A Heart Divided

by Jin Yong

  * * *

  GUO JING had problems of his own. What if Surefoot Lu kept his lips sealed regarding Lotus? He could not go through with his threat to have the Beggar Elder beheaded. Could he really hope to outsmart Lotus with this heavy-handed scheme? He knew full well he had no hope of besting her in a game of wits.

  Midday was approaching. He sat sullen in his ger, the executioners, with their broad sabers, lined up outside. A horn blast signaled that it was noon.

  Surefoot Lu entered and announced, “I have a plan, but it may be too difficult to put into practice.”

  “Tell me! I’d give my life. I’ll do anything.”

  The beggar pointed to Bald Tree Peak. “Chief Huang will meet you at the summit at midnight.”

  “Is this a jest? How do we get up there?”

  “That’s why I said it might be too difficult to realize.” With that, Surefoot Lu bowed and left Guo Jing to his thoughts.

  One word from Lotus and I’m stumped. The dejected young man sighed, staring vacantly at Bald Tree Peak. It’s several times higher than the middle crag of the Iron Palm Mountain, and far more treacherous than the Mongolian cliffs. If only there were a deity up there to throw me a rope …

  Guo Jing dismissed the executioners and rode glumly to the foot of the Peak. The mountain rose straight from the ground like a column—its bulk did not seem to taper as it reached for the sky. Its frozen surface glistened like polished crystal, reminding Guo Jing of the block of ice in which they had trapped Viper Ouyang.

  He tilted his head back and fixed his eyes on the summit, where no man or beast, except those with wings, had ever set foot. His fur hat fell to the ground with a gentle thud.

  I’d rather fall to my death than miss a chance of seeing Lotus, Guo Jing told himself. The ascent may be dangerous, but I’ll stake my life on the attempt. If I fail, at least I’ll be dying for her.

  His mind made up, Guo Jing returned to camp feeling lighter, and he ate heartily that evening.

  The sky was clinging to the last vestiges of light when Guo Jing stepped out of his ger. He had the golden dagger tucked into his belt and a long coil of rope wound around his waist. He found the three Beggar Clan Elders waiting for him.

  “We’re here to escort you up the mountain,” Elder Jian said.

  “Huh?” Guo Jing was at a loss for words.

  “Don’t you have an appointment with Chief Huang?” Surefoot Lu asked.

  So, Lotus wasn’t deceiving me! Giddy with anticipation, Guo Jing followed the Elders to the foot of Bald Tree Peak. A small company of a few dozen warriors was waiting for their arrival. They were accompanied by scores of oxen, sheep and goats.

  “Begin!” Surefoot Lu ordered.

  A soldier swung his saber, cut off the hind leg of a goat, and pressed the bloody flesh to the cliff face. The warm blood froze instantly, attaching the limb firmly to the icy surface, as if it had been nailed in place.

  Guo Jing could not understand what they were doing. He watched as the soldier’s action was repeated. The second stump was attached four chi higher than the first, and he suddenly realized they were building a makeshift stairway. This was indeed a shrewd solution, given the freezing cold. Surefoot Lu leaped up onto the highest goat’s leg and caught a shank thrown by Elder Jian, affixing it to the rock.

  Soon, the grisly ladder was more than a dozen zhang high. At first, the soldiers slaughtered the animals on the ground and tossed the limbs up to Guo Jing and the three Elders. But, as they climbed higher, they found the warm flesh was frozen stiff by the time it reached them, so ropes were let down to hoist the livestock up, and the four men prepared the footholds themselves.

  Before long, they were approaching the halfway point, where the lashing of the wind was far more intense than on the plain below. Fortunately, the four men were martial Masters, so, although their bodies swayed with the gusts, their feet remained firmly fixed on the improvised perches. Still, to guard against plunging to their deaths should they slip, they looped a rope around their waists, tying themselves together for additional support. They reached the top just before midnight; the Beggar Elders were exhausted and Guo Jing was drenched in sweat.

  Once Surefoot Lu had caught his breath, he said with a laugh, “Will you let me keep my head, now?”

  “I don’t know how to repay this kindness.” Guo Jing wrapped his palm over his fist, feeling both wretched and grateful.

