Movement IX · The Ming

Sworn Brother to Xu Da and Chang Yuchun

At the turn of the Ming and the Qing, he was sworn brother to Xu Da and Chang Yuchun.

(On this journey, counting from his rebirth in the Western Zhou, he had now wandered some two thousand three hundred and eighty years; only a few decades separated him from the era before — the Yuan, the Mongols. At the end of the Yuan the whole realm fell into chaos, and Zhu Yuanzhang drove out the Yuan and founded the Ming; and so it was that he took the oath of brotherhood in the beacon fires of a founding.)

Xu Da was the first among the founding servants of the Ming: he took Dadu (Beijing), he was skilled in the ordering of armies, and Zhu Yuanzhang praised him as "the Great Wall of ten thousand li." At Poyang Lake Zhu Yuanzhang broke Chen Youliang in a great victory, and in the northern campaign drove out the Yuan, laying a foundation of three hundred years; yet few of the founders of a dynasty came to a good end — Chang Yuchun died suddenly, Lan Yu was executed, Hu Weiyong and his whole clan were wiped out, and Xu Da, though he died in his bed, lived in fear of slander and in dread of the bite of ridicule. Chenyu swore brotherhood with the two of them, and on the field turned aside countless arrows meant for them. Those he grew close to in the camp were Cheng Yuan and Fang Rui, two personal guards, who thought this sworn elder brother a man of few words and steady worth, a good friend to whom one could safely turn one's back.

Cheng Yuan was a dour man, but his archery was true, and he often stood watch outside the camp for Chenyu; Fang Rui loved a jest, and whenever the fighting stopped he would drag Chenyu out to trade blows with him, saying, "Sworn brother, with hands like yours you shouldn't be cooped up in a tent." Chenyu fell in with the two of them, and the days came, unexpectedly, to have a little of the ordinary about them. Once Fang Rui asked, "General Chang's sister — you and she…?" and Chenyu cut him off: "Nonsense. It's the affection of brother and sister." Fang Rui laughed. "The way I see her look at you, it's warmer than the way she looks at her own brother." Chenyu did not answer; he only drained the cup he had just filled to the brim. He knew Fang Rui was right. But that warmth had never belonged to "him." It belonged only to the shadow of her that surfaced in the girl now and then.

This time he had also at his side Zhao Hao, who had followed him since the Han, and Chen Xiu, who had stood shoulder to shoulder with him since the Sixteen Kingdoms. Zhao Hao became "the lancer" among the sworn brothers, while Chen Xiu stayed close about Chang Yan as a woman guard with a pair of blades. On the field the two of them turned aside countless arrows meant for Xu Da and Chang Yuchun; Zhao Hao would clap Chenyu on the shoulder and say, "Brother — the lance we carried in the camps of the Han, put now to the wars of a founding. That's living."

It was the scent that led him into this brotherhood. A smell clear and cold as a winter river drifted out of Chang Yuchun's tent and drew him step by step nearer — and then he saw the woman in the tent holding a blade, her eyes grey-blue as a frozen river, wiping down her brother's armour. She raised her eyes and met his full on. She whom Chenyu had come upon was Chang Yuchun's younger sister — Chang Yan. Those eyes, grey-blue as a winter river: he thought almost at once, this era, at last it is her.

That night he stood outside Chang Yuchun's tent and did not leave for a long while. The thread of winter-river scent within, mixed with the iron cold of the armour and the warmth of the candle flame, was more intoxicating to him than blood on a battlefield. Chang Yan pushed the flap aside and came out to add charcoal, and seeing him standing there, laughed: "Brother, there you go again, like a clay door-god." He composed his face and said only, "Keeping watch for your brother. It's what I should do." She did not look at him, only set the charcoal into the brazier with the tongs; the firelight lit those grey-blue eyes, like two frozen lakes. A ridiculous hope rose in him: this time, perhaps there would be no farewell to see to. Yet he knew better than anyone that a likeness of scent had never once meant the soul was the same one — he had been searching more than two thousand years, and had met many who were "like," and not one of them had truly been her. The warmth of this one glance was, in the end, only a post station on the road; he did not dare think further, and only quietly set that thread of scent down into his bones.

