Each Keeps a Different Count
Each man keeps a different count.
At first light, Deputy Chief Guo Daxian stood on the ridge and frowned, his gaze moving from the summit of Qingxue Peak to the Jizhou army camp spread across Yiyang County. Among the ignorant mass of the Heishan Bandits, he was one of the few who could read, and who knew something of the Confucian way. His true name had been forgotten long ago. The nickname the mountain stronghold had given him in awe—Daxian, the Great Worthy—had hardened into the name he bore, and being a Heishan bandit, loath to show his real one, had been reason enough to bury it.
Something... has gone badly wrong.
The calm in Guo Daxian's eyes wavered. A prearranged signal had certainly come down from the summit of Qingxue Peak, yet the motion of it was subtly unlike the usual—awkward, unnatural. He had no way of knowing that in the night raid Li Hui had slaughtered every bandit on the summit save Sun Qing and Li Damu, and that the skilled flag signalman had died in the midst of it. Li Damu, barely left alive, had seized the flags and passed the orders on as signals, but set beside a soldier who had done nothing for years but wave flags, the result could only look clumsy. A decade and more of rolling through battlefields had honed an instinct in Guo Daxian, and that instinct was screaming.
How am I meant to judge an omen this ill?
He wanted to send scouts up at once and learn what calamity had struck Qingxue Peak, but the moment he recalled Chief Sun Qing's brutality, the order died in his throat. Cross that man's mood on a groundless suspicion, and his head would be off before the day was out. Sun Qing was that savage.
A blood-drying stretch of anguish crawled by. Then, from the summit, drums boomed—thum, thum, thum—and the sound rolled down to fill the ravine. Three enormous banners, red, blue, and black, swung hard through some fixed sequence and came sharp into view.
"What in the world... what kind of mad order is that!"
Guo Daxian, seated on a rock, sprang up like a coiled spring. Unable to accept the shocking meaning of the flags, he seized the signalman beside him by the collar and made him confirm it again. Only when he heard the answer did it sink, bone-deep, that he had not been seeing things. Grasping at last how grave the matter was, he barked at the man to loose two blazing fire-arrows into the empty sky—the summons for an emergency council of the stronghold's leadership.
The arrows split the morning, and the whole deep valley stirred. Soon a dozen riders came tearing up the slope in a cloud of dust, straight for the ridge where he stood.
Not long after, the lesser chiefs arrived one after another—the men who divided command of the thirty thousand lying in ambush across three ravines. Sui Gu led the main force in the center; Zuo Shou led the troops on the right; Yan Bai led those on the left. Of the three, Sui Gu was cruel and violent in temperament, as if stamped from the same mold as Chief Sun Qing, and yet sharp-witted, and so he commanded the great host in Sun Qing's stead. By office, the stronghold's second man was Deputy Chief Guo Daxian. Sui Gu, backed by Sun Qing's tacit leave and by overwhelming force of arms, had seated himself as the second in fact.
"What in blazes is this mad order come down off the mountaintop? Telling our army of thirty thousand to walk out of the ravine this instant and lay down our arms on the plain—is that the talk of a man in his right mind?"
The moment he arrived, Sui Gu leapt from his horse and rounded on Guo Daxian, veins standing in his neck. Zuo Shou and Yan Bai, coming up behind him, stared at Guo Daxian with the same dumbfounded looks.
"How should I know Chief Sun's mind any better than you? I received the same one-sided order you did, waved down at us in flags from that summit. Only, by my own short reckoning... there must have been some fatal calamity on Qingxue Peak last night. One we know nothing of."
"A calamity! Then instead of standing here gaping at Qingxue Peak, we ought to send swift troops up to the summit this instant and make sure Chief Sun is safe!"
Sui Gu bellowed, eyes glaring. Guo Daxian met him with a calm, heavy look.
"Very well. Suppose we take troops up and find there was no calamity at all. What then? For daring to doubt Chief Sun's orders and move an army without leave, that man's head comes off on the spot. Which of you will shoulder that weight and lead the way up?"
The logic cut to the vitals. Guo Daxian studied the faces of Sui Gu, Zuo Shou, and Yan Bai in turn, and the men who had come on so full of themselves all flinched as one and, as if by prior agreement, quietly looked away. All three felt in their bones that the situation was strange and wrong, but none of them was the sort to stake his one and only life and step to the front. There was not a man in the stronghold who did not know how hideous and cruel Sun Qing's killings were, when someone put a scratch on his absolute authority.
"Even so, we can't just meekly obey an order that sounds like nonsense! The moment we throw our weapons down, the Jizhou troops will come running and turn us into meat!"
Yan Bai—endlessly cruel to the weak, and yet frail before the strong—shouted it, trembling.
