Disclaimer: Still don't own Mulan, a lawyer would probably tell us I don't even own the OCs.
Betaed by: Zim'sMostLoyalServant
Treachery
"Hail Bataar, Shan-Yu! The Viper's fangs have been broken!" Batu shouted somewhere. Bataar blinked, looking down at Burilegi, or rather his corpse. The massive man was clad in filthy hides and crowed with a helm fashioned from Tianlinn's own skull; the menace seemed a bit ridiculous with a sword jammed between the eyes.
As men hailed his name, Bataar planted a foot on the usurper's neck and pulled the sword free. Green fire sprang from the wound, and Bataar stepped back as the supernatural flames spread over the body.
He looked to where Shirchin had fallen, Gaitan trying to tend to the great wound on his chest. Good, that meant, for the moment at least, his comrade was alive. Turning away, the victorious young man looked upon the Hill of Eight Bears.
"What? But that's not… right?" Bataar muttered. Looking around, he saw he was alone, the chant of the warriors fading away, leaving only the cold winds and the crackling flames.
"What is this?" Bataar demanded, once more the veteran Shan-Yu.
"This is a battle long over. Foolish boy," a voice rumbled. Holding his sword at ready, Bataar turned on the fire. The body had burned away, only the skull of Burilegi remained, clean and unscorched as the strange flames danced around it.
"Do you haunt me?!" Bataar demanded.
"Always."
"Begone," Bataar commanded, "I finished this long ago in the mist, with the very sword you stole from my father."
"FINISHED? You have never been finished, boy. Ever since you foolishly returned you have pressed onward. Fool that you are; if only my own son had been half the monster you have become," Burilegi chuckled.
"Enough, I'm not a shaman to heed the dead," the Shan-Yu spat.
"Yet you can't ignore them, look beyond and despair, fool!" the usurper laughed.
Beyond the light of the fire, the dead stood thick and fast. Chinese soldiers, Chinese peasants, Hun warriors, and people and warriors of other nations he recognized. Bataar stumbled back at the sight, nearly into the flames. Feeling them at his back he turned, pointing the sword at the skull.
He bared his teeth, looking at the sword; at least he had the blade of his brother and father. The sword he had taken back from his enemy on the battlefield and struck him down with.
"What have you brought against me!?" Bataar demanded.
"Nothing, boy. They are yours, by your own hand or by your command you have made them yours. Look upon them and see!" the dead man cackled. Bataar looked out on the dead, torn and mortally wounded, as they had been when they fell on the fields of battle and slaughter. General Li he spotted, and more and more as he looked on. He lifted his eyes to the Hill's top, empty of dead in the ring of sacred stones. A single figure stood looking down, silhouetted against a red sky.
He somehow knew this watcher was not dead.
"Who is that?" Bataar demanded.
"The one you must reach, if you would escape the host of vengeance," Burilegi answered.
"My enemy?" Bataar asked.
"Perhaps. They are either your salvation or your doom.
"If you want the answer you must reach them! Go boy! If you can, if you DARE!
"HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA!" Burilegi laughed as the skull cracked and shattered, its shards consumed by the fire.
The dead rushed forward, hands extended eyes rolling sightlessly. Bataar met them, sword swinging, cleaving flesh with practiced ease.
"Augghh!" he cried out as their blood hit him. It sizzled with heat like boiling water. They grabbed onto him, trying to drag him down. So he cut and punched and kicked at them with all the fury he could muster. Roaring his defiance to their moans he struggled uphill, as each corpse he battered or cut away was replaced by another.
"HAHAHAHHAHHAHA!"
Han soldiers seized both his arms, one a scout with an arrow in his back, the other a large man with no head. With a roar, Bataar threw them loose, stumbling forward into the press, hacking at the flesh and gritting his teeth as burning blood continued to strike him.
"HAHAHHAAHAHA!"
"Stop laughing, traitor!" Bataar roared. General Li caught Bataar's sword in his hands on the back swing. Roaring, Bataar turned on the dead man and shoved forward, stabbing the corpse deep in the belly. The General smiled and deliberately fell back, taking the sword with him as the hilt slipped through Bataar's blood slicked fingers.
