water12 THE WAY OF WATER
By Pooky

Chapter Twelve:

Most of the fighting was already over by the time Mulan saw Shang fall. Whatever remained of the enemy forces must have scattered and fled, not enough to be worth a burned forest, and a waste of men to pursue. But she had no thought for that anymore, rushing towards Shang frantically.

"Shang!" She called his name in a panic, dropping down beside him on her knees. He groaned, placing his hands on the ground to keep from falling where he knelt beside the motionless general, but hardly looked able to hold himself up. A large red stain spread over his shoulder from under his armor, the torn cloth of his robe revealing the bare, sliced skin. Even his hands were coated in blood.

"I'm getting Captain Meng," a soldier called over his shoulder as he sped past them.

Nodding, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders before he could fall on the hard stone, he was heavy but at least he managed to fall in her lap. She tried to peel the tattered cloth of his shirt back to get a look at the wound, but he pulled her hand away. "It's nothing."

She frowned at him. "You're bleeding badly." When she moved her arm just a little she saw the red smears on her sleeve as well. "Just try not to move." She hoped Tai-shan would hurry.

He cracked her a weak smile. "I'm fine and if you want me to prove it I'll spar with you right now."

Mulan laughed despite herself. "Fine, if you can get up." To her annoyance, he tried, but she forced him down again rather with the weight of her hand on his good shoulder. Settling back against her his eyelids began to droop. Mulan looked for Tai-shan and then back at him in alarm. "Shang, stay awake." Her voice was shaking.

"Alright," he sighed, fighting to keep his eyes open. "Keep me awake then, ask me something."

"Um," Mulan stammered nervously, finding it hard to think, blood was starting to gush through the tear in his clothes. "What did the medic say to you when I was wounded at the Tung Shao Pass?"

The question made him chuckle softly. "He said 'Captain Li, it seems your wounded soldier is a little more than a flower vase.' It took me a minute to figure out what he meant." Mulan couldn't help but burst into laughter. He was smiling to himself, even as he fought to breathe with the pain. Funny, how one crisis became humorous when replaced by another. Then he stopped smiling, reaching up to touch her cheek. "Now don't cry," he said softly. "It makes you look so frail, just like that day in the mountains. You should never look that way again." Mulan swallowed, she wasn't... Too late, a tear was already sliding down her cheek.

Embarrassed, she looked away. Tai-shan appeared out of nowhere, three more officers behind him, all with the same frantic look. "Did you try to stop the bleeding?" He asked in a rush, handing his helmet over. Mulan blinked at him in confusion then shook her head, moving back to hold Shang's head in her lap. Tai-shan edged closer, tearing a strip of material from his shirt and folding it quickly. Despite the panicked look painting his face, his hands were remarkably steady.

"It's hit the artery, Shan," one of the men was saying behind him, his face grim. "Look at the color of that blood." Mulan looked down to see the wound pulsing bright red. She tightened her arms around him desperately.

Shang only grumbled something as Tai-shan leapt on top of him, hurriedly pressing the cloth into the wound with both hands and holding it there. "It's soaking through," Mulan murmured, watching the red stain seeping onto Tai-shan's fingers.

He tore another bit of cloth, rolling it and holding it on top of the first, leaning back on his knees for leverage. "Blood that flows out like this needs direct pressure over the artery that's cut, it takes time to stop. With your rank you should know this, you should have done something sooner." The look he gave her was bitter and scolding. blaming her. Mulan sighed and stayed silent, not knowing what to say. Tai-shan shook it off and spoke patiently again. "Nevermind. Just keep him comfortable and watch what I'm doing. You have a lot to-" He took a glance at Shang's paling face and tightened his features nervously. "Can you hear us, Shang?" Mulan felt her heart beating faster when he did not answer. "Shang...?"

His eyes were closing, and she felt his head fall limp in her lap. Tai-shan reached up one hand and rubbed a point above Shang's lip quickly, calling his name again. "That stimulates breathing," he explained to her after a moment. "You don't want the breathing to fade." His eyes met hers as he said it, his gaze deep and severe. From the desperation in his features as he looked at Shang, and the imploring way his eyes sought the sky as though in prayer, Mulan could see that the two of them were closer than she had ever imagined.

Shang had his eyes open in the next moment, breathing heavier now. "Shan," he managed faintly, eyes moving unsteadily to his friend's face then leaning his head back to look at her, smiling drowsily.

"Alright, alright." Tai-shan breathed in a tired sigh. "Bleeding's stopped. Shang?" He rested the back of one blood-smeared hand against the side of Shang's face, still holding the cloth down on the wound with the other. Shang seized his wrist weakly, pressing Tai-shan's hand closer against his skin, mumbling something inaudible to Mulan's ears.

