The Turbulent Xiongnu (2)
When the report came that Xubu Chang had visited Luanti Hozheng's royal yurt, that was the moment to move...!
Huyan Gu ground his teeth and clenched his knees in both fists.
That fleeting, hopeful thought — that Xubu Chang, Gudu Marquess of the Xubu, had gone to urge Left Wise King Hozheng toward surrender — had decided the whole current of events.
"The Four Horns and Six Horns have resolved to elevate Hozheng as the new Chanyu. And... they mean to receive the Yanzhi from the house of Xubu..."
"They shut our clan out! How dare they!"
The roar finally tore itself out of Huyan Gu as he listened.
"Who recognizes this Chanyu? Who recognizes this Yanzhi?!"
"Gudu Marquess..."
His retainers moved to restrain him. However great the Huyan clan's prestige within the Southern Xiongnu, to let his tongue run any further would be fatal.
"This is the Luanti clan picking a fight with the Huyan!"
"But Gudu Marquess — even if we fight, what then?"
The will inside the Luanti clan had already been settled. The Xubu had taken the Luanti by the hand.
To refuse would be nothing more than rebellion.
"The Chanyu of the Southern Xiongnu is now a vassal of the Emperor."
...It would be rebellion against the Emperor himself.
"They will already have informed the Inspector of Bing Province and the Colonel Protector of the Xiongnu that a new Chanyu has been chosen. Hozheng has no defect, so the Emperor will surely give his assent. If you stand against Hozheng now, you will be making war on a Chanyu the Emperor has approved! I beg you!"
Huyan Gu squeezed his eyes shut.
To the retainers kneeling before Huyan Gu, Gudu Marquess of the Huyan, the brief span that followed felt endlessly long.
In that time he turned over many thoughts.
If he truly raised a rebellion... he would have to claim the title of Chanyu himself.
But even if he claimed it, who would follow?
The Dangyu clan, rivals of the Xubu?
They would find serving a Xubu Yanzhi distasteful, yes — but they had no loyalty that would make them lay down their lives for the Huyan.
"And the other houses? What are they doing?"
"...They have offered their congratulations that the new Chanyu's accession has been decided without incident."
An alliance he had never believed could come to pass.
Because of that alliance the Huyan had been pushed a step back, and now the other houses no longer needed to watch the Huyan's face.
The coldness of the other Gudu Marquesses. Or their baseness.
Fighting the urge to vault into the saddle that very instant, Huyan Gu planted his feet hard and gave his order.
"There are times when a Chanyu keeps more than one Yanzhi. After the first, the Primary Yanzhi, he may also take a Great Yanzhi. Send a man to Hozheng. Tell him to yield the seat of the second Yanzhi."
The instant we heard Xiahou Dun's name, Xubu Chang and I both moved fast.
I said I would finish my business cleanly with the man sent from Luoyang. Xubu Chang seemed to take that as make your decision, and make it now, because he bolted for Great-Uncle Hozheng's royal yurt.
I loosed Yufuluo's people to confirm that Xubu Chang had, exactly as I planned, agreed to a marriage alliance with Hozheng.
Then I went to Xiahou Dun, whom Lü Bu had received and kept as a guest.
Xiahou Dun.
In this year of 178 he was a young man in his twenties, much the same age as Cao Cao, and both his eyes were still whole.
Unlike Cao Cao, though, he was a big man. Not Lü Bu's size, and not Sun Jian's — but close enough to notice.
"I heard how things stand from Lü Fengxian here."
Lü Bu was outside the building where we spoke. He was still holding Zhang Xiu, the Colonel Protector of the Xiongnu, under siege.
Xiahou Dun jerked his chin toward wherever Lü Bu would be standing.
"I came here at Mengde's request."
Cao Cao would have introduced me as a Xiongnu prince, and as the Grand Huwu who heard the voice of the Xiongnu Heaven God.
And on Xiahou Dun's face sat the look that said, I listened to Mengde, sure — but this child?
...But I know you, Xiahou Dun.
Xubu Chang would have taken you, at best, for a descendant of Xiahou Ying, meritorious minister to the High Emperor, a Luoyang aristocrat and nothing more.