He could only take one step toward the fallen enemy and blade before the dead filled the gap, reaching for him.
Turning back, he saw he had almost gained the summit; he could see the watcher clearer now, it wore Han armor and held a sword in hand. Realization struck him.
"Fa Zhu!" Bataar roared. He punched a dead man's head off and rushed upward, knocking aside the bodies pressing thicker around him.
"You're the only one left, aren't you?! Face me!" the Shan-Yu demanded. He was close, only another step to reach the safety of the stones-
Cold hands grabbed him from his hair to his ankles, a hairsbreadth from safety. With a jerk he fell forward as he was hauled back.
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Burilegi's laugh still sounded through the roaring of the flames. Struggling against the weight pressing him down, Bataar turned his head from the dirt, looking up to see the watcher looking down on him, sword raised.
It wasn't Fa Zhu.
"You," he whispered. Hachin/Maral/Mulan looked down on him, raising her sword, face blank as a mask.
Wolf eyes snapped open, and Bataar snatched the sword from its place at his side as he sprang to his feet. Sweating and panting, he looked around his tent.
"A dream," he growled, lowering the sword. He looked to the opposite side of the tent, where the signs of the woman he had called wife still lingered. His eye turned to the sword he held, her father's sword.
"You killed my brother," Bataar whispered to the sword. He could see his eyes in the steel, as if the sword was glaring back at him.
A knock came at the door. Relieved at an intrusion to put the dream behind him, he called out.
"Enter," The door opened with Ulaan standing in the doorway, quirking an eyebrow at his leader.
"What is it?" Bataar demanded.
"Queen Altan arrived just now. She was rudely hasty in seeing Old Moon. Oh, and your wife has apparently taken refuge in Unegan's tent," the archer reported.
"Well, this day is off to a fine start," Bataar smiled mirthlessly.
China:
The Emperor turned his back at the array of petitions, reports, and the woven map of his empire that dominated the wall. For now, his attention was needed elsewhere.
"My grandson, I am pleased to see you in good health," the Emperor bowed his head in polite respect. Though they were in a study, the Emperor seated before a desk rather than on a throne, Prince Long bowed deeply to him. The Emperor was pleased at the sign of respect, even with only Chifu here.
'Perhaps the boy is maturing at last,' the old ruler thought.
"Most honorable and royal Grandfather, I am pleased to return after the tensions of the invasion. I was loath to leave your side," Prince Long answered, rising. He looked much like his grandsire, though his hair was jet-black, his face young, and the beard graced little more than the point of his jaw, revealing a strong line.
'He has the imperial presence,' the Emperor noted, pleased. The prince sat and the conversation could truly begin.
"It was necessary – I could risk myself and even the city on General Li's might, but to risk my heir as well was too much," Emperor Feng reiterated his reasons.
"It would hardly have been an issue, had you heeded the General's advice, and let the barbarians come to us here, where we would be strongest," the prince remarked politely. The Emperor frowned.
"My selfishness let my people suffer once for my safety. Never again – the people are the empire, and they must be protected by their rulers," the Emperor answered.
"The empire is nothing without the Emperor. And if you would protect them, you should destroy their enemies while they are weak," Long answered evenly. The Emperor looked past Chifu to the map of the empire hanging on the wall. From the reports, he could imagine the conflicts marring it like a disease on the land itself.
A disease they were blessedly recovering from.
"Colonel Li reports success upon success. His only reservation seems to be the smooth return of the rebel peasants to the fold," the Emperor said. Long waved his hand, looking bored.
"A trivial matter," The Emperor restrained himself from scowling at that dismissal, "What matters is the back of the rebellion has been broken. We are also making progress in the west against the mountain raiders. The corsairs have never been a real threat either."
"Last I heard, those pirates had burned a fishing village to the ground."
"And the empire has many more such villages."
"What matters is we now know Shan-Yu Bataar is alive. How long before he returns to threaten the empire once more?" Long questioned.
"Heaven smiled on the Middle Kingdom by destroying his army. To complain about his survival is to be an ingrate to a miracle," the Emperor stated.
