The Heavenly Sword & the Dragon Sabre Chapter 12 Part 4

Fourteen wounded strangers gather at Butterfly Valley seeking the Healing Sage's aid, but Hu Qingniu has caught smallpox and refuses all treatment. Then in the moonlight appears a woman in a green gown leading a young girl — none other than Ji Xiaofu of the Emei Order, herself grievously wounded…

Zhang Wuji¹ felt a chill. The Huashan School’s² Xianyu Tong³ was Mister Hu’s great enemy. How, he wondered, would he deal with this? He went to Hu Qingniu’s⁴ door and said, “Mister Hu, there are three gravely wounded men outside, come to seek treatment. They say they are disciples of Xianyu, the zhangmen of the Huashan School.” Hu Qingniu gave a soft “Oh?”, then said angrily, “No treatment, no treatment. Drive them out, and be quick about it!”

“Yes,” said Zhang Wuji. He returned to the hall and told the swarthy man, “Mister Hu’s condition is grave, and he cannot see visitors. I beg your pardon.” The man knit his brows and was on the point of pleading further when the thin, slight man slumped across a horse’s back suddenly lifted his head and flicked out a hand. There was a flash of gold and a sharp crack, and a small hidden weapon struck the middle of the hall table. Said the thin man, “Take this golden flower⁵ to ‘Sees Death, Saves None,’ and tell him that we three were all wounded by the owner of this golden flower. That person will be along presently to make trouble for him, and if ‘Sees Death, Saves None’ will heal our hurts, then we three shall stay on here and help him meet the foe. Our martial arts may not be up to much, but at least it is three more pairs of hands.” Hearing him speak so brashly, with none of the first man’s courtesy, Zhang Wuji went up to the table and saw that the weapon was a plum blossom cast in gold, of the same size as a true one, its stamens wrought of white-gold wire, a thing most exquisitely made. He reached out to take it, but the thin man’s flick had carried such force that the golden flower was sunk into the tabletop and would not come free. He had to fetch a pair of medicine-tweezers and pry at it several times before he had it out. This thin man’s martial arts are no mean thing, he thought, yet he has been so grievously hurt at the hands of this golden flower’s owner. He says that person means to come and take his revenge. I had best tell Mister Hu of it. And so, bearing the golden flower, he went to Hu Qingniu’s door and passed on the thin man’s words.

“Bring it in and let me look,” said Hu Qingniu. Zhang Wuji pushed the door gently open and lifted the curtain, and saw the room black as deep night. He knew that a smallpox patient dreads wind and light, and so the windows had all been hung over with felt. Over Hu Qingniu’s face lay a cloth of dark blue, with only a pair of eyes showing. Zhang Wuji was inwardly alarmed. I wonder how bad the pocks on his face are, there beneath the cloth. When he recovers, will he be left pitted? Hu Qingniu said, “Set the golden flower on the table, and withdraw from the room, quickly.” Zhang Wuji did as he was told, laid down the golden flower, and lifted the curtain to go out. Before he could pull the door to, he heard Hu Qingniu say, “Whether those three live or die is no concern of mine, Hu Qingniu. And whether Hu Qingniu lives or dies is no trouble worth the three of them fretting over either.” There was a sharp hiss as the golden flower pierced through the curtain and came flying out, and clanged, and dropped to the floor. Zhang Wuji had lived with him more than two years and had never once seen him drill in any martial art, and here was this mild and scholarly divine physician a master of the wulin besides, his skill undiminished for all his sickness.

Zhang Wuji picked up the golden flower, went out, and gave it back to the thin man, shaking his head. “Mister Hu is truly gravely ill…” Then, of a sudden, came the clatter of hooves and the rumble of cartwheels, and a horse-cart came driving toward the valley.

Zhang Wuji went to the door and saw the cart come on at speed. In the blink of an eye it was at the door, and stopped short. Down from the driver’s seat came a sallow-faced young fellow, who lifted a bald old man out of the cart and asked, “Is the Butterfly Valley⁶ Healing Sage, Mister Hu, at home? Jian Jie,⁷ the Sacred Hand Sangharama, of the Kongtong⁸ disciples, has come far to seek his cure…” The third sentence never left his lips. His body swayed a few times, and he pitched to the ground together with the bald old man in his arms. As chance would have it, the two draft horses too were spent past bearing, and, foaming at the mouth, sank to their knees at the same moment.

By the look of the two, one need not ask to know they had galloped far from a great distance, without rest along the way, to be brought to so sorry a pass. When Zhang Wuji heard the words “Kongtong disciples,” he thought: among those who had pressed his parents to their deaths on Mount Wudang were elders of the Kongtong School, and though this bald old man had not been there that day, he was likely no honest man for all that. He was about to refuse them, when he saw dim shapes moving on the mountain path, four or five more people coming on, some limping, some leaning on one another, all of them hurt. Zhang Wuji knit his brows, and before the party had drawn near called out loudly, “Mister Hu has caught the smallpox, and can scarcely save himself, let alone treat your wounds. I beg you will all go quickly and seek out some other famous physician, lest you let your hurts grow worse.”

