The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 23 – Part 7

Huang Rong was worried about Guo Jing. She ducked through the waterfall curtain and called his name, but no answer came. Panic seized her. She shook a tinder tube¹ alight, and by its light she suddenly saw him lying face down at her feet, covered in blood.

The fright left her beside herself. Her hand shook, and the tinder fell to the ground and went out. Outside the cave the guards were yelling at the tops of their voices, crying out to seize the assassins. Ouyang Feng had thrown more than a dozen of them out with broken necks and bones, and no one dared come in to fight again. But they were charged with guarding the palace, and assassins had broken in. If they did not shout at the tops of their voices, how else were they to show that loyalty came first with them and that they gave no thought to their own lives?

Huang Rong bent and lifted Guo Jing in her arms. His hand was warm to her touch, and she felt a little easier. She called to him several times, but there was no answer, so she took him on her back at once, slipped quietly out by the side of the waterfall and hid behind the rockery.

By now the lanterns and torches all round Cuihan Hall² made it as bright as day, and guards from the other halls had heard the news and were streaming in. Quick as Huang Rong was, she could not escape so many eyes. Several of them had already spotted her and came after her, shouting.

She cursed them silently. She thought, You pack of milksops. You don’t chase the villains, you chase the good people.

She broke into a run with Guo Jing on her back, gritting her teeth. The guards of greater martial prowess were closing in. She flung a handful of steel needles, and behind her came cry after cry of “aiyo” as several of them went down. The rest dared not come any closer, and could only watch, goggling, as she leapt over the palace wall and was gone, who knew where.

The uproar threw the palace into chaos. In the darkness no one knew whether the disturbance came from a plot by the imperial clan to seize the throne or a rebellion among the common people. The palace guards, the Imperial Guard and the Forbidden Army were all turned out, and not one of their commanders knew where the trouble had come from. They spent the whole night in fruitless commotion, and only at daybreak did the armoured horsemen ride out together and search the city from end to end. They caught no small number of “rebels” and “assassins”, but when it came to questioning them, they turned out to be either street roughs or petty thieves. There was nothing for it but to make up confessions and execute a batch of them at random, which both repaid the emperor’s favour and kept the commanders in their posts.

---

That night Huang Rong carried Guo Jing out of the palace and fled without choosing a direction, running at random until she was sure no one followed. Only then did she slow her pace and duck into a narrow alley. She held a finger under Guo Jing’s nose, and to her joy he was still breathing. She had lost her tinder in the palace, and in the dark she could not see where he was wounded. The city gates were still shut. She feared Guo Jing’s injury was grave and that there was no time to waste. Fortunately, circling the city wall in haste, she found a breach and slipped through, making at last for Silly Girl’s³ wineshop.

For all Huang Rong’s martial arts, carrying Guo Jing on her back through half the night, with fear and alarm weighing on her heart besides, by the time she pushed open the door of Silly Girl’s wineshop and sat down, she was gasping for breath, her whole body as if drained. She sat and gathered herself for a moment. Before her breathing had steadied she dragged herself up, lit a stick of pine-wood, and held it to Guo Jing’s face. What she saw frightened her even more than anything in the palace had. His eyes were shut tight and his face was as white as paper, and whether he would live or die there was no telling.

She had seen him wounded before, but never so grievously. She felt her heart trying to leap from her throat. She stood holding the pine-torch, frozen, until a hand reached from beside her and took it.

Huang Rong turned her head slowly. It was Silly Girl.

She drew a deep breath. With someone else beside her, she felt a little braver, and she was about to look for Guo Jing’s wound when, in the firelight, she caught sight of something black at his waist. It was the ebony hilt of a dagger. She looked down, and there was the dagger, buried straight in his left side.

---

By now Huang Rong’s alarm had reached its peak, and for that very reason her mind grew calmer. She tore open his inner garment gently and bared the skin. Clotted blood had dried on either side of the blade. The point had sunk several inches into the flesh. She thought, If I pull the dagger out, he may die on the spot. But if I wait and delay, more time will pass, and he will be past saving. She set her teeth, closed her hand on the hilt, and was about to pull, when panic surged up in her and her hand drew back of its own accord. She tried again. And again. Each time her nerve failed her.

Silly Girl had been watching with growing impatience. On the fourth retreat she reached out, seized the hilt, and yanked it free with all her strength.

Guo Jing and Huang Rong both cried out. Silly Girl, as though she had done something exceedingly amusing, burst into loud laughter.

