The Storyteller

That Cave

Bai Qian was furious.  She had so badly wanted to be the one to escort Mo Yuan from the Celestial Palace the moment she had finished speaking, only to be roughly forced from the hall by her father and Zhe Yan, had her now pacing her chamber angrily and after a solid hour of screaming at the both of them, she was no closer to calming down.

Just the imprinted vision of Shibing sitting sadly on his dais while the worlds so called leaders pack-attacked was enough to have her reaching for a third vase to throw against the wall.  None of them knew him like she did.  Well maybe his Disciples did, and it was heartening to see that they were all armed and prepared to move him out of there, but still, the entire trial was a joke, a disgraceful show of bullying and having been grounded to the den to stop her from leaving for Kunlun Mountain, she was not yet ready to talk to her brother who was doing his best to calm her down.

"How dare he ground me.  I am the Queen of this ..... this..... " her arms stretch wide as she stuttered in tears.  They felt hot on her face and her eyes hurt, because every word those Leaders uttered were still reverberating about in her head.

"Yes you are Xiao Wu.  But you must see the bigger picture.  It is because you are Queen of all this, that you must refrain from acting willfully.  Not when the world is about to go to war again and the last thing High God Mo Yuan needs is the distraction from the real issues.  If you want to help him, then you are going to have to calm down." Bai Zhens soft voice continued to fill her chamber with sense and reasoning she had now caught her attention,

"How?" she asked turning on him with her tear streaked face and red rimmed eyes.

"You are already aware that father was going to let your army lose on the darklands when he thought you had died, and having also trained them in magical weaponry and spells, they are more than ready for you to lead them onto the battlefield." he replied with a soft smile, one that tugged at her heart as she looked a little closer at this brother of hers who seemed to have aged a little and suddenly whatever anger she possessed, evaporated as she lowered herself to hug him.

To Bai Zhens mind, his sister had never seemed so young.  For the past forty thousand years, she had quietly led their people in the same traditional and quiet way that their father had.  But unlike him, she had also secretly created an army of thousands, though more to kill the boredom than for security.  Even so, the enormous effort she had put into creating their first army, was a feat that demanded respect and reverence from her people and even her family. 

And she did this by being ruthless.  She was definitely her fathers daughter, rather than her mothers.  Their mother was a gentle woman, loyal, compassionate, elegant and strong, but in a quiet and unassuming way.  His sister on the other hand was tough, arrogant, opinonated and when it came to her soldiers, heartless and brutal.  There was no room for mistakes, nor complaints and defintely no tears.  Men and women combined learned right from the outset, that their Commander in Chief was ruthless and unforgiving.  They learned not only how to fight in all styles of combat, but she took no prisoners should any of them fail any ne of her tests that she ran daily.

Only to see her on her knees and hugging his leg like a wounded dog in tears, had him wondering just what had happened in that cave and with that man.  No one had ever seen her cry since she was a child, so this unnatural display of emotion was as unnerving as that mist.  She would never have taken herself to the Celestial Heavens for any reason or anyone, let alone place herself in the midst of an angry gathering just to defend a man that she had only known for a couple of months, it was just so unlike her, that Bai Zhen couldn't help but question what was going on with her.

"What happened in that cave Xiao Wu?" he asked softly as his hand lowered to lightly stroke her hair.

For the longest moment, she merely kept her head down and let the tears fall at will.  She knew what he was thinking, only the way he had aged in such a short time and all because of her, had an emotion rising that she had not allowed to show itself until then.  Family.  It was absolutely everything, to her, her brothers, her parents and any other family that existed, only the bond they had was eternal yet painful.