Tong Lashing

by Peter David

  “No. But… I am trying,” I said.

  “Thank you for trying.”

  “Have no fear,” I assured her. “I am quite certain that, sooner or later, somehow or other, I will wind up being punished for it.”

  As I’ve mentioned in the past, I despise my knack for being correct all the time.

  Chapter 5

  Scaling the Heights

  Over the next six months, I conducted the most torrid non-affair I had ever engaged in.

  As I expected, nothing more than looks and smiles and even the occasional polite chuckle was required to satisfy the Imperior that his daughter was performing her designated duties in terms of keeping me sexually challenged. Meantime, a couple of times a week I would go during the evening to the chambers of the princess. After our first “non-encounter,” I actually entered her rooms on all my subsequent visits. We would always make sure to extinguish the lights so our shadows would not betray our activities against the door.

  And we would talk.

  Just.

  Talk.

  It wasn’t as if I’d never spent time talking to a female before. During a long hard winter, I’d been forced to share close quarters with Entipy, and we had discussed various things back then. But most of them centered around how poorly treated she’d been by her parents, and how everyone thought her insane, which wasn’t really fair, even though if one asked me, I would have been the first to say she was half a dozen arrows short of a quiver.

  It was different with Mitsu.

  To start with, there was no question of sex.

  It wasn’t that she wasn’t attractive. For that matter, it wasn’t that I wasn’t intrigued. And she certainly seemed accommodating enough. There was every possibility that, had I expressed interest, she would have been willing.

  But I didn’t. Because, despite the casual way in which the Chinpanese seemed to treat it, for me sex would have changed things. And I didn’t want to change them, because I was becoming quite taken with getting to know a woman as simply a woman.

  As the weeks passed and we carried on our sustained non-affair, I found Mitsu to be by turns acerbic, funny, melancholy, wise, foolish… the entire gamut of human emotions. There seemed to be nothing missing from her. She was a whole person, with no one aspect of her personality—such as, say, a delight in seeing things burn—consuming the rest of her.

  We spoke about a vast array of topics, and I slowly began to realize just how long it was since I had had a friend. A nice, simple friend. Someone who had never wanted to kill me. Someone I had never screwed, in any sense of the word. Even the decent villagers of Hosbiyu, I had never really thought of them as “friends.” I had been friendly toward them, but I had never been able to escape the knowledge that, in so many ways, I was different from them.

  With Mitsu, I didn’t feel that difference. We established a relaxed rapport. Far too relaxed to risk it with anything as potentially complicated as intercourse.

  Besides, it was quite obvious to me that, even though he was gone from her life, Mitsu still had strong feelings for the nameless boy from the marketplace. “You know what?” I said to her at one point. “Judging by the way things usually seem to transpire in my life, your missing love is off on some great quest even as we speak. He is embarking upon wondrous challenges and ordeals and will, eventually, return with great wealth to claim your hand in marriage.”

  “You spin lovely fantasies, Apropos,” she told me.

  “I have no time for fantasies,” I replied. “My real life is bizarre enough.”

  Although Mitsu didn’t teach me a damned thing about sex, she did teach me other things, such as some of the various hand-to-hand combat techniques I’d seen her display. Naturally I couldn’t hope to match her agility, or even come close to it. But she started showing me what she called “forms” in which I would make various movements again and again and again, swinging my arms, sweeping my hands into blocking positions, repeating other gestures which all seemed almost random and more like dance than anything resembling self-defense.

  Still, once she would show me the basics of the forms themselves, she would then challenge me to try and strike her. It was not a task I undertook lightly. I wasn’t in the habit of hitting people I liked. Then again, I hadn’t liked all that many people in my life, so I was very much exploring new territory. I needn’t have concerned myself, however. For every time I did try to connect with her, she would brush my fist away and counterstrike using one of the techniques I had been practicing. In this way, I slowly began to see how these “forms” were clever means of perfecting ways of defending oneself.