"Then we should finish what was started in the Pass. He is weak now, and he has a brother who I believe would be pliable to our cause. Now is the time to put aside petty matters and strike down the Huns," Long declared.
…
…
"Strike? Strike!? You would have us invade another nation while the Middle Kingdom still bleeds? Only a fool knocks down his neighbor's door while his own house is on fire!"
"If that neighbor set it on fire he should take care of him first to ensure he won't do it again! If you miss this opportunity, it will only be a matter of time before the Huns strike south again!"
"The Empire is wounded and exhausted. There is no point to victory if it destroys what you seek to protect!" the Emperor raised his voice, shocking the counselor.
"You were a conqueror once, grandfather," Long snapped.
"And I regret that my vanity almost cost my people everything. Leave my presence," he dismissed with a sharp gesture. The prince frowned but bowed to his sovereign. Once the door closed behind him the Emperor slumped, and took the teacup Chifu offered him.
"If only his father had lived. Sons should bury fathers, not the other way around," Feng lamented.
"Sire, it is the way of young men to test their boundaries. And it is good for an Emperor to be strong, yes?" the counselor assured him.
"Hmm, but boldness is no more strength than discretion is cowardice. Someday soon, that boy will be Emperor. And I am ashamed to say I fear what that will mean for the Middle Kingdom. The empire will need its counselors, men like you to help guide him into wisdom if he does not come into it in time," the Emperor told Chifu. The counselor bowed his head, smiling.
"Of course sire, we live to serve the throne," he said.
XXX
"What's going on?" Mulan asked. There was no one to answer; she could feel she was alone on this mist-shrouded grassland.
"How did I get here?" she wondered, lifting her hand to her brow. The motion sent her sleeve sliding down her arm. That was when she realized she was wearing the dress. The one Unegan had given her for the wedding.
"That's right, I went to Unegan's tent after… Bataar tried to kill me," she recalled. She rubbed her neck; that had been nearly as terrifying as an avalanche coming down on her.
"Still doesn't answer the question. Mushu? Cri-Kee?" she called out.
Clunk Clank ClackThunk
She heard wood hitting wood. Turning around, she listened for the sound – there it was again!
She ran towards it, almost tripping in the tight dress. She kept her feet and went toward the sound.
"Ahhh!" she called out as her foot failed to find ground. Falling backward, flat onto her back, she lifted her head and saw the mist pull back. She could hear voices below, and still that sound of wood.
Rolling over, she crawled to the ledge to try and see without being seen.
Below her on a patch of unobscured grass, two Hun children were fighting, or playing, with wooden swords. One boy had his hair pulled back in a loose braid, the other let his swing freely as they hacked and circled one another. She guessed them to be roughly ten years old.
Then the braided one gave a war cry, a hilariously pitched one, and charged. Mulan stifled a giggle at the sound, which turned to a frown as the other child cried out, dropping his sword. The attacker shoved his opponent onto their back and planted a foot on his stomach pointing the sword at his face.
"Yield," the victor commanded. Mulan's jaw dropped – the winner was a girl. She could see it clearly now, looking at her face as the girl smirked down at the boy. It seemed she was as easily fooled as men when she expected girls to be in dresses.
She looked at the boy, and saw his eyes. Wolf eyes, the Shan-Yu's eyes.
She pushed herself back away from the ledge.
"What is going on?" she demanded of anyone who might be listening.
"I yield," she heard the boy answer.
Thwack
"Ow! Hey, I said I yield!" the boy objected. Mulan rolled her eyes at Hun antics, and caught something at the edge of her eyes. Tilting her head, she saw it and gasped.
Something else stood on the ledge next to her. It stood like a man, but too tall, and wrapped in darkness that swirled around it like smoke. It started to turn its head slowly toward her.
"Idiot, that won't even bruise. If you lose a real fight you'll die," the girl shot back. Did she not see the monster!?
"You just like hitting me when I'm down Zaya! Now let me up!" the boy insisted.
Mulan pushed herself to her feet, or tried to. Her legs wouldn't spread; she fell back down, looking to see the cloth wrapped tight around her legs. Reaching down, she tried to grab the cloth only for the sleeves to fall over her hands, and knot themselves shut.
"What the?" she cursed.
