The Legend of the Condor Heroes Chapter 9 – Part 2

Wanyan Kang was enjoying himself, and the more Guo Jing heard outside, the angrier he grew. He thought, And I believed he really meant well. Who would have guessed he was so wicked? Then he thought, It’s lucky Old Hero Mu didn’t fall for it.

The woman, too, thought it very wrong. “You made a fool of the man’s daughter, and then you locked them up as well,” she said crossly. “What sort of behaviour is that? Go and let them out at once, give them a good sum of silver, apologise properly and ask them not to hold it against you.”

Guo Jing nodded to himself. He thought, That’s more like it.

“Mother, you don’t understand,” said Wanyan Kang. “People of the jianghu¹ like them don’t care a fig for silver. If I let them go, they’ll spread the story everywhere, and how could it not reach my shifu’s ears?”

The woman said anxiously, “Surely you don’t mean to keep them locked up for the rest of their lives?”

Wanyan Kang laughed. “I’ll say a few sweet things and coax them back home, and leave them waiting for me there, faithful to the death, all their lives. Ten years, twenty years, world without end!” And he roared with laughter.

Guo Jing was beside himself. He raised his palm to slap the window lattice and was about to roar at him, when suddenly a smooth, soft palm pressed against his lips and his right wrist was caught in mid-air. A gentle voice whispered in his ear, “Don’t lose your temper.”

Guo Jing came to his senses at once. He turned to Huang Rong with a faint smile, then looked in again, and heard Wanyan Kang say, “That old man Mu is a cunning one. He won’t take the bait just yet. I’ll keep him locked up a few more days and see if he comes round.”

His mother said, “I thought the girl had a good character and a pleasing look. I rather like her. Let me talk to your father. Why not simply marry her? Then there’d be no more trouble at all.”

Wanyan Kang laughed. “There you go again, Mother. With a family like ours, how could I marry some lowly girl of the jianghu? Father always says he’ll find me a match with a great and noble house. It’s only a pity we’re of the imperial clan and named Wanyan too.”

“What do you mean?” said the woman.

“Otherwise,” said Wanyan Kang, “I’d be sure to marry a princess and become a prince consort.”

The woman sighed and said softly, “You look down on poor families’ daughters… yet are you yourself really…”

Wanyan Kang laughed. “Mother, here’s another joke for you. That Mu fellow says he won’t believe a word until he’s seen you and you’ve told him yourself.”

“I’m not helping you deceive people,” said the woman. “It’s a shameful thing to do.”

Grinning, Wanyan Kang walked round the room a few times. “Even if you were willing to go, I wouldn’t let you,” he said with a laugh. “You can’t tell a lie. You’d give yourself away before you’d said three sentences.”

Huang Rong and Guo Jing looked over the furnishings. The table and stools were all of rough wood, and the bed, the curtains and every other thing in the room were like those of a common farmhouse, crude and plain. On the wall hung a rusty iron spear and a broken ploughshare, and in one corner stood an old spinning wheel. Both of them marvelled, thinking, She’s a Princess Consort, high and noble. Why is her room furnished like this?

Wanyan Kang pressed twice on his chest, and the rabbit inside his robe squeaked twice. “What’s that?” asked the woman.

“Ah, I almost forgot,” said Wanyan Kang. “I came across a hurt rabbit just now and brought it back. Mother, make it better.” He took the little white rabbit out of his robe and set it on the table. Its hind legs were lame and it could not walk.

“Good boy!” said the woman, and she hurriedly brought out her medicine spoon and wound salve and dressed the rabbit’s injuries.

Guo Jing’s anger boiled up. He thought, He knows his mother is soft-hearted, so he breaks the legs of a perfectly healthy rabbit for her to nurse, to keep her mind off the wrong he’s doing. How can a man play such tricks on his own mother?

Huang Rong was leaning beside Guo Jing when she felt him trembling all over, and knew he was in a towering rage. Afraid he would burst out and alert Wanyan Kang, she quickly took his hand and tiptoed away with him. “Never mind them,” she said. “Let’s go and find the medicine.”

“Do you know where the medicine is?” asked Guo Jing.

Huang Rong shook her head. “No. We’ll go and look for it now.”

Guo Jing thought, A prince’s estate as huge as this, where do we even start? And if we disturb Sha Tongtian² and the rest, we’ll be in real trouble. He was just about to say so and talk it over with her when a light flickered ahead. A man with a lantern was humming a little tune under his breath, “Oh my little darling, who will you love if not me? Better love me…” and he came towards them, now hurrying, now dawdling.

Guo Jing was about to slip behind a tree, but Huang Rong went straight up to the man. He froze, and before he could open his mouth, Huang Rong’s wrist turned and a gleaming Water-Parting Emei Piercer³ was at his throat. “Who are you?” she snapped.