  Surefoot Lu bowed, moved by the respectful gesture. “We have to obey our Chief’s every order, even the impossible ones. What can we say? We have a very mischievous leader.”

  Laughing, the three Elders took their leave and began the long descent. Guo Jing watched them go, until they were halfway down the crag, then turned around to take in the magnificent scenery on the mountaintop. A crystalline world that had stayed frozen in the same state for tens of thousands of years. Some of the ice clusters looked to Guo Jing like flowers and plants made of jade. Others were shaped like exotic birds and beasts, or mirrored rugged mountain rocks, or were gnarled and twisted like twigs and branches. Enchanted, Guo Jing could feel that the prospect of being in Lotus’s company was causing his body temperature to rise, his blood to bubble in anticipation, and his cheeks to flush red.

  A giggle sounded from behind him, soft, almost inaudible, but it hit Guo Jing like a thunderbolt. He spun round. A young woman, gilded by moonlight, offering him an elusive smile.

  Lotus!

  Although Guo Jing knew that the only reason he had climbed the mountain was to meet with her, to actually find himself in her presence struck him as unreal, and he feared it was all a dream. Their eyes met, the joy of the moment mingling with the sorrows of the past months. They ran toward each other with no regard for the ice underfoot. They slipped and skidded at the same time, but, before Guo Jing hit the ground, he summoned his internal strength and propelled himself forward, wrapping Lotus in his arms. He could not bear the thought of her falling and hurting herself. It had been nigh on a year since they had parted, and the longing had driven them almost out of their minds. Now that they were reunited, how could they let go again?

  It was a good while before Lotus wriggled out of the embrace and found an ice mound that was a convenient shape to sit on.

  “I wouldn’t have agreed to see you if you hadn’t been so miserable.”

  Guo Jing gazed at her, unable to utter a word. After a long pause, he murmured, “Lotus…” His voice gained strength through his joy and he forced her name past his lips again.

  She chuckled. “How many times have you said my name already? You’ve been calling it at least three dozen times a day.”

  “How do you know?”

  Lotus gave him an impish smile. “You can’t see me, but I see you all the time.”

  “Why didn’t you let me see you sooner?”

  “How dare you ask that? Do you take me for a fool?” Lotus pretended to chide him. “If you’d known I was alive, you’d have married your Princess Khojin! That’s why I kept it a secret.”

  The mention of Khojin dampened Guo Jing’s mood, reminding him of the promise he had made.

  “Let’s talk in that crystal palace.” Lotus took Guo Jing’s hand and led him to a huge, hollowed-out ice block a few paces away. Gleaming in the moonlight, it looked as though it was carved from crystal. They sat down, Lotus pressing close to him. “Should I forgive you for how you treated me on Peach Blossom Island?” she asked.

  Guo Jing stood up and faced Lotus solemnly. “I will kowtow a hundred times to beg your forgiveness.” He knelt and knocked his forehead on the ground, counting earnestly, “One, two, three, four…”

  “Get up.” Lotus reached out, beaming. “If I weren’t ready to forgive you, you could behead Surefoot Lu a hundred times and I still wouldn’t bother to climb this cliff.”

  “You’re so good to me, Lotus.”

  “Am I? You thought only of avenging your shifus. You didn’t have room for even my shadow in your heart. Why would I not be furious? But,
when I saw you make that pact with Viper Ouyang, that you were willing to spare him three times if he promised not to hurt me, I realized I meant more to you than revenge.”

  “Did it take you so long to know my heart?” Guo Jing dipped his head in disappointment.

  “Look what I’m wearing,” Lotus said, hiding a shy smile.

  Guo Jing’s focus had not strayed from her face all this time, and only at her prompting did he recognize the black sable coat—the one he had given her when they first met in Kalgan. His heart quickened at the memory, and he clasped her hands in his.

  They sat leaning against each other for a while, feeling no need to speak. At last, Guo Jing broke the silence. “How did you get away? First Shifu said you were taken by Viper Ouyang at Iron Spear Temple.”

