Meandering River, Ardent Flame

by Vivian Chak

  Chapter 14: Family Lian

  Perched precipitously in a gnarled ancient tree, a young woman peered into the gloom of the Li manor. It was the darkest part of night, and Flame could hardly see into the courtyard. A steady drizzle of rain petered down, chilling her as she navigated the thick wood to the manor walls.

  She had debated before between this and simply calling on Li, but by announcing herself, her chances of killing him would be considerably less. And it wasn't as if she would gain anything from following polite convention. For all she knew, Li or his son had already killed her sister.

  Thinking of Xiang made her feel angry. He'd reassured her that her sister would be fine in Bianjing. Clearly, that had not been the case. Flame felt slightly dizzy in the heights of the tree, and clutched her enormous wine jug and straw bale more tightly. It was all that she had been able to afford. She would have to be careful with them. Fastening both on her back, Flame readied herself to spring from the tree to the roofed walls of the courtyard. She jumped. The baked tiles of the roof were curved and slippery, unlike the stones at Taihe. Flame imagined that they were the heads of the older and younger Li, and ground her foot in them all the more firmly.

  A dog barked below, and one of the watchmen at the gate looked up. Fortunately, Flame was crouched on the other side of the wall, and out of sight. The dog growled some more, catching her scent, and Flame stayed still.

  “Smells the Jurchen coming, he does,” grumbled one man to the other, as he cuffed the dog. “They'll be here soon, and if we don't fight 'em off, they'll cut us all down, cursed barbarian turncoats.”

  “The Empire will stop them, as they always have, with expensive gifts,” said the second watchman. The other man snorted in reply.

  “Gifts like Bianjing, you mean, and the heads of everyone in it. You can only stop steel with steel.”

  “Perhaps they'll be turned back by the rising waters, when the canals have been flooded.”

  “A fool's wish.” The man glanced longingly at the roofed gate, rain trickling down his plates. “Come on,” he growled, as he tried to coerce the dog into shelter. “I'm in no mood to chase smoke.”

  When Flame had made sure that the courtyard was clear, she clambered her way to the interior of the gate. The kitchen sat along the exterior wall, to lessen the chance of a fire consuming the entire household. Flame had the brief desire to go there, but it smelled like sweet buns and reminded her too much of her mother. Though her family was why she was here. Flame hesitated a few moments more, before continuing, gripping her sword all the more tightly. She made her way softly through another gate, and into another courtyard. Li's manor was definitely large, and pocked with small gardens besides. Flame should have expected that of a wealthy official; as it now stood, she had no idea where to go and where Li would be.

  A full moon illuminated the courtyard, as Flame stood alone in the middle of it. The middle. That was where Li, as family head, would have to be. She made for the central rooms. There were plenty of them. This might take all night. Muffled voices caught her ear.

  “..have to wait all night...this isn't conspicuous enough?...extinguish other lights...”

  Flame moved into the shadow warily. The sudden realization, that the courtyards had been conveniently empty and darkened, heightened her suspicion. What if Li was trying to ensnare her? Flame glanced warily around. She was still wearing the Taoist robes; those would show quite obviously against the drab walls. In her haste to get at Li, she had neglected to remove the red trappings. Too late for that, Flame told herself. She moved on to the next room. A censer stood before the ancestral shrine, and Flame remembered how Li had destroyed hers. Around the back, a single lamp shone.

  The flame burned brightly in the rough pottery, and Flame felt almost certain that Li was nearby. She took several cautious steps up to the lamp, sword carefully held so as to avoid knocking it loudly into the walls. But no one seemed to be around. The fire burned and waved uneasily as Flame stood over it. There was no one else in the room, and no voices either. The light cast her shadow, long and high, onto the walls, as wind chimes sounded obscurely in the distance. A door stood closed before her, and Flame thought she could almost hear Li breathing within.

  Her seven years of waiting were finally over.

