by Jeremy Han
A stinging pain lanced his arm as Yang’s blade cut him just as he completed his kick. He turned to face the heavy assassin, their blades clashing as they exchanged blows, each unable to break the other’s defence.
Yin had never liked prolonged fights. Snakes never did. It was why they struck swiftly with poison. He watched the fight with one eye, the other was covered by long, overflowing hair, and concluded there would be no outcome. Two tigers could fight all day, wounding each other without any conclusion, but a fight with a cobra always ended decisively. Slowly he untied the leather thongs that kept the bag closed, reaching in feeling the familiar cold touch of the fanchantou as the serpent coiled around his hand, drawn by warmth. He dropped the bag and waited for his chance.
Meng brought his sabre down heavily in a blow that could have cleaved Yang into two, but the killer blocked. Meng shouted as he exerted all his strength to force the blade down, hoping to bring Yang to his knees but Yang was terribly strong, and with a mighty heft he pushed the agent backward, causing him to lose balance. Yang attacked with a slash to the man’s mid-level, and unable to balance and mount an effective counter-attack the Eastern Depot warrior could only retreat. At that moment he noticed a blur, and panic gripped his heart like a cold hand.
Damn! I was too distracted by Yang I lost track of Yin!
He saw something long and unfamiliar, greyish brown as it shot out from the assassin’s hand and landed on him.
“She! ‘Snake!’” Meng screamed. He was too shocked to mount a defence against the slithering creature and before he could grab the animal it bit him angrily on the neck, injecting a long stream of venom into the agent’s body. He howled in fear and threw the creature onto the ground.
His body’s nervous system reacted to the poison and started to shut down. He started to convulse, dropping the heavy weapon with a loud clang. He sat down heavily as his legs collapsed. He realised he was losing consciousness when he heard a laughter that seemed to come from far away. His fading vision recorded an image of Yang raising his sabre with a manic grin. The blade came down, just as the killer shouted one word.
“TAYJI! This one is for you!”
80
Wang Zhen ran. The minute the empress dowager and her son had entered the prayer chamber amidst great pomp and ceremony the personal slave of the emperor took off. It was his only chance. The Forbidden City was vast, and he needed to get to the Directorate of Ceremonies, which was on the other end of the sprawling palatial complex.
His heart pounded. He was going to fabricate the instructions of the empress dowager to demand for a map of the Temple of Heaven, a lie that could lead to his head landing on the ground with a thud after the swing of the executioner’s blade.
He raced through snow-covered alleys and buildings covered with a layer of white. The stark red walls of the grand halls of power looked beautiful under the winter sky, but he had no time to admire them. He only ran because they were already far behind their enemy in terms of planning. He needed to secure the map and hand it over to Ji Gang as quickly as possible. He thought ruefully that if he failed Ji Gang would kill him, yet if he succeeded the grand eunuch would kill him as well, but he dismissed those thoughts.
He was not skilled in war, but he would use his greatest asset, something neither Ji Gang nor Kong had, to his advantage – the emperor’s affection for him. He must survive, make himself indispensable to the throne and then all those who had pissed on him would regret it as he decided which of them would fall or rise before the throne. He would start with the grand eunuch, and then the commander of the Eastern Depot, but in order to achieve that he first must succeed and survive.
He composed himself with deep breaths, as he rounded the corner where the Directorate of Ceremonies was. Great puffs of white vapour floated from his mouth like clouds and as he slowed his pace he tried to look urgent, but unhurried. He adjusted his uniform and walked into the hall, carrying himself with as much confidence as he could as he approached the duty officer.
Time to bluff.
He leant into the face of the other eunuch and raised his voice. “I need the map of the Temple of Heaven, now!”
The other man looked at him incredulously. “What the hell are you talking about?” he asked. The map, although not a top security document, was not easily accessible either. The temple was empty for most of the year, and only the maintenance department cared about it.
“The map! Quickly!” Wang shouted. He gestured wildly with his hands, asking for it.
“Well, I don’t have it,” the flustered man replied.
“Then, go and get it! Do you know who is asking for it?”
“You? Another bloody eunuch just like me,” he sneered.
“You fool! Do you know who I work for? I am the Emperor’s personal eunuch! He is afraid of the smell coming from the burnt animals rotting, so the Empress Dowager wants me to personally make sure the Pit of Hair and Blood is cleaned. Do you understand?”
Of course the other eunuch did not. The directorate was too big and he was not in the maintenance department, which was also good because it meant he did not know what Wang was talking about. He just needed to follow instructions. Wang pretended to sympathise with his position as he spoke to the man again.
“Look, you and I are just imperial servants right? If the Empress Dowager wants me to do something I will have to do it, and if I tell her that you refused to help then it won’t be my fault anymore if the emperor complains of the stench. I really don’t wish to tell her it’s because of you that I could not supervise the cleaning of the pit before the Son of Heaven enters the Hall of Great Sacrifice.”
