Chapter 2: Picking Up an Enemy Empress

After Gao Yuan, Xu Mazi picked out more men until he had twenty in all. Each received a battered suit of leather armor and a fist-sized piece of dried meat.

With that, the vanguard assault force was assembled.

Xu Mazi addressed them. “Eat and enjoy yourselves today. Tomorrow, fight like hell! Hold the stronghold and we’ll go on living well. Lose it, and we’re all finished!”

The twenty men answered in a ragged chorus. The women, equipment, and dried meat had finally put a little fight into the hastily assembled force.

……

Gao Yuan took his things and led the women back to the mud-brick house where he lived.

Inside was a heated earthen platform seven or eight meters long, divided into separate spaces by wooden boards. Several grimy quilts lay piled on top. Gao Yuan shared the house with five other bandits.

The others were still outside reinforcing the stronghold. As a vanguard recruit, he had been granted a short rest.

He looked back at the women. The tall one wore an indifferent expression, while the woman in red stayed close beside her. The petite girl’s legs trembled as she glanced nervously around. Shen Shuting, his sister-in-law, kept rubbing her hands together, visibly anxious.

Gao Yuan gave Shen Shuting a reassuring look, then said, “My name is Gao Yuan. Why don’t you tell me yours?”

“Shen Shuting,” she answered first, taking his cue.

“Mu Baizhi,” the petite girl said after a moment’s hesitation.

Gao Yuan turned to the other two.

“Feng Lingxue,” said the tall woman coolly.

“Lin Hongxiu,” the red-clad woman replied in a subdued voice.

Now that introductions were over, Gao Yuan nodded. “Let’s divide up the work.”

He tossed the battered leather armor to Mu Baizhi. “Find a needle and thread and mend this. Make it sturdy.”

It might not look like much, but it could save his life when it mattered.

Then he handed the dried meat to Lin Hongxiu. “You two go make some meat porridge.”

Lin Hongxiu looked ready to flare up, but Feng Lingxue gave a cough, and she gritted her teeth and held her tongue.

The three women went out to their tasks, leaving Gao Yuan alone with Shen Shuting.

At last free of strangers, she could contain herself no longer. She rushed forward, embraced him, and burst into tears.

The softness pressed against Gao Yuan, making his mouth go dry. He suppressed the unwanted stirrings and asked, “Sister-in-law, why are you here? What happened to the family?”

Through her tears, Shen Shuting told him.

Li Chengqian, Wei’s Third Prince, had been secretly gathering allies and had tried to draw the Gao family into his camp. The family had refused and even intended to report him to the emperor. Enraged, Li Chengqian had fabricated charges, accusing them of colluding with the enemy.

The men of the Gao family had been sentenced to beheading and the women to exile. Most of the women died on the journey. Shen Shuting alone survived to reach Dangyang, only to be seized by bandits before she could settle there.

Fortunately, she had found Gao Yuan. Otherwise, she could scarcely imagine what would have become of her.

Gao Yuan sighed. The Gaos had been fools. Refusing the Third Prince was one thing, but trying to expose him too? They had practically asked for death.

Shen Shuting looked at him through tear-filled eyes. “Yuan, you’re the only man left in the Gao family. You must find a way to survive. You’re our only hope of clearing the family’s name!”

His mouth twitched. That was a daunting task.

He was a man from another world and felt little attachment to the Gao family. Even if he had cared deeply, he was only a bandit now. How was he supposed to fight a prince? And that was assuming he survived the vanguard’s mission to strike at the enemy’s leaders.

Still, whatever he thought, he had to comfort her. She needed something to hold on to. In a world like this, a reason to hope could keep a person alive.

……

Outside, Feng Lingxue and Lin Hongxiu stood together in a secluded spot.

Lin Hongxiu struggled to contain her anger. “Your Majesty, a person of your station shouldn’t be in a place like this, much less spend the night with that brute! Seeing you humiliated hurts me more than death. If there’s no other choice, let’s fight our way out after dark!”

If Gao Yuan had heard her, his jaw would have dropped. One of the women he had picked on impulse was the ruler of Beimang, an enemy nation?

Feng Lingxue stood with her hands behind her back, gazing at the distant sky. Her clothes were torn, but she carried an unmistakable air of command.

“The poison is still in your body,” she said slowly. “You cannot use even a tenth of your strength. How would we get out alive?”

After a pause, she added, “Besides, remaining here is not without its advantages. It has given me time to think.”

Lin Hongxiu frowned. “About what?”

A cold light entered Feng Lingxue’s eyes. “Doesn’t everything that happened today strike you as suspicious? I came to the front in person, and we infiltrated this border city of Great Wei. The plan was to strike from within while our forces attacked from outside, taking Dangyang in one stroke.

“Instead, you were suddenly poisoned, every personal guard we brought was killed by the city’s defenders, and at the crucial moment our Beimang army abruptly withdrew in defeat. If not for that, we would never have fallen into these bandits’ hands.”

Lin Hongxiu’s heart jolted. “Your Majesty, do you mean Guan Feixiong is involved?”

Guan Feixiong had commanded the Beimang army attacking Dangyang that day. He was also the only other person who knew about the plan to coordinate the attack.

Feng Lingxue shook her head slightly. “They nearly drove me to my death today. Guan Feixiong would never dare do that on his own.”

She exhaled, watching the clouds glow blood-red in the distance. “It may well be the work of those old men in Shangjing, Beimang’s capital.”

The Beimang court was like a river: calm on the surface, but full of hidden currents. Even so, Feng Lingxue had never imagined they would be bold enough to plot against her.

Lin Hongxiu stared at her. “If that’s true, what do we do?”

If Guan Feixiong had dared act, he must have made thorough preparations.

Feng Lingxue remained composed. “We adapt. Since they want me dead, I’ll use this chance to see how many rats are hiding in Beimang. When I return, I can catch them all at once.”

Lin Hongxiu nodded, then remembered something. Pointing toward Gao Yuan’s mud-brick house, she asked, “What about him?”

“We endure tonight. When Dangyang’s army attacks the stronghold tomorrow, we can look for a chance to escape.”

“Your Majesty plans for everything,” Lin Hongxiu said admiringly. “I am in awe.”

Feng Lingxue sighed to herself. Planned for everything? Hardly.

Had she not been so confident, so determined to demonstrate her martial prowess by infiltrating Dangyang with her people, she would never have ended up here. For now, she could only make the best of her mistake.