"The order those flags sent down does claim our safety is perfectly guaranteed. But I'll be honest with you. I don't believe that sweet promise either."
With that, a suffocating silence settled over the ridge. One way or another, a decision had to be made with thirty thousand lives hanging on it, and whichever side they chose, the end was hell. To have their limbs torn apart on Sun Qing's blade for disobeying was a hideous death. To throw their weapons down before their own eyes and be trampled to ruin under the hooves of the Jizhou cavalry was no better.
"But... isn't Deputy Chief Li up there too, the one with the quick eye? Would a man who calculates that fast give an order that's no better than suicide? There must be some hole to crawl out through, or he wouldn't have made so reasonable a choice. Isn't that so?"
Yan Bai, unable to bear the silence, squeezed the opinion out with care. Hot-blooded Zuo Shou cut him off in a flare of temper.
"Enough of that nonsense! If it's as Deputy Chief Guo says and a real calamity has hit that summit, that timid Deputy Chief Li would have been the first to lose his head to an enemy blade. What godforsaken reasonable choice are you talking about?"
"So you're certain a calamity has broken out up there, Zuo Shou?"
"No... well, not exactly certain. The circumstances are suspicious, is all..."
Zuo Shou trailed off and lowered his tail, and Yan Bai pressed in again.
"Then we'd better obey Chief Sun's order, uneasy as it sits. Better than dying for defiance."
"And if those Jizhou bastards start the slaughter, how in the world do you mean to stop them then?"
Yan Bai's voice cracked into a shout. Sui Gu, who had been watching the squabble with open irritation, settled the brawl in a voice like a drum.
"Quiet! We'll do it this way. We advance to the mouth of the ravine as the chief ordered, but only the front rank lays down its weapons. The main body behind them keeps its arms and stands ready to fight at any moment. That's the safest course."
"Oh! That'll do. A fine scheme, that."
Yan Bai threw his support behind it at once. Guo Daxian, who had been pressing a hand to his brow, spoke with a heavy face.
"The heart of it is the true intent behind this order to disarm us. If we don't know the real mind behind it, we'll end up walking of our own feet into the jaws of a starving tiger."
"Then we do it like this."
Sui Gu shot him a look and tossed out a flashing scheme.
"As I said—we form up at the mouth and hold a tense standoff, and you, Deputy Chief Guo, step out yourself and talk to the bastard leading those Jizhou troops. Yuan... what was the name."
"Acting Sima Yuan Shang. Youngest son of Yuan Shao, Inspector of Jizhou."
"Anyway! You negotiate with him and find out what mad business is going on atop Qingxue Peak. You can manage that much, can't you? Learn what they want, while you're at it. Something has definitely happened on that peak."
"...Very well. I'll do it."
Sui Gu, too, was convinced a calamity had struck Qingxue Peak, but fear of Sun Qing's savagery kept him from stepping forward, and he shoved the task onto Guo Daxian. Guo Daxian stroked his beard in silence and nodded. In the present trap, with no way forward and no way back, that shallow compromise felt like the only rational escape—and above all, it meant he would not have to stake his life and climb into the hell on Qingxue Peak to see it with his own eyes.
And yet... they say Yuan Shang has a knack for binding even a sharp scholar in his prime until the man cannot stir a finger. Yuan Shao handed him command of the army entire, so the rumor is surely no lie. This does not feel good.
He forced down the ill foreboding rising in him, admitted there was no other course, and rose heavily from his place.
"Come, come. No time to stand about in a daze. Make haste. Linger here any longer, and what will you do when a true thunderbolt of a reprimand comes down from Chief Sun on that summit?"
"Understood. We return to our own camps and prepare for whatever breaks."
Sui Gu, Zuo Shou, and Yan Bai slapped the dust from their seats, swung onto their horses, and scattered toward their camps in a rough cloud of dirt. Left alone on the ridge, Guo Daxian looked up into a sky so blue it stung the eyes, and murmured in a low, desolate voice.
"From the day the Yuan clan entered Jizhou... not one thing has gone right."
"Something's off. Prepare for battle—quietly, so the enemy doesn't see it!"
From the gate tower I watched the Heishan Bandits' movements and passed the order through a messenger. They had come out of the ravine in high spirits, weapons gripped, every line of them showing the will to have a fight.
Thud. Then a clatter.
The bandits in the front ranks began to set their weapons down. Even so, neither I nor the Jizhou troops let the tension go. From the high tower their formation lay open to the eye, and from the middle ranks back they still held their arms, and the spirit in them was formidable.
Did Sun Qing deceive Li Hui and send a different order? Flags can't carry a complicated explanation.
