Taming Poison Dragons

by Tim Murgatroyd

  ‘It is a long time since we last met, Yun Cai,’ he says.

  ‘Then you waved a sword around like a little boy with his toy. I have never quite forgiven you for that. Or your impudence.’

  We stand sullenly. Silence is our last weapon. One of the soldiers advances menacingly to force us to our knees but the Excellent Yuan Chu-Sou halts him with a click of his fingers. P’ei Ti flinches at the sound. I recollect his talk of torture and that Youngest Son told me General An-Shu’s chief adviser was personally conducting the interrogation.

  ‘Let them stand,’ he says. ‘They will be kneeling soon enough.’

  Still we say nothing. Yuan Chu-Sou raises an eyebrow.

  ‘I have come to confirm your sentence. Clemency was my first thought. After all, the Second Chancellor P’ei Ti is a valuable prisoner. Then I recollected how stubborn and insolent you both were in the Phoenix Chamber and wondered if the Four Punishments might tame your spirits. The Empress-in-waiting proposed a full ‘roasting’, but preparing all those coals is tiresome. So we settled on a compromise.’

  The lanterns flicker as a cool night breeze penetrates the cell. All involuntarily glance at the barred window. Yuan Chu-Sou clears his throat, then announces in a sing-song voice: ‘At dawn the sentence of His Majesty shall be applied. First, at Her Highness’s request, the ‘heater’.

  Then, when the prisoners’ hands are quite withered away, the Four Punishments. Do the criminals wish to make any appeal?’

  He longs for us to beg and grovel. But if P’ei Ti lost his courage before, he does not now. I follow his lead and shake my head.

  ‘Very well,’ says the Excellent Yuan Chu-Sou. ‘As you wish. Oh, one final thing. You might imagine that the approach of the Imperial forces makes it likely you will be pardoned, or even rescued. Let me assure you, that will never occur.’

  He bows with great solemnity, like a merchant who has struck a fine bargain.

  When he has gone, we slump back on the filthy floor.

  ‘How long until dawn?’ asks P’ei Ti.

  ‘Six, seven hours, at most,’ I reply.

  We sleep. At least, P’ei Ti does. I simply doze. There is a debt I must pay, an obligation of understanding. And, to do so, I must go back, however reluctantly. . . It does no good to rebuke yourself, though an honest man can scarcely avoid it.

  I returned to Wei from the City of Heaven to find the village stricken by plague. No one ventured from their houses as I rode up the main street on a nag barely worth eating. Bodies smouldered in communal pits, scenting cold skies of winter with the aroma of ovens. Only the foolhardy dared speak to their neighbours in case they breathed on them. I had passed through villages where beloved parents lay unburied in ditches, beside pale maid-ens and strapping young fellows in their prime. Their corpses mirrored my hopes.

  The doors of Three-Step-House were barred and few of the servants recognised me. Those that did were afraid to come near in case I was infected. I found Mother dying on her soiled bed, and in my reckless mood, clutched her until the moment her last breath rattled out.

  Father, despite his old war wounds, seemed unaffected by the plague. It is a strange fact that where I expected anger, I encountered deep relief at the sight of his only son. He never asked why I returned without office or wealth. Instead, he feverishly set out to arrange my marriage – by no means a straightforward matter in a plague-ridden district – to a daughter of a once noble family who had fallen on hard times.

  I lacked the courage to oppose his choice. That marriage obsessed him, it was his last chance to determine the future. Within a month of my return I was wed to Fragrant Dawn, the go-between having cut short all ceremony – though she charged her usual fee.

  Find a door, step through into the past – it was once the present. Which is more real? Do both exist side by side in time?

  I close my eyes and recall the touch of a vanished woman’s breasts. Where Su Lin’s were small and pert, hers were round as our hill-country, and fecund. Her nipples hard and full. On our wedding night I was determined to think of her as an imposition, a duty, yet she filled my senses. Afterwards I felt guilty, as though I had betrayed Su Lin. And indeed I had.

  When we awoke beside each other, neither of us knew what to say.

  ‘Husband, are you angry with me? Do I not make my Father-in-law happy?’