Poyang Lake · Fire Ships and Tower Ships

In the battle of Poyang Lake, Zhu Yuanzhang broke Chen Youliang's great warships with fire ships. That night an east wind rose abruptly, the fire ships drove into Chen's river camp, and in an instant the surface of the lake was a sea of flame. Chenyu and Zhao Hao took a small craft alongside one of the tower ships and climbed up by the anchor chain; on the deck a fierce captain of Chen's army swung a great blade down at them, and Zhao Hao set his lance shaft across to catch it, the lance point sliding along the blade's own momentum into the captain's throat — one pass, and it was finished. Chenyu went through into the hold and came upon Chen Youliang's personal guard; his sword flashed again and again, and seven men went down without a sound — and in the confusion he bent and drew their bloom, enough to hold him three days. Chen Xiu, on one of their own tower ships, guarded Chang Yan's carriage; a stray arrow flew at Chang Yan, and she crossed her two blades and knocked it aside, then turned back and straightened the carriage curtain, her expression unchanged.

In that battle Chen Youliang was struck by a stray arrow and died, his six hundred thousand sailors scattered, and from that hour more than half the foundation of the Great Ming was settled.

The battle of Poyang Lake had not finished the work; Chen Youliang's younger brother Chen Youren gathered the wreckage of the fleet and fought again. Chenyu and Zhao Hao boarded another tower ship; in the hold a naval captain of Chen's came at them with a pair of battle-axes, and Zhao Hao caught both axes on his lance shaft, the point sliding under the captain's ribs — one pass, and it was finished. Chenyu went through into the hold, met the personal guard, his sword flashed again and again, several men went down without a sound, and in the confusion he drew their bloom. Chen Xiu, aboard their own ship, cut down with her twin blades a stray arrow flying at Chang Yan's carriage, and with a single blade struck down a soldier of Chen who came scrambling over the gunwale. In this fight the last of the ships were burned to nothing, and the fire on Poyang Lake burned all night.

The army lay at anchor in a branch of the lake, and Chenyu slipped out under cover of night to draw bloom among the corpses Chen's men had left behind, and so fill his store — the rule of this road, and no one knew of it. When he came back to the ship, Zhao Hao was waiting at the bow and handed him a flask of water. "Brother. Those seven today — did they draw well?" He took it, rinsed the rankness out of his mouth, and said only, "Enough for three days." Chen Xiu leaned against the mast and, for once, had nothing to add; she only gazed out at the embers still burning in the distance, lost in thought. Chang Yan was in the cabin binding Chang Yuchun's wounds; hearing that Chenyu had won more distinction, she put her head out and handed him a piece of hard-baked bannock. "Brother — you never remember to eat after a fight." He took it. The bannock was cold, and yet warmer than any full meal. That night the wind off the lake was strong; he stood at the stern and watched the firelight shatter into a thousand points on the water, and thought suddenly that if this war could go on being fought, it would not be so bad — at least everyone at his side was still here.

In that battle, among Chen Youliang's personal guard there was a fierce captain who fought with paired whips and forced his way into the cabin where Chenyu stood. Chenyu's sword did not leave its sheath; he turned the whips aside with the sheath itself, spun into the captain's blind side, and sent the blade in under the ribs — one pass, and it was finished; in the confusion he bent and drew bloom, enough for a day. Zhao Hao, at the cabin door, flipped a guardsman over with his lance, and turning to see that Chenyu had already sheathed his sword, said only, "Brother, that sword of yours is too fast for a man." Chenyu said flatly, "Fast is how you stay alive." What he did not say was this: with a body that does not die, speed is not a skill — it is fear. Fear that one step too slow, and he would have to see off another person he was meant to guard.

