Laughing in the Wind Chapter 1 – Part 1

Clan annihilation.

The spring breeze caressed the hanging willow leaves carrying the intoxicating flower fragrances—it was the season when the southern lands burst into full bloom.

On Western Avenue in Fuzhou Prefecture¹ of Fujian Province, a cobblestone road stretched straight towards the western gate. Before a magnificently constructed mansion stood two stone platforms, each bearing a flagpole some twenty feet tall with blue banners flying atop.

The right banner bore a fearsome golden lion stitched in yellow silk, its claws extended and fangs bared. As the banner rippled in the wind, the lion seemed to come alive with even greater majesty. Above the lion’s head, a pair of black silk bats flew with outstretched wings. The left banner was embroidered with four black characters reading “Fuwei Escort Agency”,² the strokes as bold as silver hooks and iron lines.

The mansion’s grand vermillion gates gleamed with copper studs the size of teacups, whilst above hung a wooden plaque bearing the golden characters “Fuwei Escort Agency” with “Headquarters” written in smaller script beneath them. Inside the entrance, eight hardy men sat on two rows of benches, their backs ramrod straight, exuding a fierce martial bearing.

Suddenly, hoofbeats thundered from the rear courtyard. All eight men leapt to their feet and rushed out the gate. Five riders emerged from the agency’s west side gate and thundered along the horse path to the front entrance. Leading them was a snow-white steed with bridle and stirrups of pure silver. Its rider was a richly-dressed youth of eighteen or nineteen, with a hunting falcon perched on his left shoulder, a sword at his waist, and a long bow across his back, charging ahead at full gallop. Four riders in plain blue short jackets followed close behind.

As the five riders reached the agency gates, three of the eight men called out in unison: “Young Master is off hunting again!”

The youth laughed heartily, cracked his whip in the air, and his white steed reared up with a long neigh before charging off down the cobblestone street. One of the men called out, “Chief Escort Shi, bring back another wild boar today so we can all feast!”

One of the riders following the youth, a man in his forties, laughed and replied, “I’ll save you at least a boar’s tail, just don’t fill up on yellow soup³ first!”

Amidst the laughter, the five riders had already disappeared into the distance.

Outside the city gates, Young Master Lin Pingzhi⁴ squeezed his legs lightly and his white horse bounded forward, quickly leaving the other four riders far behind. As he rode up a hillside and released his falcon, which flushed out a pair of yellow hares from the woods. He unslung his longbow and drew an arrow from the quiver at the side of his saddle. With a sharp twang, one hare fell instantly.

Before he could shoot again, the other had vanished into the underbrush. Chief Escort Zheng galloped up and laughed: “Young Master, what fine archery!”

From the left woods came scout Bai Er’s voice calling, “Young Master, quick! There are pheasants here!”

Lin Pingzhi spurred his horse forward. At the edge of the woods, a pheasant burst into flight. Lin loosed an arrow but missed as the bird flew directly overhead. Without hesitation, he cracked his whip at the sky—with a sharp crack, the bird plummeted down amidst a shower of scattered feathers.

The five men roared with laughter. Chief Shi exclaimed, “Young Master’s whip could bring down an eagle with that strike, let alone a pheasant!”

The five men pursued game through the forest. Chiefs Shi and Zheng, along with the scouts Bai Er and Chen Qi, indulged their young master’s sport by driving prey toward him, passing up their own shots even when opportunities arose. After two hours, Lin Pingzhi had taken two more hares and two more pheasants. Having failed to find any wild boar or deer, his enthusiasm remained unsated.

“Let’s search deeper in the mountains ahead,” he suggested.

Chief Shi thought to himself, “If we go into the mountains, we won’t return until nightfall. Then we’ll have to hear the Mistress’s complaints again.”

He said aloud:,“It’s getting late, and there are sharp rocks in the mountains. We shouldn’t risk injuring White Dragon’s hooves. We can start early tomorrow and hunt for that big boar.”

This prized Ferghana steed⁵ had been purchased at great expense in Luoyang by Lin’s maternal grandmother as a gift for his seventeenth birthday two years ago.

Sure enough, at the mention of protecting his horse’s hooves, Lin Pingzhi patted the stallion’s neck and said, “My dear Snow Dragon is too clever to step on sharp rocks, but your horses might not manage. Very well, let’s all head back—we wouldn’t want Chen Qi to split his backside!”