"He's cold." One of the men said to her. Mulan nodded, seeing the way he was clutching Tai-shan's hand for warmth, his ashen face a sharp contrast with the flush of exertion to the other man's skin. "We have to get him somewhere warm, Shan, but we can't move him too much."

Tai-shan nodded as Shang dropped his hand. "Get some opium and start a fire in the tower. We'll bring him inside once he has more strength. Mulan," his tone was much calmer now, not bitter at all. "Will you go find the medic? And tell Tie-lin." Nodding, Mulan gently slid out from under Shang, easing his head onto the ground. His eyes were closed, passed out from the pain now. But none of the men seemed worried over it. Tai-shan noticed her hesitation and laid a hand over hers. "He'll be alright, Mulan," he said gently, seeming to respect her concern. "I wouldn't let him die."

Rising to her feet, Mulan took in the quiet determination in his face, surprised to find her eyes watering as Tai-shan pushed a fallen lock of hair from Shang's forehead. The image was too poignant for jealousy.

~ * ~

At first the crackle of the fire seemed the only thing in the whole world. But ever so slowly pain settled in, burning all the way from fingers to chest as if that fire existed inside his own body. There was the sense of warmth and the weight of blankets over him, the acrid smoke smell filling his nose. Years seemed to pass before his open eyes were able to comprehend color and shape, the golden capering of the flames and the deep brown of the shadows on the stone walls. Shang shifted under the covers, under the pain he knew there was such peace.

"Are you awake, Shang?" Childhood nightmares, that was what the soft question brought to mind. But his father was dead and those nightmares were gone now. "Shang?"

Drowsily, his eyes brought Tai-shan in focus, kneeling beside the fire and watching him with tired, worried eyes. How many times in ten years had Shang seen him look at him that way? "Shan," his voice echoed weak and strained in his ears. "I killed my father."

"Oh for the love of Heaven, Shang," his eyes were fierce, his angry tone hardly concealing his frustration. "And all my Ancestors - whoever they are. If you tell me that you feel any remorse for killing that son of a bitch then I will beat it out of you here and now!"

Shang flinched, his friend was far from his usual sarcasm now. "He was still my father, Shan." This time his voice was more steady.

"Be a man, Shang," Tai-shan wasn't going to concede an ounce of sympathy; his hatred ran deep. "Think of your sister that you're supposed to honor and protect. Would you rather she be sold to Shan-yu and raped every night so you won't have Li Shengli's death to feel guilty over? If that would have been one of my sisters or my uncle's daughters... " He let his words trail off with a shake of his head. "You have to remember some devotion for your family, Shang, you can't just think of yourself all the time."

That stung more than the pain of his wound, but he was too tired to be angry, and tired of being angry. Tai-shan wouldn't say it to hurt him. He stirred under the blankets again, noticing his armor was gone, the shirt he wore sticking to his skin where the blood had dried. Letting out a tight breath, Shang settled on his back, glancing at his torn shirt in the dimness.

"Here, here, I'll clean that for you," Tai-shan moved closer. "I didn't want to wake you since all I have is Liu's Du Kang." Shang cringed when he opened the bottle and splashed the liquor on a bit of cloth.

But he lay back and let Tai-shan pull open his shirt, letting out a choked breath at the torrid sting of liquor on his torn skin. His friend glanced at him apologetically as he dabbed the cloth around the wound, wiping the dried blood away as carefully as he could.

"You have a woman's touch," Shang said quietly. There was such a look of concentration on his face that Shang could not help but tease him.

"What?" Tai-shan blinked at him then tilted his head in one of his arrogant smiles. "That's not what you said when we were sparring this morning. It seems I had a Master's touch then, look." His hand travelled down Shang's chest and he winced as Tai-shan pressed a bruise deliberately. "You can go marry your Mulan, Shang, but she'll never give you bruises like I do." His laughter was rich, even when Shang pushed him away.

"Stop playing, Shan," Shang growled half-heartedly.

But when he turned his face again Tai-shan's eyes were serious. "You do want to marry her don't you, Shang?" His tone was unusually quiet. "Admit it."

A rush of a emotion swelled in him. He closed his eyes, finding it almost painful. "How can I go from holding a sword over her head in the mountains to exchanging betrothal gifts with her family? It just doesn't seem fair. She deserves more."

A taut silence swept through the room. Tai-shan lowered his head, a struggle showing through in his features. He laid a light hand on Shang's shoulder and when he spoke his voice was unsteady. "Nothing hurts so much as not being able to confess to the one you love." Shang looked up at him in surprise. He had never seen his eyes so full of pain before. He would have given the world to know what Shan was thinking then. "I think you should do what you want, Shang." Tai-shan said more confidently in the next minute.