  “Thanks to Brother Zephyr Lu’s Roaming Cloud Manor … What a pity, though.” Lotus sighed. “The Old Toad wanted me to explain the secrets of the Nine Yin Manual, but I told him I needed a quiet and peaceful environment. He thought we should go to a secluded temple, but I refused, saying I couldn’t stand monks and their dreary vegetarian fare. Eventually, I managed to coax him into asking me where I wanted to go. That was when I mentioned Roaming Cloud Manor, telling him how it was built on the shore of the beautiful Lake Tai and how refined the food and drink were in that grand house. And then I brought up the sticking point: the master of the estate was my friend.”

  “He wouldn’t like that.”

  “Have you forgotten how conceited the man is? He holds everyone else in disdain. The more I talked about Roaming Cloud Manor, the more he wanted to go there. He said it mattered not how many friends I could call on, he’d be able to deal with them all. And so we went to Wuxi, but Brother Lu had already left for Baoying with Laurel and Emerald, to visit her parents. I’m sure you remember that the Manor’s grounds were designed according to Papa’s interpretation of the Five Elements and the Eight Trigrams. The moment the Venom set foot inside, he realized he’d been fooled and tried to drag me out, but I turned a couple of corners and disappeared. He couldn’t find me, so, in his rage, he burned the whole place to the ground.”

  “Ah!” Guo Jing gasped. “That’s why all I found was ruins when I went there looking for you.”

  “I knew he’d do something like that, so I found a way to warn the household staff before I led him inside. But the crafty Venom kept watch over the route from Lake Tai to Peach Blossom Island and very nearly caught me several times. That was when I decided to head north to Mongolia. The whole time, he was hot on my heels. It’s lucky that you aren’t as sharp as he is, otherwise I’d have been hunted from every direction, with nowhere to hide.”

  Guo Jing gave a sheepish grin.

  “But you’re clever in your own way. You made Surefoot Lu come up with this plan for you.”

  “You showed me how.”

  “Did I?”

  “Yes, you told me what to do,” he said, and he went on to describe his dream.

  Moved by his account, Lotus’s smile turned solemn and her words came slowly. “People have said of old, ‘True faith splits metal and rock.’ I should have agreed to see you sooner, knowing how much you’ve missed me.”

  “Don’t leave me again. Please.”

  Lotus gazed at the sea of clouds swirling around the peak and muttered, “I’m cold, Guo Jing.”

  He untied his fur cloak and wrapped it around her. “Let’s go down.”

  “Meet me here tomorrow night. I have something to tell you about the final section of the Nine Yin Manual.”

  “Huh?”

  Sensing Guo Jing’s confusion, Lotus gave his hand a squeeze. “Papa worked out the meaning of the mysterious language at the end. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow.”

  Guo Jing was even more perplexed. Why would she claim her father was the translator, when it was Reverend Sole Light who had deciphered it? But, before he could raise this question, he felt her grip tightening again. He told himself there must be a reason for her strange behavior and agreed to return the next day.

  The two of them climbed down from Bald Tree Peak and headed to Guo Jing’s ger. Only when they were inside did Lotus whisper under her breath, “Viper Ouyang was spying on us.”

  “He was!?”

  “He was hiding behind our crystal palace, but the Old Toad overlooked the fact that ice isn’t opaque, even in the dark. When the moonlight fell on him, I caught a glimpse of his silhouette.”

  “That’s why you brought up the Nine Yin Manual.”

  “Yes. We’re going to trick him into going back. Then, we’ll remove the footholds. He can stay up there working on his qi until he becomes an Immortal.”

  6

  The next day, Genghis Khan resumed the attack on Samarkand, and, before long, more than a thousand of his best soldiers lay dead before the city walls. The Khwarazmian troops jeered and hurled abuse from the battlements, making the Great Khan curse and spit with rage. Fear began to creep into the great warrior’s heart. In the wilderness all around their camp, the ground was littered with the carcasses of oxen, goats and horses that had frozen to death. If he failed to breach the city within ten days, at least half his army would perish in the bitter cold. He could not come up with a strategy to turn the situation around, and nor could he escape the idea that he, Genghis Khan—who had led a hero’s life beyond compare—would meet his end here.