Tugging at the knots through the fabric, she looked back to the monster. It stared down at her with glowing green eyes. She looked back, gritting her teeth, pushing down her fear despite her helplessness.
The shadows pulled back, revealing yellow teeth in a smile. It turned away from her, looking down. Toward the children.
This time, she couldn't push the fear back down.
"Ru-ggghhhhhack," Mulan's scream was cut off as her collar tightened on her throat. She felt the silk wrap tighter around her chest and stomach. It was ten times worse than the matchmaker day. She tried to suck in air even as the end of her sleeves tied themselves together and her legs were forced to bend at the knees.
The world was going dark, and she could only watch as the monster leapt down, towards the children.
"Mistress?" the word let her draw a ragged breath. Pushing the hand away, she grabbed the wrist and yanked the attacker off her feet. In the dark she found their neck and seized it under her elbow.
The monster made a very human gagging sound. And Mulan really looked in the faint lamplight.
"Solongo!" she cried, horrified. She released the woman as if the touch burned. Unegan's cook wife gagged again, touching her neck as she scooted back. They were in a small canvas chamber of the King of the Left's tent, the walls hidden behind Chinese screens depicting palaces and cities in stunning landscapes.
The lamp sat by the flap entryway, obviously set aside by her visitor.
"I am so sorry," Mulan apologized. Trying to sit up she felt legs tangled tight in the ornate blanket. The feeling made her lurch back towards the nightmare for a moment. She tore it away, actually relishing the tearing sound before kicking the bedding away.
Free, she reached out to comfort the scared woman, only for the Hun to flinch away.
"It's alright, my lady! I should have just left the tray for you!" Solongo apologized, bowing her head. Mulan noticed a steaming tray of food by the lamp.
"I… had a nightmare. Please let me check you, make sure I didn't-" Mulan said, kneeling down in front of the other woman. The other woman stood up and walked backwards towards the flap quickly.
"No, I should not have disturbed you. Please enjoy your breakfast. You have freedom of the tent; if you want anything you need only ask the lesser wives. His Majesty my husband advises you to remain here until he returns to speak and plan with you. He left you a change of clothes," Solongo told her, never lifting her eyes from the floor.
She was gone before Mulan could say another word. Mulan sighed, placing herself by the array and selecting her first bite. It was good, the warmth eating away the chill from that horrible dream. Taking the time to look at the screens, her eyes fell on a low table. Her change in clothes was laid out on it.
Caspar's fine Chinese dress.
XXX
"So in other words, your answer is no," Altan stated. She sat in Old Moon's tent, ignoring the strangeness to focus on the little old man sitting across from her.
"It's not that I don't want to help, Altan. But I cannot leave now," he insisted, rubbing his very wrinkled brow. The light haired Hun pressed her lips into a line. Sighing, Old Moon spoke.
"I know you are upset-"
"Oh, this betrayal does not begin to get covered with upset," she snapped. The words were not hot; they were cold. Old Moon frowned, placing his hands in his lap.
"I betray nothing. I can't go because I am the Shan-Yu's shaman and I sense I will be needed here soon," he told her.
"Your tribe is not being haunted by a wicked spirit, a child is not being threatened here. You owe our family a debt for supporting Bataar when he needed it most. Whatever you call it, if you don't aid us now, it is a betrayal.
"And you know what my husband is when he is stirred. But also remember what I am," she warned him leaning forward.
"A foreigner with different knowledge and perspectives?" Old Moon asked warily.
"A mother, with a child in danger. Reconsider quickly, old man," she told him. Old Moon scowled as she stood up.
"Threats will not aid little Nara," the shaman told her.
"Then consider it a promise," she told him. When the entry closed behind her, Old Moon let the scowl slip and took a deep breath.
"Too quick, too little time. The evil is hidden, if I don't find it first…" he whispered.
XXX
Lassluun looked to the skies as Shirchin caught up with him. The two were walking through the Ger, by the unofficial border between the two tribes' tents. Shirchin frowned, sticking a finger under his helm to scratch at his scalp.
"So what's this business you wanted my help with?" Shirchin asked. Lassluun lowered his gaze and considered his comrade for a moment.