The famous scene was the day Dadu fell. Chang Yuchun was first up the wall; Chenyu, in the mêlée, held the ring around Chang Yan's carriage; Zhao Hao swept the pursuing soldiers aside with his lance, and Chen Xiu cut down with her twin blades a stray arrow flying at the carriage curtain, then struck down an enemy soldier who came at them; in the bloodletting of the breached city he took one draw at an enemy's throat — enough for a day — and draining a man entirely would have carried him three, and no one noticed. Emperor Shun of the Yuan fled north in the middle of the night, and the hundred-year barbarian Yuan was overturned, and the caps and gowns of the Han returned to Yanjing. Chang Yan pushed the curtain aside in the carriage and looked at him and smiled in a way that was very like Wan: "Brother. You saved me again." He answered: "Saving you is what I'm for."

Dadu taken, Chang Yan went with Chang Yuchun into Yanjing. It was the first time she had seen a city so great; she stood beneath the gate and looked up for a long while, then turned and said to Chenyu with a laugh, "Brother, look at this city. Doesn't it look like something that fell out of the sky?" He looked at her laughing; those grey-blue eyes held the light of the setting sun, and for an instant they overlapped a shadow somewhere in the deepest part of his memory — but he woke to himself at once: what overlapped was only the light, not the person. At night, in the posting house, she laid out bedding for Chang Yuchun, and, as easily, laid out bedding for Chenyu too, saying, "You always sleep outside the tent. The wind and the cold get into the bone." He stood at the door and watched her busy back, and thought suddenly: the "her" he sought on this road had never been the woman before him, and yet this woman's habit of treating his warmth and cold as her own business held his eye more than any reunion could. In the end he did not go in. He stood outside all night — keeping watch for her brother, and keeping watch over that warmth as well.

The day of the first snow in Yanjing, Chang Yan dragged him up onto the city wall to see the view. She pointed at the flying eaves of the palaces and said, "Brother, those tiles — when it snows, don't they look like a layer of salt spread over them?" He looked where she pointed, but saw only the line of her face in profile, white almost to transparency in the snow-light. Those grey-blue eyes, holding the broken snow, overlapped the shadow of some snowy night in the depths of memory so exactly that his chest tightened. She turned and caught him staring, and laughed: "Brother, there you go again." He composed himself and said only, "Watching snow is like watching a rain you don't have to run from." She pulled the fox fur at her collar up a little, and, as easily, drew it closer about him too — the corpse-cold that clung to him year in and year out, and she had remembered it. He stood motionless in the wind, snow settling over his shoulders, and forgot to brush it off.

Now and then Chang Yan would hum a little tune in camp; the air was wild, the words never complete, as though she had stolen it from the foot of somebody's wall. Once, making his rounds outside the tent, Chenyu heard her losing the tune as she hummed and laughing at herself first, and Chen Xiu laughing with her. He stood outside the curtain and did not go in — that ordinary, mortal happiness was a warmth his undying body could never reach, separated from it by a single layer of skin. And yet he craved the sound of that laugh as he craved a thread of scent about to disperse, and stood there outside the curtain a long while, until the snow covered his shoulders, before he quietly withdrew.

That night, as she was going to sleep, Chang Yan asked him suddenly, "Brother. Before — did you keep watch over someone else like this?" His hand stopped. He said only, "I did." She asked again, "Was that person important?" He looked at the darkness of the tent roof, and it was a long moment before he answered: "Important." She asked nothing more, only tucked the corner of the quilt in about him — this undying body of his had no need of a quilt, and yet that tuck of hers settled him more than any battle. He closed his eyes and pretended to sleep, and lay open-eyed in the dark, listening to her breathing grow even. The "her" he sought on this road had never been the woman before him; and yet this woman, who would tuck the corner of a quilt about him, made him for the first time unwilling to give up the thought of "staying."

