Echoes of victory faded, replaced by the grim symphony of the battlefield's aftermath: the low moans of the wounded, the ragged breathing of exhausted men, and the quiet, final sighs of the dying.

  First came the cleanup. The bandits' equipment was mostly crude junk. But desperate men carried their worldly wealth with them. It was a grim task, it was silver they had no more need for. We did not take from the living.

  Under Wei Jin's solemn direction, our men began the work of burying the enemy dead. The prisoners were asked to help to identify their fallen comrades. There was no mockery in the task, only a quiet, somber efficiency. We dug a long, shallow trench, and laid the bodies to rest, marking each grave with a simple wooden stake bearing the man's name, if it was known.

  I had sent one of the Wolf messengers galloping back towards our encampment. And an hour later, as we still buried bodies, a small procession rumbled down the road: our wagons and carts, led by Lu Chengfeng and, to my surprise, Lady Feng. She sat atop the lead wagon's bench, while Lu rode beside her.

  His gaze swept over our neat line of prisoners and the field of freshly marked graves, and a flicker of grim approval crossed his face. He dismounted and strode over to where Wei Jin and I stood beside the groaning lines of wounded bandits.

  “A clean victory,” Lu stated, his voice flat. He nudged a groaning man with the toe of his boot. “They're a liability. On the frontier, we'd dig a pit and be done with it. Saves on medicine and rations.”

  The suggestion was casually brutal. He wasn't being cruel, this was the cold logic of years of warfare.

  Wei Jin's face was softer. “Commander Lu, these men are captives. To bury them alive is… dishonorable.” He gestured to the prisoners. “The able-bodied can be put to work. As for the wounded… a quick death is the most mercy we can offer. It is a cleaner and quicker than infection or bleeding out.” He grimaced "That's the courtesy I'd hope an enemy would have for me."

  These were the common approaches, I understood that. But I still hated these suggestions.

  Lady Feng, who had approached unheard, spoke, her voice clear and carrying an unexpected weight of authority. “Is it?”

  We all turned, surprised by her interruption. “General Bai Qi of Qin slaughtered four hundred thousand surrendered soldiers at Changping,” she said. “He won the battle, but his name is now a synonym for butchery. Xiang Yu buried two hundred thousand men alive after the Battle of Julu. The Mandate of Heaven slipped through his blood-stained fingers.”

  She looked from Lu to Wei and then to me. “History teaches us that those who show no mercy rarely hold power for long.”

  She then presented a plan so audacious, we stared at her as if she had lost her mind.

  “The lightly wounded and the able-bodied prisoners will be taken to our camp, as Commander Wei suggests. But the grievously wounded,” she pointed with a delicate, determined finger towards the men who were in the process of dying, “we will load them onto the carts. We will take them to SongJiaTun.”

  We stared at her. Lu Chengfeng found his voice first. “My lady, with respect, that is insanity. March into the enemy's village with a convoy of their own wounded?”

  "Why would they help?" I asked, although I liked where this was going. The bandits had announced they'd spare the villagers, but that didn't make them friends. A brilliant, confident smile lit up Lady Feng's face. "Oh, they'll help," she said, her eyes sparkling with a tactical glee that was purely her father's. "Because I will be the one to ask them."

  Lu sighed and I gave the orders. In a way she outranked us all.

  The seriously wounded bandits were carefully loaded onto the padded wagons. Wei Jin took charge of the main body of prisoners. He and forty men would march them back to our camp. Xiao Kai returned with him, to oversee the captured martial artists, a shepherd for a flock of chained lions.

  I rode at the head of a smaller contingent. As our wagons rumbled onto the nice paved stone roads of SongJiaTun, the villagers, who had spent the morning cowering from the threat of a bandit army, now stared at a convoy of wounded men led by an Imperial Guard officer. The local watchmen hastily waved us through toward the central square, where they and the villagers encircled us. Waiting for an explanation.

  As we rolled to a halt before the ostentatious temple, Lady Feng stood. She had thrown on a dress of sky-blue silk over her Camp Manager uniform. Her hair was simply tied back and her confidence was palpable.

  She planted herself at the front of the wagon, standing on the bench, a small but vibrant figure of nobility amidst the grime and blood of our cargo.

  “Good people of SongJiaTun! Please, you must help us!” Her voice was marginally theatrical, but urgent enough. "My name is Fang Qing'e," she cried, "I am the daughter of a humble silk merchant. Our caravan was set upon by a vicious army of bandits on the road! We would have been lost, slaughtered and robbed or worse, but for the timely arrival of this brave officer and his brave men!”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  She pointed a dramatic, trembling finger at me. Every eye in the square turned to my armored form.

  “He and his loyal conscripts,” she continued, her voice swelling with emotion as she swept her arm to encompass not just our Wolves, but the groaning, wounded bandits in the wagons, “fought like tigers to save us! They drove the villains away, but as you can see, many of these brave heroes have been grievously wounded in our defense!”

  The villagers stared, their expressions a mixture of confusion. But I was wearing real looking armor, and atop a warhorse branded with the sigil of imperial armory. Plus it was a rather pretty young lady telling the story, certain to lend it more credibility.

