After the recent rains, the road was churned into small mountains of slowly drying mud. The army, and it had been a small army, had come this way during the night. Zhihao hadn't seen it, of course, as he had already been in Kaishi for nearly a full day before the main host of Flaming Fist's men arrived. His orders were to search for signs of the daughter, and then finally open the gates to allow an easy sacking. He had been successful on both accounts, in a way, but Flaming Fist certainly didn't need to know that he had actually spent the entire day in bed with the very daughter he was supposed to be searching for. Given that he was, in part, responsible for the carnage wrought in the city, Zhihao decided that he was actually a little glad they were moving past the city.
The day wore on, midday turning to late afternoon. "There's an inn not too far ahead," Zhihao said. The silence was oppressive, and only part of that was because it somehow contrived to make the crows circling above caw even louder. "I've stopped there once or twice. Excellent wine. We should stop."
"No." The woman seemed to use words sparingly, and always spoke in a damningly quiet voice, making Zhihao listen for her response.
"I'm hungry." Zhihao hadn't eaten since before he was dead, and no doubt she was now considering her own empty stomach. It rumbled to make Zhihao's point for him.
"Ein?" the woman asked.
The boy trudged along slowly, watching mud squelching between his toes with every step. "Eating makes me queasy. But I have to eat, I suppose."
"You are looking a little thin on the bones there, boy." Zhihao went to clap him on the shoulder and paused, remembering the last time they touched. He pulled his hand back and smiled instead. "Growing young man like yourself needs to eat. Build up your strength. A strong arm is the mark of a real man."
"You are my strong arm." The boy looked up at Zhihao, and his face was painfully pleasant. Zhihao couldn't decide if the lad was poking fun or deadly serious.
"Right. Well, then I need to eat. To keep up my strength." A compelling argument no matter which way they tried to sneak around it. The only problem was Zhihao had no idea who he was actually arguing with. It didn't seem right that the boy was in charge, but it seemed even more ludicrous to put a woman in the lead, even if she did know how to swing a sword.
"We'll stop there," the woman said, making it sound a lot like a royal decree. "Unless your friends have already burned it to the ground."
Zhihao laughed. "No chance of that. Flaming Fist does love to burn things." He pointed to the city behind them. "But never inns nor taverns on the road. You never know when you might need a warm bed and a warm meal. He doesn't take kindly to those who disobey either." Zhihao shivered at the memory, and had to admit he was glad, in part, to be free of the warlord.
To the north lay farm land, and Zhihao saw farmers and their workers tending rice paddies. Some of them looked up and watched the three travellers with wary eyes; others just ignored them. Some bandits took whatever they could from whoever they could, and Zhihao had seen the aftermath of such raids, but Flaming Fist had a tight rein on his men and farms were off limits. The cities and villages those farms supplied were fair game, but the world needed farms and farmers, and Flaming Fist understood that. Everyone needed to eat. Even creepy little boys, and half-mute women.
It fell to Zhihao to keep the conversation going and he did so, though it was a little one-sided. The boy occasionally joined in with the odd question or two, but the woman said little, occasionally snorting at Zhihao's more blatant lies. The boy seemed very interested in the tales of The Emerald Wind, and Zhihao was more than glad to embellish his escapades. He was a bandit, through and through, but he knew well how to make himself sound like a hero, and that seemed to appeal to the boy. He was regaling them with his version of the death of General Sitting Tiger, a rousing tale of leading charges and epic duels, almost entirely fictional, when the first of the bodies came into view.
Zhihao fell silent halfway through his story. Staked along the side of the dirt road was an old man. He had been stripped naked and his long hair was now matted into bloody clumps, or lying in the mud where it had been ripped from his head. He was dead, there was no doubt of that, and the stake had been shoved up his arse, pinning him upright like a morbid scarecrow. Only it clearly wasn't working as there were two crows pecking at the corpse, and they'd already been at the juicy bits. It was enough to make Zhihao lose his stomach, but there was simply nothing left in it to lose. So he averted his eyes, and kept walking. The woman stopped in front of the staked out corpse and knelt for a moment, saying a prayer in some language Zhihao couldn't be bothered listening to.
Scenes like this were rare. Hosa had no shortage of bandits or roving war bands, preying on the poorly defended, but few would take the time and effort to erect so grisly a spectacle. Flaming Fist, however, took matters involving his daughter quite seriously.
"What are those symbols carved in his chest?" the boy asked. "Are they some kind of spell or charm?"
The woman pulled the boy away from the body before he could start poking at the corpse, or try to bring the wretched thing back to life. Zhihao very much doubted the man would thank them for a second chance given his current state. Sometimes the afterlife, whatever it held, was simply the better option.
"I don't know," the woman admitted.
"It's old Hosan." Zhihao said, keeping his eyes fixed on the inn ahead of them. "It means kidnapper."
"So it is true? About his daughter?" the woman asked. Zhihao could feel her eyes on him. He didn't answer. He sped up his pace, moving past the others and keeping his eyes ahead. Some lies were too hard to tell, even for a man like The Emerald Wind, and he certainly wasn't about to tell them the truth.
The old man was the first of many stakes along the road side. Zhihao didn't bother counting, some things were best not knowing, but there were dozens of bodies in the distance leading towards the inn. Some were men, some women, but all received a similar treatment. All were dead, stripped to their skin and staked. It wasn't the first grim spectacle Flaming Fist had ever made, but it was certainly one of his worst.
There was movement by the inn and that seemed like a good sign. No doubt what was left of Flaming Fist's army had come this way, which meant Zhihao was following in deep footsteps. He had to admit, to himself at least, he was tempted to rejoin the warband. He'd done some horrible things with them, things that would give nightmares nightmares, but there was a camaraderie among killers, honour among thieves. And never once, in all of his time in Flaming Fist's service, had Zhihao ever gone wanting for a full belly or a skin full of wine. But first he needed to find a way to free himself of the boy.
The staked bodies continued right up to the inn, and it looked like no one had tried to take them down. Maybe it was that no one cared, or maybe no one wanted to get too close. Or maybe it was they were all too scared that some of Flaming Fist's men were still around, ready to punish those who thought to give the poor souls a proper burial. The woman stopped at every corpse, knelt and repeated her prayer to the dead, as though she owed them something. The few people they passed on the road waved a brief hello, but steadfastly refused to look at the grisly spectacles. Perhaps it was just easier not to see it.