The Taking of Dadu, Part Two · The Bloody Siege of Pingjiang

In the siege of Pingjiang, Xu Da ringed Zhang Shicheng with a long line of entrenchments. Chenyu went up the wall with Chang Yuchun; scaling ladders went up against the ramparts, and the defenders hurled down boiling broth and rolling stones. Chenyu sprang onto the wall top, and where his sword flashed, three defenders went down without a sound; Zhao Hao speared over a fierce captain of Zhang's who came at him with a swinging blade, the lance point touching his throat; Chen Xiu guarded the flank of Chang Yan's carriage with her twin blades, and though the arrows from below the wall came like rain, her blades flashed again and again and beat them all aside. Chang Yuchun was first into the city; Chenyu, in the mêlée, held the ring around Chang Yan's carriage, and in the bloodletting of the breached city took one draw at an enemy's throat, draining a man entirely worth three days to him. Pingjiang fell, Zhang Shicheng was taken alive, and the southeast was settled. Chang Yan looked at him from the carriage, her eyes full of something she could not name: "Brother. In all these battles it's as if you were never afraid at all." He smiled. "I was afraid. It's only that you go up anyway." The wind on the wall top was fierce, and he thought suddenly: of all the wars he had fought over thousands of years, the hardest, in the end, was the one called "watching the people you are meant to guard go away one by one."

In that battle Chang Yan too took up a blade and stood at the flank of the carriage, and turned aside a stray arrow for Chen Xiu — she had no skill at arms, and yet she insisted on following Chen Xiu's example, and held the grain carts behind her safe. Chen Xiu turned and saw it, and her eyes went hot; all she said was, "Sister-in-law, that stroke of yours was fiercer than mine." Chang Yan laughed until the tears came: "I'm guarding my brother's people. I have to look like something."

After Pingjiang, Chang Yan insisted on mending his armour. She had no skill at arms, and yet she would follow Chen Xiu's example, and by the light before the tent she pieced together one by one the plates a lance point had split. Chenyu sat opposite her, and seeing the fine lines of blood the raw edges of the plates had raised on her fingers, reached out to take her hand: "Don't sew. I don't feel a scratch like this." She drew it back and laughed. "Brother, with a frame like yours, blade and lance can't get in — but when the armour's torn, I'm not easy in my heart." He was stopped short — in a thousand years no one had troubled their heart over this body that would not die. She bent her head and went on sewing, the stitches crooked and uneven, and every one of them earnest. He looked at those grey-blue eyes, half lit and half dark in the candle flame, and almost believed again: this era, at last it is her. But he woke to himself at once — she did not remember; she was only a mortal woman, treating the warmth and cold of a sworn brother as her own business.

Pingjiang fallen, Chenyu stood alone on the wall top and watched Zhang Shicheng's banner go down. He had taken too many cities on this road; every time one fell, countless mortal lives folded into the dust along with the flagpole. He thought of what Chang Yan had said — "in all these battles it's as if you were never afraid at all." She did not know that what he feared had never been blade or arrow; it was the battle called "watching the people you are meant to guard go away one by one." That battle he had fought for thousands of years and never won. Below the wall the cooking smoke rose again, and he thought suddenly that this body which did not die was nothing more than "losing" stretched out into a war without end.

The Northern Campaign · The Bloody Battle of Taiyuan

The Great Ming established, Xu Da campaigned north and laid siege to Taiyuan. The Yuan general Köke Temür held the city to the death, and by night sent a valiant captain with a band of sworn-to-die men to raid the camp. Chenyu sensed it first, and stood with Zhao Hao and Chen Xiu outside Xu Da's tent. The raiders came flooding in, and his sword was a ribbon of light, a man sinking at every pass; Zhao Hao swept two shield-bearing raiders off their feet with his lance, the point touching their throats; Chen Xiu crossed her twin blades and cut down in midair a raider who had leapt onto the tent roof. The raid beaten off, Xu Da attacked in force the next day; Chenyu went up with Chang Yuchun, scaling ladders against the wall, and when he sprang onto the wall top his sword flashed and three defenders went down without a sound; Zhao Hao speared over a fierce captain of the Yuan; Chen Xiu, guarding the flank of Chang Yan's carriage, brought down every stray arrow. Taiyuan fell, and Shanxi was settled — on this road, the founders he had guarded were growing old one by one, and only Chang Yan's carriage was still waiting in the war for him to turn his head.

