A Matter of Life
The guards who had been trailing behind Li Mu's carriage immediately pushed forward, hands gripping the hilts at their waists as they glared at Nuo Ping and his men.
At that, Shen Qingzhu stepped forward. Clad in black, a sword cradled in her arms, she swept the Li guards with a cold, murderous gaze. She radiated an aura that made it seem as though she alone could bring every one of the guards before her crashing down.
"Dang'er! Dang'er!"
Li Mu clutched his official's cap, leapt down from the carriage, and staggered for a moment. His cap tumbled to the ground, and had the guards not caught him by the arm, he might have fallen outright.
"Father……"
Stricken with shock, Li Mu dropped to his knees beside his son. He reached out a hand toward the boy, who was drenched head to toe in blood, but could not bring himself to touch him; his hand only trembled violently in the air.
Gritting his teeth, he lifted his head to glare up at Bai Jingyan's carriage. His eyes locked on Shen Qingzhu, who stood at the very front, and he roared.
"What in the world is the meaning of this? Bai Jingyan, why have you reduced my son to this state?"
Chun Tao stepped down from inside the carriage and drew back the screen for Bai Jingyan. Only then did Shen Qingzhu step aside.
Dressed in white robes patterned with black, Bai Jingyan bent at the waist as she emerged, but did not descend—she stood upon the carriage and looked down at Li Mu with frost-glazed eyes. Then, her gaze gone dark as a storm-lit night, she spoke slowly.
"It seems the Left Chancellor did not take my warning to heart."
Sima Ping squeezed his way between the Bai family guards and pushed forward for a better look. The moment he saw Bai Jingyan standing atop the carriage, he doubted his own eyes.
"Sister Bai?"
Bai Jingyan carried an aura as savage as if she had just walked out of a mountain of corpses, and her voice was chilling enough to raise the hair on one's neck.
"I believe I made myself clear to the Left Chancellor? That I had no wish to stand against him—that I desired only peace and quiet. I assumed he understood. I thought he would do nothing to displease me while aiding the Liang King. And yet he laid hands on my younger sister."
Venom had gathered in Li Mu's reddened eyes. He glared at Bai Jingyan as though he might tear her limb from limb on the spot, yet the instant his gaze met hers, an inexplicable chill ran through him.
This was the woman who had burned a hundred thousand surrendered soldiers to death. How cruel, how terrifying a person must she be!
"My temperament is rather like a blade, you see. Show me courtesy, and I return it twofold; torment me, and I repay that twofold as well. Since you have displeased me so, I am left with no choice but to return the discomfort in greater measure."
Bai Jingyan's eyes were dark and cold—eyes full of majesty and ferocity.
"Today's affair is a consequence born of the Left Chancellor's failure to read the situation. It falls to you to consider how to mend this matter, and how to mend it without sullying the Bai family's name. If you cannot present me with a clear answer before the sun sets today, then by all means, take your time pondering how you will explain this correspondence to His Majesty and to King Yama—after your family's necks have been scrubbed clean."
When she finished, Bai Jingyan bent once more and withdrew into the carriage. Without so much as a backward glance, she was gone.
Li Mu bit down hard, fists clenching within his sleeves until the veins stood out on the backs of his hands and across his forehead. Yet in the end, he could do nothing but grind his teeth and swallow his fury.
He had never imagined Bai Jingyan would handle matters with such boldness and resolve. He squeezed his eyes shut and shouted.
"What are you all doing! Carry the young master to the carriage! Hurry and take him back to the estate—summon the physicians at once!"
A deep, viscous fear had seized Li Mu. A cold dread climbed from the soles of his feet up his spine, and his whole body shook.
There could be no doubt that the correspondence was in Bai Jingyan's hands. Otherwise, how would she dare flaunt such arrogance? How would she dare have his son beaten to a pulp, beaten past all recognition?
The rumor that Zhenguo Commandery Princess Bai Jingyan had ordered the guards of the Bai estate to drag the Left Chancellor Li Mu's youngest son out of Huamanlou and beat him half to death spread through Dadu in less than half a shichen.
