A Bond Undone Read online

  “You do know how to take my mind off my troubles. I shall teach you that kung fu tomorrow.”

  I RECALL asking Brother Qu a question once: “Why does Shifu call himself Old Heretic Huang? It’s such a horrible name. He’s only a decade or so older than you. He’s neither old nor a heretic.”

  “He’d be so pleased to hear that.” Tempest broke out one of his rare smiles and told me Shifu’s story in great detail.

  “Shifu came from a literati family of great power and influence in the Zhejiang area, not far from our capital, Lin’an, today. His ancestors served our founding Emperor and performed great deeds, so, for generations after, they were granted noble titles and held important positions at court.

  “Shifu’s grandfather was the Censor-in-Chief during the reign of the Gaozong Emperor, in charge of uncovering misdeeds and corruption among the Empire’s officials. When the villainous Chancellor Qin Hui imprisoned General Yue Fei, Shifu’s grandfather petitioned again and again for the General’s release. His persistence enraged the Emperor and Qin Hui; he was removed from his post and demoted. He continued to petition for the patriotic General even though he had been barred from court, inciting officials and the common people to rise up in support of Yue Fei. For that, Qin Hui had Shifu’s grandfather executed, and exiled his family far into the south-west borderlands to serve in the army. That is why our shifu was born in Jang Satam.

  “Shifu grew up receiving training in both the martial and the literary arts. When he was a boy, he vowed to avenge General Yue and his grandfather by bringing down the Song court and assassinating the Emperor and his corrupt officials. But the culprit, Qiu Hui, was long dead, and Emperor Gaozong had grown even more muddled with age. Shifu’s father tried to rein him in with the way of the sages – loyalty to the rulers and deference to the family – but he refused to obey blindly and always argued back.

  “Eventually, after one particularly heated disagreement, his father threw him out. Shifu travelled all the way back to his homeland, Zhejiang – not to Lin’an, to take the imperial examination, but to Qingyuan prefecture, to vandalise the Hall of Ethics at the Confucius Temple. He also posted notices inside the Imperial Palace and outside the Chancellor’s Office and the Ministry of War, in Lin’an. He even went to Quzhou to nail protest letters to the doors of Confucius’s descendants who had retreated south with the Song Empire after the Jurchen invasion. These inflammatory, iconoclastic statements pointed the finger at the corrupt court and refuted Confucian teachings, proclaiming that a campaign to recover lost territories in the north was the only just course of action.

  “The court sent soldiers and cavalrymen in their hundreds to hunt him down, but how could they ever subdue our shifu? His supreme kung fu, his open apostasy, together with his utter contempt for authority, earned him the name the Heroic Heretic in the jianghu, across the rivers and lakes of his native land. He gave voice to thoughts the people were too frightened to say out loud.

  “Some years ago, a long-forgotten text known as the Nine Yin Manual was discovered and the scramble over its ownership led to great carnage in the martial world. It was an anthology of the most profound and powerful kung fu from every martial branch under the heavens, with detailed instructions for attaining these skills. Whoever had possession of the book would hold immense power and knowledge, making them invincible in the wulin.

  “The Quanzhen Sect leader Double Sun Wang Chongyang sought to end the senseless killing, and organised a melee, stating that whoever could demonstrate the finest martial skills would be the work’s custodian. He invited the greatest to this tournament. Five men took part in what we now call the Contest of Mount Hua – our shifu, Heretic of the East, together with Venom of the West, King of the South, Beggar of the North and Central Divinity Double Sun Wang Chongyang.

  “It was a fierce competition, but ultimately they all agreed that Central Divinity was the strongest and most deserving. A Taoist monk, he was upright, fair and kind. His pursuit of celestial enlightenment meant he had little concern for earthly reputation. Most importantly, Wang Chongyang was not interested in using the power conferred on him by the Manual to suppress others.”

  For all of us on Peach Blossom Island, it was hard to imagine someone more skilled than our shifu, but that was the way of martial training. As Brother Qu put it, “Above the sky is a loftier heaven, beyond the man a mightier body.”