By the time the party had come close, he saw that there were five in all, each face white as paper, without the least trace of colour, yet with no wound or bloodstain upon them: all, it seemed, hurt within. The man at their head, tall and stout, gave a nod to the bald old man, Jian Jie, and to the thin man who had thrown the golden flower, and the three exchanged bitter smiles. So the three parties knew one another. Zhang Wuji’s curiosity stirred, and he asked, “Were you all wounded by the owner of this golden flower?” The stout man said, “Indeed.” The man who had come first and spat up the blood asked, “Young Brother, what is your honoured surname? And how do you stand to Mister Hu?” Zhang Wuji said, “I came to seek Mister Hu’s cure myself, but he will not treat me. And I know that once Mister Hu has said he will not treat, he assuredly will not. There is no use in your hanging on here.”

Even as they spoke, four more people arrived one after another, some by cart and some on horseback, all begging together to see Hu Qingniu.

Zhang Wuji was much perplexed. Butterfly Valley lies out of the way. Apart from the folk of the Ming Order,⁹ few in the jianghu¹⁰ so much as know of it. These people, some of Kongtong, some of Huashan, none of them of the Ming Order, how is it they all came to be wounded together, and all came seeking a cure together? And he thought too, This owner of the golden flower is so formidable a hand that to take these people’s lives would have been no hard matter. So why wound them all so grievously, and no more?

Of these fourteen men, some pleaded with fair words and some kept silent, but all dragged their heels and would not go, and as the day drew toward dark, the fourteen crowded the thatched hall full. The page-boy who did the cooking brought out Zhang Wuji’s meal. Zhang Wuji did not stand upon ceremony with them, but ate his fill on his own, then opened a medical book, lit an oil-lamp, and read, treating the fourteen men as though he saw them not at all. Since I have learned Mister Hu’s art of curing men, he thought, I had best learn his art of not curing them too.

Deep in the still of the night, in all the hut there was no sound but Zhang Wuji turning his pages and the coarse breathing of the wounded. Then, of a sudden, from the mountain path outside came the light footfalls of two people, walking slowly, coming toward the hut.

After a moment, a crisp girl’s voice said, “Ma, there is lamplight in the house. We are here.” By the sound of it the girl was very young. A woman’s voice said, “Are you tired, child?” The girl said, “I am not tired. Ma, when the doctor cures you, then you won’t hurt any more.” The woman said, “Mm, only I do not know whether the doctor will be willing to treat me.”

Zhang Wuji’s heart gave a start. That woman’s voice is so familiar! It seems to be Aunt Ji Xiaofu. He heard the girl say, “The doctor is sure to treat you. Ma, don’t be afraid. Does it hurt a little less now?” The woman said, “A little less, yes. Alas, my poor ill-fated child.”

At this Zhang Wuji doubted no longer. He sprang to the doorway and cried, “Aunt Ji, is it you? Are you wounded too?” In the moonlight stood a woman in a green gown leading a girl of some ten years, none other than the Emei¹¹ xia, Ji Xiaofu.¹²

When she had seen Zhang Wuji on Mount Wudang he had not been ten years old. Now, near five years apart, he had grown from a child into a youth, and meeting him thus abruptly in the dark, she could not know him at all. “You… you…” she said, at a loss. Zhang Wuji said, “Aunt Ji, you do not know me? I am Zhang Wuji. On Mount Wudang, the day my father and mother died, I saw you once.”

Ji Xiaofu let out a startled cry, for it was the last thing she had looked for, to meet him here. And remembering that she, an unwed woman, carried a daughter with her, and that Zhang Wuji was the shizhi¹³ of her betrothed, Yin Liting,¹⁴ young though he was, it was in the end a thing hard to account for, she was struck all at once with shame and confusion, and the colour flooded up crimson in her face. Her wound was no light one, and, so startled, she swayed on her feet and was near to falling.

Her little daughter, seeing her mother about to fall, caught hastily at her arm with both hands, but small and slight as she was, what use could that be? Seeing the two on the point of toppling together, Zhang Wuji rushed forward and steadied Ji Xiaofu by the shoulder. “Aunt Ji, come in and rest a while.” And he supported her into the thatched hall. There, by the lamplight, he saw that her left shoulder and left arm had both been fearfully cut by blade and jian, and that blood still seeped without cease through the cloth that bound them, and he heard too how she coughed softly and would not stop, past her own stilling.

Zhang Wuji’s medical skill by now already surpassed that of the ordinary run of so-called “famous physicians.” Hearing the wrongness in her cough, he knew the lobe of her lung had taken a heavy shock. “Aunt Ji,” he said, “your right hand met another’s palm, and the Taiyin lung meridian is hurt.”

