knew from the feel of the bag that it didn’t contain enough gold. He could have told the shopkeeper that without opening the bag, but he opened it anyway and spilled the contents across his hand.
“There is not enough,” Zedong accused.
“It is all we have,” the jeweler whispered.
“Nonsense. You have a fat cat. If you have enough to keep your cat fat, then you have enough to pay the emperor his taxes.”
“No, I swear to you,” the old man said. “It is all we have.”
Zedong dropped the bag into the emperor’s chest. Then he looked around the shop. “You have gold ingots and jewels.”
“Please,” the old man begged. “We do not have many of those. Hardly enough to stay in business. If you take those, we cannot make items to sell. Then the emperor’s new taxes won’t be met.”
“If you don’t meet the taxes,” Zedong promised, “things will go badly for you.” He turned to the warriors. “Seize the gold and gems.”
The warriors went about their assignment. Screaming in outrage and pain, the old jeweler grabbed one of the warriors by the arm and yanked. Without hesitating, the warrior shoved the old man away and thrust a dagger through his throat.
The jeweler fell and his blood stained the wooden floor. He clasped his throat and kicked helplessly as his life ebbed.
Wailing, his aged wife abandoned her chair and rushed to her stricken husband. She called on the gods and for help from anyone, but no one came. No one dared.
The old woman’s pain didn’t touch Zedong. He’d ordered the deaths of many others. This one had been easy because he didn’t have to think about it. Furthermore, with one man dead, the other shopkeepers would readily pay.
As her husband died, the old woman turned to Zedong. “May the gods curse you,” she moaned. “May your life end soon and in painful agony. May you throw up your own entrails and take days to die.”
Zedong knew he couldn’t afford to allow such an affront. He was the emperor’s tax collector. An insult to him was like an insult to the emperor. If he did not avenge it, the emperor would have him executed.
“Kill her,” Zedong ordered.
The nearest warrior drew his sword instantly, then slashed down into the old woman, cleaving her from shoulder to heart. With a last gasp of pain, she fell across her husband.
Zedong looked at her and hated her even in death. He kicked her three times, getting madder each time because she wasn’t alive to feel pain.
He wished he’d killed her before she’d cursed him. Curses were powerful things.
At his order, the warriors looted the shop. Zedong stood and watched. The fat cat stared at him with its unblinking green gaze. Zedong walked toward it, slipping a dagger from inside his sleeve. When he was close enough, he struck.
But the feline moved at the last moment, leaping over Zedong’s knife, landing on his arm and leaping up again. The cat’s claws struck Zedong’s face above his right eye. Blood dripped onto his cheek and fire stung his flesh. He swung the knife again, but the cat vaulted through a window and vanished.
Zedong wiped the blood from his face and kicked the dead woman again. He didn’t think she had the power to properly curse him. The cat was merely bad luck.
Still, he wished he knew for sure.
T HAT EVENING , AFTER FULL DARK had finally draped Loulan City and all the shopkeepers had paid, Zedong left town. With two people dead, Loulan City wasn’t safe for him. He wouldn’t have admitted that to the emperor, though.
Eating roast duck from the large basket of food he had seized from the vendor, Zedong listened to the emperor’s gold clinking in the trunk at the back of the carriage. He relished the spicy meat enough to lick the flavor from his fingers.
The carriage took a sudden hard turn to the right. Zedong cursed the driver as he reached into the basket for one of the pastries he’d claimed.
The carriage dodged again.
Cursing more, Zedong slid the window shade aside and took a deep breath to better yell at the incompetent driver. Likely the man had gone to sleep. He had complained of fatigue for himself and the animals when ordered to leave town.
Before Zedong could remember the man’s name, the driver’s corpse suddenly sprawled over the side of the carriage. The man’s dead face slapped against the window. Only the long arrow through his throat kept his head from entering the carriage. A fearful look was frozen on his face.
In a moment he was gone, dropping to the road beneath the whirring wheels of the carriage. The vehicle rose sharply for an instant as it rolled over the dead driver.
Zedong grew afraid. The horses ran faster, thundering over the road as fear filled them.
“Help!” Zedong called out. “Help me!”
Inside the carriage, he bounced vigorously, slamming against the walls and the cushioned seats. He fumbled the door open and gazed outside, thinking of trying to climb up to the driver’s seat.
Twenty feet ahead, one of the warriors toppled from his mount with an arrow deep between his shoulder blades. Only then did Zedong see two other riderless horses running after the carriage.
One of the warriors in front of the carriage wheeled his mount around and spurred the animal to speed. “Get back inside the carriage!” the man yelled.
Zedong wanted to retreat to safety, but he wished to know what was happening. Gazing behind the carriage, he spotted a slim rider dressed in black. The rider drew back an arrow and let fly.
The warrior who’d gone to engage the enemy gazed down at the arrow that suddenly jutted from his chest. While he still seemed lost in his astonishment, he slid from the saddle. His right foot didn’t clear the saddle straps and his body was dragged across the broken terrain.
The surviving two warriors approached more carefully, riding low over their horses. They closed on the rider in black.
Ignoring them, the rider urged his mount on. He slid the bow over one shoulder and pushed himself into a crouch on the horse’s bare back, balanced one foot in front of the other.
Before Zedong realized what the rider was doing, he’d vaulted from his mount to the top of the carriage. Zedong screamed shrilly and dodged back inside the carriage. Glancing through the back window, he watched helplessly as the final two riders went down to arrows.
Seconds later, while Zedong quivered in fear, the carriage came to a stop.
The rider was at the side of the carriage. He held a sword in his hand as he opened the door.
“Out,” the rider demanded.
Certain that he’d been held up by one of the many thieves that made travel so dangerous in the area, Zedong obeyed. He tripped on the step and fell to his hands and knees. Before he could stand, a blade was pressed to his throat.
The clouds cleared