Amid general laughter, the group turned their horses around. Lin Pingzhi raced off, but instead of taking the original path back, he veered north, riding hard for a while until his excitement had worn off, then slowing to an easy walk. Up ahead they spotted a wine shop’s banner by the roadside. Chief Zheng called out, “Young Master, shall we stop for a drink? We can stir-fry this fresh hare and pheasant meat to go with the wine.”

Lin Pingzhi laughed. “You claim to come hunting with me, but drinking is what you really care about. If I don’t treat you properly, you’ll be too lazy to join me tomorrow.”

He reined in his horse, dismounted gracefully, and walked toward the wine shop.

On any other day, Old Cai the shopkeeper would have rushed out to take his horse’s reins, fawning, “Young Master has caught so much game today! Truly your archery is divine, unmatched in all the land!”

But now the shop was eerily quiet. By the stove stood a young woman in blue, her hair tied in twin buns secured with simple thorns⁶, tending to the wine. She kept her face turned away, not acknowledging the customers.

Chief Zheng called out, “Where’s Old Cai? Why isn’t he coming to tend the horses?”

Bai Er and Chen Qi pulled out some benches, dusted them off with their sleeves, and presented the seat to Lin Pingzhi. Chiefs Shi and Zheng took seats to his right,⁷ while the two escorts sat at another table.

A cough sounded from the inner hall, and an elderly man with white hair emerged. “Please be seated, honored guests. Would you like some wine?”

He spoke with a northern accent. Chief Zheng asked, “Are we drinking wine? Did you think we came for tea? Bring us three jins⁸ of bamboo leaf green wine⁹ to start. Where has Old Cai gone? Has this wine shop changed hands?”

“Yes, yes,” the old man replied. He called out, “Waner, serve three jins of bamboo leaf green.”

He continued, “To be honest with the honored guests, my humble surname is Sa. Though I’m originally from these parts, I left in my youth to do business. After my son and his wife passed away, I thought of the old saying, ‘Though a tree may grow ten thousand feet tall, its leaves must ultimately return to the roots.’ So I brought my granddaughter back to our ancestral home.

“Yet after forty years away, not a single familiar face remained. As it happened, Old Cai wished to sell this wine shop, so I bought it for thirty taels¹⁰ of silver. Ah, at least I’m back in my homeland. Just hearing everyone speak our local dialect brings such comfort to my heart. Though I’m ashamed to say I can no longer speak it myself.”

The young woman in blue kept her head lowered as she carried a wooden tray to set cups and chopsticks before Lin Pingzhi and his companions. She placed three wine jugs on the table, then withdrew without once daring to look at the customers.

Lin Pingzhi noticed the girl’s graceful figure, but her skin was dark and coarse, with what seemed to be numerous pockmarks on her face, making her quite ugly. Thinking she must be new to serving wine, explaining her awkward manner, he paid her no further attention.

Chief Shi took a pheasant and a hare, handing them to old man Sa, “Clean these and stir-fry two large plates of them.”

Old Sa replied, “Yes, yes! While waiting for the game, the gentlemen might like some beef, broad beans, and peanuts to go with the wine.”

Without waiting for her grandfather’s instruction, Waner brought out the appetizers. Chief Zheng said, “This young gentleman is Young Master Lin of the Fu Wei Escort Agency, a young hero who upholds justice and spends silver like water. If you cook these dishes to his taste, you’ll earn back your thirty taels of investment in less than a month!”

Old Sa bowed repeatedly, saying, “Yes, yes! Many thanks, many thanks!”

He took the pheasant and hare away to the kitchen.

Chief Zheng poured wine for Lin Pingzhi, Chief Shi, and himself. Lifting his cup, he drained it in one gulp and licked his lips. “The owner may have changed, but the wine tastes the same.”

As he poured another cup, the sound of approaching hoofbeats came from the northern road.

Two riders were approaching at great speed, and in a flash, they arrived outside the wine shop. One called out, “There’s a wine shop here, let’s have a drink!”

Chief Shi heard the Sichuan accent¹¹ and turned to look. He saw two men in blue cotton robes tying their horses to the big banyan tree in front of the shop. They swaggered in, gave Lin Pingzhi’s group a cursory glance, then sat down with no ceremony.

