Past Frenzy into Greater Frenzy, and Beyond That into Frenzy Upon Frenzy
"Zhuge Jin will see to the restoration of Xiaopei. Guan Yu, you come with me to Xiapi."
"Yes, elder brother."
Once Lu Bu's army had been driven off, each man took up his new charge, and they scattered.
"Seongo, you won great merit in this battle. I will be counting on you, as always."
"Yes, my lord!"
With Zhang Pae taking Liu Bei as his lord in earnest, what had been only a loose alliance among rival warlords settled into a true bond of lord and vassal.
And so Zhang Pae returned to Mount Tai, while Zhuge Jin remained to oversee the work of recovery. The three sworn brothers—Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Zhang Fei—together with me, and Zhao Bao, far off as he had been, turned our horses toward Xiapi.
On the ride, Liu Bei drew up alongside me and began to ask this and that.
"Fengxian has gone his way. What does that leave us?"
"Yuan Shu, I should think."
"And in a situation like this, would he truly attack?"
"He will."
I said it with certainty. Liu Bei thought a moment, then asked again.
"Lu Bu might go to Yuan Shu and place himself under his protection."
"I would call it even odds."
"Speak plainly."
"Yuan Shu is known as a man whose talent for command is wretched beside the vast power he holds. If he could throw his weight across the whole of Yangzhou, it was only because he had a mighty warlord beneath him. Sun Jian."
"Elder Brother Wentai. Yes... I met him a few times, long ago. A warrior among warriors. A pity, that man."
At the name of one he had known from the Yellow Turban campaigns all the way through the coalition against Dong Zhuo, Liu Bei shook his head slowly.
"After Sun Jian died, Yuan Shu absorbed his strength, and in truth it is Sun Jian's remnants who do the fighting in Yuan Shu's army. But you cannot raise a tiger cub like a puppy forever."
"You mean Elder Brother Wentai's son, Sun Ce? I have heard plenty. They say the boy is a terror in a fight."
"And his ambition to conquer Jiangdong in his father's footsteps is anything but small. Sooner or later he will leave Yuan Shu. When that day comes, there may well be an alternative by the name of Lu Bu."
Liu Bei listened, then turned to me with a crooked little smile.
"Baijin, the way you tell it, it sounds as if I had the tiger in my hands, then fed it and let it go."
"Once the tiger and the fox join hands, the hunter can come down and take them both. Isn't that so?"
"Hoh. So that's how it is. Then sending Lu Bu off with something in his hands wasn't a bad choice after all."
He tugged at his own long ear, let it spring back, and spoke.
"A rumor that one of my men carried off Lu Bu's woman would travel far less kindly than a rumor that we fought him, beat him, and then mercifully sent him home with oil and army grain besides. Hahahaha!"
So he really has been turning that over this whole time. Not that I imagine a scandal of that sort would spread so very far among the warlords of this age...
We talked of one thing and another for several days, and so we came home to Xiapi.
The people gave us a tremendous welcome, of course. At the government office we exchanged commendations for all we had endured, and then there was nothing left but for each man to return to his own house.
"Time to head home."
"Ah—one moment."
The prize I had brought back from Lu Bu—that is to say, Diaochan—was in a room of the yamen, making herself beautiful. Fresh from the bath, she had changed into new clothes and dusted herself with a faint perfume. At the mirror of her dressing table she stained her lips red, then, from among powders of every hue, took up a brush and laid a deep color about her eyes. On a face already perfect, it was like the addition of wings.
To stand there spellbound, watching her paint herself, was a magnificent reward in its own right. When she finished, rose, and came toward me with a smile, my heart began to pound.
"I shall follow you now to your residence, my lord."
"Ah. Yes."
"I hear that since your marriage you have two ladies."
"My principal wife is of the Zhuge clan, Ziyu's younger sister. The other is Huan Ying, a young woman of Xuzhou whom I saved during the fighting."
"A fate like my own, then."
"Is that how I ought to put it?"
