Amid the sudden uproar, four yamen runners in total had come bursting into the inn — one carrying a water-and-fire staff, one with a blade, one dragging iron chains. Seeing Lu Wenke and the others rise to their feet, they pointed straight at the group, shouting loudly as they advanced, their manner thick with menace.
“Nobody move! Anyone who moves will be treated as an accomplice to the criminal!”
“I am Lu Wenke of the Lu family of Hongzhou. What crime has this man committed?” Though the runners’ tone was harsh, Lu Wenke and the others still stepped forward to meet them. Fan Heng, Chen Junsheng and the rest also announced their own names — as members of the scholarly class, they weren’t, in principle, afraid of these runners; under ordinary circumstances, anyone would have shown them some measure of respect.
“He’s a wanted man! Step aside—”
In the brief moment of contact between the two sides, the lead runner shoved Lu Wenke back, while another runner shouted from behind: “You want to get arrested too!?”
Fan Heng slapped his palm down on the table. “Is there no law left in this land?”
Chen Junsheng said, “You owe us a reason, at the very least.”
Amid the chaos, Wang Jiang lay collapsed on the ground, covered in blood, and Ning Ji quickly checked over his injuries. Wang Jiang was a traveling performer of the rivers and lakes, having practiced a crude form of hard qigong for decades, without much real skill at actual fighting — though his ability to withstand blows far exceeded that of an ordinary person. Precisely because of this, the beating he’d taken covered dozens, even close to a hundred places on his body. Most of it was superficial flesh wounds, but the injuries to his head and the possible damage to his bones and tendons underneath could well prove serious — though it was hard to assess clearly in the moment.
Injuries this extensive wouldn’t have come from an ordinary brawl.
A quick check was enough for Ning Ji to reach his conclusion. Though Wang Jiang traveled the rivers and lakes as a performer, his martial skill wasn’t high and his nerve wasn’t strong — if these runners had come to arrest him, he wouldn’t have tried to flee. Given the state he was in now, it was clear he’d been beaten for a long stretch of time after being caught, before finally fighting back out of desperation and running here for help.
Even as he lay on the ground, what weighed most on Wang Jiang’s mind was still his daughter. He reached out and grabbed at the hem of Lu Wenke’s robe, who stood nearby. “Young Master Lu, save — save Xiuniang… Xiuniang’s been… been taken by them…”
Even as he spoke these words, the approaching runner had already closed the distance, aiming a vicious kick straight at Wang Jiang’s head. Chaos reigned all around; Ning Ji casually gave the long bench beside him a shove, and with a loud crack, the solid wooden bench went flying up to meet the kick. The runner let out a miserable cry, clutching his shin and hopping about, cursing hysterically: “Damn it—”
The main hall of the inn had nothing but eight-immortal tables and long benches scattered about; the runner had simply kicked one hard by accident, and no one else could quite tell what had actually happened. Several of the scholars were shouting: “Let’s talk this through properly—” while more runners rushed in from behind, one of them flipping over a table: “You’re trying to shield the criminal!” Fan Heng and the others protested: “This man is traveling with us, he’s no criminal — we’re not running anywhere.”
Wang Jiang spat out flecks of blood, wailing. “They took Xiuniang… Young Master Lu, you have to save her, don’t let them, don’t let them—” His voice broke off into sobbing.
Ning Ji rose from his side, and in the midst of the chaos made his way over to the table where they’d been playing cards, took a bowl, poured out some hot water, and dissolved a pill into it, preparing to treat Wang Jiang’s injuries as an emergency measure. He was young, and his face carried an air of gentleness, so neither the constables, nor the scholars, nor even Wang Jiang himself paid him much mind at that moment.
By now Lu Wenke was already demanding answers from several of the runners: “You’ve taken his daughter too? What crime has she committed?”
The runner who had rushed forward to kick Wang Jiang — meaning to cut off his words — had, by that point, already let slip that Wang Xiuniang had been taken. He now said, “This father and daughter match the description of people spotted spying on military affairs outside the city the other day. There’s a war on up north — you think you can go around shielding them? Or are the lot of you all in on it together?”
“Their head constable took Xiuniang, their head constable took her… it was in the courtyard to the north, hurry, go there—”
Wang Jiang shouted this from the floor. His words gave everyone a rough sense of what was happening. Some looked toward Lu Wenke, whose face flushed red, then pale, then red again. One of the runners cursed: “How dare you still spout such slander!”
Ning Ji grabbed the pill and hurried back to Wang Jiang’s side. “Uncle Wang, drink this first.” But Wang Jiang, his mind still fixed entirely on his daughter, struggled to grab hold of Ning Ji’s clothes. “Save Xiuniang…” — and refused to drink the medicine. Ning Ji frowned and said, “All right. To save Sister Xiuniang, drink this first, and we’ll go save her together.”