Huang Rong saw blood come gushing from the wound like a spring, while Silly Girl was still laughing like a simpleton. In shock and fury Huang Rong struck her a backhanded slap that sent her tumbling, then bent and pressed her handkerchief hard against the wound. Silly Girl fell, and the pine-torch went out. The hall went dark. Silly Girl flew into a rage, lunged forward, and kicked Huang Rong hard on the leg. Huang Rong did not dodge, and took the blow full. Silly Girl, afraid Huang Rong would rise and beat her, ran off at once after the kick.

After a while she heard Huang Rong weeping softly. This puzzled her greatly. She went and lit another pine-torch and asked, “Did my kick hurt you?”

---

The pain of the dagger’s withdrawal had dragged Guo Jing from unconsciousness. In the firelight he saw Huang Rong kneeling beside him and asked at once, “Grandfather Yue’s book… has it… has it been stolen?”

When she heard him speak, Huang Rong’s heart leapt with joy, and seeing that he could think of nothing but the book, she thought, I mustn’t add to his worries now. “Don’t fret,” she said. “The villain hasn’t got his hands on it…”

She meant to ask about his wound, but her hands were hot and slick with blood.

Guo Jing murmured, “Why are you crying?”

Huang Rong gave a sad smile. “I’m not crying.”

Silly Girl suddenly broke in, “She did cry, and now she’s denying it. Aren’t you ashamed? Look, there are still tears on her face.”

Guo Jing said, “Rong-er, don’t worry. The Nine Yin Manual⁴ contains a method of healing. I won’t die.”

Huang Rong felt as though a lamp had been lit in pitch darkness. Her eyes, black as lacquer, shone bright. Joy beyond naming flooded her. She turned and took Silly Girl’s hand, asking with a smile, “Sister, did I hurt you just now?”

Silly Girl still had it in her mind whether Huang Rong had cried. “You did cry. You can’t deny it.”

Huang Rong smiled. “All right. I cried. You didn’t cry. You’re a good girl.”

Silly Girl was delighted at the praise.

---

Guo Jing slowly circulated his neili,⁵ and the pain was more than he could bear. By now Huang Rong had collected herself. She took out a golden needle and pierced the acupoints⁶ above and below the wound on his left side to slow the bleeding and dull the pain. Then she washed the wound clean, put wound salve on it and bound it up, and gave him several Nine Flower Jade Dew Pills⁷ for the pain.

Guo Jing said, “The stab went deep, but… but it missed anything vital. It’s… it’s not serious. The bad part is that I was hit by the Old Venom’s Toad Skill.⁸ Luckily he didn’t seem to use his full strength, so it looks as if it can still be healed. Only it will mean seven days and seven nights of toil for you.”

Huang Rong sighed. “Even if it meant seventy years of toil for you, you know I’d be glad to.”

A sweetness flooded Guo Jing’s heart, and then a wave of dizziness came over him. After a while his mind steadied again. “It’s a pity,” he said, “that after Shifu was wounded, the Old Venom and his nephew were on the island too, always pestering us, so that he could never settle down and heal himself. Otherwise, fierce as the snake venom was, the internal injury could still have been cured.”

Huang Rong said, “The method of healing you, it’s the same as what you told me on the island that day, isn’t it?”

“Yes. We have to find a quiet place, and the two of us circulate our neili together following the method in the Manual. Each of us puts out a palm against the other’s, and with your neili you help me heal.” Here he closed his eyes and took a few panting breaths before he went on, “The hard part is that for seven days and seven nights, while the breath is going round the Greater and Lesser Heavenly Circuits,⁹ our palms must not part. The two of us become one, our breath in common. We may speak, but not a word to a third person. We must not rise and walk so much as a single step. If anyone comes to disturb us, then…”

Huang Rong knew that this way of healing worked on the same principle as ordinary seated cultivation at its critical stage. Until the work was complete, a moment’s intrusion from outside, or a demon of the mind within, the least loss of control, and not only would all the effort be wasted, but at best one would be injured, at worst killed. Nothing was more perilous. This was why martial artists who practised neili cultivation chose remote mountains and uninhabited wilds, or sealed themselves away, or had a master or friend of high skill standing guard.

She thought, A quiet place is hard to find at short notice, and the healing needs my help. Counting on Silly Girl to keep intruders off is out of the question. She’d only pester us without end. Even if Big Brother Zhou¹⁰ came back, he could never hold his mind to guarding us for seven days and seven nights. The Old Wild Child is more use spoiling things than making them. What’s to be done?