I was still turning over, on the way home, what on earth I would say to Xue and Ying when—
"Baijin! My Baijin!"
"Wah—!?"
"Oh my!"
Someone seized me from behind, arms locked fast, a hand catching me by the nape. I turned my head and found Liu Bei, those great ears of his flapping, beaming as he hugged me.
"Governor!"
"It's been too long. I should like a meal at your house."
"Ah... ah, yes."
I had no idea why Liu Bei had taken it into his head to do this all on his own, but for the moment I went along. Diaochan rode in the carriage. Liu Bei and I took the reins, and so we arrived.
The moment I appeared, the servants threw the gates open. Xue and Huan Ying were waiting.
"My lord, congratulations on your victory."
"I am so glad you have returned unharmed—oh my, oh my?"
"Sisters-in-law. It has been too long."
"The Governor of Xuzhou!?"
Liu Bei slung an arm over my shoulders and waved with that shamelessly genial face of his, and my two wives dropped hastily into bows. Then, before Diaochan had even stepped down, we walked together into the main hall.
"We heard it is thanks to you, Governor, that our husband has come safely home. We are truly grateful."
"Hahaha! What have I done? This fellow's head is Lü Buwei and Lord Mengchang rolled into one. The heart of Xuzhou is your husband."
"Oh my, what extravagant praise. We who wait at home do nothing but fret ourselves sick."
Huan Ying received the guest with smooth, eager courtesy, and Liu Bei took a seat in the reception room where visitors were welcomed. Then, before the bowed heads of Zhuge Xue and Huan Ying, he made as if to speak.
"Ah, the thing is... Baijin rendered such extraordinary service this time that I wanted to do something for the man."
"To hear the Governor speak so moves us beyond words."
"Hm. Yes. It happened during the war, you see, and it may sit a little hard with you ladies..."
Wait. No—wait.
Lord Liu! Governor! Imperial Uncle Liu! Don't tell me you mean to explain, in front of my wives, how I brought Diaochan home!
"Among men there are certain things, you understand, and since it would be difficult for him to tell his two wives himself, I thought I would say that the doing was mine—"
"Hrk—! Hrrk!?"
In that instant Xue clutched her face and began to retch.
"...Eh?"
"Oh heavens!"
"Uh—uhm!?"
Liu Bei's face took on a look of panic I had never once seen there, and a whole basin of cold sweat seemed to pour off him.
What he had meant to do, dropping by our house as the familiar gentleman of benevolence and righteousness, was to say something like, Such and such happened; he took a woman as spoils from the enemy, and I permitted it. So, my two dear sisters-in-law, do not scold Baijin. I recognized it as merit in battle, and you may take it so.
But Xue was dry-heaving. Which meant...
"It has been two months since my husband left... and it still hasn't come."
"...No. No, no, no—truly?"
Tears stood in Zhuge Xue's eyes from the violence of the retching, but she smiled and nodded to me.
"And I as well, of course."
"Pfft—!"
"Baijin, you marksman. I came to cadge a meal, and this is what I walk into..."
"Governor, we beg a verse of blessing for the child she carries. For the sake of our house!"
"Th-that I can do, but the other matter..."
"But what was it you meant to tell us just now? You said it was something that passed between men in the war, and that you would speak of a reward. Surely you don't mean..."
"Th-that is..."
"Has our husband received some high office? A grand administrator, or an honor from the province?"
"Ahem. Khrm!"
And that was when it happened.
"Madam, I have brought the refreshments."
"Oh my!"
At the voice from outside, Huan Ying opened the door.
Xue was one thing. But Huan Ying had ended up with child as well.
And the one who had brought the refreshments was no maid. It was a woman with a familiar face: bangs and side-locks sticking out in uneven tufts, long narrow fox-eyes forever full of a smile, a mole at the corner of her lips. Zhao Bao's daughter.
"How can a guest be doing something like this!"
"Oh my. I thought we were friends. That's why I help with the housework now and then."
"Miss Zhao! It isn't only my husband—the Governor of Xuzhou is here!"
"Oh my?"