  “I have nothing to offer but my gratitude… and this!” Lady Feng turned, her hand outstretched. Lu Chengfeng, who had been watching this performance seated with an expression of stoic bafflement, hesitated. She fixed him with a glare and he reluctantly unslung the heavy sack of looted coins and placed it in her hand.

  She hoisted her bag onto her shoulder, the silver within jingling with a sound that cut through the murmuring crowd. “My father's caravan is lost, but I will give every last coin I have to any who will help me tend to these heroes! For the physicians, for the wine, for the bandages, for your time! Please! Will you not help me save the men who saved you?”

  For a long moment, no one moved. The villagers looked from my official armor to the very real bag of silver, then to the very real suffering of the men in the wagons. A man in the front of the crowd, his face grim, called out, “The bandits who came for us are gone, then?”

  “We've driven the cur back into the hills from whence they came!” I boomed, playing my part. “Thanks to the courage of these men!”

  A woman pushed through the crowd, carrying a roll of clean linen. “My husband is a physician, my lady,” she said. “I will fetch him.”

  It was like a dam breaking. The villagers surged forward, a wave of chaotic, compassionate energy.

  “The temple!” Lady Feng directed, her voice now sharp with command, the frightened merchant's daughter replaced by a confident field marshal. “It is the largest space! We will turn it into a hospital!”

  Under Lady Feng's surprisingly deft direction, the garish ancestral temple of the Song clan was transformed. The statues were respectfully covered with cloth, and the smaller, mobile ones were moved to the edges of the hall for space.

  Lady Feng stood at the door and handed out coins with one hand while directing a team of village women with the other.

  “More boiled wine! We must wash every wound! Tear the linens into strips, clean ones only! You, fetch more water from the well! Quickly!”

  The villagers, paid generously for every bucket of water and every roll of bandages, worked with a fervent will. Several of the bandits, those conscious enough to understand what was happening, wept with a mixture of pain, shame, and overwhelming gratitude.

  Late in the afternoon, the clatter of hooves on the stone road announced a new arrival. A column of yamen runners in their official brown uniforms marched into the square, followed by a portly, middle-aged man in the fine silk robes of a county magistrate. He bustled forward, a team of physicians with their heavy satchels trailing in his wake.

  He took in the scene, the temple with wounded, and my own armored form standing guard, and his anxiety curdled into profound relief. Of course he knew this was Vice-Director Song's ancestral village; a successful bandit raid here would have been a political catastrophe for him.

  “I am Magistrate Han of JiangNan County!” he announced, puffing out his chest. He stopped before me, his eyes quickly assessing my armor, recognizing the insignia of the capital's elite Imperial Guard. A flicker of confusion crossed his face. “An officer of the Left Guard? So far from your station? What is the meaning of this?”

  I gave him a crisp, formal martial salute. “Collating Officer Zhang ninth grade, at your service, Magistrate. A fortunate coincidence. My men and I were on a discreet assignment in the region when we received word of this bandit army threatening the peace.”

  His eyes lit up with understanding. He leaned in, his voice dropping to a whisper. “The Vice-Director is truly a man of foresight, to have his own agents protecting his home. A brilliant success, Officer Zhang! Brilliant!”

  “Indeed,” I said, letting him lead the conversation. “The Vice-Director values discretion above all else. He prefers to handle such matters quietly, without troubling the provincial authorities with unnecessary paperwork.” I paused, letting him connect the dots. “I'm certain he would show his profound gratitude to a local magistrate who understood the delicate nature of this operation and saw no need to file a formal report.”

  Magistrate Han's face split into a wide, greasy grin. He clapped me on the shoulder like an old friend. “Say no more, Officer Zhang! There is nothing to report here but a quiet, peaceful afternoon.” He beamed, already composing the glowing, private letter he would send to his powerful patron.

  With the magistrate's official and unofficial blessing, his physicians were a godsend. They brought with them fresh supplies, potent salves, and a level of skill that far surpassed the village herbalists. With their expert care, the tide of death was stemmed. By the time the sun began to set, it was clear that a great many of the wounded bandits, thirty or so of the hardiest among them, would survive their injuries. A few more fought for their lives and alas, twenty or so still met their ends.

  As work continued I gave a quiet, subtle nod to Lu Chengfeng, and tilted my head towards the Buddha statue.

  He understood immediately. Under the guise of clearing space for the wounded, he directed a team of four of his most trusted Wolves into the temple. The golden Buddha had already been covered with cloth, so they worked on securing it with ropes as if it were a fragile piece of furniture. It was then loaded onto the back of our largest wagon.

  We departed as twilight painted the sky in shades of bruised purple. The wounded would stay at SongJiaTun. For all they knew they were there to save the Song Family anyways, and I doubted any of them would be dumb enough to say otherwise.

  We arrived back at our hidden camp under the light of a crescent moon. The familiar sight of our palisades and the warm glow of our campfires was a welcome relief. Wei Jin and Xiao Kai met us at the gate, their own contingent of captives already secured in a hastily constructed stockade.

  The camp was now home to nearly thirty prisoners, a mix of the lightly wounded, the sullen, and the terrified.