by Vivian Chak
***
Prefect Lian had ridden his horse into a lather, searching the flat plains of Henan for his daughter. Jiang was nowhere in sight. She'd always been somewhat willful, and Lian reproached himself for not having anticipated her running off, given the impending marriage. He sighed. The past few days had been trying, given last minute changes to the wedding ceremony, and finding place to billet his friend Li's honour guard from the capital. It was understandable that he had not been able to pay much attention to Jiang, as of late.
There was also the matter of the honour guard. Lian couldn't help but feel that Magistrate Li was anything but appeased with the impending wedding. All his life, success had been as simple as working hard, with the sincere desire to provide for the needs of others. It had always benefited both parties. But now Brother Li was having none of it. Lian had been wondering lately if his friend was so staunchly a patriot, he would rather the province starve than submit to living from the reaping of the enemy.
He was loath to dismiss this idea, ridiculous as it seemed, for the alternative explanation was that Magistrate Li envied him. If that was true, Lian would be quite sad. He had always admired how the magistrate had worked his way, from poverty and obscurity, to his present position through honest means, and thought that there could be nothing finer. Lian had been furious when he discovered that his father had paid the county examiner to pass him, telling Lian that it would have been shameful to his own status, had his son not passed with the highest ranking. Lian had moved far from home after that, to study in a different province entirely, and passed the next level examinations on his own, but his early beginning shamed him. Wealth and class did such things to men.
And now it seemed that Magistrate Li was succumbing to this double lure as well. Perhaps he had been wrong to conduct such clandestine dealings with the supposed enemy in his friend's jurisdiction. It might have reflected badly on Li. Maybe that had instigated his friend's anger. But then Lian recalled how the magistrate had dismissed his beliefs that all men could be appeased with a sharing of power, or at least some notion of it. It had been rather tactless of him to state his beliefs so, if Li was indeed both callous and ambitious. Nonetheless, Lian couldn't waste time deciding who was in the wrong; he had to find Jiang or else lose Li's respect and trust. That was all Lian had, to ensure the success of his plans for averting famine, and to preserve his head as well.
The pounding of hooves made him turn. It was Li, and he was flanked by five guards. Instantly, Lian's hackles rose. There were five too many for easy conversation; too many for Lian to give himself up to. Li had wanted all from him, and the other five could not be given a share. There was no other choice but to appeal to his friend.
“Brother Li.” Lian reined his horse over with an apparent ease that he did not feel. “I don't suppose you're here to aid me?”
“I'm here to arrest you.” The magistrate's face was inscrutable.
“And are these gentlemen here in agreement?” It would be overly optimistic for Lian to hope that the Imperial guard was still of honourable calibre, but he had always treated the military with respect, and unlike other prefects, did not try to divert foodstuffs from the army.
“They're not of your rice bowl,” Li told him harshly. Well. Lian should have expected that his efforts to provision Bianjing and its troops would go unrecognized. It was always hard for the collective well-fed to believe that their meals were owed to another individual. Though it was easy enough for them to blame said man, when famine struck.
“I only mean to ask whether or not these gentlemen are in agreement with the idea of starving this year.”
“They'll starve only when you've lined your purse with the harvest of enemy crops, which no self-respecting Han would buy, and the Jurchen have ransacked the farmlands of Henan.” Li's face was hard as he added, “Facilitated by your current funds.”
“I will do no such thing,” Lian said calmly. “How have I offended you, Brother Li, that you forget all bonds of friendship, and come for me thus?”
“It's not personal,” his friend replied coldly, though Lian could see the untruth, even if Li could not. “As for any bond, you have broken it. You promised me a merger of families, and all that came with it, yet you've now hidden your daughter and seek to bring your newly bought allies against me.”
“You're very wrong, Li.” Lian sat steadily in his saddle. “I've only done what's best for others, Han and Jurchen alike. We have no conflict with these rebels fighting the Liao, but we do with the decrees of Heaven― a drought is coming, and only more efficient farming will lessen its bite―”
“Then you admit to wanting ownership of Henan.”
