Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History (41 page)

She hauled the bucket up as fast as she could and the rippling water glistened in the faint, reddish light of the fires like liquefied gold. Now she just had to find something to carry the water back in…

“What do we have here?”

Sparrow felt herself being jerked up by the back of the neck of her robe and lifted off the ground. She kicked and screamed and was thrown down, the wind knocked out of her.

Two men were standing before her, dressed in the armor and colors of the Manchu Army. But they were both clearly Chinese, and by the accent of the one who had caught her, from up north. She had heard that the Manchus had many surrendered Chinese fighting for them.

“Thought we had cleared this street already,” the man who had thrown Sparrow down said.

“Must have been hiding like a rat,” said the other. “Think it’s worth the time trying to get something out of him? Or should we just kill him and get back to camp?”

“This whole area is slim pickings. Just our luck to be assigned to a neighborhood with all the paupers.”

One of the men unsheathed his sword.

Sparrow now wished she had taken the jewels Green Siskin had offered. She would at least have something to bargain with these men. But it was too late now for regret. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut.

“Masters,” came a clear, warm voice that seemed to make the night less dark. “Do not frighten my servant.”

The men turned around. Some paces away was a woman in a flowing silk dress. Even with the faint light from the fires, it was clear that she was uncommonly beautiful.

Sparrow was stunned. What was Green Siskin doing? She would have been safe had she remained in the cellar.

“A merchant’s wife or daughter?” one of the men whispered to the other. Then he brandished his weapon and raised his voice. “Come over here and show us all the treasure you’ve hidden.”

Green Siskin walked closer, her movements languid and graceful. “What more treasure do you need when you have this?” She spun in a circle when she was about five paces away. “I would think your commander would reward you handsomely if you brought me to him.”

The two men looked at each other.

“She probably would be to Janggin Yelu’s taste.”

In the morning, the two soldiers marched Green Siskin and Sparrow through Yangzhou. By now they knew Sparrow was a girl, but they left her alone since Sparrow helped Green Siskin walk.

The streets were strewn with bodies. Blood mixing with puddles of water had created a shimmering sheen like a painter’s palette. The smell of blood and smoke and human waste filled the air, a nauseating mix. Green Siskin and Sparrow’s cloth shoes were soon soaked through with the bloody mixture. In some places the corpses were piled so thick that it was hard to find a path. They crossed a bridge over the canal and saw that the channel was almost filled with corpses, turning it into flat ground.

Sparrow felt numb. There was so much death around her that the bodies no longer felt real. She kept on expecting them to reveal themselves to be puppets or sit up and tell her they were just sleeping.

Green Siskin’s bound feet must have hurt terribly from walking this far, but she clenched her teeth and said nothing as she leaned on Sparrow. From time to time, when she really needed to stop to rest, she would engage the two soldiers in conversation to keep their interest.

“Do the Manchu officers treat surrendered Chinese soldiers like you well?”

One of the men shrugged. “No worse than my old Ming officers. At least they pay me on time, and now I get to make a little extra from the loot.”

“A soldier’s life is never easy. Have they caught Grand Secretary Shi Kefa?”

“Yes. He wouldn’t surrender though. Prince Dodo ordered him beheaded.”

Sparrow decided to not mention how Shi Kefa had been seen trying to escape from the doomed city. Sometimes heroes were made as much by what was not said as by what was said.

Small groups of soldiers were conducting house-to-house searches for survivors. When any were found, they were made to retrieve all the valuables from the residence and present them before the soldiers killed them. Howls and screams filled the air.

They passed two Manchu soldiers herding a column of female captives, strung together by the neck like a strand of pearls. Their bound feet made progress through the muddy streets difficult, and they stumbled, fell, pulled others down, and struggled to get up. Their clothes were so filthy that it was impossible to tell what color they were. The two Manchu soldiers urged them on, slapping them with the flat of a sword or poking at them with the tip of a spear.

“Looks like we aren’t the only ones who want to give our commanders a nice gift,” joked one of Green Siskin’s captors.

“None of them are as high quality as ours though,” said his companion, eyeing Green Siskin with pride. Green Siskin smiled back at him.

