Editing Chapter 1 (section)

==The three combatants converged...==

...as Sun Chee stepped out of his house with Selara.  Zhou Wing and Ping came in from the fields with their faces set like stone, while Sun Lian rode in from the north with Yao Ye at her heels.  The whole town, some fifty in all, emptied out of the houses and came in from their fields to watch.  Even the children reciting hymns to the solar conquerors at Shu Zhuang’s direction broke ranks and crept up to watch the battle.

Sun Chee spoke first.  “Ping, I have changed my mind.  You may marry my daughter, but let me tell you that I can offer you only one horse.  I have no sons, as you know, so I must consider my old age.  Who will take care of me?  I can give you nothing more than the horse she is riding!”

Ping spat (as the villagers hissed with alarm) and shouted back, “You can keep your nag.  I will marry Lian, and we will move far away from here where we’ll never be bothered by such stingy old relatives.  I will be appreciated in distant cities where talent like mine is prized!”

Sun Lian laughed imperiously.  “Bah!  I will not marry any man who can neither stand up to my father nor earn his trust, and I will not live under the roof of a tyrant!  I will join the cavalry and die a maiden, forever untouched by petty men!”

Then the shouting truly began, as various villagers began encouraging them to greater fits of passion.  Soon Sun Chee was pushing at Ping, Ping was pulling at Sun Lian, and Lian was swatting them both with her hands.  All the while they continued shouting and yelling as the children jumped and clapped their hands with glee at the entertainment.

At that moment, Grandmother Lee and Toruna stepped out her longhouse.  Grandmother surveyed the scene for a moment, casting her blind eyes about, nodded to Toruna, then shouted, “Be silent, you empty-headed ninnies!”

The town was instantly silent.  They all looked somewhat sheepishly up at her from their various activities of civil unrest.

Grandmother Lee strode across the green to the three combatants.  “What is this I hear?  What foolishness.  Sun Chee, you are a wealthy man, and you will only become richer.  Why do you begrudge a fitting dowry for your daughter?  Do you love her so little?  Ping, how dare you refuse his generosity and turn your back on the town that raised you as an orphan.  Who will mend our clothes and stitch our saddles?  There is none as skilled as you in three days ride from here!  And you Lian, why have you entertained such unfilial thoughts?   Your father has accepted your choice, but now you refuse him?  Are you so fickle as to lead Ping on like this, when he has wooed you for five years?”

The three hung their heads in shame before her.

“You could not have thought up such devilment on your own.  Who has filled your heads with such terrible ideas?  Shame on them as well!”

Zhou Wing bowed his head, while Selara knelt in obeisance to the village elder.  Yao Ye, farther back, began to try to sink noiselessly and discreetly into the grass and disappear entirely.

Chee coughed to clear his throat.  “Ping, I have wronged you, and I see now that you do love my daughter.  Before the winter comes, I will build a house for you and prepare it with the finest furnishings, and you shall have two horses... and another in a year for your firstborn child!”

Ping bowed his head before the gray-bearded man.  “You honor me with your trust and generosity.  I am sorry that I entertained such unfilial thoughts as to deprive you of your daughter, your comfort in your old age.  I will stay and be as a son to you, so that no one may say that I have robbed you of your family.”

Sun Lian grinned enthusiastically. “Now I see that it was not cowardice that made you meek before my father, but respect.  Ping, I hope that after we are wed, I can learn to be as strong as you; strong enough to humble myself as you have for me.”

Grandmother Lee turned away from them and put a hand on Toruna’s shoulder.  She whispered in a voice that only the sorceress could hear, “Thank you for your help.  They would have fumed like that for weeks, always straining but never breaking, if you hadn’t come.  Their pride has been broken.  We can have peace here again.”

“If we have helped in any way, I am certain it is only by the grace provided us by the Sun and His servants.”

“That may be.  You’re welcome to stay in my house until you leave, and we’ll be sure that when you go you have more than enough to make it to the next town.”

“We will strive to earn this immense gift.”

The three downcast amalgams, hearing nothing of this exchange, saw only Toruna turning from the grandmother to give each of them a calculating stare.  She said nothing, but the point was well taken.

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