I know you from the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
Readings of your ability and your character run in every direction. I do not care about any of that.
When you deal with this man, there is only one thing that matters.
You are the human being Cao Cao trusts most in the world.
"What was the request?"
Xiahou Dun looked faintly startled at the question.
A manner of speaking that did not belong to a child. An attitude already prepared to sit down and negotiate.
He had come this far on Cao Cao's word, but some corner of him had still been thinking, what's a little brat going to...
In the next breath he did exactly what the man Cao Cao trusted most would do.
With a grave face he flung aside the thought of talking to a child, roughly, completely, and began to speak with me in earnest.
"He says he doesn't want to finish Zhang Xiu on a charge of collusion."
"...The charge of colluding with Tanshihuai is precisely the surest way to kill Zhang Xiu, is it not?"
"Mengde said — how did he put it — that in the end the man who got fooled into approving the plan, Zhang Xiu and the rest of those traitors, was the Emperor himself."
"So he wants it ended in a way that does not leave the Emperor holding the blame."
"That's it."
Damn.
We have to pull him down on some other pretext?
No. If it comes to this, a lawful execution is off the table.
He will not even be sent to Luoyang under guard.
"You want him dealt with here, then?"
"Mengde figured a Grand Huwu like you would have a way."
I did, in fact.
Even as I admired Cao Cao's insight, I could not help keeping my guard up.
Even if we slipped the Han sphere of influence, there was the unease that Cao Cao's Wei would one day come back and make a vassal of us all over again.
For now, though, there was nothing to do but play it Cao Cao's way.
In the original history, Zhang Xiu fell out with Hozheng, murdered him, and raised Right Wise King Qiangqu as the new Chanyu.
Emperor Ling, Liu Hong, heard the news and flew into a rage.
And so Liu Hong had Zhang Xiu put to death.
...I would have to put that story to use.
"Not long ago my great-grandfather, Tute Ruoshi Gongzhu Chanyu, departed this world. And my granduncle has newly ascended as Chanyu. We will say that Zhang Xiu thrust himself into the matter, tried to swap out the Chanyu as he pleased, and died for it."
"A clean method. But do you have proof Zhang Xiu did any such thing?"
"There is someone who will gladly testify."
"Who?"
"The very man Zhang Xiu meant to raise as Chanyu."
When I finished with Xiahou Dun and stepped outside, Lü Bu looked at me and asked with his eyes what I had decided.
I went to him and said,
"Zhang Xiu has outlived his use. Let's finish it."
Xiahou Dun came and stood at my side.
"I will go to Luoyang and report what I have seen today."
In other words: Cao Cao in Luoyang stands surety for this. There will be no aftermath.
Lü Bu nodded.
He signaled Hou Cheng, Wei Xu, and Song Xian.
"Kill him."
The standoff ended without any flavor at all.
Lü Bu's men smashed the doors and came over the walls.
There had never been many followers at Zhang Xiu's back to begin with.
While Zhang Xiu was in Luoyang spinning his schemes, Lü Bu had won his men's hearts on the expedition against Tanshihuai.
There was no way Zhang Xiu could have closed that gap.
And no persuasion would ever have worked on Lü Bu.
A few screams — aaagh, aaagh, aaagh — and not long after, Hou Cheng came out carrying a head.
Zhang Xiu's.
I looked at that head, and so did Xiahou Dun, and so did Lü Bu, all of us with the same flat faces.
The man who had colluded with Tanshihuai and nearly gotten everyone in Bing Province killed.
The man who, left alive, would have murdered Hozheng, raised Qiangqu as Chanyu, and sown the seed of civil war among the Xiongnu all over again.
He was dead.
Xiahou Dun spoke first.
"Right, then. Let's have it that this man died trying to assassinate a Xiongnu Chanyu for no good reason."
Xubu Chang had the distinct feeling that he kept stumbling into more and more impossible situations.
That Luanti Bao brat had said Zhang Xiu, the Colonel Protector of the Xiongnu, was already under arrest. It had been a lie.
