Fangs of the Black Tiger: Tales of the Swordsman Vol. 2 (A Wuxia Story) Page 2

  “They’re bounty hunters,” the young woman in rags said in answer to her unspoken question. “And we are their prize.”

  When the caravan stopped for the day, Shu Yan got her first good look at the five bounty hunters on horseback. They stood out from the regular guards, not because of their dress—mismatched and dirty robes—but because of the way they held themselves. They were fighters from the jianghu, martial artists. The jianghu was an odd melting pot of sorts, a society that extended beyond the borders of provinces and cities—a loose network of itinerants. In all of the stories, the fighters of the jianghu were typically skilled fighters, specializing in a wide range of fighting styles both armed and unarmed. In the stories she’d heard from the storytellers in the marketplace, they were painted as noble heroes.

  The few fighters she met on her travels with Li Ming were rarely like the heroes of wandering storytellers. The reality was that they were as normal as everyone else. Some were proficient with their martial skills, while some were incompetent. Others had egos bigger than their swords. They had heroic moments, depraved moments, and lives of the everyday mundane.

  These bounty hunters weren’t even close to the heroic end of the scale. They looked more like thugs than heroes. She watched as the man with the wiry beard slapped a young man scurrying to set up camp. He fell to the ground, then hurried away from the abuse the bearded man yelled. The bearded man slammed the wooden pole he carried into the ground.

  Wait, not a pole.

  “A boat oar?” Shu Yan said, rolling her eyes. Her cagemate laughed.

  The weapons of the jianghu were as varied as the heroes that wielded them. Some traditional, some bizarre. Among the five bounty hunters, she counted two pairs of hooked swords carried by men that looked like twins, a woman with a long chain and heavy metal balls attached to each end, a man with a spear much like the one Jingyi carried, and of course, the boat oar.

  A sword, even a legendary one like the one Li Ming wielded, seemed pathetically ordinary compared to the exotic weapons of the jianghu.

  Li Ming. Was he dead? Did he and Tao Jun survive their encounter with Shazha Kui? Would he be coming after her? She hated feeling like she needed rescuing, but there was always a sense of safety she felt in his presence. On the odd time she was in the custody of bandits, she knew that she would be safe.

  He promised, she thought. He promised.

  There was no such comfort today. She didn’t even know if he was alive, and the thought of having to be in the clutches of bounty hunters was almost enough to send her panicking again. At the end of their journey, she knew she would be brought back to Tu’men to face the crimes she left behind there.

  Her memory was a blur, her throbbing head made it hard to think. She remembered waiting in the inn, anxious for any news from the two swordsmen. She had dozed off when the door burst apart in a crash of splinters and paper, the man’s wiry beard appearing through the doorway. She slashed wildly with her knife, saw a spray of blood. Her surprise as it splattered. Then a sharp blow to the head. Everything after that were vague snatches. Sounds, shadows, half imagined dreams.

  “They shoved you in here with me the other day. You’ve been out cold for at least two days,” the young woman in rags informed.

  “Two days?!” Shu Yan forced herself to look at the young woman, to face her ugly smile. There was something repulsive about her and the mud stains and cruel smile did not help.

  “They drug all of us when they capture us,” the young woman shrugged.

  “Drug?” She said panicked, her heartbeat raced again.

  The young woman shrugged again. “I wouldn’t worry about it. No one did anything to you while you were out.”

  “But…”

  “You’re not to be damaged. That nasty bearded one with the boat oar—he wanted to. Then that woman with the chain… anyway, she showed him. Blood in the snow. It was wonderful,” the young woman laughed, clearly taking delight in the retelling. Another loud moan from a man in the distance. A loud crack of wood striking wood, and the moaning quieted.

  Shu Yan shuddered. “Where are they taking us?”

  A bitter laugh. “There’s a bounty on your head, a bounty on my head, a bounty on that poor sap that keeps screaming back there. We’re valuable cargo, and there’s only one thing to do with valuable cargo.”

  “Get paid?” Shu Yan asked.

  The bitter laugh continued.

