Part 4, Chapter 14

Not alone in the new house

Ch 14

The next morning they were awakened by pounding feet and loud voices. 

“She said there was smoke coming from this direction this morning. And there is a bunch of clothing drying near the fire,” said a deep rumble from the outer room. 

Xun and Renping sat up almost simultaneously, wrapping their blankets tightly around them. The twins protested the movement with loud wails as the two women shifted, exposing them to the chilly morning air. 

“Someone’s here!” A second voice, also male came from the porch. 

“Get out!” Renping yelled, picking up the closest twin. 

Xun picked up the other, making comforting noises as she tried to get her child to calm down. “Please give us some privacy,” she said “We’ll come out in a bit.”

She was answered by stomping boots and a slamming door. “We’re outside,” the first voice said. “You can come out now.”

Xun and Renping came out cautiously at first and then in a rush, pulling on their still somewhat damp clothing and swaddling the protesting babies. After they were both decent the two women went to face their visitors. 

The view caught Xun’s eyes before the men did. Spread out below their little hut was a tiny, u-shaped valley with a muddy creek that had clearly overflowed its boundaries gushing down the center of it. To either side of the creek on almost every flat surface more ragged bamboo huts, similar to the one they had stayed in, clustered close to each other as if huddled together for comfort. They looked slightly forlorn in the aftermath of the storm and with the creek rushing through a few of them. Moving around among the houses Xun saw several people, but she couldn’t make out the details from where she stood. 

“What is this place,” Xun asked. 

“It’s a place you shouldn’t have been able to find,” the second voice said.

Xun finally turned her attention to the two men who were standing in the grassy yard beside the house. The man who had just spoken was lean with high cheekbones and his long hair woven into tiny braids which had been styled into a single elaborate pattern. Bells had been tied to the tip of each braid group and the chimes reminded Xun of the hair stick the Emperor had given her lifetimes ago, now left behind in Jianyu’s room at the Palace. The man’s clothes were plain and coarse, but his jewelry, two rings and a bracelet, were of the highest quality. 

Xun turned her attention to the second man. He was rougher over all, his muscular frame built for power, not speed. His face was rougher as well, the thick lines of his jaw and forehead making him look like a child’s drawing of a warrior. His clothes matched his companion’s, but his hair was in a simple top knot and something about the way he help himself seemed familiar to Xun. It hit her immediately when she saw the sword in his hand. She knew a divine weapon when she saw it. 

“You’re from the Heavenly army!” She said without thinking. 

Immediately the sword came up. “How would you know that?” He demanded. 

Renping put herself between Xun and the sword, “We are from the Heavenly Realm,” she said. “But we can’t go back,” she shot a pointed look over her shoulder at Xun, “Yet.”

The lean man out a hand on his partner’s shoulder and opened his mouth to ask why when Chunhe began to howl his hunger, his sister joining in on cue. Xun smiled a little awkwardly. 

“Well, they’re one of the reasons…” she said.