Chapter 51

The two children could sleep sweetly, but Zhuo Siheng had to force himself alert to keep the night watch.

Perhaps from his earlier spell of unconsciousness, he was only utterly weary, not drowsy; now and then he poked the campfire to keep the gaps that fed it air open enough to burn, and in due time added a handful of not-too-damp pine twigs with the bark stripped off.

The overcast night sky made the hour hard to tell; by the seep-water dripping on the stone Zhuo Siheng reckoned roughly it was the yin hour, and in a while the sky would begin to lighten, and he could nap a bit and then hunt the children a breakfast. Only, a day of life-and-death turns had passed, and before he knew it his eyelids grew heavier and heavier...

A strange rustling crept over Zhuo Siheng's drowsiness; he shot to his feet and looked warily all around.

Far off the mountain shadows loomed; the moon without light, no stars to be seen, and under the pitch-black sky twisted trees thrust their forms from the cliffs, swaying their eerie bodies in the night wind with a rustling sound.

But the sound he'd heard wasn't this stir.

The ear Zhuo Siheng had trained in Shuozhou's deep mountains couldn't be wrong — this was the sound of a beast lying in ambush, hidden in the brush; yet on a moonless night, even a seasoned old hunter like Old Huyan might not tell from where the lurking danger came.

He had to wait with patience.

Perhaps from sleeping too little to be soothed, and feeling their support gone, the crown prince Liu Xu and Princess Liu Wan both woke, still dazed, rubbing their eyes; seeing by the firelight Zhuo Siheng signal them to silence, they snapped awake at once, and dared ask nothing, huddling tight together like two little beasts.

The hemp-backed bow was a military hard-bow, of long range and strong stability; a single beast, Zhuo Siheng believed he could handle. He stood before the fire, bow drawn and arrow nocked, the rock-crevices of the platform behind them; choosing this spot to rest kept them from being caught front and back if attacked, but three directions still needed guarding.

Suddenly the crown prince, ghost-white, stared straight ahead; mindful of Zhuo Siheng's warning, he made not the least sound from his throat, but his face was terror itself.

From the corner of his eye Zhuo Siheng saw two balls of ghostly green light flickering in and out of the low shrubs.

Almost at once the arrow split the air, sharp and short, pure without a stray note; with a hiss, a hair-raising whimper, and out of the brush staggered a wolf the size of a calf, an arrow dead-center between its brows and eyes — such was the force that, striking home, it left only a stub of falcon-tail fletching outside.

Zhuo Siheng held the drawn posture still, hand and shoulder level with his line of sight, his back straight as a pine, only his thumb curled to hook the string. The crown prince and princess stared dumbstruck — this archery yielded nothing to a crack guardsman's; how was their Big Brother Zhuo only a junior-seventh-rank Hanlin attendant?

Were the standards for selecting civil officials now this strict?

The danger past, the crown prince finally breathed out, and was about to speak — but saw Zhuo Siheng's face still wore that rare gravity and guard, and that he'd drawn another arrow from the quiver, nocked and pressed the string, this time aiming the opposite way.

Not just one wolf.

The flash flood had wrecked the beasts' dens; the wolf-pack, nowhere to shelter, hungry, hunting by night, though fearing firelight still chose to press on into difficulty — that whimper a moment ago had plainly been to warn its fellows of danger.

That wolf was only a scout in the vanguard.

In Shuozhou's forests jackals and wolves were few, tigers and leopards many; only once, on a winter-famine trip south with Old Huyan, at the edge of the deep old woods near the border with Weizhou, had Zhuo Siheng met a wolf-pack. The old man had told him: meet a pack with no fire at hand and there's only death; but hold the campfire and there's a chance of winning.

"Feed the fire."

In the desolate cold night, Zhuo Siheng's voice sounded like torn silk and cracking ice, yet uncommonly calm — more soothing than gentle words. Hearing it, the two children at once added to the fire the pine twigs Zhuo Siheng had already rubbed bare.

The firelight flared up much brighter.

The dim green shadows too seemed to draw back.

Wolves don't hunt by day; before long it would be dawn, and if they held the dark from before to after daybreak, this peril could be safely passed.

Zhuo Siheng's brow was already damp with sweat; he stared hard at the blackness all round, letting no faint trace slip.

The dark night seemed filled with danger, a single tremor of a grass-blade foretelling the crisis to come; Zhuo Siheng had only eight arrows left, and no capital to loose one rashly.