Zhao Yun, Zhao Du, and Wen Chou, who commanded the Jizhou troops no less than I did, were wound just as tight. Do this well, and I secured a force with ease. Do it badly, and we would be in a melee. I did not fear a melee, but I hoped to finish the thing without blood.
Then Gao Gan, the Recorder, approached. He looked as if he had something to say, so I sent the guards around us well back.
"Shang'er. Will you be all right?"
My older cousin on my mother's side wanted a private word. I saw it in his face, smiled, and answered.
"I don't see why I wouldn't be."
"You've got nerve. If they attack, it'll be a melee, and if you lose, His Lordship will rebuke you hard."
"I've prepared for a melee as well. The losses would be heavy, but if we win, he won't have much to say. Their numbers are far greater than we expected, besides. In any case, nothing will come of this that harms the Inspectorate of Jizhou."
"They've set their weapons down, but they don't look ready to follow your will."
"They'll be uneasy. They can't be sure how we'll move. So—eh?"
I pressed myself to the parapet and looked toward the Heishan camp, and Gao Gan stuck close beside me. The ranks parted. A dozen cavalry came slowly this way, escorting a man in his prime.
"Looks like they want to talk."
"I think the same."
"They've probably caught on. This is a failure."
"If they've caught on, why come to talk?"
"They'll have their reasons. Just cut them down. No point in—"
"I'll meet him."
I answered firmly, took my guards, and went down from the tower. Gao Gan watched my back with an anxious face. His displeasure was plain.
With a long, grating creak, the gate opened. Under Zhao Yun's escort I rode out at a walk, and at the midpoint I met Guo Daxian, the two of us alone on horseback.
"Deputy Chief Guo Daxian."
"Acting Sima Yuan Shang."
He stared at me a while before he spoke.
"You seem young..."
"Does age matter?"
"It does not."
He glanced at Zhao Yun arrayed behind me, then asked abruptly, one finger lifted toward Qingxue Peak.
"What is your intent, Sima Yuan?"
I did not answer. He nodded.
"A calamity has befallen Qingxue Peak. Now I understand."
"Are you not worried for Chief Sun's condition?"
"You don't even hide that you caused it."
"You would have guessed anyway. Surrender."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then it is war. Do you imagine I will sit idle while the Heishan Bandits try to plunder Jizhou?"
"Are you confident, when we have the advantage in numbers?"
"In exchange, I have Chief Sun in my hands."
The tails of Guo Daxian's eyes twitched, a frightening flicker. The order to disarm had already put the Heishan Bandits in a bind, and if war came, there was no telling what command he would give.
"Show every tile in your hand like that, and won't we simply adapt?"
"Hardly. You don't know how I mean to play that tile. The ways to use it are endless. And from what I hear, Chief Sun holds the Heishan Bandits by fear."
"The lesser chiefs each lead their own units. There will be no problem carrying on a war."
"And if, in the middle of the war, I were to release Chief Sun? Do you not fear his revenge?"
Guo Daxian recalled Sun Qing's savagery. Whichever way he turned it, Sun Qing was the problem, and even if this matter were resolved cleanly, Sun Qing would not leave his subordinates in peace. His head began to throb.
"I will speak with the lesser chiefs."
"Let us meet again after one double-hour. There's no need to drag this out."
I drew a letter I had prepared from inside my robe and handed it to him.
"I have set down a few lines, seeking a way we might coexist in the lands around Yiyang County. I hope what is written there helps you settle your thoughts toward the better course."
"You thought it through and wrote it alone?"
"You may take it so."
"Are the Yuan always this bold, and this clever?"
"Hahaha. Hardly. Even among the Yuan, I am a breed apart."
"Then we meet after one double-hour."
Guo Daxian turned his horse with a hard face. Zhao Yun came up at once and closed around me.
"You ought to return."
"Understood."
I watched Guo Daxian's back a moment longer, then rode for the walled city of Yiyang under Zhao Yun's escort. On the way back I hoped, fiercely, that I might take them in without a battle.
They look ready to surrender. To think the Heishan Bandits had a man like Guo Daxian among them. Then again, they say men of talent lie as thick as sand on a riverbed. He would not have been a bandit from the start. In an age like this, his house was likely swept under, and somehow he came to stand where he stands.
Through him I quietly took the measure of the Heishan Bandits. I had thought them nothing but an ignorant, ferocious mob. It seemed I would have to change my mind.
If I take them in, Guo Daxian must stand at the center. But what to do with Sun Qing and Li Damu? Li Damu I might yet win over. Sun Qing does not look easy.
Worries chased worries. The more I thought, the clearer it became that the problems were not one or two. For now I decided to think of nothing but the surrender, and to solve whatever arose when it arose. This negotiation, at least, had borne fruit.