Those narrow eyes opened just a fraction. Zhao Bao's daughter looked Liu Bei over with a subtle gaze, then dropped at once into a deep bow.
"I am Zhao Mi, daughter of Lord Zhao, Commandant of Xuzhou."
"Ah, ahahaha. Is that so? Commandant Zhao has come safely home this time as well."
"Yes. This girl is truly grateful that you brought my father back unharmed."
A smiling face, narrow eyes—and yet, opened only a crack, they seemed to scan every corner of the room at speed. Zhao Bao's daughter.
Stranded in that subtle, awkward silence, with no idea what to say, I heard Zhao Mi speak.
"By the way, there is a carriage outside that a noble lady arrived in. Who might she be, and from where?"
"Hm?"
"She seemed too extraordinary a beauty to call a mere guest, so, just in case, I asked the servants of this house to escort her in."
"My... husband?"
At Zhuge Xue's voice I forgot all about reading the room and pulled her straight into my arms.
"Oh my!?"
"Thank you. Truly. You are the finest wife a man could have."
"I-I am grateful, but with the Governor watching, and Commandant Zhao's daughter as well..."
At that moment Liu Bei cleared his throat and took it upon himself to bring this festival of utter chaos to order.
"I am truly sorry to Baijin's wife and concubines. Ignorant of how things stood, I played matchmaker and bound him to a maid of Lu Bu's whom we held as a hostage."
"What?"
"...Lu Bu's maid, matched to whom?"
"This Liu Xuande has truly blundered!"
Ah, Imperial Uncle Liu...
"So you were granted a concubine and brought her home."
Zhao Bao's daughter, Zhao Mi—those thin, narrow eyes opened a fraction once more, and she smiled in the shape of a crescent moon.
The festival of utter chaos was only just beginning.
When she heard the news, Zhuge Xue was silent for a time. Then she spoke of it as a matter among men, something that had happened outside these walls, and accepted it with perfect calm.
Huan Ying, for her part, only grew more triumphant. "Then it's certain I'm the elder sister, isn't it? I don't count by age. I count by who entered the household first." And off she went herself to find a room in which Diaochan might be brought into the house.
Liu Bei kept looking painfully awkward, and before the congratulatory table could even be laid he slipped out into the courtyard. The one who came in bearing the wine for the celebration was Zhao Mi.
"Isn't there a saying—heroes are fond of beauty? The situation is delicate, that is all. Lord Zhang will truly become a hero of the realm."
"I'm grateful, but... a woman of another house waiting on mine, and going so far even with me, the master of it—there's no need for that."
"Oh my. I do it because I like to."
Zhao Mi's small lips twitched, and the mole at the corner of her mouth trembled. In pure looks she fell short of Diaochan, and yet the astonishing curves of her body, and the perfume that clung to her and made a man's head swim, filled the air with an allure that left me dizzy.
She set the wine table before me and quietly sat down facing me. It was painfully awkward with the table between us, but she only kept smiling at me.
"When I learned that Madam and Miss Huan were with child, I summoned a renowned physician of Xuzhou, and I had the household servants seek out foods good for the unborn."
"That is truly kind of you. I shall call on Commandant Zhao and offer my thanks."
"Shall we go and offer them together?"
"!?"
"I thought I would be the third. I did not expect to be the fourth."
In that instant my leg began to tingle.
From beneath the wine table, Zhao Mi's slender little foot, wrapped in silk, slipped out and tickled along my leg. Toes flexing, it climbed, brushed my thigh, and drew ever nearer a far more dangerous place. The owner of that foot rested her chin upon the table, fox-narrow eyes brimming with allure, and licked her lips.
"W-wait a moment!"
"I have heard a great deal from my father. And... the truth is, no one has yet spoken of a match for me, or of marriage. Because I am a concubine's daughter."
The silk band about her foot loosened of its own accord, and a glimpse of snow-white ankle showed. And the narrow-eyed seductress kept working her toes against my groin.
It seemed I was about to be crushed beneath a disaster of my own inviting.