A Wuxia Tale: Blade in Training

Fairness

"I'm sorry, my heart." Captain Wang's lips pressed against my temple, confirming my fears. "Dao is not on the Southern Base. In actuality, Wei didn't even receive my letter, warning and explaining to him about Dao's arrival at his base."

I pushed away from my lover so I can look into his face. "What? But why?"

"Someone obviously switched the letter with an empty one. Wei and I spent a whole day investigating what happened and where our son could be. We checked with the department responsible for receiving and sorting the letters on his base and the only envelop that came from the Capital was empty. There was a paper inside but there was nothing written there."

"Nothing? So you were right, someone replaced your letter with an empty one. Who would do that?" I asked in confusion.

Captain Wang sighed, "We suspect Dao did it himself."

I reeled in shock. "No. No!" I back away from my lover. "My son won't be stupid enough to touch an official army correspondence. Dao knows it's a grave crime to meddle in a letter with your name on it. You are the Master General of this whole army! Our son knows that!" My tone came close to shouting.

"That's how daringly stupid your son is!" Captain Wang's brows furrowed together in extreme annoyance as he shouted back at me. "Fearless boy, he really dared touch my letter and switch it all up. Your son...I will beat him within an inch of his life once I got my hands on him." There's a promise on my lover's eyes and tone when he said those words.

I glared at my lover. "You will not lay a hand on my son. Not until I am done with him." I made that clear to my Captain. "What else? What else did you and Wei learn about this antic of Dao?" I asked with a sense of urgency.

"Wei was livid with anger. If only his people told him about the empty letter, he could have sent a letter to me to ask why I sent an empty letter to him. Then we could have been alerted earlier that something is wrong. But no...days has passed without him being aware that Dao should have been under his care." Captain Wang's hands fisted. "Wei and I looked into it some more and we came up with several ideas on what could have happened to Dao. We argued about it until we ended up with only one conclusion about where our son is."

"Where is he? Where is Dao?"

"With Prince Jin. In the Mughal Kingdom." Captain Wang said.

His answer made me laugh...because it all makes sense. It makes perfect sense. "Wang Dao...he..." I turned away from my lover to walk back to the open window and gaze out at our estate. I took several calming breath as my mind settled on a course of action to take. "I will go to the Mughal Kingdom and retrieve Dao myself." I said to my Captain.

"We can't do that. The Emperor forbids it," Captain Wang said.

I turned around fast in surprise. "The Emperor? He knows that Dao is there right now?"

Captain Wang nodded. "I also notified him. The Emperor sent a letter back to me, forbidding me...as well as you...in interfering with Dao. Us going there will pose a threat to Prince Jin as well as to our son. We are not privy on the exact reason of what they are doing there. Dao could be freely exposed and dealing with the people there or he could be in hiding. If we make a ruckus there, our son will have a target on his back and he will be hunted."

I want to go to my lover and slap him. "So what do you suppose I should do? Stay here and stew in worry? Is that it?!" My heart starting going cold in anger. "I will go there. I will get Dao. Try and stop me." I dared my lover in a dangerously low tone.