wagon to take us to the docks further north,” Jurin said.
“There’d be less chance of being spotted that way.”

“So who goes into the city?” Rodden asked.

“I’ll have to go,” Jurin replied. “I speak the most Jongurian among you, so if we are stopped and questioned by anyone we won’t have to worry about that. You’ll have to decide amongst yourselves who else’ll go.”

They walked on in silence for awhile, each of them thinking of who would be the best choice to go into the city.

“Pader, you and Halam speak more Jongurian than the rest of us. If something were to happen, that might be the difference between life and death,” Rodden said to break the silence.

“I don’t think my Jongurian would fool anyone,” Halam replied with a smile.

“You’re the unofficial leader of our party,” Flint said. “Ever since the ship went down you’ve been calling the shots.”

Before Halam could answer Pader spoke up.
“And that’s exactly the reason why he should stay with all of you outside the city. If something should occur I think your best chances of getting north to the docks lies with Halam.” Pader paused to look over at the Tillatian for a moment. “He’s gotten us all this far.”

“Not that I’ve done a very good job of it,” Halam objected.
“Three of us are dead.”

“And many more could be if things
’d gone a little differently,” Willem pointed out.

“I’ll go with Jurin into the city,” Pader announced.
“Most likely these fears of ours are unfounded.

The rest of the men agreed, so P
ader and Jurin would be the men going into the city. They walked in the shadow of the mountains until darkness came yet again. Jurin allowed a small fire for the night since they were nowhere near the road, and Flint began to cook up the two pheasants that Iago had been fast enough to shoot down earlier in the day. The break from salt pork and the easy travel did much to raise the men’s spirits higher than they had been in days. They were close to getting back home and they knew it. As long as everything went according to plan in the city, they’d be on a boat bound for home in little more than a day. They joked and laughed around the fire late into the night, finally laying down to sleep for what they hoped would be their last night on the hard Jongurian ground.

TWENTY-SEVEN

The rain finally began to fall.
Leisu had been staring at the dark clouds all morning. They’d started innocently enough far off on the horizon, but as the day progressed and they rode further north the clouds had increased in size, grown darker, and moved closer overhead. It was only inevitable that they would begin to pour forth water; it was just a question of when and where. Now less than a half-a-day’s ride from Waigo and with the sun already past the midpoint in the sky, they had decided to unleash their fury on the travelers below.

Leisu heard a horse’s hooves loudly approach and turned to see Ko ride up beside him.

“I thought we might’ve made it to the city,” he said as he pulled his cloak tighter around him.
The rain was coming down quite hard and steady now.

Leisu eyed the thick trees at the base of the mountains just a few leagues away and thought about turning his men that way to escape the weather’s onslaught, but decided against it.
They were a few hours hard ride from the city, and cowering under some trees would not make the weather any more bearable or do much to keep them dry. Most of the men were already soaked anyway.

“We’ll keep riding, if anything the weather will increase our speed,” Leisu said.
“Once the men know that I intend to press on to the city, they’ll push the horses.”

Ko didn’t say anything to that, but he didn’t ride off
either. Leisu looked around at the men. They were thirty-strong, all chosen especially by Ko. About half of them were known to Leisu, but the others he didn’t recognize. If Ko vouched for them, however, he knew they were up to the task. They were all mounted and had no wagons with them to slow their journey north. They had left Bindao two days earlier after word had reached the city via carrier pigeon from Hui. He wrote to say that he’d caught the trail of the Adjurians. After coming down from the hills they had followed a series of narrow canyons to where Wen resided. They had apparently stayed the night then set out early, their course a steady walk to the northwest, well away from the roads and toward the mountains. At their current rate of speed Hui expected that they would reach Waigo in about four days. They were indeed in the company of the soldier Jurin Millos, but of Wen he saw no sign. Leisu was disappointed to hear that, but he didn’t let it bother him too much. If he knew the old man, he was probably following Hui who was following the Adjurians. He chuckled at the thought and Ko looked over at him.

“Is everything all right, sir?” he asked.

“Just a thought about Wen, is all,” Leisu replied. He too pulled his cloak a little tighter about him. The rain was coming in at a sideways angle and the drops stung when they hit his face.

They rode on for a few more minutes with only the sound of the rain hitting the ground around them before Ko broke the silence.

“Sir, there is something that I’ve been meaning to ask you since we left Bindao,” he began.

“What is it?” Leisu asked.
He allowed Ko a great deal of latitude, and even encouraged him to ask questions and formulate his own opinions. Leisu knew that when his master had secured most of Jonguria under his firm control that he would need strong men that he could trust in key areas of the country. Leisu was sure he would be one of those men, and he too would then need a strong lieutenant that he could trust. Ko was being groomed especially for that role.

“Your former master Wen,” Ko said slowly, “why do you hate him so much?”

Leisu glanced over at Ko then returned his gaze to the road. It was a fair question, and one the man deserved an answer to. There was nothing reckless about Leisu’s desire to see Wen’s death, preferably at his own hand, and he didn’ go out of his way to bring it about. It had been ten years since he’d seen his former master, and as the years passed by he’d thought of him less and less. Still, the thought of the man helping the Adjurians didn’t sit well with him, and his old feelings of animosity toward his former master came flooding back.

“After the war I left the army for a time like so many other dispossessed and confused soldiers,” Leisu said.
“I didn’t know what it was that I wanted to do, but after seeing so many trusted friends die due to a lack of training, I decided that I needed to learn how to fight.”

Leisu paused and looked up at the clouds again then over at the trees far off the road.
Perhaps it would be a good idea to head toward their cover, he thought again, but then tightened his cloak and gave an extra kick to his horse, and Ko did the same.

“I asked around about accomplished masters that were looking for students,” Leisu continued.
“I eventually heard of a man that’d just returned home from defending Waigo, so I set out into the hills north of Bindao to find him. It was he who found me, however, and almost killed me in the process. I managed to find the network of small canyons that led to his home when he jumped out at me. Before I could react there was a sword digging into my throat. He asked me what I wanted and I told him that I wanted to study fighting. He laughed and walked away. Troubled by this, I followed at a safe distance and came to his home. For three days and three nights I sat outside without food or water waiting for him to approach me. I prayed for a rainstorm such as this during those three days,” Leisu said with a smile.