  I couldn’t help but think that these were some of the techniques that Chinpan Ali was in the process of showing me. Unfortunately, he had died in the midst of endeavoring to do so, so I would never know the specifics of what he’d wanted to show me. Mitsu, however, was a perfectly decent teacher. I certainly hoped that she wouldn’t wind up being killed as well.

  I did not see much of Go Nogo during that time. I didn’t feel that to be much of a hardship. No doubt he was out there endeavoring to destroy the Forked Tong. More power to him. I was busy spending my evenings with a charming princess while learning new and interesting ways to not die.

  Still, there was one image, one moment that I was not able to erase from my mind. An instance of heartlessness that didn’t seem in keeping with the caring, thoughtful young woman I’d gotten to know. One night Mitsu was even able to tell that it was preying upon me, and asked me what I was thinking about.

  “That young woman,” I said. She looked at me blankly, and I elaborated, “The one who killed herself. The one you singled out…”

  “Oh. Her,” said Mitsu, obviously recalling. “What about her?”

  “Why her? Why did you pick out that girl? Had she done something to offend you? Angered you in some way?”

  Mitsu was clearly surprised. “No, of course not. She was my favorite handmaiden.”

  “Your favorite?” I couldn’t comprehend it. “And yet you chose her to be the one to end her life?”

  “Poor Apropos,” sighed Mitsu, and she actually looked sorry for me. She reached over and ruffled my hair. “You truly still don’t comprehend. I didn’t sacrifice her. I venerated her. To die in order to maintain the integrity of your master’s or mistress’s honor… there is no greater reward for distinguished service than that.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “It is because,” she said sadly, “you do not truly understand honor.”

  “No, I understand it. I just don’t understand dying because of it.”

  She shrugged. “Perhaps,” she told me, “someday you will.”

  Mordant showed only the most casual interest in what I was doing with my time. Most nights when I returned he either wasn’t in the room at all, or else was hidden away in some convenient nook and sleeping. Truthfully, I couldn’t figure out why he was hanging about. Mordant, however, didn’t exactly have a history of being forthcoming under normal circumstances, and this was no exception.

  Then, one day, the Imperior came to me. More than six months had passed, and he was anxious to see how his workers were doing. “We are going to go out ourselves to check their progress,” he informed me.

  This pronouncement didn’t exactly sit well with me. “Imperior, it has only been six months. I doubt that they have managed to build all that much…”

  The Imperior waggled a finger at me. “Are you questioning my word?” he inquired.

  Well, I certainly knew better than to fall into that one. “Absolutely not, Imperior.”

  “That’s excellent,” he said, and appeared to be visibly relieved. Yes, a very strange one, the Imperior. With added cheer, he said, “How far do you think they’ve gotten?”

  “I… don’t know, Imperior. I’m sure they have accomplished as much as is humanly possible.”

  “That,” he said, and here came the waggling finger once more, “is never enough. It is necessary for all creature
s to do more than is humanly possible. Only then can we hope to become what the gods want us to be.”

  I did what I always did when I wasn’t sure what the Imperior was talking about: I nodded. I tended to nod a lot.

  That evening, I informed Mitsu that I would not be around for the next few days, and explained why. Her brow clouded. “That,” she said slowly, “is unfortunate.”

  “Why?” I didn’t like the sound of that. “Why unfortunate?”

  “Because anything can happen when it comes to my father. Just… be careful, Apropos.” She rubbed my shoulders, drew my head forward, and placed her forehead against my own. “I would miss you if you died.”

  “As would I,” I said cautiously.

  The next day, we set out.

  It was quite a procession that made its way across Chinpan. Myself and the Imperior, of course. Itso Esi was there was well. Apparently he considered this the ideal opportunity to converse with the Imperior about every damned thing under the sun. At first he clearly thought that I was going to try and horn in on his time. But when it quickly became evident to him that I was more than content to hang back and let him have the floor, he took it and held it with relish.

