Entangled Alliances (1)
The remaining three kings—the King of Pingyuan, the King of Anping, and the King of Hejian—whether from belated regret or something else entirely, unleashed a ferocious offensive after Yuan Shao and Yuan Shu entered the city.
They no longer merely blocked the roads from a distance, as they had before the King of Ganling died. They pressed the attack in earnest, striking Guangzong County itself and the Taiping Dao encampments around it.
Yuan Shao, Yuan Shu, and Cao Cao rode out in turn to support the Taiping Dao forces, but there was only so much they could do. The enemy kept coming with a desperate, almost frantic intensity—as if they knew that to fall back was to die as traitors—and the Taiping Dao positions crumbled one after another.
"So in the end, this is still an army of poor peasants..."
Spirit and thorough preparation were not enough to win. Taiping Dao had no shortage of Great Fang and Lesser Fang commanders of exceptional martial skill, and the peasant soldiers they had trained over years were, man for man, formidable fighters. But an army does not grow strong on individual combat technique alone. It grows strong when it masters the techniques of fighting as a group.
And in those collective arts of war, the enemy was clearly more practiced. That was something only men who had served as military officers—not mere warriors—could possess. Holding formation. Covering the gaps in one's armor. Charging as one at a signal, striking only the poorly armed parts of the enemy, then withdrawing together.
The peasants' rage was raw and terrifying, but rage was no guarantee of martial skill. More than anything, the private troops of the great clans and the kings had been raised with money, and it showed. Their arms, their nutrition, their morale, their training—all far surpassed those of conscripted soldiers. The Taiping Dao army had high morale, yes, but the clans' private soldiers were no less determined.
How could they fight like that?
"They believe that being a private soldier places them above common folk."
A beautiful voice answered my unspoken question, as if it had read my mind. It was Jian Shuo.
"In truth, the great clans look upon their private soldiers little differently than they look upon peasants. But the soldiers themselves fall into that delusion. And so, though they are nothing more than slaves, they fight as fiercely as if they were the sons of the clans themselves."
Jian Shuo's high, reciting, almost singing voice carried a current of mockery. I wondered if that was the heart of a man who had known poverty. And then—
"My uncle was the same sort of man. Until he died at the hands of Gentleman Consultant Cao, he took every bribe and every petition that came his way, even though he was never a favored eunuch. I cannot count how many times he sold my name to break the law..."
Jian Shuo's mockery turned into a bitter smile.
"Everyone says eunuchs amass enormous fortunes. I never once laid a hand on that wealth. Only after my uncle died did I drive out my cousins and claim my share. I was truly astonished at first. 'So this is the fortune gathered by castrating a nephew and selling his name,' I thought."
I pitied Jian Shuo's past, yet an unresolved question made me tilt my head. He caught that, too.
"How did I know what the Khagan was wondering? Most eunuchs are like this, I suppose... When someone stares at something and sinks deep into thought, we can usually tell what they're curious about."
"Is that how you've attended His Majesty as well?"
"His Majesty is... a man I dare not presume to fathom."
I said nothing, only watched Jian Shuo's face. The question that had risen in me now would be a deeply impious one if spoken aloud. Did he not resent the Emperor, having been sold into eunuchhood out of crushing poverty? Did he truly believe the Emperor was right? Was he, perhaps, like those clan soldiers—convinced he was something more simply because he served a tyrant?
Jian Shuo met my gaze. He seemed to have read my question well enough.
"Khagan, being a eunuch does not mean one cannot dream of an ideal. Being castrated does not mean one loses one's spirit."
I had never expected such words from the mouth of the eunuch Jian Shuo, and I went still.
"Eunuchs keep what was cut from them stored separately in the palace, and when they die it is restored so they may be buried as whole men. I have my pride as well. It is kept in deep storage. It has not been lost forever."
Whatever the other eunuchs might feel, Jian Shuo at least took pride in following Emperor Liu Hong. Which meant—
"You believe in His Majesty."
"We eunuchs hear the voices that condemn His Majesty as a tyrant. The looks and words that scorn us for being unable to play the part of men—those I am used to now. Being called a treacherous minister who blinds the Emperor's eyes and stops his ears is almost ticklish. But he is a man who offers an ideal worth enduring every humiliation to follow."
Whether Liu Hong's vision was achievable or not, Jian Shuo followed him with hope.
"Boys sold into castration because they are poor may never vanish entirely. But at the very least... I hope that under His Majesty's reign, there will be fewer such children."
At first, they had meant to encircle the Emperor and the Taiping Dao army and slowly starve them to death. Preserve as much of their strength as possible, "dispose" of Emperor Liu Hong by whatever means proved convenient, and then the four kings would resume their contest for the realm.
But the preservation of their factions was no longer the point. They thought of nothing now but seizing the Emperor, and they poured their armies toward Guangzong County without restraint.
The battlefield grew steadily more savage and more cruel. The three kings' armies were taking enormous casualties—but so were we, and the tide of the fighting seemed to be tilting toward their victory.
"Time is the problem."
How long could we hold? The troops stationed in Guangzong County and the camps around it were burning through nothing but the grain already stockpiled in the county, with no further supply coming in. The three kings' rebels, by contrast, seemed to have no such worry—whether because they had plundered on a staggering scale, or because they were drawing provisions from each king's own fief.
