She jerked away from his hand and gave him a furious scowl.
He smiled at her. "You're damned pretty."
"You're a liar, master Shoka."
"Girl, girl, you've got it wrong: a man lies to a woman about that before he sleeps with her, not after."
That set her back. He saw the flare of her nostrils, the set of her mouth.
"Better pack before we get into too much of this rig," he said. "And get Jiro saddled. I hope you know he's not carrying much baggage. He's no pack-horse, and his full rig weighs."
Still the scowl.
"Poor old fellow," Shoka added. "You're doing a terrible thing to him, you know."
He said it to torment her. But he also felt it.
Jiro laid his ears back when the steel went on, and he blew himself up and threw his head and shifted and stamped, all calculated to make saddling him difficult.
"I suppose you know," Shoka said to the horse, and patted him hard on his leather-and-steel armored neck. "It's the road again. Back by spring, if we're lucky."
One could promise anything to a horse. Jiro never listened anyway. He only flicked his ears and sulked.
A man, Shoka told himself, ought to have better sense.
He unfolded his armor-robe from where it lay on the porch, and put it on—a little frayed, a little stained from where he had bled on it all those years ago, but the gold-thread dragons were still bright, their green eyes undimmed. Clouds and dragons on the robe, and red stitching on the breeches he was wearing, that color being faded, considerably—hard to tell what it had been to start with. He tied his belts and sashes, eased the body armor on and sighed, fastening the side ties, while Jiro waited down at the stable, stamping and fretting.
The silk weavings of the armor had been red once. Those on the body-armor mostly looked brown—especially since the mud. He finished the ties across the chest, and looked to Taizu, who came out with their bows, their quivers, her sword, and the bundles that were their food and their pots and pans and their personal necessities.
She came back in a second trip with her armor, and sat down and did her own shin-guards and her sleeves; but he helped her with the rest.
"Not at all like a bandit," he said to her. In fact, he thought, he had done quite a good job with her gear—small deer-horn plates stitched in patterns: her colors were all tans and brown. But he found a red silk cording among the things he had brought from Chiyaden and made her stand still while he tied it in her hair.
"You have to understand," he said to her. "A little decoration makes your enemy know you're confident. It makes him worry."
She frowned doubtfully at him.
"It's the truth. Who would you be afraid of? A scruffy bandit? Or a man who takes care for himself and his equipment? A ribbon or two and you look much more substantial."
Bang. From downhill where Jiro expressed his impatience, a kick at the stable wall.
"You're damn pretty," he said, and touched the scar on her face. "Wear it like a banner, girl. Like a challenge. You survived that. You're not ordinary. Hear?"
Bang, from the stable-yard.
Taizu-gnawed at her lip. Not angry, no. Listening to him.
"You're my student," he said. "You won't make me ashamed. I have confidence in you."
"Then don't go!"
"Mmmn, it's not lack of confidence in you. Don't you think the whole of Hua province is too much for one girl to take on? You at least need someone to watch your back."
"You're making fun of me."
"No. I'm determined to get you back alive. I have a strong interest in that. You've promised to be my wife if you get back."
"I—!"
"I think that's excellent good sense. Look at what I can give you. A fine house. A whole mountain to hunt on. Good company. Are you sure you want to go to Hua?"
"I know what you're trying to do. You're going to be arguing with me all the way to Hua. And you'll step in at the last moment and kill Gitu. And I'll never forgive you for that."
Bang.
Bang.
"I have no such intention. I do plan to give you a little advice. I think that's only—" Bang."—reasonable. You can have Gitu. I certainly won't contest you for a prize like that. Are we ready?"
Shoka did not look back when they left, leading Jiro. He knew what the place would look like: like home, only empty and dead—and sights like that were no comfort. Taizu did. And at least she cared.
Jiro laid his ears back and showed the whites of his eyes on the descent. It went by fits and starts, Jiro planting his feet in the narrow slot and eyeing the next steep, root-tangled turn: then a rush that ended with Jiro braced crosswise on what level ground he could find and looking with a misgiving eye at the next stage.
It had not seemed this bad on the way up, to Shoka's recollection. Or he had been seeing less on that day—when he had come to this place and decided on a certain mountain and led a much younger horse up it. It was a relief when he had all four of Jiro's feet on level ground again, with all four of Jiro's legs sound, and bearing that in mind he let the old fellow rest a while, content to walk, under the green leaves, until the trees grew fewer and they came to the fields.
Those had changed too—much nearer the mountain than they had been all those years ago.
"Are we going through the village?" Taizu asked.
He thought about that while they walked, the chances of going in secrecy, the chances that a man and a girl in armor might not be spied in all the weeks between this place and Hua. And he had worried about that since he had realized he had to leave the mountain—about that, and other things.
Maybe there was no real debt between himself and the villagers. He had never thought of one: they provided him food in trade for good furs, they were useful to each other.
But he kept thinking about the boy who came for the furs; and about the women who sent the pots of preserve; and the farmers who grew the rice, and it worried him, what they would do and what the bandits might do, once the word spread.
"We're going through the village," he said, and stopped and freed Jiro's saddle of the baggage they had slung over it. "Here you are." He handed her the roll of mats and bedding, and both their bows and quivers; and slung over the back of the saddle the rest of the packets that had not gone into Jiro's saddle kits, and tied that down. Then he set his foot in the stirrup and climbed up.
It was certainly, Shoka thought, a reason to bring the farmers running from their fields and the people from their houses—one of the odder sights that had ever appeared in the single dusty street: a gentleman in faded armor on a graynosed horse, with a somewhat undersized and over-loaded retainer. At first they had not even seemed to recognize him, or ten years had worked more change than he had thought; but then someone in the gathering crowd said: "It's master Saukendar!" and the whole village pressed about them, making Jiro anxious and crowding Taizu close to his stirrup.
But those were the young folk. The village elders came out to them, and bowed; and Shoka bowed from the saddle.
Are there bandits? he heard asked through the crowd. "Are the bandits coming?"
He felt a pang of guilt for that.
"What brings you to us, m'lord?" the oldest asked, in a voice like the wind in dry reed. "What can we do for you?"
"Honorable," he said, and bowed again, "this is my wife. Her name is Taizu."
Murmurs and bows. He could not see Taizu's face. It was, he thought, probably just as well. He imagined the scowl, fit to frighten devils. But she kept quiet, while the village women stared at her wide-eyed and the whole village wondered, in politely hushed tones, just where master Saukendar had gotten his wife and—in a little quaver of fear—just what such a woman might be.