Zhang Xiu had been murdered inside the walls of Lishi County.
"This insolent little—!"
The reason given for the killing was almost funny.
They said he had tried to assassinate the new Xiongnu Chanyu and set up a Chanyu of his own, and that the Xiongnu had killed him for it.
Worse — the man who had supposedly denounced Zhang Xiu's plot was, by rumor, Xubu Chang himself.
He had been shoved, by force, into the role of a Luanti loyalist. There was no other way to put it.
And the way the Huyan people looked at him now — that was another problem entirely.
Who in the world was spreading talk like this?
No. He knew who.
Luanti Bao.
That little boy going around running a fraud, claiming he heard the voice of Tengri...
Because of that brat, Xubu Chang now stood in the position of flattering the new Chanyu, Hozheng, and facing off against the other houses.
And he could not even deny that this was his true heart.
How was a man supposed to announce the truth — the fact is, I really did want to become Chanyu myself!
A trap he could neither climb out of nor twist away from, only sink deeper into.
Like a sheep toyed with by a leopard's cunning until the jaws closed on its throat, Xubu Chang could do nothing but blink.
I sent gifts around to the rising houses that had come up in Xiongnu society since the Later Han began — the Qiulin clan among them.
This too was possible only because of money out of Cao Cao's... no, Cao Song's purse.
The new houses would take a liking to me, nurse a useful measure of grievance against the old power-brokers, and serve as a check. That was the idea.
While I tuned the rivalries among the great Xiongnu families this way, I put a request to Xiahou Dun, who was about to return to Luoyang.
"Would you carry a word to Gentleman Consultant Cao for me?"
"What is it, Xiongnu prince?"
"Zhang Xiu died tangled in the internal affairs of the Southern Xiongnu, so we are the ones left holding that burden. I understand he means to make us lean on him if we want to survive from here. I would only ask that he treat us a little more like a friend."
Xiahou Dun put on a face that said this was genuinely entertaining.
"I'll give Mengde the words exactly as you said them."
After I had seen Xiahou Dun off, I took Zhang Liao by the hand and went to my great-uncle's tent.
"...So this is the descendant of the Nie."
"He is, Dargwa — Chanyu."
Hozheng looked Zhang Liao over with a flicker of distaste, then at last let out a long breath and made his proclamation.
Our Grand Shaman, he who received the name of the Leopard, has forgiven the Nie clan beneath Tengri. I too shall follow that will! Upon the lands of the Grand Chanyu I forbid any man to call the Nie clan to account for the old crime. You shall have my protection. Should any person do harm to your house, I will avenge it to the end, as if it were the death of my own father, or my own brother.
Once from me, the Grand Shaman. Once from Hozheng, the Grand Chanyu. Twice over, forgiveness was declared for Nie Yi and all who came after him.
Rather than bar me from the Four Horns and Six Horns on the grounds that I was still a child, this was the condition Hozheng had set for our bargain.
Zhang Liao being able to move more freely through Xiongnu society was already a great enough gain. I accepted the trade without hesitation.
Well, then. Time to set the last piece in motion.
"I would like the titles by which I am called — Grand Shaman, Grand Huwu — to be fixed as Khagan. In the Han tongue, Kehan."
This was still an age when titles of a similar sound were rolling around loose, out on the far steppe.
If I claimed one first and used it not as a sovereign's style but as a religious leader's, there would be no great strain in it.
Hozheng looked as if he found it odd, but nothing that mattered, and gave his leave.
"As you wish."
Is hereby styled
Henceforth the titles Grand Shaman and Grand Huwu shall be gathered under this name — for now, the leader of the faith of Tengri.
Those who could not see the worth of a great title of the future — what faces would they make, I wondered, when they learned what became of this thing I had bid on alone.
When currency grows common, its value falls. That is inflation.
If the title of Chanyu is handed out too freely, its value falls the same way. Call it Chanyu inflation, if you like.
So I would take hold, in advance, of the title that would replace it.
For now it would mean the leader of the Tengri faith. But if the hour came, it would be a name like the Islamic Caliph's — a sovereign's name that gathered the sacred and the secular into one hand.