Okay, here's chapter ten!
Chapter Ten
Zhuge Liang's last three sentences echoed in Mei Li's mind. Though so much was going through her mind at that moment, she was unable to convey it all into speech. Without realizing it, her mouth hung open the slightest bit and her heart started racing.
I knew them when they were alive. He had a strange emphasis on the word "alive". But Mei Li didn't care about that. He'd known her parents. They had been friends, and here she was apprenticed to a man who could tell her virtually anything she wanted to know about her past.
I attended their wedding. Their wedding … sure they must have been in love at one point to get married, but from what Mei Li recalled of her broken memories, her father had always been around when she needed him. Memories of her father had been sweet, warm, and always portrayed him as a caring person. Memories of her mother, however, had been distant, aloof, and controlling. Her mother was a kind person, no doubt, but she just wasn't a very good mother. It was almost as if Mei Li's birth had been a mistake.
I was there when you were born. This one struck Mei Li the most. No wonder Zhuge Liang had had this little interview with her. He probably suspected her of being his friends' child, and wanted to confirm the facts.
"Tell me, Mei Li," Zhuge Liang said after a minute of silence. "What memories do you have of your parents? How were you told they had died?"
Li took a deep breath and started talking. "When I was six, my father was coming home from a business convention in Southern China. He was supposed to get home on a certain day, but never did. Finally the news reached us that he had been driving at night and was unable to see the road clearly. The horse was going too fast and the cart ran over a huge log, throwing my father off the cart. His neck was broken. An old married couple found him the next morning lying off to the side of the road, but he had already died. Since no one witnessed the event, they concluded that it had been the log in the road that was lying there a couple yards behind the cart."
Zhuge Liang nodded understandingly. "And your mother?"
"I don't remember her being particularly heart-broken about my father's death. She was quieter than usual and her face seemed to have turned to stone, she was so expressionless. One day I woke up and my aunt and uncle were at my house, my mother nowhere in sight. They didn't tell me anything, only that my mother had gone to visit my grandparents and they didn't know when she was coming back. Well, three days later they found her body in a nearby river. After putting all the clues together, they discovered she had been kidnapped and then killed. The murderer tried to dispose of her body in the river, but they found it anyway."
"Did they ever catch the murderer?"
"I don't think so," Mei Li answered. "I wonder what he wanted with my mother, anyway. Wouldn't you know more about this than me, Prime Minister, since you knew them for longer than I did? You were friends with them, after all."
"All I said was that I knew your parents," he said. "I was only friends with your father."
Mei Li didn't say anything, and waited for him to continue. It was a long time before he spoke.
"Do you want to know the truth, Mei Li?"
"More than anything," she said.
Zhuge Liang sat down in a comfortable chair, and began his tale.
"I had been friends with your father for a long time. However, his business required him to move around a lot, and there were occasions when I wouldn't see him for months at a time. It was after one of these excursions that he came back with a woman. I was very surprised, but he convinced me they loved each other and they were to be married the following week. Naturally, as his best friend, I was asked to attend the wedding as the best man.
"The wedding went well, all was good without any mishaps. Not too long after, I met my wife, Yue Ying, and we were married. As a newly wed couple, we didn't have many opportunities to see your parents. Then, about six months later, I heard your mother was pregnant with you. When the time neared for the baby to be born, Yue Ying and I traveled out to visit and stay with them for a couple of weeks. The birth was fine, and your parents were very proud.
"All went well for about six years. It was then that the trouble began. You see, before your mother even met your father, she had been in love with another man. She didn't really have a home to call her own, so she traveled with the gypsies, and on one of her travels she met this other man."
Mei Li thought back to what Cai Lang had told her that one night they had a long talk. "You remind me of someone; a good friend of mine. She's gone now though. She was murdered." That good friend had been Mei Li's mother.
"They had wanted to get married," Zhuge Liang continued, not knowing what Mei Li was thinking. "But the man didn't have enough money yet to support a family. There was no way he was going to get money any time soon. When your mother met your father, and saw how much money he had, an evil plan formulated in the man's head.
"They made a deal. Your mother would marry this man, your father, who had been smitten the first moment he saw her, and therefore share in his riches. Your mother's lover would then come into the picture and kill your father, making it look like an accident had occurred rather than a murder. Your mother would inherit your father's money, and the two could get married.
"However, your mother in the process really did fall in love with your father. And after you were born, there was no way your mother would sacrifice her new family for another man. For six years your mother managed to avoid ever coming into contact with this man. But, still thinking he could win over your mother's heart, the man killed your father on his way back from a business trip. He climbed into his cart, and when it was dark and there were no witnesses, he threw your father from the cart. He really did die of a broken neck, but it was no accident. The man then placed the log behind the cart to make it look like an unintentional act of nature.
"He came back to visit your mother privately. She, of course, recognized him right away, but wanted nothing to do with him. She was enraged when she heard he had killed her husband, and threatened to turn him in. The man, of course, would not hear of this. He was equally mad that your mother didn't want him back, so he kidnapped her and gave her three days to choose otherwise. When she didn't, he killed her and disposed of her in the river.