The man was frightened out of his wits. After a moment he stammered, “I… I’m Steward Jian of the household. What… what do you want?”

“What do I want? I want to kill somebody!” said Huang Rong. “A steward, are you? Splendid. The medicines the Young Prince sent you all out to buy today, where are they?”

Steward Jian said, “The Young Prince keeps them all himself. I… I don’t know!”

Huang Rong’s left hand clamped down on his wrist, and her right pushed forward a little, sinking the steel point a fraction into his throat. Steward Jian felt agonising pain in his wrist and throat, yet he dared not cry out.

“Will you talk or not?” Huang Rong hissed.

“I really don’t know,” said Steward Jian.

Huang Rong’s right hand snatched off his cap and clapped it over his mouth, and her left hand pulled and twisted. There was a crack, and his right arm snapped at the bone. Steward Jian screamed in agony and passed out at once, but with the cap pressed over his mouth, the dreadful cry was smothered and never carried.

Guo Jing had never dreamed that so dainty a young girl could be so vicious, and he stood there dumbfounded.

Huang Rong jabbed twice under Steward Jian’s ribs, and he came round, moaning softly. She dropped the cap back on his head. “Shall I break your left arm too?”

Tears of pain streamed down Steward Jian’s face, and he sank to his knees. “I truly… truly don’t know. Killing me won’t do you any good, miss.”

Only then did Huang Rong believe he was not shamming. “Go to the Young Prince,” she said in a low voice. “Tell him you fell from a height and broke your arm, and took a bad internal injury⁴ as well. The physician says it needs cinnabar, dragon’s blood, tianqi, bear gall, myrrh and so on, which can’t be bought in Zhongdu.⁵ Beg the Young Prince to spare you a little.”

To every sentence Huang Rong spoke the steward said yes, not daring to hesitate for an instant. Huang Rong went on, “The Young Prince is with the Princess Consort. Go on, quickly, quickly! I’ll be right behind you. If you don’t play it convincingly and give away the slightest hint, I’ll wring your neck and gouge out your eyes. Have you got all those medicines by heart?” As she spoke, she reached out and dragged her sharp fingernails hard across his eyelids.

Steward Jian shivered, scrambled to his feet and, teeth clenched against the pain, ran for the Princess Consort’s quarters.

Wanyan Kang was still chattering about this and that with his mother when Steward Jian ran in, his face streaming with sweat, tears and snot, and recited the words Huang Rong had taught him. The Princess Consort saw his broken right arm swinging loose and his face white as paper with pain, and without waiting for Wanyan Kang to answer, she urged him again and again to give the man the medicine.

Wanyan Kang frowned. “Old Mister Liang⁶ has taken those medicines. Go and get them yourself.”

“Please, Young Prince, write me a note!” said Steward Jian, his face woebegone.

The Princess Consort hurriedly brought out brush, ink, paper and inkstone, and Wanyan Kang wrote a few words. Steward Jian kowtowed in thanks, and the Princess Consort said gently, “Hurry, now. Get the medicine and have that arm seen to.”

Steward Jian withdrew. He had gone only a few steps when a blade, cold enough to chill him to the bone, came to rest on the back of his neck, and he heard Huang Rong say, “To Old Mister Liang’s.”

After a few more steps Steward Jian could hold out no longer. He staggered and was about to fall. Huang Rong caught him by the back of his collar. “If you don’t get that medicine, your neck goes snap, in two pieces.” She took hold of his head and gave it a hard twist.

Steward Jian, terrified, broke out in a cold sweat, and from somewhere a sudden surge of strength came to him and he hurried on. On the way they met seven or eight servants and attendants one after another, but seeing Guo Jing and Huang Rong with him, none of them asked any questions.

They came to the guest lodge where Liang Ziweng lived. Steward Jian went to look, but the door was locked from outside, so he came out and asked again. A servant told him the prince was entertaining guests in the Fragrant Snow Hall.⁷

Seeing that Steward Jian was tottering, Guo Jing put a hand under his arm to hold him up, and the three of them went on side by side towards the Fragrant Snow Hall.

They were still some dozens of paces from the hall door when two guards with lanterns came to meet them, each with a steel dao in his right hand. “Halt, who’s there?” they shouted.

Steward Jian took out the Young Prince’s note. One guard read it and let him through, then came to question Guo Jing and Huang Rong. “They’re with us!” said Steward Jian.

“The prince is entertaining guests in the hall,” said one of the guards, “and he’s ordered that nobody is to disturb him. Whatever it is can wait till tomorrow…”

He had not finished speaking when both men felt a numbing ache below the ribs and found they could not move. Huang Rong had sealed their acupoints. She hauled the two guards behind the shrubbery, took Guo Jing by the hand and followed Steward Jian to the front of the Fragrant Snow Hall. She gave Steward Jian a gentle push from behind, then sprang up with Guo Jing, caught hold of the eaves and peered in through a crack in the window.