"Right in here," the other Hun said, gesturing to an unremarkable tent. It didn't even have a door, just a flap. Shirchin pulled the flap up, walking in; Lasuluun made to follow, but stopped, instead turning to stand casually next to the entrance.
Shirchin stopped inside the box filled tent, seeing the sole occupant.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded.
"I just wanted to talk to you in private," Unegan said. The handsome king leaned back slightly from where he sat on a chest.
"I'm not interested in anything you have to say," the warrior retorted. He turned to go as the royal spoke.
"He's not who you think he is. At least not anymore," Unegan said. Shirchin stopped and turned enough to watch the fix prince with one eye.
"What are you talking about?" Shirchin demanded.
"You follow the strong, the mighty, and so you have followed Bataar. But can you still believe he is the strongest, having been defeated by a mere woman-"
"Lasuluun, he told you that?" Shirchin demanded, hand flying to his sword.
"He saw what you are denying, that Bataar is no longer fit to lead the Huns."
"Nonsense," Shirchin spat.
"You're not a fool, you can see what has happened.
"First he leads his army to defeat. Then he shows mercy to the one responsible for his defeat. He lets an old man force him into a marriage, and doesn't even break that enemy in the marriage bed.
"You have been faithful, but he has not kept that faith. He betrays the memory of your comrades by letting their slayer worm her way into the tribe, and through him the whole confederation. He hasn't even bedded her, her hold is that strong."
"That's a lie!" Shirchin objected.
"No, it isn't. He has become weak. If he weren't, wouldn't he have dragged an errant wife back from my tent like a true man?" Unegan pressed.
"…What are you doing, exactly?" Shirchin asked finally.
"Extending an offer, as I have with Lasluun. He told me you were a man who could be counted on," unegan answered smoothly.
"Treason, you are planning to grab for the mantle," Shirchin realized.
"Shhh. One must speak cautiously. But you should know, unlike Bataar, I reward my men well for loyalty."
"Bataar has not-" the warrior objected.
"You nearly died defending him from my father at the Battle of Mists. And you came back from the edge of death to find your woman had been given to someone else. She was weak, it was to be expected, but he should have interceded on your behalf. Instead the woman, and the son, have been given to a man who doesn't care for either," Unegan smiled. Shirchin faced him fully, now, hand still on the hilt.
"I can offer what should have been yours. It's not stealing when the prize is already your due. I offer you that and much more," Unegan whispered across the room.
XXX
"A foolish question, I expected better from you, Lady," Bataar said. He stood in the corral, brushing down his stallion with a steady hand. Altan stood behind him, arms crossed and looking quite displeased.
"He is your shaman, command him to save my daughter," she told him.
"You lack your usual tact. You know better than to order me. And as a shaman, he is outside my authority. I can give him orders and make demands, but normal men cannot compel those who speak with the ancestors and spirits. Not even a Shan-Yu. And as the most distinguished shaman, even his own kind can't order him," Bataar reminded her.
"Tch, I sometimes forget how you Huns let your priests run rampant. Where I came from, royals executed priests that displeased them," she sneered.
"'You' Huns. Whatever you once were, you are one of us now, insulting yourself makes you look like a fool," he laughed mirthlessly.
"This is no game Bataar," Altan reminded him.
"I know Coyot – you expect me to believe he will go to war? For one daughter, placing all his other children in harms way? He is too reasonable for such madness, and it would be a lot of work for him besides," Bataar said. He turned to face her now, and was surprised to see her expression. It wasn't angry now; she looked… sad?
"Of course you wouldn't understand, would you? You lost your family too young, and I hear Tianlinn hardly bothered with you and the other little ones.
"Understand this, what you know about my husband is true. But it is also true there is more than that. With all men save the worst, they change when you put that firstborn child in their arms. They may not endure birth or carry the child, but men are still affected by becoming fathers.
"It changes things, sometimes a little, or sometimes a great deal. It can't be understood by the ignorant, but you would do well to fear it," she told him. She left him there a bit stunned, and oddly feeling at loss of what to do.
He shook his head a bit, clearing it. Turning back to the horse, he resumed the grooming. It hardly mattered – even if that was true, he would deal with it when the time came.