"Now, there is a little more to the story. After the deaths happened, I was convinced that your father's had not been an accident, and the two were somehow connected. I did a lot of research and discovered all of which I have just told you. We were never able to catch the man, but now that you've come along into the picture, we might be able to find him.
"Your father often spoke of a treasure greater than all the money he ever possessed. The man wanted this treasure more than anything after he killed your father. The only clue he had, though, was that you knew what it was."
"I knew?" Mei Li said, utterly shocked.
"Yes," Zhuge Liang continued. "And now that you are here, you will be able to help me. If we find the treasure, we can lure man to us, then capture him and imprison him for good."
"But, I don't know anything about a treasure." Mei Li said. "Honest, I don't."
"Think hard, Mei Li. Did your father ever talk to you about it? Did he ever say anything that might lead us to another clue?"
"No, I don't …" Mei Li paused, fingering her locket with her hands. "Unless," she said, removing the necklace from her body. "Unless the next clue is in here." She handed the locket to Zhuge Liang.
"A locket?" said the Prime Minister. "What does it say on the inside?"
"My father gave it to me for my fifth birthday," Mei Li explained. "I don't know what it says on the inside because it's rusted shut. I remember my father used to read the inscription to me, but I forgot what it said after he died."
Zhuge Liang studied the locket and attempted to open it. His tries were useless, the locket wouldn't budge.
"What happened to the money, though?" Mei Li asked. "After my father and mother died, where did it all go?"
The strategist looked at her. "To their only offspring, of course."
"You mean I inherited the money?" Mei Li said. The man nodded. "Why didn't we use it all those years, then, when I was living in poverty with my uncle and aunt?"
"You were to receive the money when you were eighteen, and considered an adult." Zhuge Liang answered. "You only have to wait one more year until you can get it. For the mean time, it's being kept safe with your aunt back at the farm. They have it buried in a completely random spot that only your aunt and uncle know of."
"And they never used it for themselves," Mei Li muttered to herself.
At that moment, a servant burst into the library, interrupting Mei Li's life changing experience. Zhuge Liang watched the man expectantly, waiting for him to talk.
"Sir, your advice is needed. Lord Liu Bei needs to go into battle and wants to know what you think about it."
"Yes, tell him I'll be right there." Zhuge Liang said, standing up. He turned to Mei Li and handed her the locket. "This will have to wait until after the battle, Mei Li. For now, why don't you rest in your room and think the whole thing over."
"Exactly what I was going to do, Prime Minister." Mei Li answered. She put the locket back around her neck and exited the library with Zhuge Liang. After Mei Li reached her room, the two went their separate ways; Zhuge Liang to discuss war with Liu Bei, and Mei Li to ponder her past with no one but herself.
After a couple of minutes, a knock was heard on her door. It was Xing Cai.
"Hi, Mei Li." She said. "I hope I'm not intruding."
"No," Mei Li lied, sitting up in her bed. "I was doing nothing, anyway." Xing Cai entered the room and sat down on a chair. Mei Li guessed what she wanted. "Should I continue the sketch I started of you last night?"
"Yes, please!" Xing Cai said, obviously happy. "That would be so nice of you."
"Sure thing," Mei Li answered. She retrieved her sketchpad and started drawing again. Except this time, her strokes were full of emotion; shock, sadness, yearning … she put all her problems into that drawing, and when she was finished, she tore it out of her sketchpad and handed it to Xing Cai. The young girl stared at it for a second.
"Wow," she finally said. "I look so real. You really know how to make a picture come to life. Thanks a lot." Mei Li nodded, not saying anything, and Xing Cai left the room.
Once the chipper young girl was gone, Mei Li threw herself onto her bed and started weeping. She wasn't sure why she cried so hard, but everything that ever happened to her came out of her that day, and spent itself in the form of tears that soaked her pillow.
Many hours later, a knock was heard on her door. Mei Li's tears had long since stopped, and she yelled out, "Come in," her voice cracking from all the crying she had done. Pang Tong walked into the room and sat down on the bed next to her.
"What's wrong, squirt?" he asked, his voice full of compassion.
"It's a long story," she said, sniffing.
"Well, I'll have to hear it when I get back." He said. "I've been asked to fight in this next battle, and we're leaving later tonight. I need to go get prepared. I just thought you'd like to know that I'd be going."
Mei Li stared at him, wondering what she should say. She didn't have to say anything, her fears were confirmed when the next sentence came out of the strange man's mouth.
"I'm going to ride Liu Bei's horse as a distraction. The enemy will think I'm our lord, and we can do a surprise attack of some sort while I lead them in a different direction. Sounds good, eh?"
Mei Li didn't answer, instead she started crying, much to her surprise, because she thought she'd cried herself out a long time ago. There was one thing she wanted to say to her friend before he left. She embraced him tightly, her tears staining his shoulder, and said to him with utmost sincerity;
"You are not ugly."