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Fate's Attendant 1.10

Added 2025-08-06 23:41:51 +0000 UTC

Mei Hua and Yu Ning took it upon themselves to drag Hong Fei through the entire household to introduce him to the maids, the cooks, the gardeners, and all the other people who made a noble house run. He memorized each name and face; it was the same honor he’d give any soldier under him or any enemy he knew he must fight.

Mei Hua grew bored when it became clear there’d be no further conflicts. The hope in her eyes died when Hong Fei actually knelt to sniff the dirt at the behest of one Li Chun, a particularly enthusiastic gardener. The man had been a veteran of the skirmishes at the western border, and he was proud of the soil’s quality. Yu Ning sighed at the dissolution of Mei Hua’s enthusiasm and assumed the role of guide at a steadier pace.

An entire world existed within the walls of the Yu estate—from workshops and storerooms to salons and living quarters. Yu Ning made them linger in the library when she learned a new package had arrived from the mainland, a treatise on the effects of land laws on farming. At the stables, Hong Fei asked to meet every horse present. He examined them all and asked questions of the grooms.

Yu Ning couldn’t help laughing at the increasingly fallen expression on Mei Hua’s face. The fairy had started the tour as Hong Fei’s most ardent supporter, and now she looked like she wanted to die.

So, when the tireless Hong Fei finally finished interrogating the head groom, Yu Ning asked a question of her own—purely from an interest in how the stables were governed, of course. Sidelong, she saw Mei Hua roll her eyes.

###

Zhang Dehua’s office was as neat as the stitching on a noble lady’s dress. A plain desk occupied the center with cabinets surrounding it. The only nod to the arts was a painting of a bamboo grove on one wall and a personal shrine against the other—a small statue of the ocean goddess Sanzu sat upon a rising wave like a chair. The scent of pine resin wafted from a stick of incense.

The steward gazed at Hong Fei before saying, “I’m going to trust you know what you’re doing. You’ve made an enemy of our xiàowèi and half our soldiers.”

“If it’s only half the soldiers,” Hong Fei began, “then it means they aren’t united under Chen Wenbin. Anyone wishing to undermine him will seek me out as an ally.”

“So, you intended to publicly clash with him?” Zhang Dehua asked, raising an eyebrow.

Hong Fei shrugged. “Not as quickly as it happened, but eventually something like it, yes.”

Zhang Dehua placed his hands on his desk to push up to standing. “Then I have no complaints. I’m satisfied as long you weren’t thoughtless about it.” From his sleeve, he removed a jade badge of office, which he handed to Hong Fei. “Now, let’s get you a place to stay.”

A hawk was pictured on the badge with twin strokes of lightning behind it. A length of gray ribbon had been strung through a ring carved into the top, so that it could be worn as a necklace. At the bottom was engraved Hong Fei’s name, his rank of dūtóu, and the words “Yu family retainer.”

Hong Fei traced the freshly carved words before putting the necklace on and following Zhang Dehua out into the corridor. The steward’s office was situated between the duke’s private rooms and the house’s public spaces. Reaching the duke meant getting past Zhang Dehua first. There shouldn’t be any other obvious ways in, assuming Hong Fei understood the layout correctly. He’d draw a map for himself later to make sure.

Not long after, he confirmed the need for a map. The path the steward had taken shouldn’t have led to a pair of doors opening onto a courtyard isolated from the rest of the house, but it had. He’d need to retrace his steps to clarify his understanding of the house’s architecture.

“This is yours,” Zhang Dehua said. “You can request furnishings if there’s anything major missing, but servants and anything else will have to come from your own budget.” He stood aside to let Hong Fei explore his new home.

Gray stones surrounded a single cherry tree in the center. Three buildings sat around it like soldiers at a campfire. There was a salon across the way that led to his bedroom and office; a private kitchen and its associated storerooms were to the left; and to the right were rooms for servants.

The courtyard was at the end of the corridor, which meant there wasn’t any other way to enter unless one went over the house’s exterior walls. Hong Fei checked and noted how it wouldn’t be a difficult climb, either in or out.

“I thought a man in your position might appreciate the privacy,” Zhang Dehua said.

Hong Fei nodded, already thinking about how easy it’d be for Auntie Ling to move around. He’d worried the steward would assign him a small room; most officers didn’t see anything the size of this courtyard until they led a thousand soldiers.

“This is more than enough,” Hong Fei said, his voice thickening with emotion.

Zhang Dehua looked away. “The duke will expect your reports daily, at least at first. I recommend the late mornings. That’s when he’ll take a break from his seclusion.”

The two men nodded in mutual understanding, then the steward departed. Hong Fei listened to the steps growing quieter. He looked out onto the corridor to compare the sound to the distance traveled. The steward didn’t notice, his thoughts already on the work waiting for him back at his office.

When Zhang Dehua turned the corner, Hong Fei closed the doors and leaned his head against the wood. His fists clenched, and the pressure inside him found relief in the tears leaking from the sides of his eyes.

His first day might not have gone smoothly, but he was in a much better and stronger position than he’d dreamed was possible. A hand unclenched and reached for the badge around his neck, the jade cool to his touch. He would do his utmost not to betray the trust placed in him.

I’ll introduce Auntie Ling to the duchess when I give my first report, he thought. Things will be less complicated that way if anything happens. I’ll go through the house again this evening to check how it operates at night, then…

Hong Fei heard a huff behind me, and he turned, a smile spreading across his face. A giant badger was there looking up at the cherry tree. Auntie Ling appeared entirely unharmed by the time she’d spent in her card.

Under the tree’s pink-filled branches was a stone seat meant for one. Hong Fei swept aside the fallen petals to sit and explain the situation they’d found themselves in.