But surely it would not come to that?
XXX
"Is it true?" Qorchi asked. The Hun family was gathered in their tent, something cooking in a pot. Ulaan lay on the men's side, looking up at the ceiling, while his wife sat on her side, mending a tunic meticulously. Her son stood beside her; she glanced up from her work at him.
"Is what true?" she asked.
"The other kids say there's a curse. That's why Old Barrago's family is fighting, and now King Coyot's daughter is dying.
"They say tings are going to get worse, because the Shan-Yu angered the spirits," Qorchi told her. She smiled at him before answering.
"We Huns are warriors; every once in a while we fight each other, too. Soon enough they'll come to their senses or someone will knock their heads together. And the girl is sick, not dying," she told him.
"What if things do get worse? Will we go war again?" he asked.
"Bataar is strong, no one would dare threaten him here," Oyunbileg told him. The boy smiled, and the man scoffed. Ulaan sat up and gave his wife an irritated look.
"Strength is no assurance of safety. I don't know if this is some curse but these events leave us vulnerable. Especially with Bataar sending off warriors east and west to try and clean things up.
"This is probably the most dangerous situation the tribe has been in since the Battle of Mists," Ulaan said. Qorchi gulped and Oyunbileg frowned as she set aside the tunic and thread.
"Really?" she demanded.
"You do him no favors by lying. Especially a comforting lie," he told her. Her eye narrowed and Qorchi backed up, away from his parents.
"And scaring him helps? He's only a boy," she responded.
"Boys become men, the sooner the better in this world," he answered evenly.
"Well I know one man who can find his dinner elsewhere," she told him, crossing her arms. Rolling his eyes, Ulaan got up, grabbing his bow and quiver from their spot by the door. He stopped to look back at his wife.
"You know I'm right," he told her. She didn't answer and he turned and left through the door, closing it behind him.
"He'll be back once he realizes he will have to knock on someone else's door in this cold," Oyunbileg smiled. She gave her son a wink; the smile he gave her… even she could tell it wasn't real.
"It will be alright," she told him. Getting up, she went over to the stove and lifted the lid to check on dinner.
"They also said Maral and the Shan-Yu had a fight, and she's staying at the King's tent now," Qorchi said. Oyunbileg put the lid back in place before answering.
"That's nothing, couples fight. I just kicked your father out for a bit," Oyunbileg told him.
'That's true, but what woman would run to that man's tent? She's a smart girl, isn't she? What aren't you telling me, Ulaan?' she wondered. A knock came at the door, and her face light up with a smile. She turned to her son, showing the look off.
"What did I tell you – he comes crawling back already. Doesn't have the social nerve to knock and ask for dinner from someone else," she snickered. She opened the door and was surprised to find a figure filling it far more than she expected.
"Shirchin?" she asked. She stopped aside, letting the Hun warrior in. He took off his helmet as he looked around, scratching at the short-cropped dark hair under it. Not a good sign, she thought.
"What are you doing here? Ulaan stepped out," she told him.
"Oh, he did?" Shirchin said. Looking around, he saw the archer was indeed missing.
"Well, I just wanted to check on you, both of you," he said. Oyunbileg frowned, stepping around him and back to the dinner in the works. Qorchi stepped up to the big Hun and asked a question.
"Is it true. Is it dangerous?" he asked the adult. Shirchin looked down at the boy, and knelled to look him in the face.
"Yes, but you don't need to worry. I won't let anything bad happen to you or your mother," he said softly.
"What about father?" he asked. He tilted his head at the slight grimace, but his mother didn't see it at all, concluding dinner was ready. She answered the question for Shirchin as she took the food from the heat.
"Your father can take care of himself. And so can I, for that matter. But for being a proper man, I think you deserve a little reward. Someone should enjoy Ulaan's portion even if he is too proud to take it," Oyunbileg said. She started to set out the food as her son took his usual place, Shirchin watching them both. Closing his eyes, he nodded his head slightly.
"Yes," he whispered. Moving away from the door he bent to help the spear wife set out dinner.
XXX
Mulan shifted, trying to get comfortable at the table.
