As the Old Saying Goes, Liu Bei Knows No Worry
I arrived with a heart full of romance, planted myself before the city gate, threw both arms wide, and shouted so that every soul in earshot would hear.
"I have returned!"
Guan Yu, at my side, set a hand on my shoulder and asked, sidelong.
"Qian, did you have roots in Shuchun?"
"…I knew it. I should have saved that line for Xiaopei."
He caught my meaning, let out a short laugh, and slung an arm around my shoulders. On my other side stood Tang Ji.
"Is this the place called Shuchun?"
"Yes. It is."
"In all my life I have never once gone beyond the country around Chang'an and Luoyang. Everything here is new."
"One of these days I'll take you to see the sea."
At that, for the first time, the faintest smile touched Tang Ji's lips.
"Well then. The land of Shuchun is where we start anew."
The moment I passed through the gates, Liu Bei, who had been waiting inside the city, came charging out and swept me into a crushing embrace. Behind him Zhuge Liang, Zhang Fei, Zhao Yun, Zhang He, Tian Yu, Hao Zhao, Wang Ling, Jian Yong, and the rest raised cupped-fist salutes, and rank on rank of soldiers offered their courtesies. Only then did I feel, all over again, that I had truly come back.
"Qian, what possessed you to break out of that killing ground alone? I was raising a hundred thousand men to come and save you!"
"I was always going to come back alive. That's why. We're all safe. Isn't that enough?"
"You hopeless fool! Must you be so reckless?"
Liu Bei pounded my back until I rocked where I stood. He was honest with his feelings past all reason, and he knew exactly what face to show the people who followed him. Better still, none of it was calculated. The performance came straight from the heart, which was why men had followed him under the name of chivalry. Lately I had come to see it for myself: however many battles he lost, however many strongholds slipped through his hands, there were always people at his side.
"But the lady who came with you and Yunchang—who is she?"
Only then, catching sight of Tang Ji's beauty for the first time, did Liu Bei think to ask. It had been a moving reunion, rich with meaning, but the moment the joy ebbed, every gaze turned naturally toward her. She was a peerless beauty who did not yield a step to Diaochan. She had none of Zhao Mi's sultry heat, she was not tall like Seoli, and she lacked Ying'er's coquettish charm—and yet this enigmatic beauty stood pressed close against my side, and the questions were plain on every face.
"She is Her Highness, Consort of the Prince of Hongnong."
"W-what? Then in Chang'an, the former—!"
Even knowing, Liu Bei did not dare speak the name of Emperor Shao of Han. The instant he understood that Tang Ji had once been empress, he clapped a hand over his own mouth.
"His Majesty the Emperor entrusted her to me."
For a heartbeat Liu Bei could not speak at all. Then he brought both hands together and bowed his head before Tang Ji. The others were already rushing over in alarm when he cried out where he stood.
That told everyone everything. Zhang Fei lunged to seize Liu Bei and ended up bowing just as deeply himself. When the soldiers dropped to their knees as one, Tang Ji was genuinely at a loss. She fled to me, hid behind my back, and peered out, waiting to see what I would do. I soothed her quietly, and we decided it was time to go in.
"Come on. For the next three days, plan on drinking the nights clean through."
"At least let me see my family first…"
"Ah—of course! They're in the annex now, with my own ladies. I thought Xuzhou too dangerous, so I brought your good wife and your children here and kept them safe."
"You brought them all the way from Xuzhou… I'm grateful. It is safer at the Imperial Uncle's side."
"I hear you were chased on the way. Brother Mengde did a truly shabby thing."
Xiahou Dun hadn't lost the eye, but he had gone home with the socket swollen up like a chestnut. The thought of Cao Cao's army brought something else to mind.
"Imperial Uncle—speaking of which, what became of Cao Xiu and Zhu Ling, the ones who joined the campaign against Yuan Shu?"
"When I heard something unseemly had broken out at Xuchang, I penned them inside the Chu army. If it came to it, I meant to kill them and march straight up into Yanzhou."
My breath caught.
"I would have struck the seat of Yanzhou, then driven every man on to Xuchang to save His Majesty the Emperor—and to save you."
"…And where are they now?"