Suddenly, from the right front of Princess Qingshan, a huge black shadow shot out, so fast the eye could scarcely follow; Zhuo Siheng stepped across, and the full-drawn hard bow gave a crisp snap — the arrow entered the wolf's right neck and out the left, the momentum flinging the wolf's body far off, hot steaming wolf-blood spattering onto Liu Wan's outer skirt; she clapped her hands to her mouth, straining with all her might to make no sound, and the crown prince clasped his sister, though his own hands shook violently.

Almost at the same moment, from the left sprang another, slightly smaller wolf, this one faster, planting its fore-paws left then right to change direction; but wolves fear fire, and it strove to skirt the blaze, edging farther right, which gave Zhuo Siheng the pattern to aim by — he fixed the next point, loosed by prediction, and the feathered arrow struck true, punching through the wolf's back and its spine, as if pinning it to the ground cut in half.

The crown prince didn't dare open his eyes until that wolf lay wholly still, his encircling arms around his sister never once wavering. Zhuo Siheng saw it, nodded to him in approval, and with the motion stepped back another pace toward the fire, until he could feel the scorching heat on his very back.

The nearer the fire, the farther the circling pack; their probes had all failed, yet they wouldn't give up a meal all but in their mouths.

Wolves are the most disciplined and strategic of pack-fighters; this raid was three striking at once, their aim plain: spend one wolf to pin the enemy's fighting strength, while the rest coordinate to attack the harmless humans. So of the three, one was the decoy to draw Zhuo Siheng's fire, the other two making straight for Liu Xu and Liu Wan!

"Get to the fire! Crouch down!" Zhuo Siheng shouted.

— and at the same instant, by rolling-finger release, loosed two arrows in succession!

The two wolves, one in the left eye, one in the right, fell almost together; but the wolf that had targeted Zhuo Siheng had rushed right up before him.

"Look out!" the crown prince cried in warning.

Zhuo Siheng rolled where he stood; a rank, stinking gust burst at his right — the vicious wolf was within a hand's breadth of him!

The next second, half-kneeling, in a "moon-in-the-embrace" posture, Zhuo Siheng loosed an arrow in a flash; at such close range, mighty and heavy, it flung the wolf that had landed where he'd been standing far off, blood rolling out in a broken scarlet trail.

Whether from the wider light after feeding the fire or the slowly brightening sky, the crown prince felt his view much clearer, and saw that the dead wolf had died of an arrow into its open mouth!

Arrows — three left.

Zhuo Siheng drew a deep breath; he didn't know how many wolves there still were, and once the arrows ran out their death would be pronounced.

At this, at last, the pack-leader appeared.

It was much larger than an ordinary wolf, its ghostly-green glowing eyes coming slowly from afar, keeping a safe distance to face Zhuo Siheng head-on, as if to see its opponent's face clearly, then lifting its head in a long howl, as though declaring the all-out assault before dawn.

Bad!

"Take up torches!" Zhuo Siheng shouted.

The two children, panicked, still kept their obedient docility; they raked two thicker branches from the fire and gripped them, their trembling backs pressed tight together; and now the several will-o'-the-wisp eyes gathering toward them, seeing the firelight, all halted and drew back, daring not a step forward.

Standoff, waiting — time was on their side.

Zhuo Siheng fixed his eyes on the pack-leader's green eyes with their thread of glowing gold, his back to the two children, and said calmly to the crown prince: "Your Highness, if something should happen to me, might I trouble you to look after my family?"

Zhuo Siheng said the most terrible words in the calmest voice; hearing them the crown prince's body and heart all but collapsed, and he nearly forgot to breathe... but if he were weak now, how could he face last night's soul-baring, night-long talk and this life-saver's grave entrusting?

In an instant, the crown prince suddenly realized that to become a man like Big Brother Zhuo, the promise to make at this moment was the first step he must take in shouldering responsibility.

So the crown prince too answered gravely: "Zhuo... Big Brother, I swear in the name of the heir apparent: while I live, I will guard the Zhuo family my whole life long." As if feeling that not weighty enough, he added solemnly: "Sooner shall seas and mountains topple than a promise once given shift."

"I trust Your Highness."

Zhuo Siheng nodded, but didn't turn his head, leaving the crown prince and princess only a resolute back and words gentle as clear breeze and bright moon.

After a brief silence, he loosed the first arrow!

