Chapter 3
Kora watched the countryside go by outside the carriage. She sighed at the slow progress that they were making. It had rained the day before, and the roads were muddy. She could literally walk faster than they were traveling, but then she’d get dirty, and they didn’t want to arrive at the Shen estate in such a state.
She smiled nervously, thinking of what lay ahead of her. Her last meeting with the scion of the Shen family, Tan Shen, had been … less than flattering. First she had embarrassed herself by attempting to measure his cultivation status and found that he surpassed her by a significant margin, despite being four years younger than her. Then he had found the bonding ritual which had connected her to the fire spirit to be so offensive that he had undone the subsumation bonding technique, something which their family had not known was possible.
And something which she was immensely grateful for, now that she understood exactly what was at stake.
“Slake, are you there?” she whispered.
“What is it you want now, you pig faced ugly wench?” her spirit asked. It still hadn’t forgiven her for subjecting it to the twisted formation which would have robbed it of its mind, over time, but their relationship was steadily improving.
“Nothing. I’m just nervous. I want to make a better impression than we did last time.”
“Don’t ‘we’ me! I had nothing to do with you making your ass of yourself. Although in retrospect, it is kind of funny,” the spirit teased.
“Don’t pretend that you don’t care what happens to me, Slake,” she scolded. “I know better.”
“Go lick a chamberpot. I’m done paying attention to you now,” the spirit said, and Kora felt its attention turn elsewhere.
She sighed, glancing out the window once more. She was trying so hard to make everyone happy. Her parents, her family, her clan, her latest mentor Renton Shen, and now Tan and his family. The engagement between her and Tan was far from official. They weren’t even formally courting at this point. They had been introduced once, which had led to a near disaster, and this was their second formal meeting.
Hopefully she’d be able to make some peace with the boy, and possibly convince him to exchange correspondence. She was more eloquent in writing than she was with her speech, and if she could write him love letters, then perhaps she could win his heart.
She sighed. It didn’t help that he was only eleven, and possibly not even interested in girls yet. He certainly hadn’t seemed interested in her the last time that they’d met. This would be so much easier if they were the same age. She knew how to woo a boy her own age. Or she thought she did, at least. But if Tan wasn’t interested in girls, then how could she connect with him?
It was a conundrum which she was no closer to unraveling than when it had first occurred to her.
The carriage came to a small manor, and Kora stuck her head out of the cart. Was this their destination? It looked so … pedestrian. She frowned. The Shens wouldn’t live in such a ramshackle place, would they?
Then she remembered that they still didn’t know where exactly the Shens lived. The agreement had been that they would travel to the local lord, and that the Shen Patriarch would bring Kora the rest of the way to the Shen estate himself. Still … if this estate was all that the local lord who hosted the Shen family could afford, then what did that say about the state of the Shen’s finances?
She shook her head, clearing it. Renton Shen was a favored servant of the emperor. Even if this branch of the family was relatively poor, the relationship was close enough to have earned Kora a personal audience with the emperor himself, and tutelage by one of his favored servants. Renton was a powerful fire cultivator in his own right. That connection alone was worth establishing a relationship with this branch of the Shen family.
Yes, Kora was committed to marrying Tan Shen. She just had to convince the boy that it was in his own family’s best interests as well.
She waited patiently in the carriage for the servants to announce their presence, and twenty minutes later her handmaiden appeared, looking nervous.
“Um, apologies my lady, but it seems that Lord Hara was caught by surprise at our visit. He says that he received no instructions from the Shen family and offers us a place to rest in his hall until he contacts them to inform them of our arrival. He is saddling his horse now, and it looks like a fine beast, but he still says that it will be several hours before he arrives at their compound to share the news with them.”
Kora blinked in surprise. Well then, that was something. She wondered what game that the Shens were playing by making her wait. Were they testing her somehow?
Very well.
“Please inform Lord Hara that I am pleased to accept his hospitality and assure him that I am not inconvenienced by the wait. Tell him to ensure that he does not stress himself or his horse on my account,” Kora instructed, and the servant hurried to relay her words.
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Kora got out of the carriage and stretched, making her way to the little hall that the lord called home. For a mortal, it was an impressive enough building. For her family, it wouldn’t be called a guest house. Maybe servants quarters, if that servant wasn’t particularly important to the family. Still, if the Shen family wished to test her patience, then she would show them patience.