Lu Yuanfeng, who had been lounging idly on his bed without moving a muscle, shot upright at the news.
His eyes went round as he stared at Sima Ping.
"What did you say? Is it true? Sister Bai really beat that damnable wretch Li Mingtang within an inch of his life?"
"I'm telling you it's true! I saw it with my own eyes! From a fair distance, sure—but I did. Sister Bai said something to the Left Chancellor, but I couldn't catch that part."
Sima Ping hurried on.
"When the Crown Prince took his secondary consort last time, Sister Bai's blade was so fast— you couldn't even see it move! It was magnificent! And today she didn't even step down from her carriage to meet the Left Chancellor! Her bearing was extraordinary! They say the Grand Princess and the Zhenguo King raised her, and it shows. She's nothing like those noble daughters of Dadu's great houses they make such a fuss over!"
Lu Yuanfeng grinned and straightened his back, faintly flushed with excitement.
"That's our Sister Bai—she dotes on me! She must have found out Li Mingtang was tormenting me, that's why she did it!"
Sima Ping barely heard a word Lu Yuanfeng was spouting. His mind was filled with nothing but the image of Bai Jingyan standing atop that carriage. From so frail a woman had flowed a presence that seemed fit to shake mountains and rivers. The commanding air and gravity that pressed in from every side made it impossible to meet her eyes directly.
Sima Ping found himself thinking of the late Zhenguo King and the Zhenguo Duke. Men whose presence was heavy and deep, their sharpness honed yet carefully sheathed. It was an aura only those who had weathered wars drenched in blood could possess.
"Yuanfeng, I've made up my mind. On the twenty-fifth of this month, I'm going to the Southern Border with you. I'll go under a false name and join the Bai Family Army!"
Sima Ping's words came out of nowhere.
At that, Lu Yuanfeng jolted upright from the arhat bed, jammed his feet haphazardly into his shoes, and dashed for the window. He stuck his head out, glanced left and right, then shut the window with all his might, dropped his voice, and grumbled at Sima Ping.
"Keep it down! Shut your mouth! If you're coming along, just come along quietly—why do you have to bellow it? If my father and mother find out, to say nothing of my grandfather, not a single one of us is going anywhere!"
"Maybe you can't go, but I can!"
Sima Ping gave Lu Yuanfeng a look that was half a smile, half not, taking in the boy wound tight as a bowstring. Then he plopped down onto the low tea table by the window and crossed his legs. He lifted his teacup, took an unhurried sip, and spoke again.
"My father wanted my eldest brother to enter official service and my second brother to join the army. And me? I've just been trailing around after you, turning into good-for-nothing riffraff! If I said I wanted to actually accomplish something with my life, Father would be pleased, wouldn't he?"
"And you just have to drag me into a corner with you!"
Lu Yuanfeng sat down on the tea table as well, eyes flashing at Sima Ping.
"The moment my father and mother hear of it, they'll lock me in the house! And my grandfather—don't even get me started…… If that old man finds out I want to join the Bai Family Army, he might flay the skin right off my back."
Before Lu Yuanfeng could even finish, the door burst open. Ye Yuanjing, dressed in a white robe traced with cloud patterns, walked into the room. His face frozen, he asked:
"Join the Bai Family Army?"
Lu Yuanfeng trembled from head to toe in shock. At the sight of his brother's stern expression, his throat went dry, and his mind filled with nothing but the certainty that everything was over.
Sima Ping, who ordinarily feared the ever-cold-faced Ye Yuanjing as well, sprang up in alarm, uncrossing his legs. He offered a respectful bow and stammered awkwardly.
"I, ah…… Brother Yuanjing…… I should be going!"
Sima Ping hurried past Ye Yuanjing and bolted out of the outer chamber.
Lu Yuanfeng forced an awkward smile at his brother. When Ye Yuanjing started toward him, Lu Yuanfeng's legs seemed to give out beneath him; he slid gracelessly down from the tea table and dropped to his knees.