The night Taiyuan was breached, the remaining enemy fell back into the lanes to fight to the death. A Yuan archer lay along a rooftop and sent arrow after arrow at Chang Yan's carriage; Chen Xiu swept her twin blades and beat three of them aside, but a fourth grazed her shoulder and opened a bleeding gash. Seeing it, Zhao Hao planted his lance shaft on the ground and vaulted onto the roof, and ran the archer through the chest, toppling him off the tiles. Chenyu came up at a run, took one draw at the man's neck and finished him, blood and all, then turned and pressed a hand to Chen Xiu's wound. "Guard the carriage. And guard yourself." Chen Xiu set her teeth and laughed. "Don't worry, Brother. A scratch like this won't kill me."

The night Taiyuan was breached, Chenyu stood among the broken walls and watched Zhao Hao and Chen Xiu escort Chang Yan's carriage away, while he himself stayed behind in the lane to draw bloom from the last enemy corpse. With the red bloom going down his throat he thought suddenly of a night many years before — the same kind of lane, the same kind of fire, only the people at his side had by then changed over several times. He wiped the corner of his mouth and looked toward where Chang Yan's carriage had gone; that winter-river thread of scent was still in the wind, faint, as though afraid of startling him. A thought came to him, near to greed: this time, could there be no farewell? But he knew the answer better than anyone. He sprang onto the rooftops and went racing off in the direction of the carriage — guarding her was the one thing, in the Ming and the Qing, that he dared be certain of.

The Northern Campaign · Pursuit into the Northern Desert

In the early years of the Hongwu reign, Lan Yu led the army north and broke the Northern Yuan at the battle of Buyur Lake. Chenyu went with the army; Zhao Hao's lance and Chen Xiu's twin blades were both in the ranks. On the open wilds of the northern desert the Northern Yuan horsemen came like wind driving sand; Lan Yu couched his blade and charged the line, and Chenyu guarded his flank, his sword seeking the gap, every stroke sending another rider out of the saddle; Zhao Hao broke horses' legs with his lance, Chen Xiu shore the weapons out of the riders' hands with her twin blades. One fierce captain of the Northern Yuan swung a wolf-tooth club straight at Lan Yu; Chenyu let the club's edge pass, spun into the blind side, and sent his blade in under the ribs — one pass, and it was finished — and in the confusion drew bloom. In this battle the main strength of the Northern Yuan scattered, and for a time the Ming's northern trouble was quieted. Coming back to camp, Chenyu watched Lan Yu's back, high with spirit, and thought of how this fierce captain would end — few founders of a dynasty came to a good end; he could guard a man for an hour, but not against the stroke the histories had already written.

The northern campaign done, the three sworn brothers sat round the fire talking at night. Zhao Hao clapped Chenyu on the shoulder. "Brother — the lance we carried in the camps of the Han, put now to the wars of a founding. That's fine." Chen Xiu gave him a look. "You do talk a lot." Chang Yan edged over too, listening to them tell of battles past, her eyes bright, as though she were listening to a storyteller. Chenyu looked at the fire, and thought suddenly that these three were the rare ones, in all the dynasties he had walked through, who would sit in a ring around him. Zhao Hao asked suddenly, "Brother, where did you learn all you can do?" He paused, and said only, "I come from a very far place, and I'm going to a farther one" — the same riddle he would not explain. But Chang Yan took it up: "I think Brother walks in someone's place." His hand shook, and he nearly lost his hold on the wine skin. She had only said it carelessly, and yet it struck exactly the thorn he had kept hidden for two thousand years and more.

