Chapter 66
FEI HONGDE DESCENDED the slope. When Duan Ling moved to follow, Fei Hongde waved him off; he thus settled down on a nearby rock. Wu Du, standing behind him, opened his waterskin and handed it down for Duan Ling to take a drink. The soldiers milled around lazily, like they were merely out for a hike.
A gentle breeze blew, contributing to the sense of idle summer pleasure. The stream reflected flecks of golden sunlight. Once again, a strange feeling of familiarity—the feeling he’d had in the corridor the night before—washed over Duan Ling.
As if, somehow, he’d seen all this before.
He turned his head to look at Wu Du, who had sat down beside him. Wu Du raised his eyebrows in response.
“I…” Duan Ling began, then hesitated.
“You what?” Wu Du asked.
What he wanted to do was lean on Wu Du. Unease overtook Duan Ling; this place, this scenery, everything spread before him was so beautiful it made him feel empty inside.
Barely a second later, Fei Hongde’s scream tore through the valley, echoing from further down the stream.
“Someone’s here!” Wu Du said. He shot to his feet and shoved Duan Ling behind him. The soldiers rushed toward the commotion, one after another. Worried this was a trap intended to lure them away, Wu Du stuck close to Duan Ling’s side. Soon after, they heard another distant rustle.
Their attacker was hiding in the forest.
“They’re still there! Who is it?” Duan Ling exclaimed.
Duan Ling rushed to the carriage and snatched up his bow and quiver, but before he could set an arrow to the string, Wu Du grabbed him around the waist and slid down into the gully. Fei Hongde had disappeared. A figure flashed through the trees in the opposite direction. Duan Ling caught sight of the motion and swiftly loosed an arrow.
“Protect Mister Fei!” Wu Du shouted.
The soldiers rushing down to the bottom of the gully discovered Fei Hongde lying face down beside the stream, motionless. Another small stream divided the gully; Wu Du had just reached its banks when the assassin disappeared into the forest—it was too late to intercept him.
Duan Ling chased after the shadow alone, splashing over the small stream ahead of Wu Du. He gripped his bow and looked around.
Across the stream was a dense forest. Something rustled within the trees. Under the mixed bright sunlight and forest shade of the early autumn afternoon, Duan Ling felt as if he was in an unexpectedly languid dream.
“Who’s there?” he called across the stream.
Within the overlapping light and shadow beneath the trees, a man dressed in black assassin’s garb moved slowly and deliberately. The trees blocked Duan Ling’s line of sight; he couldn’t locate his target. The masked man’s eyes narrowed slightly, as if he was smiling, and he silently threw a stone. It landed with a noisy clatter on the nearby cliff face.
Whirling, Duan Ling pointed his arrow toward the noise. A strong wind blew, and all the trees rustled; the masked assassin took advantage of the sound to escape through the forest.
Duan Ling was creeping toward the cliff when a hand thumped onto his shoulder from behind, and he nearly shrieked aloud.
“I’ve been calling you for ages—didn’t you hear me?! Why’d you run off?” Wu Du, having tracked him into the forest, sounded angry.
He’d shouted “Zhao Rong!” as he chased him across the small stream; his boots were soaked through. Duan Ling, unused to his new name, had entirely missed that Wu Du was calling for him.
“There was someone here,” he said. “A man. I’m sure I saw him.”
“I said, don’t wander off!” Wu Du grabbed him by the collar and shoved him against a tree. “Have you already forgotten about Helan Jie? This person hit Mister Fei with a single arrow from across the stream without revealing himself; what if they’d wanted to kill you?”
“Okay, okay,” Duan Ling said, obediently acknowledging his wrongs.
Wu Du sighed, looking around again. “You scared me.”
Seeing the anxiety written clearly across his face, Duan Ling suddenly felt touched. Wu Du didn’t know his true identity; he hadn’t once thought of using him for anything—he was genuinely worried for him.
“The sound I heard came from over there.” Duan Ling pointed into the depths of the forest.
“If there was someone, he’s long gone. Were you thinking he’d hang around and wait for you to catch him?” Wu Du scoffed.
Maybe you scared him away, Duan Ling thought.
Despite what he’d just said, Wu Du began examining the area. After a moment, he glanced back in confusion. “Come on, why are you just standing there?”
Duan Ling hurried to catch up to Wu Du. He looked around but didn’t see anything amiss. Wu Du bent and picked up a pebble, then looked up at the cliff face in front of him. “A diversion. This pebble is from the stream bank.”
Wu Du being so observant surprised Duan Ling. He would never have noticed that a single rounded pebble lying on the ground differed from the surrounding rocks. Wu Du cleared the vines from the cliff face where Duan Ling had heard the suspicious noise and uncovered a cave with a slight breeze coming from inside it.
“Should we take a look inside?” Wu Du asked.
“Is Mister Fei okay?” Duan Ling asked in return.
“Safe for now. He was only shot in the shoulder.”
“We should go back,” Duan Ling said, but he poked his head into the cave as he spoke. Was this the entrance to the treasure hoard? Would there be booby traps or just a mountain of gold and silver?
“Are you going inside or not?” Wu Du said.
“Maybe not,” Duan Ling hedged, backing away. “I’m not all that interested in money. Let’s go back.”
The pair returned to the rest of their group in the gully. Fei Hongde’s trained reflexes had saved his life. The moment he’d heard the twang of the bow from across the stream, he’d dropped to the ground. Though the arrow came from a mere dozen steps away, the split-second reaction had been enough to save his life.
Wu Du pressed a cloth on Fei Hongde’s shoulder to stop the bleeding as the group rode back toward Tong Pass. Everyone’s thoughts were racing. Upon their arrival, Bian Lingbai was at first shocked, then flew into an unbelievable rage.
“What on earth were you all doing?!” Bian Lingbai hollered, personally lashing the soldiers dozens of times with a discipline whip before he finally calmed down.
Duan Ling didn’t mention the cave entrance to Bian Lingbai, and Wu Du didn’t either.
Fei Hongde, in contrast to the rest of the room, was calm. “General, why are you so angry? Life and death are the will of heaven.”
Bian Lingbai took a moment to look over Fei Hongde’s injuries before pacing around the room. “I must apologize that you sustained such serious injuries because of me. We’ve yet to discover the assassin’s identity—the audacity of him to do this in my domain!”
Though the arrow wound in Fei Hongde’s shoulder wasn’t serious, he’d broken his leg when he tumbled down the hill. Wu Du had set the bone on the way back, but Fei Hongde would be confined to bed for two or three months. Attempting to comfort Bian Lingbai, he said, “General, don’t worry yourself. The approximate location has been confirmed; I’ll have Young Master Zhao return there with some of your men.”
“Should I…send a thousand men to guard the mountain?” Bian Lingbai asked.
“There’s no need,” Duan Ling said. He and Wu Du had re-covered the cave mouth with vines, but he felt it was unlikely to be the treasure’s actual location; otherwise, if the assassin knew about it, he would’ve already taken everything out. No one would turn down so much money. “Uncle, I’ll go look again in a couple days. After we find the treasure, we’ll bring it back to avoid any more trouble.”
“Very well then,” Bian Lingbai said, partly to himself. “That will do.”
Bian Lingbai didn’t ask again about Fei Hongde’s injury, as if he’d forgotten about it. Though he appeared kind, Duan Ling saw that, in truth, he was self-serving. So long as nothing got in the way of his personal interests, he didn’t much care.
When the commander left, only Fei Hongde, Wu Du, and Duan Ling remained in the room. Fei Hongde cast a sly look at Duan Ling.