"Brother! Please, don't tell Grandfather! I'm not going anywhere—I was just talking!"
As Ye Yuanjing kept walking toward him, Lu Yuanfeng hastily clapped both hands over his ears and hunched up, instinctively protecting himself against another ear-yanking.
But Ye Yuanjing showed no intention of approaching him at all. He strode quickly into the inner room and flung open the wardrobe doors.
Behind the red wardrobe doors sat a bundle Lu Yuanfeng had packed in advance.
Ye Yuanjing turned his head to glance once at Lu Yuanfeng, then reached for the bundle.
Lu Yuanfeng lunged forward and pressed his hand down hard on top of it.
"Brother, this isn't right! All right, fine—I won't go, I won't go!"
Ye Yuanjing shook off Lu Yuanfeng's hand. When Lu Yuanfeng kept trying to snatch the bundle back, Ye Yuanjing jabbed a single finger at him—and Lu Yuanfeng froze stiff where he stood, unable to take another step. He could only stare as his brother unpacked the bundle.
Inside were a few changes of clothes, along with silver tallies and a heap of loose silver coins.
Ye Yuanjing picked up one of the garments Lu Yuanfeng had folded—wrinkled and creased beyond rescue.
"You packed clothes like these, and you mean to hide your identity?"
Every piece of clothing in the bundle was one Lu Yuanfeng wore habitually. Each had been cut and finished with meticulous, exacting craftsmanship, the fabric precious and ornate—garments that no household short of a meritorious noble family could ever dream of dressing in.
"Everyone in the Lu family dresses in finery rare even among common folk! If you truly want to hide your rank, then……"
Ye Yuanjing confiscated Lu Yuanfeng's silver tallies.
"You mustn't carry these. And the clothes will have to be swapped for what ordinary commoners actually wear."
Lu Yuanfeng stared at his brother in astonishment, an expression of pure disbelief on his face.
"Brother, then…… you're not going to tell Grandfather?"
"Repack the traveling clothes properly and show them to me for inspection. There's no rush—leave after our sixth aunt's birthday celebration in the sixth month. If you run off before then, I'll drag you back and break your legs on the spot! Understood?"
Ye Yuanjing asked, his expression cold.
"Yes, sir! I'll remember, Brother! Don't worry!"
Lu Yuanfeng crept forward carefully and gathered the bundle into his arms. Then he looked up at Ye Yuanfeng with a sheepish grin.
Ye Yuanjing gazed at his brother as though beholding a complete fool, sighed, and walked out.
Only after Ye Yuanjing had gone did Lu Yuanfeng realize what was wrong. His brother— hadn't he just made off with every last string of silver he'd spent years scraping together?
* * *
The Li residence.
A maid in Li Mingtang's courtyard carried in a basin of hot water, and came back out carrying a basin brimming with bloody water.
The Left Chancellor's wife wailed, screaming for her son until her voice nearly gave out. Li Mingtang's shrieks rang out without pause.
The servants of the Li household dared not so much as breathe loudly, keeping their heads bowed low as they worked. Terrified of being somehow entangled in it all, they did not dare speak a word out of turn.
Li Mingtang would never walk on his own two legs again.
But the Left Chancellor had no room in his mind just now to grieve for his son's legs. A far graver thought loomed: one careless move, and his entire family could be in danger. They might even suffer the punishment of extermination down to the very clan.
Even as he left that place, Bai Jingyan's gaze—cold enough to pierce bone—kept flickering before his eyes.
She had demanded a clear answer before sunset, on the sole condition that no harm come to the Bai family. Fail, and he was to consider how he would explain that correspondence to His Majesty and to King Yama—after his family's necks had been washed clean. A shiver ran down the Left Chancellor's spine.
What manner of twisted logic was this? She had broken his son's legs, and now she demanded that he explain how to smooth the matter over?
The Left Chancellor closed his eyes tightly and gave his head a small, deliberate shake. He must not waver.
Fists clenched until they ached, he fought down the fury and the fear that surged over him all at once.