A woman holding a baby fell and could not get up. She kept on slipping in the mud. The Manchu soldier at the head of the column cursed, came back, and took the howling baby out of the woman’s arms and tossed it into the street. The mother cried and tried to crawl over to retrieve it, but the rope around her neck prevented her from getting too far.

A small detachment of Manchu soldiers on horses came thundering down the street. Green Siskin and Sparrow barely got out of the way in time. The iron-shod hoofs trampled over the bodies, temporarily animating the dead limbs. Abruptly, the baby’s cries were silenced.

The mother screamed and lurched forward, pulling the other captives along. The Manchu soldier shouted and struck her with his spear a few times, but the mother seemed to not feel the blows and continued to make her way towards the dead baby. The other Manchu soldier came over and stabbed her through the heart. They loosened the rope from around her neck, left her body a few paces from her baby’s tiny, lifeless corpse, and urged the other captives to keep on moving.

Sparrow’s eyes grew searing hot. She wanted to run up to the Manchu soldier and scratch his eyes out and sink her teeth into the man’s ear. She was no longer afraid. She understood how Grand Secretary Shi Kefa could suddenly find the courage to not surrender.
When you’ve been afraid for so long, fear stops mattering.
She wanted to do something, anything, to assuage the pure rage that filled her veins.

Green Siskin grabbed her hand and squeezed so hard that it hurt. She pulled Sparrow back and hissed in her ear, “There’s nothing you can do for her and her baby now. You must watch out for yourself.”

Sparrow hated Green Siskin then. Hated her with a passion that made it almost impossible to breathe. Green Siskin was a coward, a cold-blooded monster who only wanted to survive. What was the point of living if you had to endure images like that haunting you in your dreams through the rest of your life?

She bit down on Green Siskin’s hand until she let go, and rushed at the Manchu soldiers.

Green Siskin turned to her two captors. “Get my maid back to me. Tie her up if you have to.”

“Why?” one of the man asked. “If she wants to die, let her.”

“I need her help with my dressing and preparations,” said Green Siskin. “Your commander will surely prefer a good-looking gift to a poorly wrapped one, yes?”

The two men looked at each other and shrugged. One of them lumbered after Sparrow and easily brought her down. He gagged her, trussed her up, and carried her on his shoulder as they continued through the streets of Yangzhou. All around them was smoke, howling, and the stench of blood and death.

Finally, Green Siskin and Sparrow arrived at a mansion that had been turned into Janggin Yelu’s temporary headquarters. They were locked into one of the side halls with a dozen other young women, most of them merchants’ wives and daughters, who had been brought there as gifts for the commander.

Some of the women sat alone and stared sullenly at the ground; a few others hugged each other and wept; still others huddled and conversed. Green Siskin and Sparrow were in a corner by themselves. Snippets of the other women’s conversations reached them.

“He stripped me right there in front of all those men… I wished there was a well to jump into…”

“–he cut him open right in front of my eyes. Look at my clothes. That’s blood! Blood!”

“Why am I still alive? Three brothers, all their wives, mother, father, grandparents, six nephews and nieces – all gone…”

“Did you see a little boy about six with a jade tiger around his neck? Are you sure? I lost him around the canal crossing…”

Green Siskin untied Sparrow.

“Don’t expect me to thank you for saving my life.” Sparrow’s voice was cold as ice. She moved away, sat down, put her head between her knees, and began to sob. The image of that dead baby and its brains splattering in the mud would not leave her.

Green Siskin sighed and did not come after her.

In the afternoon a Manchu commander came to the side hall. Most of the women shrank against the wall and avoided looking at him. A few began to cry. The commander frowned.

But Green Siskin strode up to him and gave a low curtsy. “Honored Prince Yelu, I presume?”

“You’re a bold one,” said the officer, who couldn’t hide his smile.

Some tricks appear to work on all men
, thought Sparrow.
Just how low will she stoop to save her own skin?

“Tales of your valor and mercy have filled my ears like thunder.”