His gaze had by now turned entirely cold. There was, of course, some inner conflict — should he strike to kill outright, or hold back a moment longer? Wang Jiang, for now, could at least be kept alive a little longer, but Sister Xiuniang’s situation might be the truly urgent matter — perhaps something terrible had already happened, and the question was whether it was worth risking exposure to buy back a little time. And beyond that — could this group of pedantic scholars actually manage to sort this out on their own?
Hearing Ning Ji’s calm voice, Wang Jiang’s lips finally began to tremble, and he started drinking the medicine. Several of the runners and the scholars traded a few more heated words, the runners making as if to force the matter, but since things had already come out into the open, in the end they held back from actually laying hands, because whatever happened, Wang Jiang and these scholars would still have to be taken to the yamen eventually — and amid all this chaos, none of them realized just how many times they’d already skirted the edge of real danger.
“Where did you take his daughter?” Lu Wenke bellowed, eyes red.
“Whether at the yamen or not, we’re heading there now — let’s go!”
Wang Jiang shook his head from the floor. “Not the yamen, not the yamen, it’s to the north…”
“You’re holding an illegal private tribunal!”
Amid all the shouting, Ning Ji watched Wang Jiang finish the medicine and made ready to decide what to do next. Just then, another commotion arose outside the door — someone shouting: “Madam, over here!” — followed by the arrival of a whole procession of carts, over a dozen able-bodied men bursting in through the front door, along with the figure of a woman, her face dark with anger, striding swiftly into the inn.
At the sight of such a formidable procession, several of the runners suddenly looked cowed. The woman, surrounded by her escort of able-bodied men, wore white, and though her looks were passable at first glance, her figure had grown slightly plump. Lifting her skirts as she strode in, she swept the room with her eyes and fixed on the runner who had been giving orders earlier. “Little Lu, I’m asking you — where is Xu Dong?”
The runner called Little Lu frowned. “Constable Xu is right now… of course he’s on duty at the yamen, but I—”
Before he could finish, the white-clad woman snatched up a teacup from a nearby table and hurled it at him. It missed, but still gave the man a good scare. “He’s not at the yamen! He’s not at the yamen! Don’t you dare play dumb with me, you Lu — don’t make me hold a grudge against you! I hear you people took a woman — where did you take her!?”
This woman had a considerably loud voice. As the runner named Lu still hesitated, Fan Heng had already leapt up. “We know! We know!” He pointed at Wang Jiang. “The one they took is his daughter — this… this lady here, she knows where!”
These runners were clearly the villains in this affair, and the group had assumed, for the moment, that there was little they could do against them — but who could have expected another party would show up to oppose the runners, and one with obvious backing behind it. Wang Jiang, as if seeing hope at last, braced himself against a table and struggled up from the floor, saying, “I know… it’s a courtyard to the north, north… I… I, I can show the way.”
The white-clad woman glanced at Wang Jiang, then waved a hand with a fierce, vicious look. “Someone help him up, let him lead the way!”
Wang Jiang stumbled forward, with Ning Ji supporting him at his side, calling out, “Someone get a stretcher! Tear a door off its hinges!” But no one paid him any mind in that moment — not even Wang Jiang himself, frantic as he was, stopped to listen.
The group set off from the inn in a great mass, moving down the roads of the county seat. Wang Jiang’s steps stumbled along unsteadily, smearing blood all over Ning Ji, who supported him. Having seen this sort of thing plenty on the battlefield, Ning Ji thought little of it — his only concern was that the medicine he’d just given might end up overdrawing what little life force this middle-aged performer had left.
After a while, the group’s steps brought them to a small courtyard on the north side of the county seat. This appeared to be the very place Wang Jiang had escaped from — there was even a runner standing watch by the gate, and at the sight of this approaching procession, he threw the door open and bolted into the courtyard. The white-clad woman shouted, “Surround the place, hit anyone you see! Get Xu Dong out here! Move!”
Her orders came out scattered and without much order, but her men were already in motion — some breaking down the door with a crash, some shielding the woman as they pushed forward into the courtyard first, others moving to block the back exit. The four runners looked deeply uneasy, calling out from behind, “Madam, this isn’t—” as they followed in.
As Ning Ji supported Wang Jiang into the courtyard, people were already smashing rooms apart and beating people all around. A loud voice thundered from a side room within the courtyard: “Who dares!”
The white-clad woman shouted back, “I dare! Xu Dong, how dare you sneak around behind my back playing with a woman!”
“What playing with a woman, where did you even see that!”
The man emerging from the side room was burly and fierce-looking; stepping out, he swept his gaze around and roared, “Everyone stop, right now!” But no one stopped. The white-clad woman charged forward and slapped him across the head. “Xu Dong, you deserve to die!”
