Sky Pride

Epilogue 4- The Gifts of Too Human Heavenly People

Han woke up with a jolt. For a moment, he was still desperately galloping, Brother Zhan keeping pace on Steppe Fire beside him. Han would be the final sacrifice, should it come to that. He could hold back more Yuu than the rest of the Dare to Die Squad combined, and there would be no catching Steppe Fire once she was running free. It hadn’t been necessary. He could hear the screams. He could hear the hacking sabers and the thud of spears, the hiss of the goosefeather arrows coming from those hellish bows. The Dare to Die Squad had dared, and died. Not for nothing. The message got through.

They rode like the very devils of Hell were behind them. The fear of failure scourged their backs, but there was no room in their hearts for the fear of dying. The blessings of the Immortals… Han’s hand touched his chest, slowly clenching into a fist. Even knowing his teachers, even knowing their impossible humility, their inhuman disregard for wealth and status, the generosity of their blessings was impossible to measure. The sacrifice of two Heavenly Immortal lives as a distraction for mortals?

The Emissary of Heaven’s Mercy, The Pale Saint, The Blessing of the Moon Goddess himself, the man with the most heavenly merit in the entire kingdom, begged the Black and White Impermanences to use his merits to look after the fallen. To count their sins on him. Who says that? Who does that?!

Han’s eyes blurred. They all died. He knew every man in the squad. He had spent months with them. Worked side by side as they patrolled the steppes, or suppressed brewing riots, or investigated crimes. Caught spies. Caught secret heretics. Caught hoarders and collaborators and vermin of all shapes and sizes. They were good soldiers. Not always good men, but good soldiers. Under the crushing weight of the siege, they became his life and death comrades. Who else could understand the horror they had seen? Who else could understand why they did the awful things they did? No one. No one, except the immortals. They knew the price. They never feared paying it. Such was the pride of true Heavenly Immortals.

Teacher Tian was so silly. They both were. Each thought they looked very dignified, but the love on their faces when they looked at each other was obvious. An immortal life with your true love. Dynasties rose and fell, but their hearts never changed. The battle came, and they advanced as one. Hand in hand, ready to fight to the death, just to buy the mortals a chance. Unafraid to pay the price.

Han couldn’t have done it. Tears ran down his face. His body shook, his gasping breaths as close as he could come to sobs. He couldn’t have done it. Not if he loved someone like Teacher Tian loved Teacher Hong. He would throw her over his shoulder and run. He wouldn’t have stayed in the city in the first place. Student or not, heretics or not, he would have dropped everything and run. But not his teachers. They held themselves to a higher standard. They understood a greater love. He was a beast. A thing of lusts and greed, cringing and fearful in the face of loss. He was unworthy of their teachings. Unworthy of living.

For a maddened instant, he searched for his sword, a knife, anything. Anything. How dare he live when his brothers and teachers died! How dare he! Then he slammed his head back on the cot. His life was no longer his own, if it ever was. It was given to him once by his parents, a second time by his teachers, and a third time by his brothers. It wasn’t his to throw away. He would have to learn to live with this shame. Live like the dog he was.

“When the battle comes, advance as one!” He heard the words echoing in his head. It didn’t sound quite like his teachers, but there was something about it that reminded him a bit of Teacher Tian. He must have hit his head during the ride. The hazy memory of the Martyr Venerable striking a giant wolf, just on the edge of the horizon, couldn’t possibly be real.

The blazing fires, the swarms of cursed arrows, the screams from the Yuu camp as an army half a million strong convulsed like a stabbed animal and converged on just two lovers. That was real. The horses screaming, so many of them, they sounded like summer cicadas. The way the Yuu streamed in from the blockades, racing towards the battle, their shamans whipping them forward, howling something in their language he couldn’t understand, fury carved into their faces. That, too, was real.

The tears were still falling. He wiped them away, the back of his hand rough against his face.

“It gets better. Wine helps. Just don’t drown in it.”

Han turned his head. He hadn’t realized there was someone else in the room. He’d be deathly embarrassed later, but he couldn’t find the energy now.

Brother Zhang was sitting on the only other cot in the room. The room had the smell of a barracks, white plaster, the window a tiny hole in the wall with weathered shutters over it. He didn’t look any better than Han felt. Worse, maybe, at least physically. The older man, an ancient of twenty four, reached under the bed and pulled out a small jar of wine.

“One of the troopers here left it for us. I woke up an hour ago. Asked some questions.”