'This shouldn't be so difficult,' she thought, irritated. She was sitting on a proper cushion before a table that held a fine Chinese dinner, wearing the Chinese dress. She carefully selected a bit and raised it to her mouth. In addition to the dress, her host had one of his wives apply make up; he insisted she have the best in light of her distressing treatment at his brother's hands.
'Does he think getting your face painted is comfortable?' Mulan wondered. She ate the morsel carefully; she had a feeling smudging the make up would be a bad idea. Unegan sat across from her, watching her more than eating his own meal.
Mushu's light weight on her shoulders was a comfort at least; the dragon was insistent he be on hand where any Hun was concerned. She could feel Cri-Kee in her hair too. His movement was reassuring; the cold was not agreeing with the little bug at all, despite the brave face he was putting on.
'At least the make up on my neck covers the bruises,' she thought bitterly. Unegan answered the frown with one of his own.
"Everything to your liking?" he asked gently.
"Oh yes, it's all lovely, I can't believe you can do all this on the steppes.
"I was just thinking about Ba- the Shan-Yu," she told him.
"Yes, of course, he would bring a frown to any proper lady's face. Let's keep him out of here tonight; there doesn't need to be anyone else here but us," he smiled. She felt Mushu's tail wrap lightly around her neck as Unegan sipped his rice wine.
"Well, are you certain your plan will work?" she asked.
"Why wouldn't it work?" Unegan demanded.
"Well, you seem to really need me and Altan for it to go like you want. And, well, we are both foreigners. And, the Shan-Yu is very strong," she told him.
"Bataar may have great strength, but his way with people is where his power comes from. Fate and his own pride have stripped him of even more of that than he realizes.
"As for you and the other. Being foreigners should be a credit to you, not a vice. What have the Huns ever achieved worthy of remembering, I ask you?
"All they are good for is destroying, and stealing the work of better races. You were blessed to be born to the most blessed nation under the heavens, Mulan," he breathed her name.
'I shouldn't have told him that,' Mulan thought mournfully. Unegan got up from his seat and walked around the table. He was dressed in Chinese finery; it looked bizarre with his Hun face on top of it. She couldn't help but think of Bataar at the wedding – the finery had been strange, but it had suited the strange place. All of this, just like the dress that felt too tight, seemed wrong in a way she couldn't quite define.
Mushu's tail tightening on her neck slightly made her tense up; that hurt. Grabbing the dragon, she pulled him off and lightly tossed him down with her free hand. Only to realize why he had tensed, when Unegan put his fingertips under her chin.
When had he gotten so close?! And why weren't any of his wives here this time? Her eyes were wide as she was made to look up into his smiling face.
"You are beautiful. No woman of this hard, savage, land could ever match your beauty, your elegance," he told her. Well, that was a compliment she had never gotten before. She wasn't sure whether she was reddening in blush or in response to the very uninvited touch.
Hun women…
"What will happen to Oyunbileg, Choeten, and the others? When you become Shan-Yu?" Mulan asked. His fingers jerked, grabbing her jaw for a moment as his nostrils flared.
Then the hand was pulling away and he was smiling again. He stepped back and walked around the table to his own spot. Sitting down, he picked up his chopsticks and took a few bites in silence. Finally, as she watched him, he pointed at her with his chopsticks.
"You need not worry. You're too beautiful to concern yourself with petty details. Trust me, and we will get what we have always deserved," he told her warmly. As the Hun King took a long draw of the wine, she exchanged a look with Mushu. For her, being where he had wanted her to be, he didn't look happy.
'He's right though, it doesn't matter. I'm going home," she told herself. Still, the meal passed in silence broken only by pleasantries that rang empty. The best part was when the chief wife she had been resenting so recently came to escort her to her room.
XXX
Bataar stood on a stone littered hilltop, looking out on the steppes under the light of the half moon. The wind had died down even at the height; the night was still, and cold. The Shan-Yu did not turn at the sounds of someone's approach – he knew the sounds of these shambling steps well enough.
Then the steps stopped, and Bataar spoke.
"You lied to me," he told the shaman.
"You never asked whose daughter she was," Old Moon pointed out. The Shan-Yu turned to face the old man, his eyes bright in the dark.