The hall blazed with lamps and candles, and a banquet was laid. When Guo Jing saw who sat at the table, his heart began to pound. The very men he had shared a table with the day before were gathered round it: Ouyang Ke,⁸ the Young Master of White Camel Mountain, Sha Tongtian the Dragon King of Devil’s Gate, Hou Tonghai⁹ the Three-Headed Dragon, Liang Ziweng the Ginseng Old Eccentric, Peng Lianhu¹⁰ the Butcher of a Thousand Hands and others. Keeping them company in the lowest seat was none other than Wanyan Honglie,¹¹ Sixth Prince of the Great Jin. Beside the table stood a grand armchair padded with a thick felt rug, and in it sat Venerable Lingzhi,¹² his eyes half open and his face the colour of gold paper, plainly badly hurt.

Guo Jing was secretly pleased. He thought, That’s what you get for stabbing Daoist Elder Wang¹³ in the back.

Steward Jian pushed the door open, bowed to Liang Ziweng and handed him the note Wanyan Kang had written. Liang Ziweng read it, glanced at Steward Jian, and passed it to Wanyan Honglie. “Your Highness, is this in the Young Prince’s own hand?”

Wanyan Honglie took it and read it. “It is. Deal with it as you see fit, Lord Liang.¹⁴”

Liang Ziweng said to a page boy in a dark gown behind him, “Give this steward five qian¹⁵ of each of the five medicines the Young Prince sent over today.”

The page boy acknowledged him and followed Steward Jian out. Guo Jing whispered in Huang Rong’s ear, “Let’s go, quick. Every one of those men is deadly.”

Huang Rong smiled and shook her head. Guo Jing felt a wisp of her soft hair brush lightly across his face, and from his cheek right down to his heart he tingled. He argued no further, but launched himself to jump straight down. Huang Rong caught his wrist, threw her body forward, hooked her feet around the eaves and lowered him gently to the ground.

Guo Jing cried out silently, That was close! With all those masters inside, how could they have failed to notice if I’d jumped down like that? He was ashamed of himself. New to the jianghu as he was, he was apt to blunder at every turn.

Steward Jian and the page boy came out, and Guo Jing followed behind them. When he had gone a hundred-odd feet he looked back. Hanging in the Rolling Up the Pearl Curtain¹⁶ posture, Huang Rong was peering into the hall, her white robe stirring faintly in the clear breeze, like a lily blooming in the night.

Huang Rong glanced into the hall and saw that none of them had noticed anything. She turned to watch Guo Jing’s figure vanish into the darkness, and only then looked in again. Peng Lianhu’s eyes were roving everywhere, searching the room. Huang Rong dared look no longer, and turned her head to listen with her ear to the window.

She heard a man with a hoarse voice say, “That Wang Chuyi¹⁷ stuck his nose in yesterday. What do you all think, did he stumble on us by chance, or did he come on purpose?”

A very loud voice said, “Whether he meant it or not, he took a palm from Venerable Lingzhi. If it doesn’t kill him, it’ll cripple him.”

Huang Rong peeped in and saw that the speaker was Peng Lianhu, the short man with eyes like lightning.

Footnotes

1. 江湖 — jiānghú. Literally rivers and lakes. The world of martial artists, outside mainstream society. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

2. 沙通天 — Shā Tōngtiān. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 分水蛾眉刺 — fēnshuǐ éméi cì. Literally water-parting moth-eyebrow thorns. A pair of short stabbing weapons with crescent guards. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 内伤 — nèishāng. Literally internal wound. Injury to the organs or meridians from a blow, as distinct from an external wound. ↩

5. 中都 — Zhōngdū. Literally central capital. The Jin dynasty capital, in present-day Beijing. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. 梁子翁 — Liáng Zǐwēng. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

7. 香雪厅 — Xiāngxuě Tīng. Literally fragrant snow hall. A reception hall in the Jin prince’s mansion in Zhongdu. ↩

8. 欧阳克 — Ōuyáng Kè. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

9. 侯通海 — Hóu Tōnghǎi. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

10. 彭连虎 — Péng Liánhǔ. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

11. 完颜洪烈 — Wányán Hóngliè. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

12. 灵智上人 — Língzhì Shàngrén. Literally the venerable of spiritual wisdom. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

13. 王道长 — Wáng Dàozhǎng. Literally Daoist elder Wang. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

14. 梁公 — Liáng gōng. Literally Lord Liang. ↩

15. 钱 — qián. A unit of weight, one-tenth of a liang, used in reckoning silver. ↩

16. 倒卷珠帘势 — dàojuǎn zhūlián shì. Literally posture of rolling up the pearl curtain. A qinggong posture, hanging head downward from a height. ↩

17. 王处一 — Wáng Chǔyī. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