  Waking after drinking, my gentle friend is gone.

  Whether wind or water, the current carries you away.

  And then, one day, the verse Shifu quoted came true.

  One morning, Shifu woke up and I was gone. Carried away by my second-eldest martial brother, Hurricane Chen.

  His thick eyebrows, his intense eyes, Hurricane was a man of few words. He did not talk to me much, but his eyes were always on me. He looked at me so intently – it makes me blush to think of it – I had to turn away.

  When the peaches ripened on Peach Blossom Island, he always left the biggest, juiciest ones in my room. He put them on my table and left without saying a word.

  We were almost the same age. He was just a little bit older. Tempest was more than a decade our senior, Zephyr was a couple of years younger, whereas Galeforce and Doldrum were little boys in my eyes.

  Hurricane’s manners were as rough as his sinewy physique.

  “Dainty thief, let’s pinch a few peaches.” He grabbed my hand.

  I waved him away. “What did you call me?”

  “We’re stealing peaches. What does that make us? Thieves. And the next rosy peach this burly rogue will take is his dainty thief.”

  I pretended to ignore him, but a sweet giddiness I had never known spread inside me.

  He led me to the orchard after nightfall. We picked many, many peaches and carried them back to my room. He set them down on the table in the dark and wrapped his arms around me. I squirmed and struggled, but, the moment he whispered into my ear, I lost all my powers of resistance.

  “I want you to be my dainty thief always.”

  I felt myself melting into him.

  A FLUSH of crimson warmed Cyclone Mei’s cheeks and her wheezing suddenly sounded worse.

  Guo Jing could pick out gasps and sighs and snatches of words as she heaved air into her lungs.

  “Why?” she rasped. “Why?”

  They were still sitting on the ground, not far from the pit. Her fingers were still around his neck.

  “Why break his legs? Why banish him?”

  Cyclone Mei held revenge literally in her hand, yet her grip seemed to be loosening.

  BY THE time I was eighteen, I understood why Tempest looked at me that way. I knew what it meant. He was a widower with a young daughter and I had been swept away by my Hurricane. I needed to avoid his eyes.

  One night, when my burly rogue was holding me, in bed, someone shouted outside my window.

  “Hurricane Chen, come out, you bastard!”

  Brother Qu.

  Hurricane pulled on his clothes and rushed out. Immediately, a gust of wind rustled the paper in the wooden window frame. They were fighting!

  “Tempest, please, forgive us!” I implored from inside.

  “Forgive you? ‘Our encounter was lodged in my heart then, and ever more so now.’ Who wrote those words? I can forgive you, but I doubt Shifu will.”

  Thwack! Someone had taken a heavy blow.

  “You intend to kill me?” It was my storm speaking.

  “Cyclone, you said you’d learn kung fu from Shifu all your life. You said you’d serve him forever. You lied!” Tempest had never been so angry with me.

  “Why does it bother you?” Hurricane would not let anyone speak rough to me. “You’re jealous, aren’t you?”

  Shadows flitted and swirled. My kung fu was not good enough to catch what was happening.

  Then Hurricane’s body flew up and hit the ground with a thud!

  “I am not jealous. I’m doing this for Shifu. You will pay with your life today, you ungrateful dog!”
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  I leapt through the window and shielded him with my body.

  “Brother, have mercy!”

  Tempest took one look at me, sighed, and walked away.

  IN THE morning, Shifu summoned the three of us. I was too scared to look at him and kept my eyes on the ground, but I could sense the sadness that was engulfing him.

  “Why?” Shifu’s voice was almost tearful. “Why?”

  Hurricane decided to answer for us all.

  “Brother Qu is jealous. He wants to kill me because Sister Mei and I are together.”

  “Tempest, it’s futile.” Shifu shook his head and sighed. “This is fate.”

  I fell on my knees in tears. “Shifu, it is my fault! Please don’t blame Brother Qu.”