  The Imperior appeared to listen to everything he had to say. Every so often he would nod, which pleased Itso Esi no end, and he would veer off onto another “incredibly important” topic.

  We were certainly well protected. There was a handful of Hamunri there, but my assumption was that most of that upper echelon of warriors was off with Go Nogo, investigating the Forked Tong business. Granted, no reward for the demise of the Forked Tong would be forthcoming if Nogo’s people disposed of them, but the bastards would be gone with no risk to myself. Plus I had my own rather handsome compensation awaiting me upon completion of the Imperior’s new home. So I was satisfied with the situation as it stood.

  Instead of the Hamunri, there was a large column of regular Chinpan soldiers on either side of us. They looked as if they’d been cut from a cookie cutter. Each one identical, marching in perfect, uniform stride or, in some cases, on horseback with their mounts also moving in precision. Their grim expressions were identical, the way they wore their swords, their weapons, absolutely indistinguishable one from the other. I had to shake my head in grudging admiration. All the times I’d seen knights riding out into battle or going on a journey, I was able to discern individuality. Not from this bunch. They moved with one mind and, presumably, with one purpose. I was relieved that we were all on the same side. I would have hated to have to face them in combat.

  The journey took several days. We passed farm villages along the way, or groups of travelers standing to either side of the road to make way for the Imperior’s procession. People would bow and scrape as the Imperior passed. I liked to entertain myself every so often by pretending they were responding to my presence rather than his. When one is on a long journey, one passes the time any way that one can.

  On the fifth day of our journey, I knew we were drawing close. I could even hear the sounds of construction coming from the far side of a ridge. We would not be able to see the progress of the house until we achieved the top of the ridge, but that was perfectly fine as far as I was concerned. It would be more dramatic that way. To ride to the top of the ridge and look down upon the sprawling achievement that would (if my instructions were being followed) look remarkably like King Runcible’s castle lifted stone by stone from Isteria and relocated to Chinpan.

  I drew close, ignoring Itso Esi’s chatter about some new and amazing weapon he was trying to convince the Imperior about called “gunpowder,” and I said, “Prepare to be dazzled, Your Worship.”

  The columns of soldiers separated as we approached the ridge, allowing us access to the top. The Imperior’s horse reached the top of the ridge first, which was of course as it should be. He paused there for a long moment, staring outward thoughtfully. Then slowly he turned toward me and said, “I am perceiving a severe lack of dazzlement.”

  Well, I certainly didn’t like the sound of that. I snapped my horse’s reins and urged the beast forward, carefully so that I didn’t startle the Imperior’s steed and cause an accident. I achieved the ridge and looked down, and couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

  Far below, like a swarm of ants, the builders were constructing what was clearly a wall. It was supposed to be one of the four sides of the exterior wall that would surround the castle.

  There was not, however, a castle. Not even the beginnings of the foundation for the castle.

  Instead there was simply a wall. The one wall. It stretched as far as the eye could see, miles in either direction, and was roughly twenty-five feet high. As near as I could determine, workers were continuing to labor to extend the wall farther and farther both ways.

  “What the hell—?” I gasped out.

  “There is a wall there,” said the Imperior. He did not sound especially pleased.

  “Yes, Imperior, I know there is a—”

  “Where there is one wall, should there not be at least…” He paused, counted. “…three others?”

  “I would think so, yes.”

  “To form a sort of square?”

  “Most definitely.” I was starting to feel faint.

  “And yet I count just the one,” the Imperior noted. “One very long wall, running—it would seem—the length of my country’s border. I do not pretend to understand it. But I cannot say I like it.”

  “I fully understand, Great One, and we shall immediately investigate the cause of this…” I searched for the right word. “…this anomaly.”

  “See that you do. Because I am quite sure I wanted to see a house. Or, minimally, the recognizable beginnings of a house. Not a single wall. And if a single wall is all you have to show me, honorable architect, then you will have a serious problem on your hands.”