The two men had white cloth wrapped around their heads and wore blue robes in a scholarly style, yet their legs were bare and their feet clad in simple hemp sandals without ear-straps.[^sandals] Chief Shi knew this was typical Sichuan dress—the white headcloth was worn in memory of the Marquis Zhongwu,¹² who was so beloved that a thousand years after his passing, the people of Sichuan still wore white in mourning.

Lin Pingzhi, however, found it peculiar, thinking to himself, “These men seem neither properly scholarly nor martial—there’s something odd about them.”

Just then, the younger man called out, “Bring wine! By heaven, Fujian’s mountains are endless—–even the horses are exhausted!”

Waner approached their table with lowered head and asked softly, “What kind of wine would you like?”

Though quiet, her voice was clear and melodious. The young man started, then abruptly reached out his right hand to lift her chin, saying with a laugh, “What a pity, what a pity!”

Waner gasped and quickly stepped back. The other man laughed and said, “Brother Yu, this flower girl has a fine figure, but that face—it’s like a hobnailed boot in mud, like a pomegranate skin turned inside out. By heaven, what an awful hide!”

The one surnamed Yu roared with laughter.

Lin Pingzhi felt his anger surge. He slammed his hand on the table and shouted, “What sort of creatures are you? Two blind curs coming to our Fuzhou to cause trouble!”

The young man surnamed Yu laughed and said, “Second Brother Jia, someone’s cursing us. Care to guess who this pretty boy’s¹³ cursing?”

Lin Pingzhi took after his mother in looks, with fine features and clear eyes that made him quite handsome. If any man so much as gave him a suggestive glance, he would immediately strike them. Now, hearing this man call him “pretty boy,” how could he contain his rage?

He grabbed a pewter wine pot from the table and hurled it at Yu’s head. Yu dodged, and the pot flew out the wine shop door onto the grass, spilling wine everywhere. Chiefs Shi and Zheng leapt to their feet and rushed to stand beside the two men.

Footnotes

1. 府 – fǔ. Prefecture in the Ming Dynasty was the secondary administrative division supervised by a province. See Wikipedia. ↩

2. 福威镖局 – Fúwēi Biāo Jú. Fuwei is literally prosperity and might. An escort agency was a security company that provided armed escort services for valuable goods and people, a common business in ancient China. ↩

3. A chiding term for huangjiu, literally yellow wine, a type of Chinese rice wine. See Wikipedia. ↩

4. 林平之 – Lín Píngzhī. His name meaning “Level-minded” or “Fair and just”. ↩

5. 大宛马 (Dàyuān mǎ) - Ferghana horses were legendary steeds from the Ferghana valley in Central Asia, highly prized in ancient China for their speed, stamina and “heavenly” bloodline. They were considered the finest horses available. ↩

6. 荆钗 (jīng chāi) - Simple hairpins made from thorns, typically worn by common women, in contrast to the elaborate gold and jade hairpins worn by wealthy ladies. This suggests the girl’s humble status. ↩

7. Being on the right is 下首 (xiàshǒu), which literally means lower head, a sign of a lower position. The left side is 上首 (shàngshǒu), literally higher head, and is considered a more honoured position. ↩

8. 斤 – jīn. A Chinese unit of weight, approximately 500 grams or 1.1 pounds. ↩

9. 竹叶青 – zhúyèqīng. Literally bamboo leaf green. A famous variety of rice wine known for its green colour and medicinal ingredients of more than a dozen Chinese herbs. It gets its green tinge from bamboo leaves and is traditionally aged in bamboo containers. See Wikipedia (Chinese). ↩

10. 两 – liǎng. A unit of measurement equivalent to 50 grams or an ounce. It was used as the standard weight of currency in ancient China. ↩

11. 川西 – chuānxī. Western Sichuan. See Wikipedia. ↩

12. 忠武侯 – Zhōngwǔ hóu. Literally Marquis of Loyalty and Martial Prowess. The posthumous title given to Zhuge Liang, the legendary strategist and Chancellor of the state of Shu Han during the Three Kingdoms period, whose profound influence on Sichuan culture persisted for centuries. See Wikipedia. ↩

13. 兔儿爷 – tù’er yé. Literally “rabbit lord”, a derogatory term historically used in northern China to mock men for being pretty or effeminate. ↩