"At Ruyin I heard that you and Yunchang were safe, and I sent them straight back. Yuan Shu is dead and the seal was taken, but I had been holding those prisoners, you see."
Ah—ah! Imperial Uncle, that was well done… You moved that far purely for my sake. I truly am grateful…
"Cao Cao's speaking out of both sides of his mouth—we can let that pass."
"Hm?"
"Cao Cao is a frighteningly clever man. He can turn a subordinate's mistake inside out whenever he pleases."
At that same hour, Xiahou Dun—who had ridden in with his own neck staked on the outcome—finished setting the kingdoms of Liang, Chen, and Pei in order, and met the troops of Cao Xiu and Zhu Ling, come back from the campaign against Yuan Shu. He welcomed with genuine relief the men who had been detained and then released. The traitor Yuan Shu had died in flight, so they had failed to take his head; but they brought his daughter and the generals under him as prisoners, and the Heirloom Seal of the Realm, which by rights belonged in Luoyang and which the wretch had kept clutched in his own hand. At the sight of it, Xiahou Dun packed them straight off to Xuchang. When the settling was done, he once more drew a brush-line across his own throat and entered the city with his head high.
"General of Established Might, this failure belongs to me. I will bear the whole of the blame."
"Master Xun, what are you saying?"
With the entire business already in ruins, Xiahou Dun gave a dry laugh at the sight of Xun Yu taking the fault upon himself. Xun Yu was genuinely shaken. He meant to shoulder the responsibility and demand punishment of himself. He was not the only one who had reached that thought.
"Prefect of the Masters of Writing. General. Say nothing. We will have it that I acted on my own."
"Fengxiao!"
"The Minister of Works was made a fool of by a boy and flew into a rage. When I saw the Prefect's displeasure, I read the room and arranged the thing myself."
Xiahou Dun looked at the two counselors of Yingchuan and shook his head.
"What, you've written an entire script? If you've done wrong, you take the punishment for the wrong. That's the end of it."
"It has to be this way. Especially because Colonel Zhu and Commandant Cao returned unharmed and brought the seal back to the capital."
Guo Jia had stepped forward ready to take the lead and settle the matter himself, but Xun Yu and Xiahou Dun were both adamant. All of them were guilty men. They had broken their lord's word and once more laid upon him a humiliation that could not be washed away. Heads high, they made for the Ministry of Works, prepared to take their punishment openly from a furious lord.
And when they stepped inside, Cao Cao was—
"Oh. So you've all come?"
"Minister?"
Cao Cao sat half-buried in beauties, dressed in a fresh official robe and a tall cap, fairly glowing with triumph. At his side his nephew Cao Xiu, just returned from the field, silently offered his greetings to Xiahou Dun, Xun Yu, and Guo Jia.
"Minister, we came because there is something we must say."
"Which is?"
Xiahou Dun came first. He knelt, pushed his armor aside, and bared his neck.
"I broke a promise made in my lord's name, acted on my own, and committed a grave error. I offer this neck in apology."
"Xiahou Dun, what nonsense is this?"
As Cao Cao blinked in bewilderment, Guo Jia and Xun Yu stepped forward.
"Minister, we—!"
"Enough. I already know everything you're about to say."
From among the women attending him, Cao Cao picked out those whose faces were especially thick with paint and whose figures were especially generous, fondling them idly, overflowing with high spirits.
"The pursuit of Zhang Qian—that was my own idea. And how obliging, that someone divined my will and carried it out."
"My lord!"
"Honestly, as a man, I never much liked the thought of doing such a thing. If not for this precious boy of ours, here."
Cao Cao beckoned Cao Xiu closer, set a hand on his shoulder, and spoke to Xiahou Dun, Xun Yu, and Guo Jia.
"Liu Bei made the first mistake. Zhu Ling and Cao Xiu, whom I sent to punish a traitor, ten thousand soldiers, and the seal he claimed as spoils—he detained the whole of it inside the Chu army, as if he meant to keep the lot. So I swore that if Liu Bei was going to play it that way, I would go after Zhang Qian and kill him."