Ma Yuanyi, whom I had sent west again before we accepted the county magistrate's surrender and took the city—where was he? What were the Taiping Dao Great Fang and Lesser Fang commanders of the other commanderies and states in Jizhou doing? If they arrived in time, we could strike the enemy from within and without alongside Guangzong's main force and drive them off.
But an operation like this... on an ancient battlefield, without developed communications or transport, having reinforcements arrive at precisely the right moment was a desperately difficult thing. How many battles had been lost because a plausible strategy foundered on problems of contact and movement?
I could only hope this would not be remembered as yet another case of an unrealistic plan collapsing into a wretched defeat.
"Right Guli King."
As if to restrain Yufuluo, who kept wanting to surge ahead, Lü Bu brought his horse up alongside him and called his name.
"Fengxian."
"Don't be impatient. We need only perform the role Bao expects of us. Bao is with the Emperor—he'll be safe."
In truth, Lü Bu only hoped Bao was safe. There was nothing on a battlefield that could be promised. He was simply trying not to imagine riding into Julu Commandery after a victory only to find Bao's ruined corpse. Yufuluo would be the same. He was the boy's father—how could he not be?
But Yufuluo looked at Lü Bu and forced a smile.
"That's right. That child is strange, but he's never been wrong. We do our part and we help him. That's all."
It sounded like a vow he was reciting to himself. Lü Bu turned his eyes from Yufuluo to his own men.
Besides Wei Xu, Song Xian, and Hou Cheng, Lü Bu's following had swollen considerably. Wei Xu had brought along a man named Wei Yue, claiming him as a younger kinsman, and Lü Bu had taken him on. Li Su, an old friend from home, had come sniffing around after stories of Lü Bu's exploits and the trade flowing through Shouxiangcheng and Duman City, and had ended up settling into Lü Bu's camp for good. And there was Zhang Liao as well—sixteen years old, and already beginning to look like a fine young man.
Yufuluo's troops had been added to this. Right Wise King Qiangqu had contributed a force as well, if only a modest one. Fold in the Wuhuan soldiers Liu Bei had given them, and the Xianbei troops absorbed in the fighting against Tanshihuai, and it was a host no one could afford to take lightly.
This force, composed entirely of cavalry, had set out from northern Bingzhou, rendezvoused across Yanmen Commandery, and forced its way through the rugged mountains straight into Changshan State. The people of Jizhou watched the sudden arrival of a great cavalry host with eyes full of fear and suspicion.
Men in yellow turbans stepped into their path and barred the way.
"Ah, I know how to handle this."
Wei Xu rode forward. He had met Zhang Jue once before, when he had gone to Youzhou with Bao, Huchuquan, and Zhang Liao. When Zhang Liao had told him that Zhang Jue and the Emperor had joined hands, and that Bao stood between them, Wei Xu had exclaimed, "It turned out like that?"—and yet here he was, swaggering as if the whole business were familiar. That was Wei Xu's flaw and his virtue both. He quickly cleared up the Taiping Dao commanders' misunderstandings and beckoned Lü Bu over.
Talking with them alongside Wei Xu, Lü Bu found that the men who commanded the Taiping Dao army had rather unusual names. Bai Qi. Yang Feng. Huang Long. Aliases, most likely... The thought crossed his mind, and then he set it aside and at once began to shape a plan to aid Bao.
"You said you were heading south to Julu Commandery to aid the Great Worthy Teacher?"
"We are."
"We came all the way to Jizhou to rescue the Xiongnu Khagan, who is there as well—but helping the Great Worthy Teacher is helping the Xiongnu Khagan. I'll leave that side of it to you."
"Is Lord Lü not coming with us?"
"Your going to Julu Commandery should be enough. The rebels' assault on Julu will weaken. We will strike straight for Hejian, Anping, Ganling, and Pingyuan."
It would be a long march, but they were cavalry. A maneuver that would have cost infantry a great deal of time was well within their reach. Lü Bu and Yufuluo's army brushed past northern Julu Commandery, passed through Zhongshan State, and crossed into the borders of Anping. They held their course southeast, and there they found the column Lü Bu had been looking for.
Lü Bu pressed his weight into the stirrups and gently stroked Red Hare's mane.
"Time to cut the enemy's lifeline."
At his signal, every man tucked his weapon under his arm and started forward. They checked that their stirrups and saddles were sound, then quickly dressed ranks to Lü Bu's left and right.
They had not been able to outfit the entire force as iron cavalry—as cataphracts—but most of those who would lead the charge had been issued the new saddles and the stirrups that came with them. Lü Bu and his inner circle wore armor that covered most of their bodies, of course, and the barding on the horses gleamed.
Lü Bu had discussed at length with Liu Bao how to break prejudice and put stirrups into general use. They had concluded that Lü Bu, celebrated as a God of War, must always wear his stirrups as if he were showing them off. The fruit of that decision would show itself in this battle.
"Charge."
Lü Bu did not shout. He gave the order low, and that was enough. The flags and drums that carried his word spread the signal through the entire elite northern cavalry in an instant.
A strange war cry rose—nothing like the Han roar of waaah, but a bizarre, cackling ihihihi, as if they were laughing. Together with that flesh-crawling howl, the northern cavalry's charge crashed down upon the rebel supply train.