Han’s hand shakily formed the sign asking “What?” It had been Brother Zhang’s suggestion. Sometimes the army used hand signals when they needed to move in silence, or when the noise of battle made speaking impossible. No reason Han couldn’t do the same, right? So long as the other person knew the signals, anyway.

“General Chu… I underestimated him. Everyone underestimated him.” Han gestured for Zhang to continue. Zhang punched a hole through the paper sealing the jug and took a long sip. “Rotgut. Bastards couldn’t find anything better?” He took another, longer, drink. “Chu’s an infantry man to his bones, and defensive as a turtle in winter. He knows good and well he can’t beat the Yuu in a cavalry battle, and even heavy infantry is just target practice. The only thing that really kills the Yuu are logistics and fortifications.”

Han gave Zhang a dark look, and got a dark look back. “They know about the human wave tactics. Reports got to them, don’t ask me how. Spies, I assume, and secret informers. They adopted an even harsher stance than the City Lord. Anyone who approaches an army line without military orders or carrying an envoy’s banner is a rebel to be killed on sight, no exceptions. And they do have the time and resources to exterminate the three generations of every rebel.”

Han shook his head.

“Logistics- the Yuu survive on their horses. The City Guarding Immortals showed the way, there. The Iron Bulls Army sent out raiding parties of horse thieves, and when that didn’t work (which I could have fucking told them it wouldn’t), they switched to fires. They just burn grassland. Hundreds of miles of fires. Want to come? Good luck feeding your horses. Good luck feeding yourselves. They burned the fields, Brother. They burned the villages, they even burned the towns. They burned everything. Anything a peasant couldn’t carry on his back was burned, and the people sent deeper into the kingdom. Anyone who protested was killed on the spot.”

Han could hear the words, hear the truth of them, but couldn’t understand them. There was a logic there, but it was the logic of an ant colony. Surely no one could-

“Govenor Sui had imperial approval, the general was doing it before the orders were even confirmed.” Zhan read Han’s face. “Then came part two of the plan, and it’s why the Gods Damned relief column never came through. They figured the city could hold for at least a year, and if it couldn’t, the soldiers here were screwed regardless. So they used their time to build mobile fortresses.”

Han gave Zhan another hard look. The captain stared down at the wine jug, his voice raw but still conveying wonder.

“They load up wagons with wooden panels covered in treated ox hide. The panels are mounted on thick posts that get buried in the ground. Then the panels are chained together. They soak the hides in something to make it harder to burn, but it honestly doesn’t matter. If a panel breaks, it’s just wood and hide. Easy to replace. They can haul the panels to wherever they are going, then stop and have a fortification up in minutes. It wouldn’t hold up to siege equipment, but it doesn’t have to. It just has to stop cavalry and stop arrows, and it does that just fine. Give them an hour, and they will dig a ditch around the fort. Give them three, and they will have proper earthworks supporting the walls.”

Zhan leaned in, punctuating with the wine jar. “They even made armored wagons, adapting our plans from when we counter-ambushed the Yuu. Put five or six of them in a rough circle, chain ‘em together, and you have a fortress complete with arrow loops. We can’t beat the Yuu on mobility, so General Chu didn’t bother trying to. He flipped the whole board and started playing a different game entirely.”

Han signed “Slow.”

“Very. Twelve miles in a day, fifteen if the road is in good shape and they are willing to take casualties. Not much further than a soldier could march in full kit. But that’s not the point. The point is, now, everywhere the army is, is a fortification. A small one, and the Yuu could easily bypass them, but that means leaving their herds and backs exposed to every detachment the army sends out. They could knock out each fort, but that takes time, and pins them in place long enough for our cavalry to hammer ‘em. It takes away at least some of the advantages their light cavalry enjoys. And they have almost exclusively got light cavalry.”

Han nodded at that, but felt despair crawling up him. The Earthly immortals, what few of them there were, had been dispatched to destroy the new catapults and to capture the Yuu’s siege engineer. Han didn’t know if they succeeded or not. If they failed, the city would be gone by the time the creeping relief column arrived. Wait. Had the relief even left yet? He sat up sharply and looked over at Zhan.

“No, they haven’t left yet. Assembling all this took time. Making the doctrine, drilling the soldiers on the new methods and tactics, learning to use the new equipment, it all takes time. The fact that General Chu did it in months instead of years should be enough to have a General Shrine erected in his honor after he dies. But now they have the dispatches from the city. The message got through. They are leaving today. Birds carried the orders to Red Reed Crossing. We are to wait here in the fort, and join the column when it arrives.”