She pondered a long while. Then her eyes fell on the cupboard, an idea came to her, and she thought, I have it. We’ll heal inside that secret chamber. When Mei Chaofeng¹¹ practised her arts without anyone to guard her, didn’t she hide in the cellar?

---

Dawn was breaking. Silly Girl went to the kitchen and cooked porridge for them.

Huang Rong said, “Jing gege, rest a while. I’ll buy some food, and we’ll begin at once.” She thought, In this heat, rice and dishes left for seven days and nights are bound to go bad. So she went into the village and bought a whole load of watermelons.

The villager who sold them carried the melons into the wineshop and piled them on the floor. As he took the money and stepped out, he said, “The watermelons of Niu Family Village¹² are sweet and crisp, miss. One taste and you’ll know.”

The name gave Huang Rong a jolt. She thought, So this is Niu Family Village. This is Jing gege’s old home. Afraid that if Guo Jing heard it, it would stir up painful memories, she put the man off with a few words, and when he had gone she went into the back room and saw that Guo Jing had fallen into a deep sleep. No blood had seeped through the cloth binding his wound.

She opened the cupboard, turned the iron bowl, and swung the secret door wide. One by one she carried the watermelons in, leaving the last for Silly Girl. She warned her that on no account must she tell anyone they were in there, and that whatever happened, however great the matter, she must not call out to them from outside.

Silly Girl did not understand her meaning, but Huang Rong’s face was grave and her words plain, so she nodded. “You want to hide inside and eat watermelons, and not let anyone know, because you’re afraid they’ll steal your melons. You’ll come out when you’ve finished. Silly Girl won’t say.”

Huang Rong was pleased. “That’s right. Silly Girl won’t say. Silly Girl is a good girl. If Silly Girl says, Silly Girl is a bad girl.”

“Silly Girl won’t say. Silly Girl is a good girl,” Silly Girl repeated.

---

Huang Rong fed Guo Jing a large bowl of porridge and ate a bowl herself. Then she helped him into the secret chamber. As she closed the cupboard door from inside, she saw Silly Girl’s simple face break into a smile and heard her say, “Silly Girl won’t say.”

A sudden thought came to Huang Rong, and she thought, The girl is such a simpleton, she’s bound to tell everyone she meets, “They’re hiding in the cupboard eating watermelons. Silly Girl won’t say.” Killing her is the only way to be safe.

Steeped from childhood in the ways of her father, Huang Yaoshi,¹³ she cared nothing for benevolence and righteousness, morality, orthodox and heterodox, right and wrong. She knew Silly Girl must be closely bound up with Qu Lingfeng,¹⁴ but since she put Guo Jing’s life in danger, she would have to die, and so would ten more like her. She picked up the dagger drawn from Guo Jing’s waist and was about to step out of the cupboard and do it.

Footnotes

1. 火折子 — huǒzhézi. A tinder tube: rolled paper or fibre treated with saltpetre, kept smouldering in a tube and revived with a puff of breath. ↩

2. 翠寒堂 — Cuìhán Táng. Literally Emerald Cold Hall. A hall in the Southern Song imperial palace at Lin’an. ↩

3. 傻姑 — Shǎgū. Literally silly girl. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 九阴真经 — Jiǔyīn Zhēnjīng. Literally true scripture of the nine yin. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 内力 — nèilì. Literally internal force. The kinetic manifestation of cultivated qi. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. 穴道 — xuédào. Acupoints, the nodes along the body’s meridians through which qi flows. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

7. 九花玉露丸 — Jiǔhuā Yùlù Wán. Huang Yaoshi’s elixir, compounded with the dew of nine kinds of flower and hard to make. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

8. 蛤蟆功 — Háma Gōng. Ouyang Feng’s hereditary art, practised crouching like a toad. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

9. 周天 — zhōutiān. Literally heavenly circuit. The circulation of qi through the jingmai; the Lesser Circuit (小周天) runs through the Ren and Du vessels, the Greater Circuit (大周天) through all the channels. ↩

10. 周伯通 — Zhōu Bótōng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

11. 梅超风 — Méi Chāofēng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

12. 牛家村 — Niújiā Cūn. Literally Niu Family Village. A village outside Lin’an. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

13. 黄药师 — Huáng Yàoshī. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

14. 曲灵风 — Qū Língfēng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