“I told you, there’s nothing going on!” The head constable Xu Dong’s voice was booming and forceful. The woman slapped him again, knocking his hat askew.
“She’s a criminal under interrogation!” Xu Dong roared. The woman slapped him again.
“Nobody’s allowed to act rashly, I said!”
The woman jumped up and slapped him again.
“She’s the one who seduced me!”
The woman kept right on slapping him. Xu Dong took blow after blow without fighting back, only shouting, while all around, the crash and clatter of smashing and beating filled the courtyard. Wang Jiang struggled forward; several of the scholars, watching this absurd scene, wanted to press forward too, but were held back. Ning Ji let go of Wang Jiang and moved ahead; a burly man reached out to stop him, but he ducked low and slipped past, already deep into the inner courtyard, running toward the room behind Xu Dong.
Xu Dong was still bellowing, while the woman kept beating him, cursing and berating him in some dialect no one could understand, then grabbed him by the ear and dragged him toward a room, muttering something that sounded like accusations about a “vixen.” Xu Dong kept repeating: “She’s the one who seduced me!”
The woman dragged the head constable into the room, with Ning Ji now right behind them. The woman seemed ready to give this “vixen” a beating too, but the moment she saw what was inside the room, she stopped short, brow furrowed. Ning Ji slipped past the two of them; the room reeked of blood and filth. Wang Xiuniang was curled up in a corner, her body covered not only in blood but marks of excrement and urine as well.
Ning Ji crouched down. Her clothes were torn to little more than half of what remained; the corners of her eyes, her mouth, her cheeks were all swollen from beating, her face smeared with feces. He glanced back once at the couple still brawling behind him, barely able to hold back his own rising fury. Wang Xiuniang, seeming to sense the movement, stirred, opened her eyes, and tried to make out the person in front of her.
“Sister Xiuniang.” Ning Ji took her hand.
“Lu… Little Long.” Wang Xiuniang said weakly, then smiled. “It’s fine… I was… clever, I wasn’t… he didn’t… get what he wanted…”
“How could you…” Ning Ji frowned, at a loss for what to say for a moment.
“Don’t touch my hand… it’s filthy…” The woman pulled her hand back as best she could, wiping the foul substance on it onto herself, and gave a weak smile.
Ning Ji fell into a difficult silence for a moment, then forced a smile through gritted teeth. “It’s fine that you’re all right… Brother Lu is… he’s worried about you, let me take you to him.”
He lifted Wang Xiuniang up off the floor and carried her toward the door. At this moment, he had no attention left to spare for the still-brawling couple; in his mind, he had already resolved that anyone who tried to stop him now would be cut down on the spot, and he simply walked straight through.
The couple, too, froze for a moment. Xu Dong bellowed, “She’s a major criminal! I was interrogating her!”
The woman jumped up and hit him on the head. “Interrogating her! Interrogating her!”
“I’m not talking to you, you shrew!”
The woman kicked him in the backside, then hit him on the head again. “Shrew—”
“You’re the shrew!” The two of them stumbled out of the room together, Xu Dong still shouting, “Stop smashing things!”
By now Ning Ji had already carried Wang Xiuniang outside, back to Wang Jiang’s side. Wang Jiang knelt beside his daughter, weeping. Fan Heng and the others were seething with righteous fury. “This is outrageous! Outrageous! Is there no law left in Tongshan County!”
“For something like this, you owe us an explanation!”
Xu Dong was still shouting. “Today, whoever crosses me, Xu Dong, I’ll remember every one of you!” He then caught sight of Wang Jiang and the others, pointed a finger at the group, and strode over. “So it’s you people!” His hair had been beaten into disarray by now, and the woman behind him kept striking him, tugging at his ear as well. His face twisted, glaring at Wang Jiang, then shifting to Lu Wenke, Fan Heng, and the rest.
“I’ll remember you!”
The woman slapped him on the back of the head, but he kept going, word by word, spreading two fingers to point first at his own eyes, then at the group, his eyes bloodshot, spit flying from his mouth.
“I! Will! Remember! Every! One! Of! You!”
“Is there any law left in this place at all? We will absolutely take this to the county yamen!” Fan Heng roared.
The woman kept wailing and cursing, all while dragging her husband Xu Dong by the ear, shouting, “Get these people out of here—” though this last was directed at Wang Jiang and his daughter, Fan Heng, Ning Ji, and the rest of the group.
Several of the able-bodied men who had come with her broke off to start pushing and coaxing the group to leave, while the woman, back in the courtyard, kept right on beating her husband, and — apparently annoyed that these outsiders were taking too long to leave — dragged him by the ear, screaming hysterically. “Get lost! Get lost! Get these things out of my sight, now—”
The number of able-bodied men closing in around them was steadily growing. For just a moment, the gleam of a scalpel slipped out from Ning Ji’s sleeve — but glancing at Fan Heng, Lu Wenke, and the others, he finally slid the small blade back away, and left the courtyard along with the group.