  3

  Li Ming and Bai Jingyi waited, and waited, and waited.

  The swordsman pulled his fur-lined overcoat tighter around himself and turned away from the sudden gust of wind. The cobwebs of his dream still crawled across his skin, and the bracing cold brought him back to the moment. When the wind died down, his hand brushed the winter-rough skin of his face, the stubble on his normally clean-shaven face. The cold made the angry cut on his face ache.

  Where was that bastard?

  They sheltered under the cover of thick cedar trees. Snow and rain alternated. It was an awkward season—straddling the deep of winter and the last gasps of autumn. Snow fell but rarely stuck to the ground. Thin piles of snow sat on the side of the muddy roads. The signs of impending winter were upon them, a perpetual grey shroud over them.

  The swordsman had seen better days. Li Ming’s arms and legs hurt from the slash and cut wounds he received in the fight against Lady Yue’s assassins. He could move, he could fight, but everything hurt. His internal reserves of energy and qi felt ragged, exhausted. He was aware of how much rest he needed, but he pushed away the discomfort as much as possible. He couldn’t afford to be slowed down by pain now.

  His nightmares had begun to merge, and he shuddered involuntarily at the thought. He wondered if he’d ever have a restful sleep again.

  A short distance away the spearwoman, Bai Jingyi, paced next to her stamping horse, occasionally looking down the road towards the city of An’lin. Jingyi had ridden hard to catch up with the swordsman, dropping everything when she received his message. She was a powerfully built woman in her mid-twenties and dressed in the warm traveling clothes of the merchant class. A warm cap covered her ears. Tiny flecks of snow and rainwater rested on the fur collar of her cloak.

  He was grateful that her business concerns with Righteous Will Agency kept her in the area. While Li Ming was confident that he and Tao Jun might have been able to find whoever had taken the girl, he knew Jingyi tipped the odds in their favor.

  If only Tao Jun would hurry up and show.

  It began to snow again. Li Ming cursed.

  “Master Li Ming, where’s your friend? We need to go before the trail goes cold,” Jingyi asked.

  “He’ll be here.”

  “Let’s leave him. We can take them on our own.”

  “We need his help.”

  Jingyi walked away muttering and shaking her head.

  She was right, of course. Every moment they waited for Li Ming’s sworn brother was another moment they lost on the girl’s trail. But she was wrong about not needing Tao Jun. He may have looked like a useless sort of magistrate but he had a knack for finding people. He had found Li Ming and the girl in Dong’shui. And then encountered them outside of Kong Wu’s monastery.1 Each time, Tao Jun greeted them with an idiotic grin. It made Li Ming want to slap the grin off his martial brother’s2 face. Then again, he wanted to slap his brother’s face most days—a feeling that hadn’t changed since their days under Master Guo’s tutelage.

  Li Ming had let Tao Jun persuade him into waiting instead of charging down the road after the girl’s abductors.

  “We don’t even really know who took her. They’re connected to Lady Yue, but we don’t know how. We need information, and that information will make up for lost time,” Tao Jun had said. Li Ming only scowled in response.

  They turned at the sound of a horse arriving at a gallop. Mud splashed and the horse whinnied as Tao Jun pulled on the reins. Tao Jun looked about as terrible as Li Ming felt. A heavily bandaged leg peeked through the folds of th
e magistrate’s robes. His left arm bandaged at the bicep, and in his eyes a weariness that seeped into the bones. His skin had a pallid tone, and it was clear he was still weak from their encounter with Lady Yue’s assassins. Still, despite the bandages and injuries, Tao Jun had found a set of clean magistrate robes to change into. He always seemed to have a set of clean clothes on hand.

  “You’re late,” Li Ming said, fixing the saddle of his horse. With a leap he mounted his animal. Jingyi followed suit.

  “Fine greeting, brother. Fine greeting. Nice to see you too.” Tao Jun waved a hand dismissively, but even that motion seemed to hurt. “Is there a ‘thank you Tao Jun’ for your hard work in tracking down where the bounty hunters were going? Of course not. It’s not easy finding leads you know.”