~~~~~~
Lord Hara arrived at the Shen farm in the late afternoon. Despite the young mistress’s words, his horse was lathered from the haste of the journey, and Lord Hara himself was sweaty and stressed. He knocked on the door and was greeted by the lady of the house, whom he knew to be a powerful cultivator in her own right and bowed humbly to her in accordance with this knowledge.
“Greetings, Mistress,” he said.
“Lord Hara. To what do we owe the pleasure? Another letter? No, something more than that or you wouldn’t have half-killed your horse.”
She waved her hand and the horse seemed to relax as she worked some sort of magic over it.
“No, it’s more than that,” he admitted. “The Zang family has sent their young mistress to my estate. I was expecting them on the Seventh day of the Eighth month, not the Eighth day of the Seventh month.”
“As were we,” Wensho said, frowning. Her husband appeared with a dishtowel and a half-washed bowl. “Dear, do you know why the Zangs are trying to send their daughter a month early?”
Tren frowned, and Lord Hara’s heart froze at the displeasure in his face. “If they’re playing power-games with us, they’ll regret it.”
“Do you think that’s it? Or is it an honest mistake?” Wensho asked. “Someone might have just gotten the numbers mixed up. And by someone, I mean … we did ask Tan to be the messenger, and he didn’t have anything written down when he arrived. You know he sometimes gets his numbers transposed when he does his math.”
Tren’s expression softened. “Yes, he does,” he admitted. He sighed. “I’ll check with him if he’s entirely certain that it was supposed to be next month, or if he might have made a mistake. Then I’ll go pick the girl up. Lord Hara, thank you for your efforts on our behalf, as always. Please, feel free to join us for dinner, or spend the night as is convenient for you.”
“I would not trouble you or your lovely family for—”
“It’s no trouble at all,” Wensho assured the lord. “In fact, I’m going to insist upon it. I want to make certain that your horse has time to rest before you ride it again. Honestly, if you’re going to ride it half to death every time you come to our little farm, then we should buy you a second one so that you can switch between them halfway.”
“I could not ask for such an imposition—”
“I’m going to insist once more,” Wensho said. “Now go, put your horse up in our barn and then I’ll draw you a some water to wash yourself. If you—”
Tren stepped away from his wife as she harried the lord, grinning at how she was mothering the man. He loved her dearly, and she was doing her best to put the lord at ease.
Tren was pretty certain that the lord knew at this point who the Shen family really was, and he had a reason to be nervous. Their reputation was a bit exaggerated, but it was their reputation for a reason. That reason being Tren’s father, who was fifty years dead but whose ghost still shook the land from time to time.
He sighed as he climbed the hill where he’d set up the four elements gathering array for the children. He could tell, feeling the flow of Qi through the earth and air, that he was interrupting a productive session, but it couldn’t be helped. The children paused their cultivation when they realized that he was coming to see them.
His three students exchanged nervous looks, while Tan just stood and stretched. “Yes, father? You need something?”
“When we sent you to Lima city to meet with the representative of the Zang family, are you certain that he said they would arrive on the seventh day of the eighth month?” Tren asked.
Tan blinked in surprise. “Pretty sure, yeah.”
“How certain are you, Tan? Is there a chance that you got the numbers confused in your head again?”
Tan blushed. “Um, I don’t think so. But I guess now that you said that I might have? I’m sorry, dad, you know I’m not very good with numbers and sometimes—”
“I’m not angry, I’m just asking. If you got them mixed up then Kora appearing at Lord Hara’s estate isn’t a case of the Zang’s playing power games, just an innocent misunderstanding. If they’re playing power games at this stage, then—’
“Okay, I probably got them mixed up,” Tan admitted. “I mean, I don’t know. But I’m not as certain as I was, okay? Don’t be mad.”
“I’m not mad. At you, nor at the Zangs at this point. We’re going to just mark it up as a little misunderstanding, okay?”
Tan relaxed, grinning. Then he frowned. “Wait, does that mean that she’s here?”
“She will be once I fetch her,” his father answered. “I’ll be back in a few hours, Tan. You should take a bath and get ready to meet her. Wear your good clothes. All of you.”
“Yes, Master Shen,” the other children said formally. He winced. Ever since they’d figured it out …
Tan also glared at them, wondering why they were acting weird lately.
“Alright Tan, see you in a little while,” Tren said, and he vanished, employing the Titan’s Walk technique to cover the distance between his farm and Lord Hara’s estate in a moment.