  Certainly she gave him comfort, I could not reproach her for that. But he was old and fading; he was disappointed with me. How absurdly jealous I felt, that he might love his gentle daughter-in-law more than his own son!

  ‘Father, do you remember the day we both walked to Mulberry Ridge and I improvised a verse? Do you remember the lucky geese who flew over us?’

  He looked at me through blood-shot eyes. A stroke had paralysed him and he was dying.

  ‘Father, do you know what I am saying?’

  Idiot-eyes blinked at me. A week later, he journeyed to the ancestral shrine he had commissioned for a thousand generations of bones.

  Then I was Lord of Wei, the title inherited, but by no means deserved. I was no hero as Father had been. Yet I was determined to produce heirs, to fill the ancestral shrine. It was all I hoped for.

  ‘Husband, we have been married six months and I am not with child. I beg forgiveness it has taken so long.’

  ‘You beg forgiveness? Foolish woman! Such things are hardly subject to will.’

  Of course, she saw no other way I might esteem her.

  Habits of bitterness and rancour had begun to settle in my mind. Mostly my thoughts were groping after shadows, or griping at those shadows.

  After Father’s death I became the reluctant custodian of our estate, obliged to contemplate the husbandry of pigs, yields of rice, the maintenance of our irrigation system.

  Without the help of my old playmate, Wudi – who first became head of his clan, then Headman of the Village – I would have floundered. Of course he did very well by my ineptitude, for I rewarded him handsomely. With the proceeds he bought considerable property of his own. Did he cheat me? Probably. It was a price I paid gladly.

  Then, eighteen months after my wedding with Fragrant Dawn, a daughter was born.

  How I loved Little Peony! At last the dammed up love within me flowed freely, a love I never felt for her mother.

  Pretty, lisping girl, I rebuked any who suggested she was less than a son. What plans I made to teach her to write and learn the Five Classics, as though she were a boy!

  She was an artless child, blessed with round, earnest eyes and a most frank gaze. At first her unblinking way of examining my face made me uncomfortable, then I came to welcome it, for her love, guileless and trusting, lent me confidence. I would perch her on my knee and the nagging emptiness in my breast faded for a while. She was a doorway through which a life of quiet affection and laughter might be glimpsed. Her freckles were deliciously absurd.

  She took after her mother in eating anything set before her, then wanting more.

  Yet one morning Little Peony left me and went far away. Her giggling suddenly stopped. She was just learning to talk. There is no reasoning away such sorrow.

  Sometimes, when I met her old nurse in the village, I would be filled with a desire to weep.

  Our next child, another girl, died before her swaddling clothes were cast aside.

  Perhaps that was what drove me, step by step, toward the numbness of wine. After all, it is no weakness to seek oblivion, but a kind of wisdom. In the midst of drunkenness one glimpses things otherwise unrevealed. Stars shine brighter and the moon fills one’s heart. I wrote hundreds of poems no one ever read. And constantly, I neglected Fragrant Dawn.

  So it was a surprise when Eldest Son was born in my twenty-ninth year. I barely noticed him. Then came Youngest Son, an autumn child to bless my thirty-sixth birthday.

  I am sure my indifference towards my sons grew from a certainty they would not live. After all, our other children had died in infancy. I could not bear to become attached to them, or mourn as I
did for Little Peony. Their mother never shared my reserve. She cooed and delighted over each stage of their growing. I looked on with a hundred emotions and, in my confusion, appeared cold.

  ‘Husband, why do you not teach Eldest Son how to hold a brush?’

  I remember that conversation well. The boy was six years old. I was copying out a poem praising Su Lin, written when I lived in Goose Pavilion by the West Lake. The paper had grown mouldy in our damp mountain air. In truth, the same mould was rotting my soul.

  ‘I have told you before not to interrupt me when I am composing,’ I chided.

  She put on her obstinate face. No escaping a conversation then.

  ‘Husband, you write so well. Are our sons not to learn their characters?’

  I laid my brush on its wooden rest.

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Because all gentlemen should know how to read and write,’ she insisted. ‘Honoured Father-in-law did as much for you.’

  Perhaps I emptied my cup and filled another with a shaking hand.