  “Where are they going?” Li Ming growled impatiently.

  “North.”

  “Obviously.”

  “Yes. It is obvious. But it’s important. We know they’re headed north because they have to bring your daughter to the Tu’men. They can’t just drop her off at the local magistrate’s office or else we wouldn’t have to be here in the cold, and I would already have her. So we head north.”

  “If it’s north, then I know a few places they might have stopped along the way,” Jingyi said, approaching with her horse. “I have a few contacts that watch the road for me.”

  “That will help,” Tao Jun said, then leaned towards Li Ming. “And who is this?”

  “Bai Jingyi. You remember her father, Bai Jingshen? She now runs the Righteous Will Agency. She’s his successor and a master of their family’s flying spear technique,” Li Ming answered.

  Tao Jun’s eyebrows furrowed for a moment as he scanned the woman’s face, then his eyes widened in recognition. “You’re that little brat that was always running around? The one that stole my wolfskin hat and threw it over the cliff?”

  Jingyi laughed, “I did everyone a favor.”

  “You owe me a new hat!” Tao Jun grumbled. He urged his horse towards the road. “Come on, let’s go get your daughter.”

  “Your brother keeps saying that Shu Yan is your daughter. The girl said you weren’t her father. But maybe she doesn’t know? Well, that makes so much more sense.” Jingyi’s eyes widened as she tried to piece it all together. “Master Li Ming! I had no idea you were that kind of man.”

  “She’s still not my daughter,” Li Ming scowled.

  “It would make more sense if she were your daughter,” Tao Jun said.

  “I agree,” nodded Jingyi.

  “Will you both shut up? Let’s go,” he said. He kicked his heels hard into the horse’s sides, and he took off at a gallop.

  “But I haven’t finished explaining—” Tao Jun called after him.

  “North!” Li Ming called back. “Explain on the way!”

  4

  “Someone likes you,” the young woman in rags said.

  Shu Yan looked up to find a young man carrying a mace staring at her from the other side of the cage. He looked no older than Shu Yan, short with plain features. When she made eye contact with him, he blushed furiously and looked away.

  Another night had fallen. The convoy made camp off of the main road in the shelter of a copse of trees. The warm light of a way station inn shone in the distance. The thin smell of cooked pork drifted to their cages. Her stomach growled.

  From the way the camp was set up, Shu Yan saw that they were in one of four cages—all occupied. A faint moaning came from one of the cages opposite theirs. She didn’t get a glimpse of the occupants of the other cages, but from the moans they made, she thought they were older men. The guards and bounty hunters mingled and huddled around two campfires, talking quietly among themselves.

  The young man dropped the mace on his foot, yelped, and picked it up again. He struggled to find a comfortable way to hold it while speaking to her.

  “Maybe that’s not the right weapon for you,” she said wryly before he could start.

  In the dim light of the campfires, Shu Yan thought she saw him blush again. He smiled, revealing a pleasant, snaggletoothed smile. He doesn’t belong in this camp, she thought.

  “I…” he started, blinking at the girl. His eyes darted from Shu Yan to the young woman in rags. He held up a finger to her and disappeared out of view. He returned a moment later without the mace and instead passed her another blanket through the bars.

  “It’s cold,” he said.

  She was too surprised to say anything in return.

  An awkward moment hung in the air, mixing with their exhalations.

  He turned and ran.

  “Awwwww…how adorable,” the young woman in rags mocked. Shu Yan ignored her and unfolded the blue blanket and wrapped it around herself. The second blanket helped. It wasn’t as warm as sitting next to a fire but it helped.

  She looked doubtfully at the tree line. The other night she caught a flicker of movement in the forest. Something stirred out in the dark. Shu Yan tried not to move, lest the jingling of her chains scare whatever it was away. A person maybe? Then a howl of a wolf in the distance and the shadow disappeared again. When she tried to fall back asleep, she could not shake the feeling of being watched.