“Ha! Not even a hint of a blush when you lie. I have a guess as to what kind of woman you are. But I’m tired of weeping girls, and even if your arms have cradled the heads of hundreds of men, you might still be more fun. All right, come with me.” He turned to the soldiers behind him. “Distribute the rest of them to the soldiers, then get rid them after two days.”

The comment sounded so casual that it took a few moments before the other women registered what it really meant. The wailing in the room redoubled.

“Honorable Prince,” said Green Siskin. “Some of these girls are quite pretty. It would be such a waste to not taste them. Why not save them for a while and see if I can persuade them to be a bit more pliable?”

“Never!” one of the women shouted angrily. “You unchaste, shameful
thing
.”

Sparrow saw that, although Green Siskin’s voice was as sultry as before, the hem of her dress trembled. She held her hands together before her in a gesture of supplication, and she was twisting and playing with the jade ring on her right hand. Green Siskin was terrified.

“My orders are to cleanse the city,” said Yelu. He hesitated. “I might get away with keeping you, but all these…”

Green Siskin’s face registered shock. “Ah, forgive me. I did not realize that you had not the authority to delay the execution of these foolish girls. It’s just that you seemed to me such a powerful prince.”

“Never mind,” said Yelu as he puffed out his chest. “Of course I can do whatever I want on the battlefield. I’ve decreed that these women are not to be killed, for now.”

“Perhaps you and I can be better acquainted,” said Green Siskin. “But first, let my maid help me wash up?”

Green Siskin beckoned at Sparrow. They locked gazes.

She could have hidden in that cellar and never made a peep. She could have held her tongue just now and let the women die.

After all this time, Green Siskin still carried the swallow in a basket on her arm.

Sparrow walked up to Green Siskin and curtsied.

Sparrow observed the guards outside the bedroom. They stood ramrod straight and kept their faces impassive, focusing their eyes on the ends of their noses. They seemed to not hear the sounds coming from within the bedroom at all.

A soldier rushed into the hallway from outside, and, before the guards at the door could warn him, he shouted at the closed door, “Janggin! We’ve caught a few rich ones!”

The bedroom fell silent. Then, a few giggles could be heard through the door. The new soldier, realizing his mistake, blushed.

A few moments later, Yelu and Green Siskin emerged from the bedroom. Green Siskin’s robe had been hastily tied back together and the sash was not straight. She hung onto Yelu’s arm, a lazy smile on her face, flushed and sweaty, as Yelu straightened his robe and cleared his throat a few times.

“Let’s go see what you’ve found.” He shook off Green Siskin’s hands and walked out, and the guards followed.

As Sparrow came up to Green Siskin, the smile on her face fell off like a mask. Green Siskin looked weary and scared, and Sparrow suddenly realized how young she really was.

“You’ll have to help me figure out which among those
chaste
women are at least somewhat pliable,” Green Siskin said. “We’ve got to give Yelu something if the rest of them want to live. And the swallow?”

“I got the guards to give me some jerky to feed it. It’s resting in our bedroom.”

Green Siskin’s face relaxed a little. “Let’s go see who our brave commander caught this time.”

The front hall was filled with tables laden with jewels, coins, silver, gold, silk dresses, and furs. A row of captives, by their looks scholars and merchants, knelt on the ground, watched over by pacing guards. They looked exhausted and dejected, some possibly injured.

“Janggin, these are among the wealthiest men of the city,” said the Manchu soldier who had come for Yelu.

Green Siskin squealed in delight and pawed through the piles of silk dresses and the jewelry, trying out various bracelets and pearl necklaces. “Can I have this one? Oh, no, this one is even prettier!”

Yelu observed her indulgently.

“Do you think there’s any more treasure to be found?” he asked the soldier.

“I think we’ve squeezed everything we can out of them.”

One of the merchants looked contemptuously at Green Siskin and spat at her. “It is because of traitorous whores like you, devoid of virtue, that the Great Ming ended up like this. Look at you, clinging to the enemy like a vine. I would kill you myself if I had the chance.”

Sparrow felt her face grow hot. She recognized the merchant. It was Wen, one of the five men who had hired Green Siskin to entertain Captain Li so that the soldiers wouldn’t trash his house. That seemed like a lifetime ago.