  I noticed that he wasn’t saying “we” would. I would.

  Quickly we made our way down to the work site. The workers saw us coming, and word spread quickly throughout the camps. Within minutes all construction had halted, and everyone was on their knees, their eyes resolutely down.

  It didn’t take us long to find the foreman, an aggressive fellow named Kan Du, renowned for his attitude. He approached us, grim-faced and clearly determined to make a positive impression upon the Imperior. He had my plans for the construction of the residence tucked under his arm. They looked rather worn. I had the feeling he never put the damned things down.

  But Kan Du wasn’t stupid. He could see immediately that the Imperior did not appear happy. Nevertheless, he gamely bowed and said, “Greetings. Work continues apace on the wall.”

  “On the wall?” asked the Imperior. He turned and looked at me questioningly.

  Kan Du was staring at me strangely as well. I should have realized that he was reacting to the clear fact that I was not from this country, but I had too much else on my mind at that moment. “What about the other walls?”

  “We do not have remotely sufficient building materials for the other three,” said Kan Du as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “So we elected to accomplish as much as we could on the one wall and wait for more materials to arrive.”

  “More materials!” Itso Esi squealed out. “But what you had should have been sufficient to construct the entire palace! Instead you have placed it all into this… this…”

  “Wall. Is it not great?” said a cheery Kan Du.

  “A great wall is of no use to me,” said the Imperior. He sounded angrier than I had ever heard him, and I couldn’t entirely blame him. “How did this happen?”

  “We simply followed the designs we’d been sent.”

  “Designs,” and slowly the Imperior looked at me. “Designs crafted by you.”

  “But my designs didn’t call for a miles-long wall!” I protested. I dismounted and limped over to Kan Du, practically ripping the designs out from under his arm. I eased myself onto the ground and spread the designs out. “Look! Look here!” I jabb
ed my finger repeatedly into the plans. “Each of these squares is supposed to be ten…”

  I stopped.

  Keep in mind, I didn’t know how to write the language. But Itso Esi had volunteered to show me how to write “One square equals ten feet” for me, and I had then meticulously copied what he’d written onto the plans. The thing was, I had stared at the designs for so long that I knew every square inch of them. So when I looked at the writing now where the scale was, I knew something was wrong. There was a variation in the letters. Minor variation, so small as to be almost unnoticable at casual glance. A line or two added. But it was enough to change it.

  “What does this say?” I asked slowly.

  Kan Du leaned in and said, “One square equals ten miles.”

  I shook my head. “No. No, that’s not possible.”

  “Possible, not possible, no matter,” Kan Du replied. “That is what it says. Our job is not to question documents. Our job is to build what documents say. We did our job.”

  Itso Esi looked at me in a most accusatory manner. “Honorable Po,” he said in a voice reeking of stunned shock, “how could you possibly have made such an error?”

  “Me?” I clambered to my feet. “You’re the one who told me how to write the scale!”

  “And I told you correctly. I can’t be held responsible if you sent it out with a mistake.”

  “There was no mistake when I sent it out!”

  “And yet there it is!” pointed out Itso Esi. “Do not attempt to shirk responsibility.”

  “But you looked at the plans as well!”

  “And they were correct when I did,” he said calmly.

  “But now they’re wrong!”

  “And whose fault is that?” he inquired.

  That, of course, was when I knew. When it became clear to me.

  Itso Esi had set me up. He had deliberately tampered with the plans for the purpose of making me look bad to the Imperior. I didn’t know when he’d done it, but he had. And I was being left twisting in the crow’s cage because of it.

  “You little bastard!” I snarled, and in an uncharacteristically aggressive move, I swung my walking staff at him. It slammed across his knees, taking his legs out from under him and sending him sprawling to the ground. In a heartbeat I was atop him, gripping my staff firmly and placing it crosswise across his throat. His eyes went wide as he tried to shove it off, but with no luck. “Admit it! Admit what you did!”