  That night, Guo Jing, Lotus and the Beggar Clan Elders made preparations to quickly take down the makeshift footholds once Viper Ouyang had ascended Bald Tree Peak. They waited and waited, but there was no sign of the Martial Great. The Venom was keeping watch from a distance for any movement at the summit. He would not commit himself until he was certain that Guo Jing and Lotus were up there.

  Eventually, Lotus realized they would have to take the initiative to lure the Old Toad out. She adjusted their plan, asking for several long ropes to be soaked in rock oil.

  Found below the ground in Khwarazm, rock oil had first been discovered more than a thousand years before. When the locals dug wells for water, they came across a dark liquid that ignited readily. Ever since, they had been using it to cook and light fires, calling it fire oil. The Mongolian army had been seizing stores of it on their march through the country, amassing their own supply of fuel.

  After securing the oil-soaked ropes on their backs, Guo Jing and Lotus made their ascent. Once they reached the summit, they concealed the coils behind a rock and sat down in the same ice cave as the night before. Viper Ouyang followed the young couple in absolute silence, confident that they would be unable to detect his movements thanks to his supreme lightness qinggong, though in fact they had already spotted his indistinct outline through the ice.

  Lotus began to explain a passage from the Nine Yin Manual and Guo Jing played along by prompting her and asking questions. It was all for show, but she was quoting directly from the martial tract. Viper listened intently, overwhelmed by the wisdom that was reaching his ears. Even if he did manage to cow the wench into sharing these martial secrets with him, she would never go into such detail. How fortuitous that he had this opportunity to spy on them instead. And yet, the Venom soon grew frustrated at Guo Jing’s endless questions. This boy is indeed awfully stupid, he concluded.

  Suddenly, urgent horn blasts filled the air, making Guo Jing jump to his feet. “The Great Khan’s summons! I have to go.”

  Of course, the bugle call was part of Lotus’s plan.

  “Let’s meet here tomorrow.”

  “Can’t we talk in my ger? It must be tiring for you to climb up and down.”

  “The Venom has been searching for me all over the camp. There’s nowhere to hide down on the ground, but even he wouldn’t think to look for me up here.”

  Hearing this, Viper Ouyang could not resist a smirk. You think this little hill can stop me? You can run to the sky’s edge and I’ll still find you.

  “Wait for me here. I’ll be back in an hour.”

  At a nod from Lotus, Guo Jing began his de
scent. He was anxious about leaving her alone with Viper Ouyang, but, since the Martial Great wanted to listen in on their discussion about the Nine Yin Manual, it was unlikely that he would reveal himself or do anything untoward. As he made the long climb down, Guo Jing coiled the oil-soaked ropes around each frozen foothold.

  Viper watched as Lotus appeared to grow increasingly restless, until she stood up and began pacing and muttering to herself. “Why’s Guo Jing taking so long? This place is probably haunted. What if the ghosts of Yang Kang and Gallant Ouyang appear? I should go down. I can always come back up with him later.”

  Fearing that he would be discovered, Viper stayed huddled behind the ice block, utterly still, watching her disappear from view over the edge of the cliff.

  Guo Jing and the Beggar Elders were waiting for Lotus at the foot of the mountain. The moment she was safely on firm ground, they lit the ropes. The flames licked higher and higher, feeding greedily on the rock oil and melting the frozen blood that had kept the severed animal legs affixed to the cliff face. They fell to earth, one by one, as the fire devoured the ropes, slithering toward the summit like a blazing snake. Against the inky sky and the brilliant white snow, it was a magnificent sight.

  Lotus clapped and cheered, then turned to Guo Jing. “Are you going to spare him again?”

  “Yes, but this is the last time.”

  “I know a way you can stay true to your word and claim his life to avenge your shifus.”

  “Lotus, you really are full of ideas!” Guo Jing gushed.

  She gave him a smile. “It’s just a simple plan. We’ll let the Old Toad eat a bellyful of icy wind up there for ten days and nights. When he’s hungry and cold and exhausted, we’ll build a new stairway to bring him down. And that will be three times you’ve spared his life, won’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “So, once he’s back on the ground, we won’t have to be courteous to him anymore. The two of us can dispatch a sickly, half-dead man, can’t we? With the Elders’ help, of course.”