"Then you did know. From the beginning?" Bataar asked.
"No, it came together piece by piece. The object of your obsession had to be tied to the means of your redemption," Old Moon answered calmly.
"Fa Zhu's child. His only child – you kept my vengeance from me. Would you have let me perpetuate his bloodline, mingling my father's blood with his, like a fool?" Bataar demanded. Old Moon looked at him coldly, seeing and blind eye both boring into golden ones.
"Is it true you tried to kill her?" Old Moon asked.
"Yes," Bataar answered. He barely blocked the staff from hitting his face. But the shaman was behind him then, and struck in the back of the knee, sending him to kneeling hard. Old Moon struck him over the head, the wood rapping hard in his skull.
"Savage! You are blessed with a thread of salvation and you would rip it apart!?" Old Moon screamed, raising the staff to hit him again. It came down in the palm of Bataar's hand. Standing, the Shan-Yu jerked the staff out of the shaman's grip, sending him falling to the ground. Bataar tossed it away and looked down on the old man.
Old Moon propped himself up on an elbow and glared up at the Shan-Yu.
"I sent you to your death. You know that, but you haven't really thought in it, have you? I raised you as best I could, you are the closest thing I have ever had to a son, and I could not deny you had earned the fate I saw for you!
"I remember in the north, the day Zaya died. You sensed it, you knew even before I told you. It broke my heart to see that light leave your eyes. And when you returned with a heart full of hate, I was frightened for you.
"When you spared Unegan, and so many who followed Burilegi, I thought you had come through the darkness. But you were only moving on to your next target in your vengeance," Old Moon snarled.
"Sparing Unegan was a mistake," Bataar interrupted.
"No! It was not! He may have squandered your mercy, but on that day he did not deserve to die. Mercy and honor, they are not weaknesses! They are the gift of the strong to the weak. They burn away the edges of the darkness that would swallow the world," Old Moon insisted.
"Honor, mercy, you should know better! Bharbo's honor saw him dead, his mercy let Fa Zhu live to turn the tide at the Imperial City!" Bataar roared.
"Fa Zhu's lack of honor does not mean Bharbo's honor was misplaced. The test of honor is when it faces the dishonorable."
"You think my family was with his honor?!"
"They were my family too you brat!"
"…"
"There was no blood between us, but I lived with them, served them long before you were born. I held Tianlinn the day he was born and tried to learn of his future. Same for Burilegi and the other children of their father and his brothers.
"I watched generations grow from babes at their mothers' breasts, to being laid in their graves from war, disease, or age. And I lived to see all that be torn away, by a boy who I had once encouraged to rise from the sorrow his brother's shadow cast him in.
"Do you think a day passes when I don't wonder what else I could have done? If there wasn't something, anything, I might have done to stop that horrible night? Or to even keep that lonely child from becoming a man so consumed by ambition he would do such a thing?!
"You know nothing of grief! I have outlived more friends and kin than you have met people in your life!
"But unlike you, I moved on! I mourn the dead, and get up to serve the living. I didn't want you to avenge the dead. I wanted you to seek justice, to free the living and secure a future free from his madness.
"And now I look at you, the boy named 'hero'. And I see so much of the very men you hate in you. Burilegi, brutal and thoughtlessly cruel to those he deems enemies; and Fa Zhu, without honor," Old Moon finished.
Bataar gritted his teeth, with a straining sound in his jaw. He turned away, and kicked a rock clear out of the soil sending dirt flying.
"You… may live, if you do not oppose me. But you do so as the shaman of this tribe, that and nothing more. Things will no longer be as they were," Bataar whispered. Old Moon lowered his brow to dying grass, not watching the ruler walk away.
"Failure. I don't ask your forgiveness Zaya, I deserve whatever punishment comes," Old Moon whispered to the night and land.
Author's Note:
Three more chapters to go. Next chapter will be a bit. I want to update DX and take a little break from this story. That chapter is already approximately half done, so it should not take long. However, I also leave on vacation on the sixth, and I won't be writing during that time.
Still we may see this story wrapped up inside July!
Hope it stays appealing in the final stretch.
Long days and pleasant nights to you all!