Robert Lyndon - Imperial Fire

‘Is that everyone?’

‘Everyone who’s coming,’ Josselin said. ‘Two refused to leave. One was too drunk to stand. The night patrols caught another.’

He clambered into the other boat and the turbaned man stepped into Lucas’s craft and cast off.

‘If you haven’t plied an oar before, you’d better learn fast. We have to get beyond the last wall before the Chinese work out how we intend to breach it.’

Lucas picked up a paddle. ‘You heard him. Dig hard, dig deep.’

The Outlanders found some semblance of rhythm and the city began to slide past. Lucas thought of Xiao-Xing, the lovely maid he would never see again. He reached out and prodded the orchestrator of this upheaval in the back.

‘If someone rousts me from bed at dead of night, I want to know who he is.’

The man turned and smiled. ‘Well met, Lucas. I’m glad you survived the journey and even gladder that you overcame the demons holding you apart from your father.’

‘Wayland! How did you get here?’

‘Later. Keep going.’

Confusion made Lucas obey for a while. ‘They’ll soon work out how we intend to escape and send cavalry to secure the ship. We won’t outpace horses.’

‘Vallon’s put a lot of thought into our flight. If we escape the city we’ll reach the ship.’

‘Where is he?’

‘Gone ahead with Hero and Aiken. Now stop pestering and row.’

Lights bobbing ahead made Lucas draw his sword. He sank back when he saw they were only floating lanterns placed on the water by nocturnal revellers. Watching them glide past, he thought again of Xiao-Xing. The pang of loss subsided into a clench of vague dread. Kaifeng had been a haven, the ultimate oasis. What would they do now? Where could they go?

Several times on their journey watchmen spotted them and raised the hue and cry, their shouts merging into the alarms spreading through the entire city. By this time the Outlanders had put thoughts of abandoned sweethearts and warm quarters behind them and were rowing for their lives, what was lost gone forever and an unknowable future ahead.

A squad of cavalry intercepted them and loosed arrows without mercy, wounding two rowers before a warehouse built on the waterfront in defiance of planning regulations blocked their pursuit. The city’s outer wall bulked large. Soldiers carrying torches ran about on its ramparts. A tunnel through the barrier gaped.

An arrow thrummed in the thwart beside Lucas and then the tunnel closed around them. Moments later they slid clear, the landscape ahead empty and the Yellow River mirrored on the base of low-hanging clouds.

‘Not far now,’ Wayland said.

Lucas heard a whinny and spotted horses in a node of darkness on the right bank.

‘Put in,’ Wayland said.

Vallon stood on the bank. ‘Mount up and ride for the ship.’

Lucas flung himself onto a horse. Quarter of a mile behind, a stream of torches emerged from the city wall.

‘They’re coming,’ Vallon said. ‘Don’t spare your horses. We won’t need them again.’

With that he spurred into the dark and Lucas followed, concentrating on extracting every last effort from his horse. The plain flew past, pools of shadow stretching out to the north. The river showed ahead in the light of the fleeting moon. A flame winked on its bank.

‘Make for the torch,’ Vallon shouted.

Lucas reached the jetty and threw himself off his horse. Gorka stood on Jifeng ’s deck, urging the troopers to make haste. Lucas ran up the gangplank and turned to see the lights of the pursuing cavalry pricking the plain behind. Wayland was the last to board. The sweating horses they’d left behind gleamed in the dark.

‘Cast off,’ Wulfstan shouted.

Jifeng slipped her moorings and nosed away down the flaccid current. She was still close to shore when the Chinese reached the bank. They galloped along the dike, loosing arrows until the ship drifted out of range.

‘That was close,’ Lucas said.

‘They ain’t going to let us slip away that easy,’ Wulfstan said.

Vallon stepped onto the stern deck. Qiuylue stood behind him, dressed in nomad fashion — tight tunic nipped at the waist and kidskin leggings. Josselin clapped his hands for silence. The mutters of the trooper died. A hundred Outlanders had embarked at Constantinople and only fifty-four remained to hear Vallon announce their fate.

‘You’ve probably heard the rumours that I’ve accepted a commission as commander of a Chinese regiment. Who’ll take service with me?’

Lucas looked around and raised his hand.

‘Only a third of you,’ Vallon said. ‘Just as well, because I have no intention of joining the Chinese army. I’m going home. Who’ll follow me back across the Taklamakan?’

‘I think it’s one of his trick questions,’ Gorka murmured.

Vallon’s gaze swept the troopers. ‘Still only a third. What do the rest of you want to do?’

The soldiers maintained an obstinate silence.

‘I know what you want,’ Vallon said. ‘You want to rest idle in the Palace of Friendship with your doxies, being served on hand and foot. Do you really think the Chinese would allow you to go on living in such luxury? I’ll tell you what they’ll do. They’ll conscript you and post you to some frontier outpost like that shithole in the Tsaidam. Or they’ll send you to work building walls on the Yellow River. I’m told the bones of a million men lie entombed in those fortifications.’

‘What’s the reason for our flight?’ a trooper demanded.

‘We were sent east to establish mutually respectful relations between Byzantium and China. Unfortunately, the Son of Heaven doesn’t recognise any country as equal to his own. We leave with only a few flowery words of friendship.’

No one spoke. Kaifeng was just a reddish smudge out on the plain.

‘I was taxed with another mission,’ Vallon said. ‘That was to obtain the formula of a Chinese incendiary called Fire Drug. I didn’t discover the formula, but Hero and Aiken succeeded in obtaining a barrel of the compound. Unfortunately the man who provided it is a drunk whose mouth runs over when he’s in his cups. The transaction was discovered, and if Wayland hadn’t had an informer in the armoury, we would all have woken this morning with swords at our throats. That’s about all. Any questions?’

‘Where are we going?’

‘How the hell did Wayland get here?’

‘Both questions beget the same answer. Wayland sailed from India and I plan to return the same way. The prospect chills me less than the thought of retracing our steps across Asia. With fair winds we could reach India by mid-summer and be home by Christmas. You’ll have plenty of opportunities to trade on the voyage, and you’ll find no shortage of women in the ports where we put in. And think of the stories you’ll have to tell when you’re back in Constantinople. It will be free drinks in every tavern.’

Gorka hawked and spat. ‘Hell, I was getting bored lying around doing nothing but eat, drink and fuck.’

A trooper pushed towards Vallon. ‘How come you get to keep your woman while we were forced away without even time to say farewell?’

‘I’ll overlook your insolence,’ Vallon said. ‘If I’d left Qiuylue behind, the Chinese would have killed her. Dismiss.’

Vallon entered his cabin and embraced his mistress. ‘I’m sorry I gave you no warning. There wasn’t time.’

‘You shouldn’t have brought me.’

‘Would you have preferred death?’

‘You’re going back to your family. You told me that in your country a man takes only one wife. There can be no place in your household for another woman. It would create disharmony.’

Vallon sank onto his cot. ‘I’ll put you ashore with enough gold for you to start a new life. You can’t return to Kaifeng, but everywhere else is open. You could go back to your homeland. If it’s city life and comforts you desire, you could go south to Hangzhou. Whatever you choose, I’ll do my utmost to grant.’