Zhao Hao's loyalty to Chenyu was not in words; it was in standing at his side in every mêlée. Once, in the raid on the camp at Taiyuan, a cold arrow came out of the dark at Chenyu's back; Zhao Hao's eye was quick, he set his lance shaft across and beat the arrow aside, and took another stray arrow himself across the forehead, the blood coming down over half his face. Chenyu turned and saw him grinning. "Brother. A bit of colour like that is worth it." He was stopped short — this sworn brother of his had followed him for several hundred years, from the lance in the camps of the Han to the wars of a founding, and every time had written the word "guard" onto his own body. He understood suddenly: that mouthful of blood which had turned Zhao Hao was not a shackle; it was the only hand held out to him in this long undying night.

In the fighting in the northern desert, Chenyu watched Lan Yu's back, high with spirit, and his heart sank. He knew how this fierce captain would end — his merit too great for the throne, and in the end Zhu Yuanzhang would have him put to death on a charge of "treason," flayed and stuffed with straw. He could guard Lan Yu for an hour, but not against the stroke the histories had already written; just as he could guard Chang Yan for an hour, but not against a mortal's span of years. The further he went on this road the clearer it became: this undying body of his could cut down a thousand armies, and could not cut the single thread that runs between any one person and their appointed end. He ran a hand along the sword hilt, and thought suddenly that so-called immortality was nothing more than watching the thing called "not being able to keep" over and over, for thousands of years.

The Temple of Tang He and the Faith of the People

There was one other thing he heard tell of in this era — Tang He.

Tang He, a founding servant of the Ming like Xu Da, made his name instead by building walls against the Japanese pirates. The southeastern coast suffered endlessly from the raids; Tang He patrolled the frontier, raised walls, moved the people into strongholds, and set up a screen. Later generations, grateful, raised temples to Tang He about Wenzhou in Zhejiang, and processed and sacrificed there year after year, temple and regalia both kept whole, until the faith became a national-level intangible cultural heritage. When Chenyu was stationed in Zhejiang with the army he had once watched that temple from a distance, its incense never dying out. He understood nothing of sacrifice, but he understood one thing: the people remember a man not by the historian's brush but by the feet of generation after generation coming to pay their vows. What Tang He guarded was living people; what he guarded was one person — different roads, and both of them came to rest on the word "guard."

While he was stationed in Zhejiang, Chenyu went with Tang He to patrol a stretch of the sea defences. One night the pirate ships came raiding; he stood on the wall of the fort, and his sword flashed again and again until every pirate who had come creeping up was finished, the blood going to him, and the guards took it only for the general's valour. Tang He clapped him on the shoulder and sighed: "With you here, the people on this coast sleep soundly at night." He smiled and did not answer — what he guarded was living people, and it was also, in this disordered age, to hold one more corner of peace for that thread of scent. That night, seeing from far off the incense at the temple of Tang He, he understood suddenly: this undying body of his could guard one person for an hour, and could not guard the people for a thousand years; but the walls Tang He built and the temple he raised could keep the word "guard" standing for him a great deal longer.

Chang Yan and Chen Xiu

Chang Yan and Chen Xiu, two women with blades, took to each other. Chen Xiu would often sit with Chang Yan in the tent wiping down their blades, and Chang Yan laughed and said, "Those two blades of yours are sharper than mine." Chen Xiu said, "I guard a life, and so do you — you guard your brother, and I guard mine." The two looked at each other and laughed; both knew how heavy the word "guard" was. Now and then Chang Yan would gaze at Chenyu abstractedly, as though she had seen him somewhere very far away; Chen Xiu saw it and quietly pressed that moment of absence back down — she knew the one this Brother Chen had searched for so long was never the woman before them, and yet the woman before them deserved to be guarded well. On this point she and Chenyu had, for once, a rare understanding.