The man’s forehead creased with worry. A mere inconvenience caused to the emperor could mean a heavy punishment for him, but he was too low to make any decision. Wang sensed that, so he decided to push him further.
“Well, the imperial family has just entered the prayer chamber. If you need verification,” he jerked a finger toward the direction he came from, “then ask your supervisor to go in and ask her.”
The man’s face was a cross between suspicion and fear. “She could have passed word to us to do the cleaning,” he stammered.
He jerked his finger toward the prayer chamber again. “Well, why don’t you ask her that?” he said as he folded his arms and shook his head in frustration.
Why is he so dense? Eunuchs don’t question emperors and their mothers. In truth, he was just as afraid of the other man. What if a more senior officer challenged his claim? He was banking on the fact that nobody could verify anything he said with the empress dowager for the next three days. No one would dare barge into the sacred chamber just to check what her personal eunuch said, not even Kong Wei would do that. Not only was it a breach of protocol, it might anger Heaven, and the empire’s misfortune for the next year would be on that person’s head.
The duty officer frowned and fidgeted, clearly unsure what to do. Finally he said, “Wait here.” Then he disappeared into the great chambers. After a long time he re-appeared with a scroll but he was accompanied by another officer, obviously more senior than him.
“That’s him.” The duty officer pointed at Wang to his superior, and Wang could have pissed himself in fear, but instead he took a deep breath. He needed all his courage to maintain his charade. He thought of the favour he would win and decided to risk it. He had almost died once, and he was not afraid of dying anymore, just as he did not want to be used by anyone anymore.
To his surprise, the officer did not say anything. He merely passed a ledger to Wang, saying, “Sign here. If anything happens, we’ll trace the map to you.” He said this gruffly like a typical bureaucrat who was more concerned with his backside than his duty and Wang looked at the book. His signature could either exalt or condemn him. In two days, he would know which. He signed it, took the map, and walked out, hardly able to breathe. When he was out of sight, he ran like he had never ran before.
Ji Gang knew something had gone terribly wrong, bu
t he did not know what. Meng and An had disappeared, and men like that did not simply vanish when the mission would turn critical in two days. In forty-eight hours he had to get into the temple, and Zhao and Li shared his sentiment without voicing it. Zhao cracked his knuckles to ease the tension. Then they heard a knock on the door.
Ji Gang took a step forward but Li stopped him, “Let me open it. You must not be seen.” Ji Gang nodded.
Li asked casually, “Who is it?”
“Open up! It’s me! Wang Zhen!”
Everyone in the room tensed. Did he have an army behind him? Before Li opened the door Ji Gang motioned for him to wait. He ran up to the second storey and looked through the window, scanning the area. The eunuch was alone.
He signalled the Acrobat, and Li opened the door. Zhao hid behind the door with his sabre drawn just in case.
“I’ve got the map!” the eunuch shouted triumphantly as he entered the room.
“Show us!” Zhao cried.
They spread the parchment over a table and studied it. After sometime they found the pit and Wang traced his finger over it as he explained the ceremony’s procedure. The three military men’s mind started to form plans.
Zhao’s finger landed on a spot on the map. “It seems the pit’s maintenance tunnel goes this way, exiting to the west.”
“Which means, this is the most likely the way we can enter,” Li added.
Ji Gang looked at the three people around him. “Somehow we must get in. It is the place our enemies least expect us to be.”
Zhao looked at Ji Gang, asking, “What objective do you seek?”
It was critical to define the outcome before deciding on a strategy.
“Protect the imperial family, surprise and destroy any assassins sent by the eunuchs,” Ji Gang replied to his former foe.
“Then we must lie in wait for our prey,” Li concluded. “There is no other way.”
Together, the ex-enemies hatched a plan.
81
The grand eunuch Kong Wei felt as though a stone had gotten stuck in his stomach, weighing heavily and indigestible inside him. It was not because of the stress of organising the imperial rituals though. It was because someone who was supposed to report to him failed to turn up.
Kong had dismissed the spy’s delay to the busyness at the palace. The man was a eunuch like Wang, and his secret job had been to tail the emperor’s slave and report to Kong if Wang was up to anything. At first he had detected nothing extraordinary about the young eunuch after his return, so Kong had left him alone, but as the harvest rituals approached Kong wanted to be sure so he had sent his spy to trail Wang. This time the undercover eunuch did not return, and at first Kong had not had any time to fret about this. But once the empress dowager entered the prayer hall, he had started to worry. He summoned his friend to come immediately, and when Lei entered the room Kong spoke even before his friend even had the chance to sit.
“Our spy is gone.”
Lei fixed him with a hard look. Everyone was tensed when the mission was so close to its climax. “Perhaps he has other duties and was delayed,” he suggested. “He is, after all, a junior eunuch in the imperial household.”
“I doubt it,” Kong said. “He knows I am not to be disobeyed.”
“When did you summon him?”
“I left a message yesterday. Till today, no news.” Kong’s jaw tensed and his jowls shook a little.
“We have to assume the worst,” Lei said as he exhaled. He looked at Kong for his approval and slowly, Kong nodded.