  The door opened noiselessly. Li was sound asleep on an elaborately carved bed. Flame went up, empty sword hand trembling, the other grasping her scabbard as it shook. Li did not look as she remembered. There were more lines on his face, which was to be expected, but what struck her was his expression. It looked perfectly calm, and paradoxically, that made her feel even more panic. His features were as full and sharp as ever, and the pointed whiskers and beard just as she remembered, but when he breathed, Li looked more alive than she had ever remembered from her dreams. She stepped back a pace uneasily, trying to still her shaking hands.

  It was the perfect opportunity. Should she kill him immediately, or later? Flame crossed her arms over shaking hands as she tried to decide. There would never be another chance as good as this one. The guards might come at any time, or Li could wake up. Flame's scabbard rattled softly as she breathed deeply. She grasped her sword. Her hands stilled.

  After so many years of being tormented—by nightly reminders from her parents to avenge their deaths, her guilt for not burying them, of hearing again and again the whispers of her family's shame in breaking their promise to Li, being ostracized for her name, being forced into hiding all the time—Flame could now put an end to all that. The man who had caused it all was right before her, defenceless in slumber.

  Flame drew her sword. The steel gleamed faintly with the light of the opened door. Only one thrust. It would be clean. Yet when she saw Li's chest rise and fall, she couldn't do it. Not while he slept. Maybe Li Xiang's so-called notions of honour had taken hold of her; how else could she explain her frozen hand?

  Flame sheathed her sword. She had waited seven years; a few moments would be nothing. Surely her parents would understand; maybe even approve. Li would die in the end anyway, but drawing his last words by sword point would satisfy her all the more. Perhaps he would even tell her the truth, as she would tell him the truth, of why he had to die. Telling Li might even ensure that her parents heard her take vengeance, and then they would finally rest in peace, and haunt her thoughts no longer.

  She decided. Sitting down, with her hands shaking anew, Flame spread the straw and opened the wine jug with trembling fingers. Her heart was pounding in her ears, though the room was silent. The sound of the door opening further was a thunderclap to her ears. A quarter of the jug was spilled, before Flame rectified it, scrambling unsteadily to her feet.

  “Lian Flame,” cut a voice. Li stood before the door, framed by the light of the lamp. It gave him a demonic appearance. Flame's sword was out in a flash, and her sword arm did not tremble.

  “I'm here for your life.” Flame wouldn't waste that much time explaining. Li only needed to know she knew him to be guilty before he died. It would be like a trial of sorts, like the kind Li had once presided over. Her parents would hear it all. Wind chimes sounded as she looked at Li.

  “That's incorrect. You're here for your sister's, your father's, and your mother's, lives.” Li was curt. Flame waited for him to draw. As soon as he reached for his sword, Flame would determine his death.

  “Isn't it so? After all, I'm not likely to give my life freely.” The former magistrate did not move.

  “You can't give me my family's lives either,” Flame said, her voice shaking in anger. The sword in her hand was steady, though. But Li would not draw. Instead, he sat languorously onto a stool.

  “No, I cannot. Though I could claim yours, to go alongside theirs.” Li spoke at a leisurely speed, and Flame was transfixed by the sight of how his needled moustache gave only the slightest of movements. She still watched him warily, though. “And wouldn't that be fine? The Lian family would finally be wiped clean from the earth, with their one-generation ancestors forgotten
, and the current generation dispatched.”

  That was a lie. The Lian family had set up an ancestral shrine to her parents' grandparents, in spite of the estrangement from their living relatives. Flame's father had still kept the generational respect and norms of society. But that was a concept that Li would probably twist, just as he had twisted the failed wedding into a perceived slight, and used it to murder her family.

  “So why haven't you yet? Surely I don't intimidate you so,” Flame demanded angrily, trying to provoke the prefect. She made a slight cut in the air before Li's face. Instead of looking angry, however, Li smiled superiorly.

  “It appears that your elder sister must have been possessed of extraordinary brilliance, if she could grasp what you cannot.” Flame was burning all the more, but Li still didn't reach for his sword. It was, however, getting easier to envision her blade cutting through his throat.

  “What are you talking for?,” Flame grated. “You've murdered my family and ruined my life. Surely there's nothing else for you to say. Draw.” She would get the most satisfaction from overcoming him with his favoured weapon. Li stood up. The moonlight shone through the grated windows to reflect off her sword, as he moved from its reach.

