ShaoShu knew better than to try to run any farther. He stopped, and Tonglong was beside him a moment later.
“Going somewhere?” Tonglong asked.
ShaoShu was scared, but he was also angry. Tonglong had set him up with that note. He knew that ShaoShu was going to get nabbed as soon as he set foot on the street. ShaoShu found that he could not contain himself. “You knew I would get caught, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” Tonglong replied with a smirk. “But I also had a hunch that you would escape. And I was right.”
“It was a test?”
“Yes, and you passed with flying colors, unfortunately.” Tonglong pulled two gold coins from the pouch on his sash and threw them to ShaoShu. “You have earned those, Little Mouse. You managed to find a flaw in my recruitment enforcers’ procedures. I will have to fix that, beginning with the proper way to tie knots.” He nodded to the bundle of cord still hanging from ShaoShu’s left wrist.
ShaoShu stared at Tonglong. “What if I had failed?”
“Then you would likely begin training as a powder boy first thing tomorrow morning. We can always use fast, nimble children like you on the battlefield to carry cannon fuses and other items to the front lines.”
ShaoShu looked away from Tonglong, frustrated.
“Cheer up, ShaoShu,” Tonglong said. “You succeeded, which means you will remain with me. I will even have a red uniform made for you so that no one will question you again.”
“Thank you, sir,” ShaoShu mumbled, still unable to look at Tonglong. He glanced at Tonglong’s horse.
Tonglong patted the animal’s neck. “You did not know that I am a horseman, did you? I have been riding all my life, and I have the finest stallion in China waiting for me at a former bandit stronghold. I have not seen him in several months. This stubby, hairy one will have to do for now.”
ShaoShu glanced at Tonglong, and Tonglong pointed at the gold coins in ShaoShu’s hand. “We are packing up and moving out tomorrow. I suggest you exchange some of your new wealth for a means of transportation. I will have one of my elite men take you pony shopping today. It is a long walk to the Forbidden City.”
It had taken Long and PawPaw nearly two weeks to pack up all of PawPaw’s belongings, and he was glad to be almost finished with the task. She did not have much in the way of clothes or furniture, but he guessed that she had more medicinal herbs than the best apothecary shops in the largest of cities. Many of the items were rather odd, and she seemed to have saved the strangest for last.
“What are these?” Long asked, holding up a stack of thin, rigid black wafers, each roughly the same size as his palm.
“Dried fruit bats,” PawPaw replied. “Good for digestion.”
“What about these?” he said, poking a finger into a small container of tiny dried objects.
“Don’t touch those!” PawPaw snapped. “Larks’ tongues. Very expensive.”
Long pulled his finger away and shrugged. He wrapped these final fragile items and moved on to the remaining bulky objects, like dried deer antlers and whole tortoiseshells that would one day be ground into powder.
Thanks to PawPaw’s constant attention, Long’s health had steadily improved and he could now handle nearly any task she threw at him. She had removed his stitches, and both wounds were healing nicely. Hok’s estimate of a two-week general recovery proved to be accurate, and he was healthy enough to travel. He was probably even ready to climb onto a horse.
Horses had been on Long’s mind ever since Xie had first mentioned them, and Long was somewhat relieved when the bandit escorts finally arrived with two workhorses, each pulling an empty cart. It meant that he would get a chance to observe the animals up close before he would ever have to climb onto one’s back. In some ways, he wished that he could observe the bandits in advance, too.
His sensitive dan tien had detected the bandits approaching well before they knocked on PawPaw’s door, and he was not sure he liked what he saw. Peering out of PawPaw’s shuttered windows, Long saw the first bandit come into view, and he was one of the strangest-looking humans Long had ever seen. The man had a stubby torso, curiously long arms, and a ratty mustache that reached all the way down to his chest. He was filthy, and even from a distance Long could see that his nose was very wide and almost completely flat. Thick scar tissue crisscrossed his forehead and cheeks, a clear sign that the man was a veteran fighter. He must be NgGung—Centipede.
Hok and the others had told him about NgGung. They had said that he was a very nice man, but warned that he loved to play a game called “One new thing you’ll know for every blow.” Apparently, NgGung would encourage people he had just met to fight him as a means of exchanging information.