Sorry if this chappie is kind of short! Enjoy anyway.

Chapter Fourteen

"Prime Minister!" Jiang Wei called out as he ran down the halls to the library, clutching a piece of paper in his hand. He was waving it about like a madman. "Prime Minister you have to see this!"

Normally Zhuge Liang would be outside in the peach garden around this time of day, but a light drizzle was falling outside, so he committed himself to the library. He was busy reading Sun Tzu's famous book, and a personal favorite, The Art of War, when he heard his young apprentice's calls echoing down the corridors. He found a good stopping place, and gently put the book down and folded his hands in his lap, awaiting Jiang Wei's arrival. Not two seconds after he did this did the young man come bursting through the library door.

"Prime Minister!" he said one last time, realizing that the man he was looking for was sitting right there. "It's Mei Li. She's run away, and she left us this note."

Zhuge Liang, though surprised, did not show any emotion on his face. He held out his hand to receive the note from his young apprentice. "Where did you find it?" he asked curiously.

"She had run somewhere after learning of Guan Ping's death yesterday. I couldn't find her, so I figured it would be best to let her be for a while. This morning I knocked on her bedroom door and when she didn't answer, I was afraid something had happened to her, so I opened it up myself and saw she wasn't there. The bed was neatly made, the room clean, and her things gone. Then I noticed this note sitting on her dresser. It's a page from her sketchpad that she must have used to write on."

Zhuge Liang gave Jiang Wei a brief look. He only asked a simple question and he got such a detailed answer that wasn't necessary. But that wasn't the problem at the moment, so Zhuge Liang focused his attention on the note in his hands. He began to read:

To all my friends at Shu:

I'm sorry for leaving without really saying goodbye. But I've been the cause of three deaths and I wouldn't want to stick around and make it four. I leave you all with my best wishes. Don't worry about me, I know where I'm going and I have friends there, so all is well. I'm sorry, Zhuge Liang, that I cannot stay and help you find the treasure. I know that both you and Jiang Wei are smart enough to figure it out without my help. I enjoyed being your apprentice for the short time I was at Shu. Give my love to everyone there.

--Mei Li

PS – I hope you don't mind; I took one of the horses

Jiang Wei, having already read the note at least three times, turned to Zhuge Liang once he saw that the Prime Minister was done reading the note. He stared at him, waiting for his master to say something. When the man said nothing, Jiang Wei started talking.

"If she only left yesterday, we could probably track her down. And it'll be easier knowing that she has one of our horses. All we do is go into the stable, see which one is missing, and –"

"Jiang Wei," the Prime Minister interrupted. "I think it is best that we do not pursue Mei Li."

"What?" Jiang Wei exploded. Zhuge Liang was surprised at his sudden outburst. "Come on! She practically left us a trail! We could find her easily! We can't just abandon her. She left because she thinks she's the cause of all this trouble. We have to show her that she has friends here."

"She has friends wherever it is she's going," Zhuge Liang replied. "Her note said so. And I think Mei Li will be just fine. She's run away from home before; she knows what she's doing."

"But I –" Jiang Wei stopped himself before he said something he might regret. "I mean, she –"

"Don't let your personal feelings get in the way, Jiang Wei." Zhuge Liang said, his head turned down as he opened up his book to start reading again.

Jiang Wei blushed scarlet and said, "That's not what I was going to say. What I meant was, she has the locket, and the next clue to the treasure." When Zhuge Liang didn't say anything in response, Jiang Wei continued. "You've spent the last ten years of your life looking for the man who killed your best friend, Prime Minister. You're closer than you've ever been before to finding him, and you let the answer run away with a sixteen year old girl?"

Zhuge Liang thought about this rude comment made by his apprentice, and to Jiang Wei's surprise, he did not start to scold him and his forward behavior. Instead, Zhuge Liang pondered the subject for quite a time. Finally, he stood up and looked Jiang Wei in the eye. The young man could tell he had come to some grand conclusion as he said, "Not with a sixteen year old girl; as a sixteen year old girl."