Now and then Chang Yan would wave a blade about in imitation of Chen Xiu, and Chen Xiu would soberly teach her a few forms, and the two of them would collapse in laughter. Chenyu sat to one side wiping his sword, and looking at these two women he thought suddenly that although the "her" he sought on this road was never the woman before him, this taking-to of the woman before him added a little warmth to a disordered age.

Little by little Chang Yan came to treat Chen Xiu as an elder sister. Once, when her monthly pains doubled her over, Chen Xiu boiled ginger broth without a word and brought it to her, saying, "A woman's business. Don't bear it down." Chang Yan held the bowl, and the rims of her eyes went red, and all she said was, "My mother died early; I'd forgotten what it was to have someone care." Chen Xiu sat down beside her and, for once, softened her voice: "You have me now." Chenyu heard it from outside the tent and did not go in — he knew the bond between these two women was a warmth that an outsider like him could not step into. Later Chen Xiu said to him privately, "Brother Chen, Chang Yan is very like the one you've been searching for so long"; he shook his head. "Like. And not her." Chen Xiu asked nothing further, and only folded those words, together with her tenderness for Chang Yan, away into her heart. She knew better than anyone: the one this Brother Chen sought was never the woman before them, and yet the woman before them deserved to be guarded well.

Once the two of them were drilling before the tent; Chang Yan used a wooden blade, and Chen Xiu had drawn the edges of hers in, only touching, never cutting. Chang Yan got halfway through a form called "Guarding the Brother" and began laughing at herself, the wooden blade flying out of her hand and nearly braining Fang Rui, who was passing by; Chen Xiu's eye was quick, and she flicked it aside with one blade, laughing and scolding: "Sister-in-law, with blade-work like that you won't guard your brother, you'll wound your friends." Chang Yan picked the blade up with a red face, and then asked in earnest, "Chen Xiu — if one day I'm not here, will you guard my brother for me?" Chen Xiu stopped, and nodded gravely. Chenyu, hearing it where he stood, turned his face away — he knew that this, in the end, was a charge he himself would have to take up with his own hands.

The Death of Chang Yan

The night Chang Yuchun was struck down by sudden illness, Chenyu kept watch outside the tent and did not dare go in. He heard Chang Yan weeping within, each cry scraping at his ear like a blade. He wanted to go in, and stopped at the curtain — with a body that does not die, even comfort would have looked like an affront. Chang Yuchun was a man whose fate the histories had already written; he would die of illness at forty, and Chenyu could not guard him, and must not; if he forced his blood to hold life in him, he would be altering the great currents of history, and immortality would be forfeit. He stood in the snow and listened to the weeping grow faint, until from within the tent came the sound of Chang Yan fainting. He crouched down and buried his face in his palms — he had seen off too many people on this road, but this time he was watching with his own eyes as her brother was taken away by the histories before him. For the first time he felt that the four words "do not alter history" were heavy enough to break the shoulders of a body that does not die.

But gradually he came to see that though Chang Yan was like her, the memory in her was broken — she remembered no former life, and took him only for a sworn brother. When she mended his armour she would now and then go still and say, "Brother, you're like someone waiting for somebody. But not for me." And the next moment laugh at herself for imagining it. He confirmed it once again: another "like," and still not "whole."

Chang Yuchun gone, Chang Yan was like a body with the sinew drawn out of it. She was slight to begin with, and in her grieving she withered day by day. Chenyu kept watch at her bedside and watched those grey-blue eyes slowly lose the light of lake water, until only a grey haze was left. In her lucid moments she would still try to mend his armour, but the needle would not go through the holes, and she would gaze at him blankly and say, "Brother, your eyes are looking at somewhere very far away — and not at me." Every time he said, "You imagine too much"; every time he dared not tell her. She laughed at herself for imagining it, and the next moment was asleep again. He sat by the bed holding her hand as it cooled, and for the first time hated this undying body: he could live, and he could not guard a mortal's span of years. He wanted to turn her, to keep her as he had before — but he thought of Zhao Hao, and of that shackle. Undying was not a gift; it was choosing, in her place, a road she had no right to choose. In the end he did not act. He only laid her hand gently back beneath the quilt.