  ‘Madam, go away.’

  As a dutiful wife should, she obliged.

  But I did pursue her suggestion, every day insisting that my sons learn a new character. One might think that a man who has loved the flow of writing like his own breath, would seek to nurture the same in his sons, yet I was a harsh teacher. Each mistake was met with disappointment and rebukes. The more they dreaded our lessons, the more intolerant I became. Still I persevered and our daily lessons dragged on through years of resentment.

  Fragrant Dawn sometimes criticised my methods and I would reply scornfully: ‘What do you know? You are an illiterate woman.’

  Once she replied: ‘Perhaps so, husband, but I can see that you are crushing our boys’ spirits!’

  Of course I fumed and ignored her. Each time I punished them for stupidity, I was punishing myself.

  Then, in the depth of winter, as frost hardened the hillsides, Fragrant Dawn fell sick. At first I ignored it. Too busy, always too busy with something. As her health failed I went the other way. Day and night I lingered by her bedside, overcome with remorse. Her spirit escaped in a rattle of breath. As she stepped from this world into the next, her eyes glittered at me – a look of distrust and reproach, I thought. She feared what would become of our sons when she was no longer there to protect them.

  From me, their own father! Oh, I understood her final look very well. I have never ceased to grieve over it. . .

  Father! Look at me! Look how high I go!’

  Youngest Son cries out as he swings back and forth on a rope attached to a tall bough in our orchard. Why don’t I acknowledge him? No doubt I am thinking of something else. What it is, I cannot remember.

  ‘Father, I have copied out the verses of Lao Tzu you wanted.’

  There is a plea in Eldest Son’s voice. He is trembling. At once I realise he is afraid of me, that he yearns for a slight dusting of praise as a flower needs pollen. I am torn between sadness and irritation. I glance over his efforts and say sharply to cover my own confusion, ‘Much neater than usual. Do you know what the words mean?’

  How could he? He is ten years old. Copying them so neatly is a triumph in itself. He bows shame-facedly, then runs from the room. I am left alone with the paper in my hand.

  ‘They are hard words to understand!’ I call out after him.

  But it is too late. He has gone.

  ‘Father,’ says Youngest Son as we sit over dinner, plying our chopsticks in gloomy silence. Perhaps I am recollecting Fragrant Dawn. Or Su Lin. Or nothing at all.

  ‘Father!’ he tries again, eager for my attention. ‘Today I climbed the cliff at the back of the village all by myself.

  My companions said that even a monkey could not do that!’

  Eldest Son shoots a warning glance at his brother. I regard them both.

  ‘It is a steep cliff,’ I concede.

  I have no idea who these companions are. It is the kind of thing a father should know. Soon enough I will come to learn about them, when it is too late.

  ‘Never let anyone compare you to an ape,’ I say, at last.

  ‘Remember you are a man. After all, one should not insult monkeys.’

  I smile at my own wit. He does not know how to reply.

  He is ten years old. Our chopsticks click and click.

  Everyone is relieved when the meal ends.

  ‘Father, I have good news!’

  Eldest Son is twenty-one now and already the father of a toddling boy.

  ‘You know that piece of wasteland above Swallow Rocks,’ he says, proudly. ‘Wudi and I have arranged that it should be cleared. Actually, it was my idea. And I have ordered that the Widow Shu’s sons should be allowed to till half of it. I know how strongly you feel that widows should receive access to land.’

  He beams, expecting praise. Instead I frown.

  ‘Who is this Widow Shu?’ I ask, amazed such a person exists.

  ‘Why, Old Shu’s wife,’ he says.

  ‘That much is obvious,’ I remark.

  Eldest Son hovers.

  ‘Father, did I not do well?’

  Perhaps he thinks I am displeased. It is worse than that.

  *

  I am indifferent to almost everything he does. He leaves, and another lonely afternoon drags towards dusk. . .

  P’ei Ti has woken. He stretches, and manages a faint smile. I glimpse his yellow teeth in the starlight.

  ‘We are still alive!’ he exclaims.

  ‘Apparently so.’

  ‘I can feel my strength returning,’ he says. ‘Is there no food?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Further down the corridor, a prisoner bellows for his mother. We huddle together.