  Their cage rattled along the road. The weather alternated between rain and snow. Inside the cage Shu Yan was partially sheltered from the weather by a thin canvas covering that served as a roof. But there was no protection against the wind, and when the wind blew, it cut through her bones, drenching with a slap of rain and snow. Shu Yan huddled under her blankets. She was again grateful for the extra one.

  The young woman in rags sang to herself. It was a southern dialect Shu Yan wasn’t familiar with—a few words she recognized, but the rest was incomprehensible. Still, the melody came through, pure and true, a harsh contrast to the mocking tone of the young woman. She sang often, some light and up beat like festival songs, others mournful. Shu Yan liked the music. It helped keep the cold at bay.

  She thought the guards would have slapped the cage or yelled at the young woman to shut up, but instead they left her alone. Maybe they enjoyed the singing. Anything to break up the monotony.

  The bounty hunters rode alongside the caravan, rotating their watch positions every few hours. From what Shu Yan could tell, there was a pecking order of sorts in the camp. At the top was the woman that carried the chained weapon. Her name was Duan Cai, but the others referred to her as Madam Duan. When she shouted orders everyone listened and moved quickly. Then came the four jianghu fighters: a muscular spearman, a pair of twins, and the bearded man. They rode and walked with the swagger and confidence of men that were used to getting what they wanted through force.

  Then came three scruffy looking bandits that called themselves the Three Tigers. She knew this because they constantly referred to themselves as such. The trio looked like they wanted to be jianghu fighters but were doing as close an approximation as they could with a limited budget. Torn and stained clothes, black face paint across their eyes. They might have been more intimidating if their scrawny bodies hadn’t looked like beggars.

  Then on the bottom of the caravan, the other guards and mercenaries—completely forgettable. They moved with the indifference of men not being paid enough but unable to find better work.

  And below the bottom was the boy.

  She learned from the bearded man’s yelling that the boy’s name was Jia Bo. He was the butt of jokes from his uncle and the other bounty hunters. The Three Tigers scowled at him whenever they could. The guards paid him no mind, but weren’t kind either, occasionally tripping him and roaring with laughter if he fell. Casual bullying, but he looked resigned to it. He cleaned the camp and tended the horses. He let the animals eat out of his hand and brushed them gently, speaking soothing words.

  The boy’s uncle, Jia Su, was the bearded man she slashed in the inn. He abused the boy whenever he could. From their exchanges it sounded like he was the only family the boy had left—a responsibility that the uncle loathed and made him suff
er for it. Jia Su picked at his wounds constantly, which made it bleed more. He often glared in her direction often. She shuddered each time she met his hateful glare.

  Jia Su was not well-liked in the camp. He argued constantly with Duan Cai, questioning her every decision. Sometimes the fights would end after she reached a hand towards her chain. The gestured cowed him, and he stormed off muttering to himself. After one such exchange, the bearded man dropped back in the formation, riding alongside her cage. Jia Su caught her watching him and spat at her, muttering something about how princesses got to ride out of the rain.

  “You want to ride in the cage? I’ll trade with you. I’ll even bow, princess,” Shu Yan needled. Jia Su scowled, slapped the cage with his boat oar. The cracking noise brought an inquiring shout from Duan Cai and an angry response from Jia Su as he rode away from the girl.

  She let go of a breath she didn’t realize she was holding.

  “You’ve got a mouth on you, don’t you?” the young woman in rags chuckled.

  “He really doesn’t like me,” Shu Yan replied.

  “What did you do?”

  Shu Yan shrugged, “Nothing. Maybe. I think I stabbed him. It was dark, but I’m pretty sure it was him.”

  “You think you stabbed him?” the young woman laughed that ugly grating sound. “Yeah, that would do it. You missed though. You should have slit his throat.”

  She winced.

  “Never killed before?”

  She shook her head.

  “It’s easy. Just a quick slash,” the young woman said, with a quick motion of her hand.

  It wasn’t that she was unfamiliar with death. Traveling with the swordsman had opened her eyes to how violent and sudden death could be. She’d watched as the swordsman took the lives of bandits and other unsavory sorts with casual ease. He never seemed to worry about it. Maybe it was just something that one just had to do to survive in the world.