The morning Chang Yan went, the snow had stopped. Chenyu took from her pillow the Chang family jade pendant, and the half-finished piece of armour she had been mending for him — the stitches crooked and uneven, and every one of them earnest. He buried her with his own hands, and as the earth went down over her, that thread of winter-river scent dispersed at last into the wind of the Ming. He stood before the grave and did not weep — one who does not die is slower than a mortal by half a beat, and tears are no exception. But he knew that what he had seen off this time was not merely another who was "like," but the only one, in all the eight movements of this journey, who had stirred in him the thought of "staying." The red thread lay ahead; he turned, and put that reluctance, together with the coolness of the jade pendant, away into his breast.

The ending of the Ming was merciless. Chang Yuchun died early of a sudden illness (as the histories record); Chang Yan grieved after her brother and died not long after. Chenyu kept the two graves, and saw off once more a life of "the one like the beloved." In this era he turned no one — Zhao Hao and Chen Xiu had long been at his shoulder, and he did not dare make another of his own kind whom he might one day have to kill with his own hand to set things right.

Departure

Between the Ming and the Qing the beacon fires rose again. He escorted the surviving house of Xu Da to the south, drawing red bloom from the enemy in the confusion as always; Zhao Hao and Chen Xiu went with him. The Great Ming toppled, and he carried a Chang family jade pendant that Chang Yan had left behind, and followed the red thread onward.

Between the Ming and the Qing the smoke of war rose once more. Chenyu escorted the surviving house of Xu Da to the south, drawing red bloom from the enemy along the way as always, and no one noticed. Zhao Hao and Chen Xiu went with him; the two of them were still as they had been the year the oath was sworn. The night they crossed the river the wind off the water was a blade, and that Chang family jade pendant lay against his chest, cool as her hand the last time she had held his. He looked back north: the fires of Yanjing, the walls of Pingjiang, the battle of Poyang Lake, all become behind him a thread of dust that would not disperse. He had seen off too many "ones like the beloved" on this road; Chang Yan was the most recent of them, and the one who emptied him most — because this time he had truly, for once, felt the thought of "keeping" stir, and had pressed it down with his own hand.

On the road south, Zhao Hao and Chen Xiu rode to left and right, guarding the carts of the surviving house of Xu Da. Zhao Hao said quietly to Chenyu, "Brother. This road — the two of us, from the camps of the Han to the wars of a founding. It was worth it." Chen Xiu, on the other side, put in: "And me." Chenyu looked at these two, sworn brother and sister, and thought suddenly: Chang Yan was gone, but these two were still here — they were the only ones of his own kind he had kept across more than two thousand years, and the only companions who would walk with him to the end. He thought of that mouthful of blood he had given Zhao Hao all those years ago; what it had planted was not only a brother but a thread, and now to that thread Chen Xiu had been added. The red thread lay ahead, and the three rode abreast toward the darkest stage, and the one most likely to be the last — with these two at his side, this road, at least, would no longer be walked alone.

The red thread lay ahead. He counted: the Western Zhou, the Warring States, the Han, the Three Kingdoms, the Sixteen Kingdoms, the Sui and the Tang, the Song, the Yuan, the Ming — nine movements. He had a dim sense that the next stage would be the darkest, and might well be the last.

He touched the Chang family jade pendant in his breast, and thought suddenly that what eight movements had taught him was not killing, but "letting go" — letting go of one person after another who was like her, and swallowing that warmth, together with the unwillingness, down into the long undying night. The next stage was the Qing; he had heard that there the wharves stood thick and the markets were loud, and that another thread of scent he had not yet smelled was waiting. The red thread pulled him on, and he set his feet toward the darkest stage, and the one most likely to be the last.

*(End of this movement. Continues in Movement X · The Qing)*