The pack-leader seemed not to have expected the man to attack rather than hold his ground, and leapt far off in alarm; as it fell back several steps, the other green shadows withdrew too — only, that arrow flew wide.

Zhuo Siheng had never meant to hit with one stroke; forcing the leader back was what mattered most. Then he hurried to turn and pull a burning pine-brand from the fire, and hurled it into the air; the scarlet glow drew a vivid arc across the no-longer-so-black sky, lighting the once-blind view. Zhuo Siheng could at last see clearly the ground some distance behind the pack-leader; and now the arrow in his hand was full-drawn, loosed in a breath — but aimed not where the leader stood!

The pack-leader hadn't thought its hiding place would be laid utterly bare; wolf though it was, blooded through storms of gore, it looked a little flustered facing this cold arrow, and seemed to feel its side's winning moment had been lost in the standoff; yet unwilling, refusing to concede, it was forced by that ghostly, unpredictable arrow to step forward once more.

That step was the one Zhuo Siheng had waited for!

This was his last arrow!

The long metallic scream of it split the air in a lovely humming, like a very fast pipa's rolling fingers plucked in sequence. The torch Zhuo Siheng had thrown had gone quite out, yet all around grew brighter and brighter — bright enough to see the arrow's track reach, a step ahead, the very foothold the leader had cunningly reckoned, and, before it could stand firm, run straight through its skull.

The lush mountain shadows flushed red then gold, and even the stubborn thin remnant green that wouldn't yield to autumn rain and wind — all seemed kindled by the rising sun, throwing out brilliant crimson outlines, the faint dawn-light shimmering.

Day had come at last.

Zhuo Siheng was near soaked through with cold sweat; the wolves, the instant the leader died, had already fled in panic — they were saved.

Just then, the crown prince noticed with astonishment that the dead pack-leader's crown held two arrows.

One was Zhuo Siheng's guard-issue black-nocked arrow, its tail the red-brown of falcon-feather; the other was fletched pitch-black, as if stained with the thick dusk of the night just past.

A tall black steed stood atop the rock-platform above them.

Zhuo Siheng looked up too, and saw, in the shining dawn, that the pitch-black armor of the Frontier Command could throw off a splendid rainbow sheen.

Yu Yong looked down from on high, and behind him appeared dozens more armored cavalry.

Whose that arrow was needed no saying.

Heedless of the great drop between the rock-platforms, Yu Yong dismounted and leapt down in full armor, scales grinding, yet himself steady as a mountain; landing, he stood straight and sure, walked unhurried to Zhuo Siheng's side and stopped, his square, long eyes glancing over sidelong: "The Three-Arrow Soul-Chasing volley — how does a small Hanlin civil official come by such archery?"

Zhuo Siheng had had his doubts a moment ago, and hearing this now his heart flared; meeting the man's unfriendly gaze, he said coldly: "How long were you watching up there?"

Yu Yong's gaze didn't waver in the least, and between the locked looks he returned, flat and cool: "About an ho—"

Before he finished, he was cut off — Zhuo Siheng suddenly seized the scarf over his armor's collar and yanked the whole man close before him.

Seeing this, the officers and men of the West Victory garrison-pass were aghast, then furious — a petty civil official daring to lay hands on their commander! — and a dozen leapt down at once, blades and swords out the instant they landed, pressing in.

"Insolence!"

"Let go!"

The soldiers' shouts were full of threat and destructive force, yet Zhuo Siheng didn't so much as move his eyes; coldly he looked at the unruffled Yu Yong, and forced through his teeth, in a rasp of barely-suppressed fury: "If any harm had come to the crown prince or princess, what would your crime have been?"

"With Attendant Zhuo's divine arrows guarding the two Highnesses, they'd surely not have taken the least hurt." Yu Yong actually gave a light laugh, and raised a hand to signal his men to hold.

Zhuo Siheng let go.

He had never been so angry.

Being genuinely angry burned more energy than killing wolves, damn it.

So Zhuo Siheng thought, and forced a deep breath, making himself calm, calmer.

But the sight of him now frightened the crown prince and princess, used to the gentle, kindly, considerate big-brother look; seeing his ice-sculpture face at the height of cold fury — more terrifying than the wolves — they dared not breathe.

Yu Yong didn't spare Zhuo Siheng another glance; straightening his deep-purple collar-scarf, he knelt on one knee and kowtowed to the two children: "Crown prince, princess — this general, Yu Yong, Commandant of the West Victory garrison-pass, came late to the rescue; I beg your pardon."