  “Why did you recite that poem, Tempest? Why did you say Cyclone lied to me? Why did you say she broke her promise of waiting on me for a lifetime? Why did you eavesdrop on us? Do you think I didn’t know you were listening? Well, you’ve grossly underestimated me. And what grievances have I got? If I had any, do you think I would need another to act on my behalf? If I ordered you to confront them, then, yes, you could assume that I was jealous, but I never sent you to do what you did. Hurricane, Cyclone, out!”

  A swing of the wooden staff and the bones in Brother Qu’s legs were shattered. Shifu then announced, “Tempest Qu broke the rules of our house. A disciple of Peach Blossom Island he shall no longer be.” Then he ordered the servants to take Brother Qu to Lin’an.

  From that day forward, Shifu would not speak to Hurricane or to me. He also stopped teaching us kung fu and left the island soon after. He travelled to Qingyuan and then Lin’an. When he came back, it was two years later, and he was married.

  Shifu’s wife was very young. She and I were born in the same year, the Year of the Monkey. Her birthday was in the tenth month, so she was actually a couple of months younger than me. She was beautiful, her skin unblemished and smooth like milk. No wonder Shifu was so enamoured, taking her on all his travels. Shimu was not trained in the martial arts, but, like Shifu, she had a great love for literature and calligraphy.

  One day, Shimu said to me, “Shifu has told me many times how good you are, how loyal you are to him. He also says that you had a difficult start in life and bids me again and again to treat you well. He doesn’t understand anything about our sex, but he is very remorseful that he wasn’t able to look after you better as you were growing up on this island. I want you to know that, if there is anything I can help you with, you can come to me.”

  I was moved to tears. “Shifu couldn’t be more kind. He couldn’t have looked after me better. We’re all very pleased to see how happy he is now that he has found you.”

  “I know Shifu hasn’t been teaching you kung fu; rest assured, it has nothing to do with you. Shifu and I came across a martial-arts tract called the Nine Yin Manual on our last trip. Inside, there was a strange passage that makes no sense. You know how fond he is of deciphering codes and riddles, and how he never lets anything beat him. We’ve been working on this text since our return and we still can’t make head nor tail of it. You know what he’s like. He’s now refusing to do anything else until he’s figured it out. That’s why he has been keeping to himself.”

  She pointed at two volumes on her desk. “There it is. I don’t know why he’s so interested in someone else’s martial secrets when Peach Blossom Island already possesses skills that are unrivalled in the heavens and on earth. But then I guess I share the same sentiment when I see an exceptional verse; I won’t rest until I’ve learned it by heart and understood its craft inside out.”

  ONE MOON Festival, Shimu prepared a banquet to celebrate with all of us, and Shifu drank heavily throughout the meal. When she went to the kitchen to prepare the soup course, Shifu mumbled to himself, “Now, no-one can say Old Heretic Huang wanted to marry his own disciple . . . How is Tempest? I bear no grudges. How are his legs?”

  Those words affected Hurricane. A while later, he said to me, “Do you recall Shifu’s words on Moon Festival? He let slip his feelings about Tempest. If Brother Qu returns, he won’t let me live. Dainty thief, let’s live up to our names and steal that Nine Yin Manual.” He reminded me of the conversation I’d had with Shimu about the Manual. “Once we’ve learned its powerful kung fu, we can bring the book back to Shifu. By then, we’ll be afraid of no-one – not Shifu, nor Tempest Qu.”

  I begged him to banish the thought. I threatened to tell Shifu. But my storm was fearless. He put his words into action that very night.

  IN THOSE days, Shifu was always preoccupied. His fingers were never still, always counting, but it did not look like he was working out a rhyme or fitting lyrics to a tune. He did not teach us kung fu and hardly spoke to anyone. His hair was turning greyer by the day and the sight broke my heart.

  When I mentioned this to Hurricane, he was certain that Shifu was thinking about the kung fu in the Nine Yin Manual.

  That night, Hurricane came across Shifu heading to the Sword Trial Pavilion with one volume of the Manual in his hand. He told me Shifu’s eyes were fixed at the sky and nonsensical mutterings were coming out of his mouth. He greeted Shifu loudly, but he just walked on, oblivious.

  Hurricane saw his chance and sneaked into Shifu’s study. There, on the desk, was the other volume of the Manual.