  “I still speak, because you're very wrong.” The prefect moved easily around his bed. Flame made sure to position it between him and her exposed left side, though her sword arm was still close enough to strike.

  “Firstly, I did not murder your parents. The Empire required their deaths. Your father was a traitor for dealing with the Jurchen, and your mother stood by him.” The prefect pulled out his hat of office, and Flame was struck by the familiar sight of a black-winged hat.

  “Secondly, your sister is still alive. Her meddling with my son, however, means that she must die. That too, is understandable under the laws, because the entire Lian family was condemned, originally.” Li removed a sword from the side of his bed.

  “Thirdly, I did not ruin your life. You did that yourself.” The former magistrate brushed the dust from the sword's grip. “Rather, you and your sister did that, by becoming involved with Li Xiaowen, or Xiang as you know him.”

  “I did not,” Flame retorted, “and you are entirely responsible for my parents' deaths. You hated my father, and blamed him for your own lack of success when he exceeded you in achievement.” That was something her sister had thought aloud once, and Flame had believed it readily. Li's face darkened with anger, to her satisfaction.

  “Did you know that I return every year to visit the site where your father died? Would I do that if I held no respect for him?”

  “Power has a way of drawing respect,” said Flame heatedly. “And fear, along with coercion. Guilt too, I suppose. My sister suffered a lot from that.” When Li opened his mouth to reply, Flame spoke right over him. “She always felt like everything was her fault. But it wasn't. It was yours.”

  There was no sense in blaming the dead, and her sister was now one of them. One certainly couldn't attack them for their faults. Li, on the other hand, was still breathing, and he replied with heated breath.

  “Prefect Lian has no hold over anyone now, save his daughters.” Li drew his sword, though it still pointed down at the floor. “I merely pay my respects—”

  “—so that everyone can see and believe in your upright, lawful character. You're just as insecure and power-hungry as everyone, Li. Only you've sunk lower. You're a liar and a hypocrite.”

  “And you're a young woman who needs to know her place.” A meaningless retort. Flame felt that she had struck the truth.

  “With the family.”

  Li's words came curled with fury as he slashed in a downward diagonal. The bed, however, meant that the cut did not reach as far as he intended it, and Flame had little trouble moving out of the way. She wasted no more breath on speech after that. Li's strokes, though slower than Xiang's, were executed with more precision, each one a thrust meant to disarm or find her vital points. Flame, in contrast, fuelled by fury, was cutting in quick succession, not caring if her strokes reached.

  Round the room they circled, and Flame's anger did not abate. Li tried for an opening slice, bringing the sword in a circular swipe from foot to head, but Flame leapt easily out of the way with the speed of youth. She followed up with a vicious thrust that nearly pinned the prefect's sleeve. Li slashed for her side, exposed by her thrust, and Flame barely struck it aside. She concentrated on her enemy. Though she couldn't read Li's next moves—so practised was he in his skill—she believed herself to be quick enough to counter them when he struck.

  Li suddenly cut for her wrist. Her sword thrummed, a part of her hand, as she turned both wrist and sword over in avoidance and parry. Though Li had almost struck off her hand, her quick withdrawal had saved it, and only a trickle of blood flowed. Flame returned with an upward diagonal slash, aimed to cut under his sword arm. Li turned easily, and thrust out for her throat. In dodging, Flame saw that Li's sword would have penetrated and cleared her throat by several inches, had she not moved. Clearly his chi and hatred were being extended through his blade. Flame now hung back, with her blows aimed only to distract, trying to find a more direct method to kill the prefect.

  While none of Flame's blows had struck, she could see that Li had not fought for such an extended period in a long time. His chest was rising and falling rapidly, though it did not show in his stony expression. Perhaps she could outlast him. For once, the patience and endurance, that the nuns of Yongtai had tried to teach her, would be useful. Flame now tried only to defend. She would strike when Li was too tired to parry.

  “Xiang taught you incorrectly.” It seemed that Li had seen through her strategy, and was now talking to distract, to give himself time to rest.

  “I don't care,” Flame retorted shortly. “You'll die anyway, and so will your son, for killing my sister.”