There was a lingering silence, then Han wrote in the dust of the wall. “A general came up with all these wagons and mobile forts?”

“Hah, no. It was some local, would you believe it? He resisted the draft, but volunteered as a siege engineer. General Chu was the one who figured out the equipment manufacturing, logistics, communications, combat doctrine, and how to integrate it all into an actual military expedition.”

Han closed his eyes again. It would be weeks until the relief force came. He was so damn tired. Sleeping for a month sounded just nice. Maybe he’d never wake up.

He only got to rest for another eight hours. A messenger rode up, this one smiling with joy, bearing a great missive. All their hard work, all the deaths, was for nothing. The Holy Family had forced the Yuu to give up on the city. They had guaranteed its safety, and the safety of the road. The war was only beginning, but Burning Flag City was safe.

There was a private set of orders for Han and Zhan. They were to return to the City. Zhan to take up his duties as Captain of the White Horse Fellows detachment, and Han, to report to the City Lord, with no explanations as to why.

Han wasn’t dusty or stinking of horse when he reported to City Lord Pei. He had taken the time to wash up and put on a fresh change of clothes. He had a room in the servants quarters adjacent to his teacher’s courtyard. Servant’s quarters or not, it was still the nicest room he had ever called his own. It no longer felt familiar. His teachers were missing from the courtyard. He could feel their absence, the sudden lack of a pressure he never knew he was experiencing. Still, the echoes of them remained. No one had come into the courtyard since the battle. It was entirely possible that no one ever would again, until the day his teachers returned.

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Should they ever return.

Why hadn’t they returned? Why didn’t they come for him? Were they disgusted by him? Sickened by his cowardice and greed? He could understand if that was the case. He lived, when everyone else died. Why? Because his unimaginably distant ancestor arranged teachers for him? Where was the logic in that? It sounded insane. His own father didn’t even acknowledge him until he was fourteen, and barely acknowledged him now!

City Lord Pei was no less tidy than Han, and considerably better dressed. Han had never seen the man without his court robes, his long fingernails always sheathed in gold caps. It had never bothered Han before- a plain sign of wealth, and that the noble sir didn’t need his hands to secure his living. Now it just reminded him of claws.

City Lord Pei smiled thinly, seeing where Han’s glance lingered. “You aren’t the only one. For the first time since I assumed my post, I’m seriously considering trimming my nails short. There would be an unholy scandal, and no doubt a reprimand from the censor’s office, but I somehow can’t bring myself to care. Maybe I will in a week or two.”

Han pulled out his cards, and extended one he made a point of keeping fresh looking. “You summoned me, your Lordship?”

The lord nodded lightly. “Your teacher made several contingency plans. One of them was what to do in the event that the city survived, but he was dead or otherwise unable to return to the city. His instructions to me, communicated by a note carried by a servant he waved down as he wandered through the compound, were to give you this letter and this package. Nothing else. I suppose that was all he thought would matter, under the circumstances.”

He handed over a small bundle and an envelope addressed, in Teacher Tian’s eerily unchanging handwriting, “For Student Han.”

“Did you know I never spoke with The Burning Heaven Cranes? The only time I was in the same room with them, so far as I am aware, was for the investiture of the City God. I suppose there was nothing they felt needed saying.” The City Lord stared at Han for a long moment. “You know what? I want you to see something. You managed their mortal business, what there was of it. I assume you know how to read a ledger? Good.”

The Lord pulled a thread bound book from a shelf, and opened it to a marked page. “We track the expenses for Immortals in the military defense budget, or sometimes the civil order budget. There are certain laws that apply, and potentially, theoretically, rebates or compensatory tax relief from the Imperial Court to make up the expenditure.”

The City Lord tapped the heading on a page with many, many entries. The writing was quite small, and still spilled over into multiple pages. “Here, the expenses for Master Yan, Lightning Blade of the Southern Marches, amongst numerous other epithets. Eighty six thousand taels of silver, just in the last two years. Eighty six thousand taels. Can you conceive of such a sum? Of course you can, you have been sent to carry a chest of gold. Well, at this rate, it won’t take long for Master Yan to empty that chest. His fee is exorbitant. His expenses are worse. Immortal wine is expensive, as are the rare herbs he demands, the spiritual beast meat, antiques to decorate his compound, servants, maintenance for his entourage, compensation for the women he has permanently damaged through carelessness, though mercifully not malice.”