He took out seven gold needles and, through her clothes, drove them into seven acupoints: the Yunmen at the shoulder, the Huagai at the breast, the Chize within the elbow, and the rest. His art of the needle now was as far from what it had been when he had treated Chang Yuchun¹⁵ as heaven is from earth. In these two years and more, following Hu Qingniu in devoted study, he was in the diagnosing of illness and the varying of drugs still bounded by his want of experience, and stood far from Hu Qingniu yet, but in acupuncture alone he had learned seven or eight parts in ten of this “Healing Sage’s” craft.

At first, seeing him take out the gold needles, Ji Xiaofu did not know his intent, but his hand was exceedingly quick, and in the turn of an eye the seven needles were set, each in its acupoint, all seven of them vital points of the Hand Taiyin lung meridian, and the moment the needles took, the choking misery in her breast eased greatly. In surprise and gladness together she said, “Good child, who would have thought to find you here, and skilled besides in so fine an art.”

That day on Mount Wudang, Ji Xiaofu had seen Zhang Cuishan¹⁶ and Yin Susu¹⁷ take their own lives, and, pitying Wuji’s forlorn and orphaned state, had gently sought to comfort him, and had even taken off the gold collar from about her neck, meaning to give it to him. But Zhang Wuji then, his heart wild with grief and rage, had counted every soul who came up the mountain among the enemies who had driven his parents to their deaths, and so had answered Ji Xiaofu with hard words that left her nowhere to turn. Later, when he was older, Zhang Wuji learned that his father and the several shibos and shishu had once meant to join hands with the xia of Emei to stand together against a strong foe, and knew then that the Emei Order was in truth a friend, and no enemy.

Footnotes

1. 张无忌 – Zhāng Wújì. His name meaning “Without Envy” or “No Misgivings.” Son of Zhang Cuishan and Yin Susu, and the protagonist of the tale. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

2. 华山派 – Huàshān Pài. Huashan School, a martial school based upon Mount Hua, one of China’s Five Sacred Mountains. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

3. 鲜于通 – Xiānyú Tōng. Zhangmen of the Huashan School, styled the Divine Strategist (神机子) for his cunning. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

4. 胡青牛 – Hú Qīngniú. His name meaning “Green Ox.” The Butterfly Valley Healer, a physician of the Ming Order, nicknamed “Sees Death, Offers No Aid” for refusing to treat any who are not of the order. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

5. 金花 – jīnhuā. “golden flower”: a plum blossom cast in gold and thrown as a hidden weapon, the mark of the mysterious enemy who wounded these fifteen fighters. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

6. 蝴蝶谷 – Húdié Gǔ. Lit. “Butterfly Valley.” The secluded valley home of Hu Qingniu, on the shore of Nüshan Lake in northern Anhui. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

7. 简捷 – Jiǎn Jié. Bald elder of the Kongtong School, styled the Sacred Hand Sangharama (圣手伽蓝); 伽蓝 (Sanskrit saṃghārāma) is a Buddhist temple, and 伽蓝神 its guardian spirit. Epithet casts him as a temple-guardian of divine skill. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

8. 崆峒派 – Kōngtóng Pài. Kongtong School, a martial school based in the Kongtong Mountains of the northwest. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

9. 明教 – Míngjiào. Also known as Manichaeism, a dualistic religion of Persian origin that became the backbone of several rebel movements in Chinese history. In the wuxia tradition, it serves as the organising force against the Mongol Yuan dynasty. ↩

10. 江湖 – jiānghú. Literally rivers and lakes. Itinerant world beyond settled society and official reach, holding not only martial artists but the trades that travel with them, including pedlars, physicians, fortune-tellers, entertainers, boatmen, beggars, outlaws and the like. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

11. 峨嵋派 – Éméi Pài. Emei Order, the Buddhist martial order founded by Guo Xiang on Mount Emei; 派 renders as “Order” for its religious character. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

12. 纪晓芙 – Jì Xiǎofú. Her name meaning “Dawn Hibiscus.” A disciple of the Emei Order, once betrothed to Yin Liting of Wudang. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

13. 师侄 – shīzhí. Lineage nephew or niece. Disciple of one’s shixiong, shijie, shidi, or shimei. Shī means teacher. Zhí means nephew or niece. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

14. 殷梨亭 – Yīn Lítíng. The sixth of the Seven Xias of Wudang, who fell in love with Ji Xiaofu. After her death, his consuming desire for revenge against Yang Xiao drove him to devise this suicidal sword technique. ↩

15. 常遇春 – Cháng Yùchūn. Fighter of the Ming Order who befriended Zhang Wuji; historically a founding general of the Ming dynasty. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

16. 张翠山 – Zhāng Cuìshān. His name meaning “Verdant Mountain.” Fifth disciple of Zhang Sanfeng and member of the Seven Xias of Wudang. His epithet is the Silver Hook Iron Brush. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩

17. 殷素素 – Yīn Sùsù. Her name meaning “Plain and Simple.” Daughter of Yin Tianzheng and mother of Zhang Wuji; she took her own life two years before. See Wuxia Wiki. ↩