"I think I'll try at least," Shang smiled to himself.

"Here," Shan had something in his hand that Shang realized was opium. He smeared a small amount of the sticky stuff on Shang's lip quickly before standing up. "I'm going to get the others. It's cold. We'd better take you inside."

Nodding, Shang lay back, licking the bitter drug from his lips. The first thing he was going to do was ask for Mulan.

~ * ~

An hour later, Mulan was pacing outside the hall, waiting for Shang to wake. In that time they discovered that General Li had not died, but was bound in another room unconscious again and too broken to be of any trouble. It was Shang's decision what would be done with him. Mulan could not decide what Shang was most likely to do, and wondered if he had known his father was left alive all along, if he had done this purposely. Shang would rather preserve a life than take it, he had learned that much of the Way.

"His wound is bad karma.'" Tie-lin had explained, watching in sadness as her brother was carried inside by the men. She showed an equal sadness for her incapacitated father, though of a different kind, and with more depth. The sadness for one who might have chosen a different path, a more honorable path, more like the son he so hated. "It's the price he paid for satisfying his anger with a fight. Soldiers, when will they learn? It is always better to let things be. The Tao gave birth to the world without armies, and for a long time it survived in peace." Mulan nodded her fervid agreement, Shang should have just let his father go. He could have been killed today.

Mulan tried to hide her eagerness as Tai-shan emerged from Shang's room, the medic behind him carrying a small pile of bloodied clothes and bandages. Spotting her immediately, the captain waved her over.

"He is asking for you, Mulan," Shang's friend said gently. There were dark circles under his eyes now. But she let out a breath that she seemed to have been holding the entire hour. Everything would be alright now. "He's had a lot of opium but I think he wants to tell you something." And with a little bow he walked away from her, scooping up Tie-lin and carrying her down the hall.

Smiling, she made her way into the room.

Shang was propped up on his pillow with his eyes open, his arms folded restlessly over the blankets, unaccustomed to lying still. A large white bandage was entwined around his arm and over the wound, but aside from that he was bare-chested, even his hair was beginning to escape its usual tidy knot. It was an odd picture, for someone who was always so meticulous.

He smiled when he saw her. "Another trick of yours, Ping?" his voice mocked her faintly, softly. "You appear by magic every time I need you."

Tai-shan was right, he was not clear-headed at all, but it was one of the few times she had ever seen him at ease. "You asked for me," she reminded him patiently.

"Did I?" He blinked in uncertainty. "I don't remember." His eyes fell closed a moment and he sighed, something painful, wistful, crept across his face. "I had a dream. I was riding along the slopes of Wushan, it was lonely and dark. I met a woman there who took pity on me and let me rest with her beside her pool. She had your face."

The poignant longing in his words was enough to make her chest ache, filling her with hope and unhappiness at the same time. She crossed to the room to him slowly, sinking to her knees at his side. Her hand inched up to touch his forehead, finding no sign of fever. His eyes still closed, unwilling to let go of the memory. He seemed so moved.

"You've been in my dreams before," she confessed softly. A lump was rising in her throat, this wasn't supposed to be painful. It wasn't... it was... so dramatic and strange.

His eyes had opened, blinking again as if wondering if he had heard her right. "Really? What was I doing?"

"I don't remember," she glanced down, blushing, comrades weren't supposed to dream of each other. "I would just wake up with the feeling that you were there."

"Was I bullying you? Giving you black eyes, laughing at you? Standing back and not doing a thing while Yao and Ling torment you?" A wave of guilt crossed his face. "Or was I being completely ungrateful, abandoning you in the cold mountains? I can't imagine what nightmares you must have of me." With another long sigh he elapsed into his usual solemnity.

Mulan clutched his hand over the blankets. "No," she shook her head gently. "Nothing like that, nothing to do with the army. In my dreams you were always happy."

His fingers entwined their way around hers. "Well I must have been if I was with you."

Unable to conjure anything but a flushed smile in response, Mulan glanced at his wound. "Does it hurt?" What did the medic say?"

Turning towards her he gave her a half smile. Had it come from anyone else she would have called it flirtatious, the way he cocked his brow and winked a little. It must have been the drug, or Tai-shan rubbing off on him. "Look at you, what if someone walked in now, they would think you were in love with me."

At first she was abashed, then offended, he made it sound disdainful, as if he were talking to another man. Not until she caught the almost hopeful look in his eyes did she realize he was only playing, covering up his question by teasing her.