  ‘Yun Cai, I cannot believe my good fortune in finding you,’ he says.

  ‘You call this good fortune?’

  He manages a dry laugh.

  ‘Given the circumstances, I suppose I do.’

  I stare into the dark. It is as though years of separation have never existed, such is our ease with each other.

  ‘There is a question I must ask,’ I say. ‘Why did you come to Chunming Province? I can hardly believe it was to visit me.’

  ‘No, I was ordered here,’ he says. ‘I have requested leave of absence to visit you many times, Yun Cai, and always His Majesty could not spare me. But at last it was granted.’

  ‘To accomplish what?’

  ‘Our spies reported that General An-Shu was gaining in ambition under the influence of his concubine and advisers. I was instructed to ensure Chunming Province remained steady and, if need be, execute General An-Shu.

  By the time I arrived the rebellion was well-advanced. My escort was massacred and I was thrown in this prison. Of course I intended to visit you in Wei. Indeed, that is why I persuaded the Privy Council to assign me this mission. I wanted to see you again before I died.’

  We sit without words. Now the dread of execution begins to clutch. P’ei Ti stirs.

  ‘Didn’t you hear?’ he whispers. ‘Movement in the prison.’

  I listen. There is some kind of noise. It no longer seems important. I close my weary eyes and my spirit leaves me, flitting through the narrow window, flying high into the night sky. Now I see everything: General An-Shu’s army resting on hillsides before tomorrow’s battle; the Emperor’s forces illuminated by countless campfires. Then I feel my soul being dragged back to the dark streets of Chunming, back through the window, back to this prison, this narrow cell.

  ‘Just a dream,’ I murmur. ‘Just a dream.’

  If so, I wake with a start. The bolts of our cell are scraping. The time has come. I close my eyes, and wait.

  The cell door, swollen by damp and age, opens with a jolt.

  A lantern bobs, blinding us. Dark silhouettes peer inside.

  We cannot see faces, just shapes.

  ‘Preserve our dignity,’ whispers P’ei Ti.

  I sense his deepest fear. To lose face and betray the Son of Heaven, as
he did in the Phoenix Chamber. The figure in the doorway raises the lantern.

  ‘Is this the right cell?’ he whispers. ‘I see no one.’

  He steps in and shines the lantern, revealing us crouched in a corner. We blink like startled cats.

  ‘Your Excellency!’

  In a flash the man is on his knees. I look in confusion at P’ei Ti. Then I recognise the voice and struggle to my feet.

  ‘Get up!’ I say, filled with wild hope. ‘This is no time for ceremony.’

  For the man is Ensign Tzi-Lu. And behind him, holding the lantern, stands Golden Bells.

  ‘What?’ croaks P’ei Ti.

  ‘Quick, Your Excellency!’ hisses Ensign Tzi-Lu. ‘Follow us!’

  We find ourselves in a miserable corridor lined with closed doors. The prison is silent, its inmates asleep or too frightened to draw attention to themselves. Golden Bells’ lantern casts strange shadows on the walls. He leads us to a small courtyard in the centre of the prison. Here are more lights and I gasp a lungful of cool, night air.

  A scene frozen by menace awaits us. Thousand- li-drunk stands by the entrance, complete with his basket. Four warders kneel, guarded by half a dozen armed men, holding swords to their throats. Other warders lie dead on the floor. The Ensign Tzi-Lu looks around and listens.

  Stillness. No alarm has been raised. His own sword is in his hand, glittering faintly in the starlight.

  ‘Kill them all,’ he says.

  At once there is a flurry of blows. One of the warders manages a thin scream – but that is hardly unusual in this place. Within moments they lie crumpled on the earth.

  The Ensign raises his hand for silence. Again, no sound.

  Golden Bells walks over to the corpse of the Chief Warder and spits on it. I glance away.

  ‘Hide them in that cell,’ murmurs the Ensign. ‘Then follow us.’

  He leads us to a side entrance. We wait as he unbolts it.

  No one speaks. I can hear P’ei Ti’s laboured breath and steady his arm. Yet his eyes are bright.