Shuli Go Stories Vol. 5: The Two Keepers

Part 15

Xue Fen was alone in one of the bandit's caves, her bed roll out and the sun already long set, but she was too excited to even think about sleep. She sat on the ground next to the small fire she and her uncle had set to keep warm, examining with one hand the dagger – longer than a knife, too short for a sword – she'd taken from the bandits' stash as her weapon, its blade matte but its point sharp and illuminated in the firelight. And her other hand was wrapped tight around the handle of the pistol Lian had picked out, tight as if it was going to escape her grasp at any minute.

When she'd held the knife to Quan's throat the night before, she'd felt a rush, but not the one she'd expected. It had made her sick to her stomach, the way the blade cut through that first layer of his skin, as if it was nothing. She'd thought it would be harder – she'd needed it to be harder. She'd never killed anyone, hardly even slaughtered an animal until these last few lean years, and she'd expected it to be more difficult somehow, different from carving a chicken or slicing a roast. But it wasn't. His skin had given way just like any other animals', and that disgusted her from the stomach out: just how easy it would be to kill someone.

Li Jie had left over half an hour earlier, saying he needed to urinate. She figured he would be out talking to the peasants, reassuring them, and she knew that was his rightful place. But right then she wanted someone to reassure her. Not about the next day's trap – she knew that was well designed. But she needed someone to talk to about what it would be like to actually put the sharp end of that dagger into someone's skin. Someone's bone. Someone's heart. She needed someone to tell her she could do it without throwing up all over the battlefield the next day.

Just then that someone arrived. She stood a few feet away, staring at Fen's fire, and casually asked. "Can't sleep?"

Fen looked up at Lian, but the Shuli Go didn't look back. Fen answered truthfully. "No."

"It's not usually like this," Lian said vacantly, her eyes flickering in time with the fire. "Usually you don't know when it's coming, or even if it's coming. It just happens and you react."

"...I don't know how you did it," Fen admitted. She held the blade out at arm's length against the backdrop of the fire, where its dull surface could block out most, but not all, of the firelight. The edge still gleamed under the mixture of stars, moon, and whispery flames. "I don't know how you could take someone's life so easily."

Lian sighed. A sigh that said 'I can't believe we're back on this topic again' as if there had ever been any other topic worth discussing between the two of them. Fen felt the same rage that had taken hold of her the night before, when she'd decided she would kill Quan. Then she remembered the convulsions in her stomach and they came back to her again. She let Lian talk and just held the dagger out there, admiring the contrast between the dull and the shine.

"I could lie and tell you it isn't easy. And maybe it wasn't, once. I don't remember that though. It's always been easy."

"There must be something wrong with you," Fen said.

Lian laughed and Fen dropped her short sword to look at the older woman. The laugh was not, to her surprise, dismissive.

"You're right, there probably is," Lian admitted. "There's something wrong with anybody who kills someone. That's true."

"But you'll still do it."

"Sure... and so will you."

Fen shook her head and placed the dagger on the ground. "I don't know. When I think about it..."

"It's not the same. Thinking about it and doing it. Not even close."

Fen thought for a moment then said, "Quan told me the Tiendu Shu believe all life is connected. That makes them pacifists right? I mean, if you're killing something, you're hurting the universe, right?"