The spring cold had a bite in it and the river water was freezing.
And the moon was dark, the wind was high, and the waves ran heavy.
Ning Chen put his head up out of the water, looked at the capsized ship, and his face went livid.
This is a warship. These people dared scuttle a warship to try to kill me… Their nerve is past all measure. No — it is more than that. They are out of their senses.
Touching a warship is a crime that takes the entire household to the sword.
I have been careful the whole way, and I never imagined they would dare move on a warship.
Bodies came up one after another and were carried downstream.
A warship usually carries forty or fifty crew.
By the number of bodies, almost everybody on board had been dealt with.
Then something closed on Ning Chen’s ankle.
A hand had hold of his ankle and was trying to drag him under.
Ning Chen let his body sink with it and drove his other foot out hard, and it landed square on the man’s chest.
The hand on his ankle let go. If the man was not dead he was badly hurt.
Ning Chen came up again and swam toward a plank.
The plank was some piece of the ship’s structure, about the size of a round table. Ning Chen climbed onto the plank and looked around him with sharp eyes.
“Old Pan! Old Feng!”
“Old Pan! Old Feng!”
Ning Chen still had not seen Pan Yucheng or Feng Qizheng, and it made him frantic.
But he called several times and got no answer from Pan Yucheng or Feng Qizheng. What he did get was the assassins.
One assassin swam up quietly behind Ning Chen, and the moment his head broke the surface Ning Chen’s dagger came after it and went straight in between his brows.
Then there was a thud from under the plank.
An assassin must have tried to come up at him from under the plank, but the plank was thicker than he judged, and the blade did not come through the plank.
Ning Chen watched the water around the plank warily.
Sure enough, a head came up out of the water at the side.
But before the man could react, Ning Chen’s dagger went in through the crown of his skull and killed him with the one stroke.
Ning Chen crouched on the plank, one hand braced against the plank to steady himself and the dagger tight in the other, and killed them one by one as they came up.
Before long more than ten assassins had died at Ning Chen’s hands.
Ning Chen waited a while and saw no more assassins come up.
He turned and looked at the wreck of the warship being carried downstream, drew a breath, shot out like lightning, touched a toe to the surface of the water, rose again, and in a few bounds landed on the warship’s wreck.
“Old Pan! Old Feng!”
Ning Chen shouted it.
But he never got an answer from either of them.
Ning Chen’s brows drew tight. “Old Pan, Old Feng… you two had better not be dead.”
After a moment’s hesitation he took a deep breath and went headfirst into the water.
It was a long while before Ning Chen came up again, gasping for breath.
He had risked going inside the ship. The warship was already smashed past recognition and there was no searching it at all, and he had nearly been trapped inside himself.
There was nothing for him to do but come out again.
Just then Ning Chen heard a whinny.
Ning Chen swam over quickly, climbed onto a plank and looked toward the sound.
The light was dim and the water was running fast, and he could not see clearly.
“Diaochan! Is that you?”
Ning Chen shouted.
A whinny came back almost at once.
Ning Chen kicked off, using the surface of the water for purchase, and went downstream like a dragonfly touching the water.
It really was Diaochan.
Ning Chen was surprised. Diaochan had both forehooves hooked over a length of timber and both hind legs paddling for her life.
Horses can swim, but not far.
He was astonished at how clever Diaochan was, to have found herself a piece of wood to hold her up.
But the timber was too thin to take Diaochan’s weight, and Diaochan’s strength must have been at its end. Several times she went under.
Ning Chen dropped into the water and looked around him, and saw the plank he had been on come down from upstream.
He swam over and pushed the plank until he caught up with Diaochan.
He pulled away the timber she was holding on to and put the plank there instead.
Diaochan whinnied again and again, as if she were thanking Ning Chen.
The man and the horse went with the current.
At a bend downstream the water grew calmer.
Ning Chen pushed the plank and Diaochan paddled for her life with both hind legs, and they made for the bank.
There was no telling how long it took. In the end the man and the horse reached the shore.
Once the two of them were up on the bank, both were worn out to nothing.
Ning Chen lay sprawled out on the ground, gasping for breath.
Diaochan snorted and blew, and made a pillow of Ning Chen, laying her great head down on Ning Chen’s chest.
Ning Chen felt as though a large rock had been put on him. He could hardly breathe, and he pushed several times without shifting her.
“Get off, you’re crushing me to death!”
Ning Chen slapped at Diaochan’s great head.
Diaochan finally moved her head off him.
The man and the horse were both done in.
The breath Ning Chen had been storing in his lower field all this while was very nearly used up.
After a rest, Ning Chen went and gathered some firewood.
The fire striker was useless now, but making a fire was too simple a thing for Ning Chen.
Before long the fire was going.
Ning Chen took off his clothes, wrung the water out and set about drying them.
He took out the treaty signed with the Wu Kingdom.
Luckily it was silk. If it had been paper it would have been finished.
Even so the ink had run and the writing was blurred in places, though it could still be read.
With his clothes dried and rest enough behind him, Ning Chen rode Diaochan straight downstream.
Thirty li downstream there was a landing.
The landing had soldiers garrisoned there, and existed to supply passing shipping.
By the time Ning Chen got to the landing, the soldiers stationed at the landing had found the bodies coming down from upstream and were fishing them out.
“Who goes there?”
Seeing Ning Chen come riding up, several bailiffs drew their blades warily.
Ning Chen reined in. “I am Ning Chen. Send your landing master to me.”
A landing master is much the same thing as the station master of a post station on the land roads.
But a station master is only a clerk and holds no office… A landing master does hold office, though he is no more than a ninth-grade nobody.
Ning Chen?
The bailiffs thought the name sounded very familiar.
Then one of the bailiffs caught up with it and said, astounded, “You — you’re the Idle Marquis?”
Ning Chen nodded.
The bailiffs sheathed their blades quickly and went down on their knees together. “We greet my lord!”
“Get up. No ceremony. Where is your landing master?”
“A moment, my lord.”
One bailiff ran off at speed.
Before long a middle-aged man in official dress, a little stout, came hurrying up in a rush.
He straightened his clothes and his cap and made his bow with fright all over his face. “This official greets my lord.”
Ning Chen swung down from the saddle. “Get up. No ceremony.”
“Thank you, my lord.” The landing master got to his feet and made bold to ask, “This official presumes — may I ask why my lord is alone?”
Ning Chen said coolly, “I met an assassination attempt thirty li upstream. The warship was scuttled and turned over.”
The landing master’s face changed.
Who has nerve enough for that? To try to assassinate the Idle Marquis of the Great Xuan, and to hole a warship… this is a crime that wipes out a house.
“My lord, we found several bodies a little while ago. They must be the ones from upstream.”
Ning Chen asked quickly, “Do you know the fish-scale coats?”
The landing master said quickly, “I do.”
“Among the bodies you found, was there anyone in a gold fish-scale coat?”
The landing master gave a start. A gold fish-scale coat meant a gold coat of the Inspectorate.
He said quickly, “Reporting to my lord. There was not.”
Ning Chen let out a small breath of relief.
“Have your men set nets across to catch them, and get every body up on the bank… And send out a party to search along the river thirty li upstream, looking for two men.”
“Both of them are Inspectorate men. One is called Pan Yucheng and one is called Feng Qizheng.”
The landing master did not dare be slow about it. “Yes. This official will see to it at once.”
(End of Chapter 418)