It had been a matter of a hair's breadth. On the news that reached him through Cao Xiu, Xiahou Dun had charged off on his own and come back with nothing but disgrace, and Cao Cao had decided to take him in with a broad spirit. He declared that the fault was no one's but his own—entirely his own idea—and he folded his subordinates into the same generous pardon. In any case, Cao Xiu and Zhu Ling had brought the ten thousand he sent back alive. Once Liu Bei learned that Zhang Qian was safe, he had released them, and they had returned to Cao Cao unharmed. Better still, Cao Cao had gained a pretext: he himself would present that tremendous treasure, the Heirloom Seal of the Realm, to the Emperor, and thereby raise the authority of the capital still higher.
"Xiahou Dun. You never truly meant to kill Zhang Qian, did you?"
"My lord, I… that is…"
"You were angry, that's all. If that Liu Bei wanted to run, he might have run by himself—so why did he detain Wenlie and Wenbo and surround our army? That's why you chased after him so righteously. Isn't that so?"
"Th… that's right."
"Hahaha! Then all's well."
He let the mistake pass in magnanimity, and he had manufactured a justification on top of it. Nothing could have been neater. With that, Cao Cao and Liu Bei split completely. Cao Cao held Xuchang, Yingchuan, the kingdom of Chen, the kingdom of Liang, half of Pei, and Yanzhou, Sili, and Guanzhong. Liu Bei was left with Runan, Yiyang, Anfeng, Xiaopei, Xuzhou, Shuchun, and Huainan, and the two stood opposed. The Central Plains had been cut in two—Cao Cao with Guanzhong, Liu Bei with Huainan. From then on, how these two heroes of the realm would move across the plains of the heartland was left to the strategists who served them.
"Qian, Heaven itself has helped us!"
"Heaven does as Heaven does."
Su Shuang and my sister Yanhua came running, threw their arms around me, and wept as we shared the joy of reunion. I held my wives, of course, and my little son and daughter, and only then did the relief sink all the way into my bones.
"Yes. What use is wealth? We're alive now. We can move again."
"Ah, but all that property of ours sitting in Xuchang… even so…"
"Madam, that is not the issue."
When Yanhui murmured it, Su Shuang rebuked her sternly and shook his head. We had lived, so of course the loss stung now that there was time to count it. Ours had been one of the foremost thousand-gold houses on the continent, and nearly all of that staggering fortune was gone.
"Even so, it is not as though we begin again on bare earth."
"Who said anything about bare earth?"
They stared. I shrugged and pointed at the carriage.
"Did you think I truly came back penniless? I even brought Her Highness, a consort of the realm, along with me."
"Qian, did you at least secure deeds to fields, or notes of credit? I'm sorry to say it, but even those would have to be claimed in Xuchang. You won't get them back."
"Those would be empty paper now, of course. But…"
I went up to the carriage and stroked the horses, which were resting deep and eating their fill. Then I wet a handkerchief with spit and scrubbed at the saddles cinched on them like yokes. At first they were dull black things, without a gleam. Scrub them clean, though, and a color came up.
"Th-this is—?!"
"Oh my. The saddle is shining."
"It ought to shine. It's pure gold."
For a moment, no one could make a sound. I had told Cao Cao I would take only two horses, a carriage, and Tang Ji. The saddles on those two horses, hidden under black lacquer, were pure gold. It is always darkest directly beneath the lamp.
"Oh—ohhh!?"
"And that isn't all."
I went to the carriage and kicked out the pin that fixed the axle of a wheel gone creaking from the hard run. I pried off the cap and drew the axle free. This, too, was an axle made of gold. Solid gold is soft, so it had been set as a double shaft around an iron core.
"Care to accept a pillar of gold? There's a little dirt on it."
"No—this as well?"
"The carriage roof. Up there."
I couldn't climb up and pull it out myself, so I took a pole and struck with all my strength. The ornamental tiles tore away, and from above them came a bright, rattling rush.
"There's a hollow between the body and the roof~"
Silver taels and genuine wuzhu coins—the realm's standard cash—came pouring down in a clattering flood, and every mouth fell open.
Be prepared beforehand, and calamity never finds the road. That is what the words mean.
Yes. Prepared—and free of worry.
And Liu Bei would have nothing to worry about!