  Yet Hurricane was not content. He could not stop thinking about the one in Shifu’s hand. He convinced himself he needed it too, but I would not let him take anything else.

  Stealing one volume from Shifu was bad enough. If we took both, we would be worse than animals. Shifu had always been kind to us. It would be a betrayal too far.

  “Of course he’s kind to you, but to me?”

  “Don’t do it! I will scream and shout!”

  “SHIFU!” CYCLONE Mei croaked. “Someone has come to take the Nine Yin Manual! Shifu!”

  “Huh?” Guo Jing was confused.

  “Mind your own business.”

  She caught the scent of plum blossoms in the night air. The Peach Blossom Island of her memory smelt just as sweet.

  WE FLED Peach Blossom Island that night. We found a boat to take us to Mount Salvation and hid in a cave by the shoreline. We had with us the second volume of the Manual. Hurricane spent the next days poring over the text written in Shimu’s hand, his brow locked in a frown.

  “Maybe we should make a copy and return this to Shifu. But how?” He was talking more to himself than to me.

  “Let’s go back!”

  “Do you think we can set foot on that island again and come out alive?”

  We stayed on Mount Salvation for one month, but it was too close to Peach Blossom Island, so we sailed to the mainland. We spent the next few months flitting between towns like Qingyuan, Shangyu, Baiguan, Yuyao, then we moved inland to Lin’an, Jiaxing, Huzhou, Pingjiang, lying low in the myriad waterways that criss-crossed these cities. We shut ourselves in our boat during the day to avoid being seen – in case Shifu or our martial brothers were seeking us – and the incessant river traffic kept us well concealed.

  WE STUDIED the Manual together. It was indeed full of powerful martial skills. Our volume opened with the Nine Yin Skeleton Claw and the Heartbreaker Palm, how to master and overcome each move: These skills can be acquired through external training and do not require a foundation in inner strength. By these methods, my younger brother and sister were slain. The verse “Silently slaughter with the ease of cutting grass” aptly describes their effect.

  This was perfect, and so our training began. We needed to practise on living human beings, so I suggested Jiang Village in Shangyu. We could start with the malicious Mistress Jiang, then reduce all the men and women in the village – old and young – to piles of skulls and bones.

  But the place also reminded me of the day Shifu rescued me, the new lease of life he granted me. What did I do to requite him? This! The thought broke my heart. When I mentioned it to Hurricane, he became wild with jealousy and berated me for thinking about Shi
fu.

  Before long, we reached an impasse. The remaining martial techniques required a basis of internal strength. The neigong principles were explained in the first volume – the one we did not have. To complicate matters, the skills were all rooted in the Taoist tradition, a completely different branch of kung fu from that of Shifu.

  But, each time we became stuck, Hurricane would say, “He who aspires shall achieve great deeds.”

  He believed it with all his heart. With time, he developed his own interpretation and devised a way to learn the skills described within the Manual, which he also taught me. He focused on palm strikes and I worked on the White Python Whip.

  He had a whip made especially for me, gilded with silver. He said that, as he had not given me a love token to mark our nuptials, he would make it up to me with this opulent weapon.

  We might have been in hiding from Shifu and our martial brothers, but we had plenty of gold and silver. With our kung fu skills, we took whatever we wanted, whenever we felt the urge. Wealthy households, government treasuries – we plundered them with ease. No-one could stop us.

  FEELING A breeze ruffling her hair, Cyclone Mei tilted her head back. “Are there stars tonight?”

  “Many,” Guo Jing replied.

  “Can you see the Silver Stream?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is it separating the Weaver Girl from the Cowherd?”

  “It is.”

  “What about the Northern Dipper?”

  “Huh?”

  “What an idiot! Look to the north. Seven bright stars. Aligned in the shape of a ladle.”

  Guo Jing scanned the sky, following the description, until eventually he exclaimed, “I can see them!”

  “What is the Gathering of Seven Stars?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Didn’t Ma Yu teach you?” Mei tightened her grip.

  “The Elder only taught me how to breathe lying on my back.”