Meandering River, Ardent Flame

  ***

  Jiang was in a panic, though she tried not to let it show. If Brother Wong had muttered correctly, they would need to leave now.

  While waiting for her sister to return, the monk had casually pointed out a squad of constables, staring stone-faced at them from across the street. Jiang had not read much in this; people were welcome, in her mind, to stare wherever they pleased, though when the two of them moved, the constables had moved with them. That too, could be excused. But when they broke into a run at her sister, and Brother Wong muttered “Prefect Li” under his breath, Jiang wondered if she could have died of asphyxiation, so long did she hold her breath in shock.

  And maybe she would have deserved that, Jiang thought, as the scene of policemen converging on her sister released her constantly suppressed memories.

  She was twelve again. Cowering behind a screen, Jiang had been paralysed by the imposing figure of Magistrate Li as he swept into the room.

  “So you've found her.” The judge addressed Jiang's mother, who held Flame protectively back.

  “What kind of mother would abandon her child to be found by you?” Lady Lian replied with steel in her voice. The magistrate was amused.

  “Did I mean any harm? I merely willed that our families be joined. But Lian spat on my wishes and promised his eldest to a Jurchen khan; why, the fact that you're with her merely proves that Lian's been hiding her for barbarians. And to what end? Fermenting the fall of a dynasty? Betraying his people for promises of land?”

  “My husband did none of that. You're blaming him to serve your own ends. And our eldest remains unf—”

  “Lady Hua, I trusted Lian to billet the county troops, feed them, and deliver on a simple promise. Instead, he shamed me by 'losing' his daughter. And then he rode out in arms.”

  “Were we to believe that Jiang had simply wandered off and not been forcibly taken?”

  “I wanted none of this,” said the magistrate, shaking his head in regret.

  Jiang had shaken similarly behind the screen. She had remained there, legs immobile but trembling, as her sister's nightmares played themselves out: Li authorizing arrest, directing his constables, and exercising his powers as magistrate to the full. Jiang had ventured out only to pull her sister from the flaming room and hear her mother's extortions for Flame to remember the family. And this was the price of flaunting authority in order to satisfy her selfish desire to escape marriage.

  Seven years later, having submitted fully to the authority of faith, Jiang had believed herself to be beyond the power of such recollections. The sight of black-capped constables; the regret that cut into her for her ancient inaction, smashed this paradigm to pieces. The words of her mother, for the sisters to never forget each other, reopened and salted her hidden wounds. And the pain, along with her regretful desire for repentance, made her run.