“Yes…the worst.”
“But what should we be expecting?”
“Hmmm….” Kong tried to process the little information and theories he had. “Firstly, he does not know our plans,” he thought aloud, “so he could not have leaked it.”
“But he might know you are planning something.”
“Is he that clever?” Kong asked as he raised a doubtful eyebrow.
“Clever or not, our heads are on the line my friend,” Lei stressed. “We have to assume that if anything were to happen it will be at either the palace or the temple.”
“There is no need for us to guard the palace because nothing is going to happen there,” Kong said like a prophet who could tell the future.
“Then we just need to guard our area of operations. Make it full-proof.”
“Yes. The interior of the temple is under our guard. The only thing is to ensure it continues to remain within our control.”
After a pause, Lei slowly nodded. “I know what to do.”
Kong stared at him, as though he had pinned all hope on the man, and said eventually, “I have selected the best fighters from the eunuch army for you. Put the Xi Chang to good use.”
“Very well.”
82
Four hours before dawn the Forbidden City was already brightly lit despite the heavy fog that blanketed the area like cotton wool. The soft white vapour tinted orange with to the glow of a thousand lanterns as a few thousand men stood on parade, waiting for the Son of Heaven and his mother to descend from the hall of prayer and lead them to the Temple of Heaven. Other than the fluttering of the flags all were in disciplined silence.
A large gong sounded, echoing dimly through the thick fog and all kneeled as one, loudly proclaiming, “TEN THOUSAND YEARS!” as divine mother and son appeared. Wang dutifully followed behind his royal charge as they descended the steps and took their place at the head of the grand procession. This was the only part of the ceremony where the emperor had to walk, and though The Temple of Heaven was not far for a boy of eight, woken from his sleep in the middle of a cold winter night, it was too much. He was fussing, and only the comforting presence and gentle encouragement from Wang kept the boy from bursting into tears. When they reached the front Kong Wei bowed, dressed in the highly elaborate uniform of a ceremonial director.
“Permission to start the procession, Majesty,” he said.
“Carry on,” the empress dowager replied coolly.
“Yes, Majesty.”
He bowed again and the procession began with a loud crash of cymbals, and like a giant centipede a thousand pairs of feet stepped forward.
Away from the pomp, three men dressed as lowly servants pushed a cart down a lonely road that ran parallel to the temple compound. The wooden vehicle was loaded with brooms and other cleaning equipment. The cart creaked, and they moved slowly. Anyone who saw them would conclude they were just a municipal cleaning crew. To ward off the cold they wore raincoats made from straw thatched together. They had similar straw hats that covered half their faces and all three men shuffled their feet and hunched their shoulders like burdened labourers. One of them towered over the others.
Eunuch Wang had reconnoitred the street the day before with them, and after studying the area they had decided to disguise themselves to enter the pit as servants. Wang then had to report back to the palace because the young emperor and his mother would soon finish their second day of prayer, and would enter the temple for the final day of fasting before ascending the Hall of Great Harvest. They were to hide in the pit until the ceremony was over and the crowd dispersed. Then they could sneak into the great hall before the royal family entered. They heard a distant gong.
“It has started,” Zhao whispered.
“We better hurry,” Ji Gang replied through clenched teeth.
They pushed the cart a little faster but they did not rush because cleaners never rushed. They also could not afford to drop anything that would give them away, so they had another reason to push slowly. The carts concealed Zhao’s and Li’ weapons. The sabre and the guandao were hidden beneath the pile of brooms and rags.
They entered the alley that led to the west wall of the temple compound, wheels creaking loudly in the cold winter silence. Puffs of vapour appeared above the silent men. Fortunately the ground was not slippery with excess snow, and they made good progress. They walked along the walls of a row of old grey houses until they came to the end, then they tur
ned into the street where the entrance to the pit was. The street was empty and quiet in the cold morning, save for the distant sounds of the procession and the wheels of the cart sounded like thunder to their nervous ears.
“Damn it!” Ji Gang whispered as his whole body tensed.
“What?”
“Look!” The commander pointed.
“What is it?” Zhao asked again, more urgently this time.
The wind blew, and the fog shifted.
“I see them,” the Acrobat muttered.
Li saw four men guarding the entrance to the pit, standing as still as stone sculptures. They might as well have been made of rock, for they seemed impervious to the cold. The men were tall and looked very fit, but they were not dressed in the uniform of the regular army or the deep red of the Imperial Bodyguard. Instead they were in sapphire blue tunics with black coats. Two men stood next to the gate and two more stood facing them across the street. In the fog they looked like the statues of war gods who guarded temple doors. A brazier holding orange embers warmed them and as the group approached they could smell the charred wood.
“That bastard eunuch. He told us no one was supposed to be here!” Ji Gang cursed.
“Things change in war, Ji,” Zhao reminded him. “Better to focus on the fight ahead. No backing out now. Who are they?” Zhao whispered again. He noticed their unfamiliar uniforms when they got nearer.