Auntie Ling listened intently, her eyes locking onto him whenever he described a person with a number floating above their head: Mei Hua’s 5, Yu Hui’s 14, Chen Wenbin’s 3, and Ma Zhi’s 6. The last was the name of the shízhǎng with the long knives. He’d learned her name from Yu Ning.

Afterward, the badger sat on her haunches to consider the situation. Carefully, she began to make shapes with the cherry petals on the ground. They formed a simple formula at first: “5+3+6=14.”

“They’re connected?” Hong Fei asked.

Auntie Ling hesitated, then swept away the petals to write a series of new formulas, these with circles in them to show gaps: “O+O=5. 3+6=9. 14+O=O.”

Hong Fei scratched his chin, thinking. “If I understand correctly, there’s a relationship between people and creatures with numbers, but we can’t be certain of how without investigating and potentially finding everyone involved.” He leaned back against the tree, the conclusion obvious: “We don’t have enough information.”

Auntie Ling nodded.

“And what happens when we do find everyone?” he asked. “We don’t have to kill them, right? We can choose not to.”

The badger wrote a series of symbols in the petals looking like “depends,” but couldn’t explain the meaning through gestures. The two of them stared down at it helplessly.

The answer, either way, was to learn more—about the household, about the town around it, about Auntie Ling, and about the cards from which she came.

###

At seeing the thinness of the family’s newest retainer, the cook was unsurprised to see him carrying two bowls of rice porridge. She took him to the hearth and ladled him two big helpings of stewed pork and fried onions.

The rest of the kitchen bustled as the staff rushed to prepare breakfast for the household. Hong Fei nodded his thanks before getting out of their way and leaving for his courtyard.

The sun wasn’t up yet, so this was the only active part of the house, the cooks’ schedules offset from everyone else. The shift from night to day staff was due soon, however.

Hong Fei yawned when no one was looking and turned at the partially hidden corridor that led to his courtyard. He’d missed it the first two times he’d gone exploring on his own.

He set Auntie Ling’s bowl by her sleeping form, and the other went on the table in the salon for him to eat later. Then, he went back out to watch the shift change happen throughout the house.

Chen Wenbin had six shízhǎng reporting to him, each responsible for either the exterior or interior of the house during one of three shifts—morning, late afternoon/evening, and night. The soldiers under these shízhǎng met their assigned duties without fuss, laziness, or gaps in coverage.

What was unusual was the size of the squads. None had fewer than twenty members, when ten was typical. Perhaps, Hong Fei thought, it was a way to compensate for the number of old injuries among them.

He pondered the question as he walked, aiming to find a path to the training hall that let him get past the night interior patrols. They’d be at their most tired now. The sun was still a handspan from rising.

Hong Fei kept to an ordinary pace. He didn’t make an effort to hide his presence—not yet. This was a simple, initial test of the household’s security.

A pair of soldiers stopped him when he came close the courtyards belonging to the Yu grandchildren. He noted how a second pair of guards was also visible, maintaining line of sight on where he was being questioned.

He showed his badge of office, gave the night’s pass phrase, and moved on.

Hong Fei was stopped again in the garden behind the training hall. This time, the soldiers recognized him from the encounter with Chen Wenbin the previous day, and they questioned his identity more strongly than they perhaps needed to.

Afterward, he moved through the empty training hall to check on the front gate. There, the soldiers paced back and forth to keep the blood in them from becoming stagnant. They also kept track of their comrades patrolling outside the walls.

All in all, Hong Fei was pleased with how well the family was guarded. He wasn’t sure yet whether the credit belonged to the xiàowèi or to the magnetism of Duke Yu drawing such experienced warriors from across the empire. The probable answer was that it was a combination of both factors.

In his wanderings, he noted two incidents to be investigated further: a collection of empty wine jugs hidden behind a storeroom, and a lively gathering of soldiers in one of the hidden gardens. The soldiers had immediately quieted when they’d spotted him approaching. The remains of the game board they’d been using hadn’t been entirely scuffed out of the dirt, however. The dice they’d been using were no doubt in someone’s pocket.

What he didn’t find was anyone else with a number over their head. He was thinking about expanding his explorations to the city when he re-entered the main hall.

The empty mat called to him, so he grabbed a training sword and prepared to move through the martial forms taught by the imperial army as a warm-up to the day. The Hong-family style would wait until he was in the privacy of his own courtyard.

At first, Hong Fei moved with perfect slowness. Every line, every shift in his weight, and every calibration of force was exact. He’d long moved past the ideals established by the style’s forebearers, however, and reached the stage where he’d adapted the movements to himself.

They were his lines, his shifts, and his expressions of force. A sword spoke of the person wielding it, and as Hong Fei moved faster, the sword sang of him. It celebrated his decades of practice, his unyielding heart, and his determination to be victorious.

In the past, whenever Hong Fei had doubted, the sword had reminded him of his path. That had always been the way of things.

He missed the shift change he’d intended to watch. The sun rose, and Hong Fei continued his practice, pushing his body in the ways it remembered—from before his terrible injuries.

Sweat poured down his face as he continued to move faster and faster. He’d only just returned to the Body Forged realm, but his attacks were so clean, they practically cut the air. They were short, brutal things meant for killing and killing only.

He noticed the soldiers gathering around him and ignored them. This was another way to establish his authority, and maybe he’d tempt the more skilled among them into a duel. A warrior challenged and loved to be challenged in turn.

When Hong Fei came to a stop, he gazed at the soldiers who’d formed a circle around him, meeting every pair of eyes. Some looked daunted, others intrigued. There were people here he could work with, he thought. Soldiers who might become brothers and sisters to him.

Yu Yong and Yu Ning had been among the crowd watching, along with their companions.

The grandson stepped forward with eyes hungry and said, “Teach me.”

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