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Mei Li rode faster than she thought the horse was capable of running, the rain pelting her and soaking her clothes that were heavy with rain. Though it was only a drizzle, Li had been riding long enough to get drenched, and riding fast enough to have the raindrops feel like tiny pebbles as they struck her skin. She was surprised that her blanket full of belongings hadn't broken open and fallen everywhere, the ride was so bumpy. She stroked the horse's mane as they rode on, trying to give it some comfort. She felt a tinge of regret as she realized that maybe she shouldn't have taken Liu Bei's horse; maybe she should have taken one that belonged to someone of a lower ranking. But she this was the horse Pang Tong had used, and it consoled her in an odd way to know that her friend had once ridden it.

Finding her way to Wei wasn't as hard as Mei Li might have thought. For one thing, the gypsies had been traveling the same route for years, so the wheels of their caravan had dug deep into the earth, leaving a permanent trail behind. And besides, Li knew that they traveled in one direction the entire time to get to Shu; all she had to do was travel in the opposite direction to get back to Wei. The only thing she was concerned about was how fast she would get there. This horse would not run forever, and it had taken twelve days rolling along in those gypsy caravans. Though the horse moved considerably faster than the caravans, it could only move so fast for so long. And since Mei Li had been in such a hurry to leave, she'd forgotten to take some food and drink from the kitchen with her. Her spirits lifted a little as she remembered she at least still had the money that her uncle had earned from Lei Lei with her.

As the horse thundered along, Li thought back to the recent events. First her uncle, then Pang Tong, then Guan Ping and Guan Yu had all died. Who would be next? Li hoped it was no one. But she knew there was no way to stop these dreams from happening, and once they did happen, there was no way to stop the future. It seemed as though her future was written in stone, and there was nothing she could do about it.

She thought back to the day that Zhuge Liang had admitted to her the story of her past. It had been so much different than what she liked to imagine it as. To think that her mother had married her father, intending to have him killed! She shuddered just to think about it. But she had to smile when she remembered that in the end, her mother had indeed fallen in love with her father. And their lives would have been just fine if that evil man still didn't love her mother. He had to come back and ruin everything. That made two things that ruined her life; this man and her dreams.

Trying to redirect her mind from such unpleasant thoughts, Li decided to play a game of a sort. She tried to guess what all her friends back at Shu would be doing right now. Zhuge Liang, no doubt, would be reading in the library; probably "The Art of War", seeing as that was his favorite book. Xing Cai might still be in her room, mourning over the loss of Guan Ping, her best friend. Li felt guilty for a second. Though she truly liked Guan Ping and wanted to be his girlfriend, she couldn't help but realize that Xing Cai had to be suffering much more than she, because she had known Guan Ping for far longer and had even been his best friend. And surely she would be lamenting the loss of Guan Yu as well, the tall and firm general. Though he hadn't said much to Mei Li, she always thought he had a friendly aura about him.

Yue Ying would either be in the library or the garden. Li decided to change that to just the library, seeing as it was raining outside. And Jiang Wei, what would he be doing? This was actually a tough one for Mei Li. She hadn't actually talked to him all that much up until a couple days ago, but he seemed nice enough. There were a lot of things he might be doing; reading in the library, in his own room doing something, comforting Xing Cai, agonizing over the sudden departure of Mei Li.

That last one came as a shock to Mei Li, but it sort of just popped into her head without much reason. She wondered why she had thought it in the first place. For the next several minutes, she found herself thinking about the young man who had tried so hard just to be understanding towards her. He really was a nice guy and she found that she –

Wham! Something hit Mei Li hard across her head and she fell from the running horse to the ground, unconscious and covered in mud. A shadowy figure jumped out from the bushes, stopping the horse before it got away. The figure then proceeded to pick up Mei Li's belongings that had scattered with her when she fell, and tied them all back up together. It then picked up Mei Li, climbed up onto Liu Bei's horse, and started riding away into the night.

Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion of "Secrets that Kill"! Yes I've decided to wrap it all up in the next chapter! It's going to be one, big, long SUPER chapter, but exciting nonetheless. Reviews are appreciated!