Two could play. "What?" Mulan teased back. "I'm in love with Yao."

He started to say something more, but stopped, meeting her eyes. For once his gaze was not hardened by anger nor darkened by worry, but it was no less intense. A part of her wanted to look away, his eyes revealing too many secrets at once for the mystery he had been. Instead she saw her chance and seized it, pulling him forward and forcing her mouth against his. His lips were soft when they moved against hers, but still the kiss continued urgently.

A disgusted cough interrupted them.

"General Li!" Chi fu nearly shrieked. "Can't you keep your hands off your own soldiers?" The pair of them, who could not decide whether to be amused or embarrassed, just stared at him. Finally Shang shrugged with his palms spread out to show that this was not his doing, leaving Mulan to blush and pull properly away.

"You wanted something?" Shang recovered his dignity faster than she did, and his impatience.

Chi fu mumbled something before scratching on his clipboard. "Yes, I am reporting to the Emperor. We will have to leave for Ch'ang-an tomorrow, the Emperor will be impatient."

"Fine," Mulan was surprised he did not ask why. He did not seem to care. "But first we stop in Louyang to see my sister safely home."

Nodding, Chi fu made a few final notes before stalking back down the hall.

"Shang," Mulan lowered her voice when he had gone far enough out of earshot. "I'm not sure how far he is involved in your father's conspiracy."

He only shrugged as if to say this too was for the Emperor to decide. Then he dropped the subject just as suddenly and closed his eyes. "Will you stay with me?" He mumbled drowsily. "I want to dream of you again."

She nodded, quietly still holding his hand as he fell asleep once more.

~ * ~

Six days later Mulan found herself at a tavern in Louyang. They had already returned to camp, bearing the news of General Li, who was left sedated with opium under a tight guard. Special pains were taken to be sure he remained alive to receive due punishment in Ch'ang-an. Death from a battle wound was too honorable an end for a traitor.

Mulan looked around the table at her three companions, Tai-shan and Shang seemed to be paying more attention to their liquor than the meal, and Tie-lin was hardly eating herself. Too much had happened in the past few days to conjure much of an appetite.

The solemn mood must have been too much for Tai-shan, he picked up the shot of liquor before him and set it right in front of Mulan. "Drink up," he commanded in his usual self-satisfied amusement. "I made a bet with Captain Liu that I could endure one more week without drinking."

Surprised, Mulan sniffed at it gingerly, her nose wrinkling. She'd only ever had wine before.

"Shan, what do you think you're doing?" Shang glared at his friend, not amused at all. "She'll pass out right on the floor if she drinks that."

She knew it was silly, but her pride was hurt. Tai-shan saw it and laughed, shaking his head at Shang. "She wants to dress like a man she can drink like one," he reasoned simply, but he was smiling. "I told you that you had a lot to learn, Mulan, but you did do well. They'll honor you when you return to Ch'ang-an. Still, you'd better drink. No one will ever accept you as an officer until they see us carrying you out of here." He chuckled as if the image amused him. Mulan only shook her head. It was simply too difficult for him to say thank you for helping Tie-lin escape.

Glancing at Tai-shan crossly, Tie-lin lifted her wine glass. "How about a toast?"

After the two men nodded, Mulan tipped back the cup and tried not to choke on the awful tasting stuff, wondering what the fuss over it was. Still, she was smiling at her strange new acceptance, even if it only came from crazy Tai-shan.

"Brother," Tie-lin was glancing between her and Shang with a little smile. "You know the Emperor will grant you a favor for your victory at the Wall. What will you ask for?"

There was a layer of secrecy to the those words, something which made Tie-lin grin pointedly and Shang look down in smiling embarrassment. The look that passed between them was one only shared between siblings, even Tai-shan did not appear to understand when Mulan looked to him for help.

He never got a chance to answer though. In the next minute one of Marshal Yu's men was approaching the table, leaning to whisper something to Shang which made his smile fade quickly, pressing a small object into the General's hand.

That smile did not return when the soldier departed. "My aunt, the Princess Taiping wants to see me when I return to Ch'ang-an," he announced somewhat somberly. Mulan was perplexed, knowing nothing of this famous woman, only the name. She had heard it spoken often among the courtiers at the banquet.

"You might account her summons as a blessing, brother." There was a slight scolding to Tie-lin's words, and that pointedness again which put Shang off balance. "If you play the game right you might understand that a woman is more likely to grant the reward you might seek.." Cryptic as ever, she took a sip of her wine, throwing a triumphant glance at Tai-shan for some reason.

Shang was smiling again uncomfortably, shifting his feet under the table. "I'll talk to my aunt," he said quietly.

~ The End ~