“Management is not the same, Li.” Lian spoke quietly but firmly. He didn't want to embarrass Li by feeding his friend's polemic before five others. However, Li seemed to not care.
“You false friend, I've proof of your transactions.” Li waved Lian's ledger for the month furiously. He opened it to a random page, covered in scrawled characters. It wasn't likely that the soldiers with him could read the characters, so furiously did Li shake the pages, but men saw what they wanted to see.
“Who fed you such falsities?,” Lian asked, forcing his tone to stay neutral. The last word trembled from Lian's barely contained anger. Though the numbers were true enough, there was nothing incriminating about them. Lian just didn't want to accuse his friend. It appeared that the magistrate's insatiability for power had pushed him over the edge of reason.
“That's for the trial.” Li was firm. The supposed proof of Lian's wrongdoing rested lightly in the magistrate's hands. Something caught Lian's eye―
“I asked where you got that book.” Lian's voice grated like steel dragged from a forge. He recognized the silk strip: Flame had given it to him as a bookmark. It was the newly burned edges that kindled his anger.
“From the flames.” Li's face was emotionless, save for a slight movement of the throat― Lian wanted to cut that throat― when Li swallowed. His friend was gone, consumed by an uncontrollable fire that had brought down Lian's family as well.
“Don't do that, Lian,” warned the magistrate, as Lian gripped his borrowed blade. “The next bride's father won't be pleased to wear a broken sword.” Li's humour had returned, but Lian saw no laughter in his former friend's eyes. His blade came out. Five horses started forwards, but Li motioned them all back, eyes glinting unnaturally.
“Prefect Lian scorns the headsman. So be it.” Li drew his sword as well, a dappled grey steel that rippled, like a river, when he moved. Lian gripped his own more tightly. He had never had any formal training with the sword, but for scattered lessons taken out of amusement, in his younger, more hot-blooded days.
Li spurred his horse into a canter, hardened steel sweeping for Lian's face. Jerking instinctively, Lian interposed his own blade between himself and Li's sword. The harder blade shaved slivers from his own as Li pulled back, only to circle the blade out again, for Lian's head. He bent low, but Li's blade trimmed his scholar's topknot as it passed. So sharp was the blade that Lian didn't realize what had happened, until he felt his hair fall to his neck.
“You will die for what you would do to the Empire,” ground out Li, face as hard as his blade, “and for what you would do to me.” Li's sword cut almost lazily, and Lian realized that the magistrate wanted to tell him something before attempting to cut him down.
“That's hardly fair, given what you've already done to me.” He tried for distraction, as his hand circled for an opening. If Lian had to die along with his family, he would at least avenge them, though it was hard to do so when he pitied what Li had become. The sky had grown dark with night, and Lian was sorry that he had invited the guests for no reason. It was already past the designated time for the wedding. Several more strokes shot for Lian's wrist and arm, and he struggled to parry them all.
“What I've done to you? You've harmed me by association, ever since your schemes to acquire land started. Then you shamed me, not onl
y before your family, but the entire county, when you decided not to give your lands to my son, and lost your daughter as an excuse.” Li continued to cut at Lian while speaking furiously. “Your eldest daughter was at home, I can attest to that personally.”
Lian's blade thrust rapidly for Li's throat. He couldn't see properly for the fury in his eyes, so he missed Li's blade swinging in an upper-handed stroke. By the time he noticed, he barely had time to jerk his wrist down into a block.
The magistrate's blade caught in the fresh notches of Lian's sword, shearing the softer steel through. Then it opened Lian's chest. Lian attempted a final stab, but Li pulled his horse back.
“You can't share power,” Li admonished him, holding an expression of pity, for Lian's naivety, mixed with satisfied triumph. And then Flame slashed wide her father's throat.