Lord Pei drew a deep breath and brought his voice under some degree of control. “Eighty six thousand taels in two years. I could equip a regiment with that kind of money. But I have to spend it on cultivators, because they can do things no mortal regiment could, and Yan, until recently, was the single most powerful cultivator willing to garrison the city on an ongoing basis.”

Han nodded heavily. Lord Pei checked his expression, then flipped the page. “We can’t hire Heavenly Cultivators. Even the Emperor doesn’t have Heavenly cultivators in his personal entourage. It would be considered rebellion to even try, assuming I survived the attempt. Still, there are rules. Information to be recorded, ledgers to be kept. We have gotten rather good at collecting the clues cultivators leave behind.”

Tian Zihao, Heavenly Realm Cultivator, Core Disciple of the Ancient Crane Monastery. Part of the trio known as the Burning Heaven Cranes. Also known as Emissary of Heaven’s Mercy, see appendix three for a complete list of epithets and honor names. Expenses summary, -1,500,437 taels.

Han looked up. There was no way Teacher cost so much to maintain. None! What fraudulent… His blood fired up, and it was only Lord Pei’s rapidly shaking head that saved Han from committing an unpardonable act of treason.

“You are misreading the ledger. He has negative expenses, because he has made a net financial contribution to the city. Immortal Hong is the same. Worse, actually, because she cost the city even less. Do you understand? Do you understand even slightly why I’m in the state I’m in? He trusted me to do my job, never once intruding, never once demanding my attendance, never once trying to impose himself on the order of the city. He harmed none, and directly saved countless lives. Countless.”

Lord Pei started rapping on the ledger with his knuckles, then threw it down with a slam on the desk and started walking around the room, the flush racing up his neck and nearly reaching his eyes. “He gifted the city with a fortune in gold and gems, enough military supplies to feed our soldiers and horses for six months, secured our safety with a treaty signed by that never-sufficiently-damned Wuusan, and he created a god! A true god! Do you know the last time a City God manifested to physically defend a city? I’m asking, because I don’t, and I’m hoping the immortals might have told you something about it. As far as my books say, and I have carefully checked, the last time a city god manifested physically is when the founding emperor ascended to the throne!”

Han’s eyes flew wide open. The Martyr Venerable had manifested? He had noticed the atmosphere in the city was strange, but he hadn’t paid much attention. The world was strange, it would be stranger if things were normal. What he saw was real. It was real, and he ran from it. It was his duty, but the thought still tore his guts.

“All that and neither of them bothered to look at me once. I have been killing myself for this city for a decade, and their evaluation was ‘Adequate, not in need of supervision, but incapable of resolving serious matters.’ They weren’t wrong, were they? Here’s your package. You have been a blessing to the city, an immense help to me personally, and I’ll have a suitable reward sent to your room. I find you likable, most days, but for right now, go away. Far away. Take this however you like, but I sincerely hope I never see you again. Unless I need you, obviously. Which at this rate, will probably be in two hours. Why are you still cluttering my office? You aren’t banished from the city, but scram regardless!”

Han didn’t remember staggering to his room. At some point he was sitting on his bed, staring at the unopened letter resting on the only chair in the room. He knew he had been sitting and looking for some time. The shadows had gotten long. Soon he would need to light a lamp. He couldn’t be bothered. He forced himself to reach out and open the letter. He was a disgrace to his teacher, but not so far gone that he would ignore his teacher’s words.

Student Han-

Never feel that

I can’t be bothered to find a clean sheet. I always used to start letters with something about the scent of camilla blossoms, but there aren’t any around here. Assume I said something properly poetic.

Yes, that sounded like Teacher. He could practically see the aloof face dissolving into irritation when he realized he had forgotten modern mortal etiquette. Again. Even his handwriting was antique. Legible, perfectly legible, but clearly learned long, long ago, and he had never bothered learning anything new.

If we are dead and you are alive, we managed to kill the heretic who was, indirectly, trying to kill you. If we are alive and not able to get back to you… well, I don’t know what happened, so it’s up to you to look after your own little life. On a related point, I have a job for you.

In the package you will find, amongst other things, two sticks of incense, preserved in separate wooden tubes. The wooden tubes are lined with incredibly thin tubes of jade to preserve the spiritual essence of the incense, so for the love of all you hold dear, DO NOT DROP THEM. Anyway, if you light the incense, it triggers a mechanical bird in my possession which will make a racket and point its beak towards the incense. This works, apparently, anywhere within ten thousand miles. Even through warding spells and my storage ring, if the promotional literature can be believed. I haven’t the faintest clue if that’s true or not, this is something I looted. Anyhow, if it’s your life, light the incense. If we are still alive, if we can, we will try and come and save you. Just keep in mind that we can’t be there instantly. Plan for several days delay, and light accordingly. I’d wait until the whole kingdom turns against you, which, again, is coming.