……
No one had eaten lunch that day. Back at the inn, Ning Ji bandaged and treated the injuries of Wang Jiang and his daughter, while Fan Heng and the others went to the yamen to see what they could learn, intending to file a formal complaint and demand justice.
Once the bandaging was done, Wang Jiang, whose injuries were complicated enough that no one could say whether real trouble might yet follow, had already fallen into an exhausted sleep. Wang Xiuniang’s injuries were mostly superficial cuts and bruises, nothing life-threatening, but her spirits were low; she said she wanted to rest in her room, unwilling to see anyone.
She was, after all, at that age full of youthful bloom, and over these past two months, feelings had grown between her and Lu Wenke; a woman dresses up for the one who delights in her, and she had, of late, taken noticeably more care with her appearance. Who could have known that this outing to perform would catch the eye of that head constable — who, judging she was just a wandering performer without any real backing, had seized her and tried to force himself on her. In her desperate moment, Wang Xiuniang had smeared excrement and urine on herself, and though the enraged, humiliated Constable Xu had beaten her badly for it, she’d managed to preserve her chastity. But what Lu Wenke would make of all this afterward was, in truth, very hard to say.
Ning Ji hadn’t gotten around to thinking about any of that yet. He simply felt that Wang Xiuniang had shown remarkable courage. Lu Wenke, by contrast, had come back looking rather unsettled, his mood swinging unpredictably — though that wasn’t the pressing concern at the moment either.
Not long after the father and daughter had been bandaged, Fan Heng and Chen Junsheng returned from outside. The group sat in the room exchanging what they’d learned, their expressions and words alike heavy with complicated feeling.
“…This Xu Dong is apparently the chief constable of the local yamen — not exactly a major figure, plenty of people with the authority to discipline him. But the problem is his wife, Li Xiaoqing — this woman is Li Ruoque’s daughter, Li Yanfeng’s younger sister. Back when she married Xu Dong, the Li family wasn’t yet a great household, but now… especially after the ravages of the Jurchen invasion passed, the Li family here has become, quite literally, the local emperor whose word is law…”
“…We spent some money, and everyone willing to talk told us the same thing — this case can’t be pursued. Whatever’s between Xu Dong and Li Xiaoqing is their own family business, but if we insist on suing this Xu Dong over it… we probably won’t even get through the yamen doors. Some even said it’d be hard for us to even leave this place.”
“…So we’re just supposed to drop it, then?”
“…Then we go file the complaint anyway.”
The group fell silent for a while at this, clearly torn. After some discussion, someone said, “What does Brother Lu think?”
Lu Wenke clenched his fists, his eyes red. “What could I possibly think.”
Seeing him in this state, the others found it hard to say much more.
By mid-afternoon, the autumn wind picked up in the courtyard, and the sky began to cloud over. Then the innkeeper came in with word that an important visitor had arrived, asking to meet with them.
The group went out to the main hall of the inn, where they found a middle-aged man in a long scholar’s robe, who looked at first like a man of letters, though he carried a certain air of the rivers and lakes about him as well, with a scarred gap on his face from an old blade wound. He introduced himself to the group: “I’m the steward of the Li family — surname Wu.”
“Has Steward Wu come to settle today’s matter?” Fan Heng asked.
“You could say that.” The steward Wu nodded, then gestured for the group to sit, taking the head seat at the table himself first. A servant at his side came over and poured him a cup of tea.
“All of you are scholars, I take it.” The steward Wu went on, speaking as though to himself. “Scholars are fine people, I hear — sensible, good at getting things done. What happened today between my young lady and Constable Xu could easily have been settled quietly enough on its own, but I hear someone here had some rather intemperate words to say.”
“…Intemperate words?” Fan Heng and Chen Junsheng frowned. Lu Wenke’s eyes flushed red again. Ning Ji sat off to one side, watching.
“What happened today is a private family matter of the Li family. As for that father and daughter — there was suspicion they’d been spying for the enemy, someone had accused them… well, that matter could have been let go by now, but the way you all went around shouting your heads off there — that wasn’t exactly proper. And I hear you then went straight to the yamen to grease some palms, saying you meant to pursue this to the end, no matter what — word of that reached my young lady’s ears…”
“My young lady’s already dealing with quite enough vexation from what happened today, and here you all are, stirring up more trouble on top of it. And calling yourselves scholars — you don’t even understand how things work.” He paused, taking a sip of tea. “So my young lady says — people like you shouldn’t stay in Tongshan any longer, lest something else come of this… so all of you, leave now. Before dark, you need to be gone.”
He gave his sleeve a shake and, with that, saying, “So, tell me — what would you even call this?” — he reached into his robe, pulled out a few ingots of silver, set them down on the table with a sigh.