Hok tried to pull away, or shift left or right, or do something, but it was no use. The more she pulled, the worse it hurt. She began to breathe in great gulps. Hok felt the sinews in her arms begin to pop. Her outstretched arm was going to snap. She wanted to scream, but she held it in.
“Hurts, doesn't it?” Tsung purred. “You think this is bad? Wait. After I break your arm, I'm going to dislocate every joint in your body, one at a time—”
Hok knew the end of her arm was near. She would soon lose her life, too. She had to do something. Without another thought, she thrust her hyper-extended elbow skyward and twisted her body as hard as she could to one side.
Hok heard her arm snap before she felt it, a clean break somewhere below the elbow. She cried out, but continued to twist.
Tsung's grip faltered, and Hok yanked her mangled arm free. She hopped to her feet and raced into the trees, cradling her broken arm as tears of pain cascaded over a badly bruised cheekbone. It even hurt to cry.
Hok had always had an unnatural ability to travel silently through dense forest at an amazing rate, and she used this to her advantage. She heard Tsung following her, but she could tell he was falling behind. She knew that he was incredibly fast in short bursts, but those bursts drained him of energy. He could not keep up with her over long distances.
Hok stayed on the move until her legs were wobbly and her knees swelled. And then she ran some more. Eventually, she came to a stream.
Still cradling her arm, Hok waded in above her ankles and followed the stream for several It through the darkness. She remained in the cold water the entire time. Her bare feet grew numb, which made walking difficult, but she stayed in the water because it meant there would be no tracks for Tsung or anyone else to follow.
As the sun began to rise, Hok saw a point where the creek forked. Unsure which branch to follow, she stopped and glanced down both routes. She needed to find a place to rest. For no particular reason, she decided to take the left branch. However, after taking a step in that direction, she detected movement out of the corner of her eye. Some distance down the right branch was a large bird wading in the water. It had a snow-white body, a black neck, black wing tips, and a brilliant red crown on its head. It was a crane.
Hok turned toward the bird, and it flew off downstream. She decided to follow it. She didn't have to walk very far before the stream suddenly opened into a wide marsh—the perfect resting place. The crane was gone.
Hok unhooked two of the loops on the side of her dress and carefully slid her broken arm into the space like a crude sling. With her one good arm, she managed to collect enough marsh grass to form a small pile on the shoreline, and she finally collapsed into the makeshift nest like an exhausted bird that had lost her flock.
Twenty-nine-year-old Tonglong pulled hard on his horse's reins, stopping the black beast at the wide-open gates of Shaolin Temple. It appeared he'd missed a history-making event. Shaolin was destroyed. That was good news for the Emperor.
It was even better news for Tonglong.
Tonglong adjusted his long ponytail braid over his shoulder and scanned the area. The attack must have occurred at least a day and a half earlier. He couldn't help but grin at the rows of neatly stacked corpses rotting in the midday warmth. Whoever was behind such a methodical operation had to be mad. Some of the buildings were still smoldering, but the victims had already been accounted for and the troops had moved on. It could only be Tsung, the former Shaolin monk who was now a general within the Emperor's ranks. Renegade monks like Tsung and Ying seemed to be favorites of the Emperor these days. Tonglong hoped to change that soon.
Tonglong maneuvered his horse around the far side of the compound to see what else there was to see. Halfway across the grassy expanse that separated the walls of Shaolin from the tree line, a strange object caught his eye. He climbed off his horse and picked it up. It appeared to be a strip of red silk tied around a fragment of roof tile. Most of the silk had been burned.
Puzzled, Tonglong dropped it and led his horse over to the tree line. There he found signs of a scuffle. He scoured the ground and noticed something tiny and green and glimmering.
Tonglong knelt and found a small jade crane connected to a single strand of silk. He recognized it as Hok's. Women typically hung jewelry from their sash in much the same way men hung storage pouches, but he had seen Hok wearing this around her neck.
Tonglong's eyebrows raised. He tied the string around his own neck and slipped the crane into the folds of his robe. Hok had no value to him, but Fu and Malao did. They had the dragon scrolls that Ying so desired. Tonglong desired the scrolls, too, but for a different reason. Ying wanted the scrolls to learn dragon-style kung fu. Tonglong wanted them to take over the world.