We are only giving you one of the sticks of incense. The other stick is for the family of Censor Hanshen. Same instructions. Your job- deliver it to them. If you have confirmed we are dead, sell the incense at Mountain Gate City and split the money with Hanshen’s family. Keep what money of ours you still have, and take it as your emergency fund. Use it to escape fatal danger. Invest in escape routes now. Don’t be slow. Emperors are fickle animals, and the beasts of court are somehow worse.

Han had no idea which emperor offended Teacher Han. Perhaps it was why the dynasty changed all those thousands of years ago. Whoever it was, whatever it was must have been utterly atrocious. It made sense, actually. Who else but his teachers could invite a god to descend bodily? If they weren’t there, how did a god manifest at the coronation of the Founding Emperor?

Sis’ Liren made you a very fine iron token, declaring you are our student. It’s not magical, beyond being hard to destroy. It might be of some use at some point, or just a nice souvenir. It might be a danger to you. Keep it if you like, or don’t. The token doesn’t matter. What matters is that you are our student. In this life, and perhaps the next. You have grown a root. I would be glad to sweep your immortal path in the life to come. My father did it for me. It seems right to do it for you.

Did I ever tell you I’m an orphan? I am. My father, my true father, is my Senior Brother Fu. He took me in when I was a feral child, ruthless and mistrusting, and raised me into someone capable of kindness. This leads me to the serious business of this letter.

If you have lived, your comrades in the army have almost certainly died.

Han couldn’t read the letter after that. Not for a little while. He had to light a lamp when he gathered the strength to read it again.

I remember it was after one of the first really serious battles I fought. Heretics had killed so many of my brothers and sisters. So many. My brothers did their best to look out for me, but there is no such thing as a cultivator with clean hands. Not if you wear the blue and white. I was killing my way across the battlefield, my rope dart snapping like a scorpion’s tail, my palms shattering organs, whatever I had to do to kill the heretic and save my brothers. It wasn’t enough. They still died. Looking back on it, I should have been kinder to myself. I did my very best, but I was, perhaps, Level Four of the Earthly Realm. Something like that. I was around thirteen, I think, or twelve. It was a long time ago, and time has always been a bit vague for me.

Twelve. Teacher was twelve, and killing his way across the battlefield in the primordial era. He could feel the truth coming off the page. The self loathing rose in his throat, nearly choking him. The next line actually stopped his breath.

I wasn’t right after that. Surviving something like that when so many didn’t, you are never quite right again. Even now, I ask myself “Why did I live? Why me and not them?”

It was nearly a minute before Han remembered to breathe.

At the time, I just wanted Brother Fu to be proud of me. I wanted him to see how hard I had worked, how well I studied, how sincerely I honored his words and teachings. I know now that Brother Fu would have given his right arm to spare me the battlefield, but that wasn’t within his power. He could only do his best to prepare me, and guide me through what he knew would come.

I sit with the sick and the dying in hospitals. I speak with them. Listen to them. I suggest you do the same. The old soldiers know. They have been there. There is no why you and not them. It just is. Fate, Heaven’s will, luck, whatever you want to call it. It just is. Now you have to live with it. You can live with it. I know you. You didn’t run. You did your duty, and by doing so, you honored the lives of those who fell. You did not fail them, nor did you disgrace your teachers.

Sister Liren was there too, on the same battlefield as me. We trod those red sands together, at each other’s throats half the time. She was the only other person my age. We bickered endlessly, comforting each other with tea and crackers and just being there together. Just by being another living person who was living in the same Hell and who understood. I’m not saying you have to find your Sister Liren, but a lonely life is too hard for me. It’s too hard for almost everybody. Don’t be afraid to welcome others to your side, in whatever role. You aren’t saving them by driving them away. They might well be saving you.

He couldn’t breathe. How did Teacher know? How could he possibly know? It was like he was in the room, speaking to him, picking the thoughts from his mind with the care he used to lift tea from its container and put it in the tea pot.

Live well, Student Han. I am a petty, vengeful, man, lacking in compassion and possessed of towering arrogance, but I have always wished that for you. Lousy daoist or not, I have always wished that you would live well. You don’t need anyone’s permission for that, you know. It is your birthright. It is the birthright of all humans. They just need to be shown the way.

I hope I have shown you the way.

Until we meet again-

Tian Zihao