  She aimed directly for his throat, trying to transmute into the blade her full chi and all of her hatred for Li's crimes. The blade cut the air soundlessly, and Flame's anger burned as she saw nothing but a murderer, and the father of a murderer, before her.

  Li, however, was not as tired as he seemed, and batted the blade aside. His rippled steel—the very one that had murdered her Ma—shone like water as it cut for her side. Flame moved her sword outwards, twisting away as she did so, but Li's hateful blade returned and dove for her foot. Flame jumped, but Li had struck something. While returning the blow, Flame felt like she had stepped in a puddle of water. Sudden pain told her it wasn't.

  The sword dove for her throat with a ruffling of the prefect's dark robes, and Flame instinctively knew that she could not raise her sword in time.

  So she kicked his feet out instead. Li went down in a crunch, and Flame clamped her good foot down on his blade, relieving him of his sword. She spilled the remainder of the wine on him when she knocked the jug over with her foot. The wine covered a good half of his front; the rest soaked the straw, and a rusty red formed where it soaked into the ground. Flame saw it clearly, in the moonlight, as she pressed her sword at his throat. Despite all this, Li laughed. Flame wondered if he had lost his wits with his chance at victory.

  “I'll tell you what Xiang taught you in error,” Li said, eyes gleaming unnaturally. Even disarmed, he still attacked, with words.

  “I don't want to know,” Flame told him. “I just want to avenge Family Lian.” She prepared to twist her sword into Li's throat.

  “It was mercy.” He smiled ironically. Flame opened her mouth to argue that mercy wasn't wrong, but a sound at the door stopped her.

  The doorway was suddenly packed with Li's guard. Had they been there all along? While she glanced, her blade dropped slightly. Li had pushed her sword away with one hand, and was reaching with the other for her sword arm. Unhesitatingly, Flame slashed him aside, even as the first man entered with a yell.

  It was a sufficiently deep cut. Flame could see the blood, even amid the red stain of wine. Li could only purse his lips in pain as he clutched at his side
. The guards streamed into the room, some heading for the fallen prefect, others converging on Flame.

  She now swung wildly. Her only desire was to finish Li, but the guards were all around her. She glanced at her enemy. He was now bent up against the bed, still in the position she had left him, with two of his guard surrounding him. The ugly mess in his lap told her why. Li was in worse condition than the dying Jurchen she had met on the road. Satisfied, Flame focused on cutting free of the guards that pressed around her.

  But the men kept entering in a flood. One of them held a lamp. As they grasped for her arms, Flame knocked the light from the man's hands with a spinning kick. The lamp fell on Li. Fuelled by wine, oil, and straw, the flame spread almost instantaneously. Though some of the straw had dried, the lamp oil on it was potent. The room became a conflagration.

  Flame didn't look back. The earthen walls wouldn't burn very well, but the straw was burning enough that the occupied guards didn't see her exit. Within moments, the nearby veranda was aflame as well. The sloped roof had kept the wood dry from rain, and the fire had spread with the aid of her hay. While the damper and more distant parts of the Li mansion wouldn't burn, Flame was triumphant.

  It had stopped raining. If the fire wasn't put out by morning, maybe the entire house would be dry enough to catch fire. Guards, labourers, and servants were all running now, to put out the fire. Flame noted with interest that Li's personal guard, sent to deal with her, had been small. Most likely because Li had meant to keep the business private.

  It no longer mattered. Li was now dead by her hand. Perched safely in another tree, beyond the compound walls, Flame surveyed her work while musing over what she had learned. What had she meant to say to Li? She couldn't remember, though she could recall wanting to disagree with Li's insistence that teaching her mercy had been wrong.

  Flame thought the statement was quite true now. Mercy had almost gotten her killed. It had certainly killed Li. If I had been Li, I would have killed the entire Lian family at once, Flame thought to herself. She wasn't a Li, however, but a Lian. Her sword still hung by her side. She could kill the entire Li family at once, if she found Xiang. Certainly, that was what her family's memories deserved.

  Rainwater no longer trickled on her face, and Flame was completely dry. Far off, the sound of wind chimes rang mournfully. And the flames burned ardently.