midday came and went, but there was no sign of anyoneon the road in front. lu was surprised and wondered ifhe could have guessed wrongly. finally, instead ofriders approaching from in front, they graduallybecame aware of the sound of camel bells from behind,and saw a dust cloud rising as a large desert caravanhurried towards them.

the caravan consisted of dozens of camels with 20 or30 horses squeezed in between them, all ridden bymuslims with high noses and sunken eyes. they hadthick beards on their faces and white cloths tiedaround their heads. scimitars hung from their waists.

muslim traders were a common sight on the road to thecentral areas and lu did not consider it unusual.

amidst the group, he noticed a graceful young girl,dazzlingly beautiful, dressed in yellow robes andriding a black horse.

lu was impressed, but did no more than glance at her.

yuanzhi, however, stared in open-mouthed wonder.

growing up in the northwest border areas, she had seenfew well-groomed girls, let alone girls as beautifulas this one. she was about the same age as yuanzhi, 18or 19, with a dagger at her waist and long braidshanging down over her shoulders. she wore afull-length yellow gown, leather boots and a small hatembroidered with gold silk, on the side of which wasfastened a turquoise feather. she was an enchantingsight.

as the girl trotted by, yuanzhi spurred on her horseand followed, gazing fixedly at her. the girl wasannoyed at being stared at disrespectfully by achinese boy, and she whirled her whip above her headand wrapped it round the mane of yuanzhi's horse.

giving it a sharp tug, she pulled out a large clump ofhair, and the horse reared in pain, almost throwingyuanzhi to the ground. the muslim girl cracked thewhip in the air and horse hair flew in all directions.

in a fit of pique, yuanzhi pulled out a steel dart andthrew it at the girl's back. but, not wishing to harmher, she also called out: "watch out for the dart!"the girl leant to one side, and the dart shot past herright shoulder. she waited until it was about ten feetbeyond her, then flicked her whip, caught the dart byits tip and smoothly sent it flying back towardsyuanzhi, calling out: "hey, little boy! here's yourdart!" yuanzhi caught it neatly.

the muslims in the caravan applauded loudly at thesuperb skill with which the yellow-robed girl handledher whip. a tall, thick-set man with a heavy blackbeard went over and said a few words to her, to whichshe replied: "oh, father!" but she took no furthernotice of yuanzhi. the dozens of camels and horsesmoved on and gradually disappeared.

"that girl was impressive, wasn't she?" said lu.

"these muslims ride day and night. they ought to begood with their whips. but it doesn't mean she knowsany real kung fu," yuanzhi replied.

lu laughed. "really?" he asked.

towards evening they arrived in the town of bulongji.

there was only one large inn in the town, outside ofwhich was planted the flag of the zhen yuan bodyguardagency. with two large groups to look after, the inn'sservants were very busy.

lu had a wash, and then strolled into the courtyard ofthe inn with a cup of tea in his hand. in the dininghall, he saw two tables full of agency men drinkingand talking loudly. the lead escort with the fiveelement wheels had put the weapons down but kept thered knapsack on his back.

taking a sip of tea, lu gazed up at the sky.

one of the lead escorts laughed. "brother yan, onceyou've delivered this toy to beijing, general zhaowill reward you with at least a thousand, won't he?

you can go and have a good time with that girlfriendof yours, xibao."so it really is one of the yan brothers, lu thought,and paid even closer attention to what was said.

"a reward?" said yan. "ha! well, everyone will getsomething.""your xibao has probably gone off with some other manwilling to make an honest woman of her," added aneffeminate voice. lu looked over out of the corner ofhis eye, and saw a man with a sly face and a slightfigure, also dressed as a lead escort.

yan grunted, obviously not pleased.

"you bastard, tong," added the first lead escort. "younever have anything good to say."tong laughed. "all right," he said. "but brother yan,fun is fun and serious is serious. don't think aboutxibao too much or you might find someone has stolenthat red knapsack off your back. it's not important iflose your head or not, but the agency's reputation hasto be maintained.""don't worry," yan replied angrily. "if those muslimstry stealing it back, i'll soon put an end to theirnonsense. i am one of the six guandong devils and igot where i am with real kung fu, not like some of theweaklings in the bodyguard agencies these days who cando nothing but eat and fart!"lu looked at the red knapsack on yan's back: it wasn'tbig, and from the look of it, whatever was inside wasvery light.

"it's true that the six devils of guandong arefamous," tong said. "it's a pity that brother jiao wasdone in. we don't even know who the murderer was."yan banged the table. "who says we don't know? it hasto be the red flower society!"that's strange, lu thought, i killed jiao. what isthis red flower society? he walked slowly around thecourtyard inspecting the flowers, moving closer to thegroup of lead escorts.

tong would not let the matter drop. "it's a pity," hesaid. "if i wasn't such a weakling, i would havesettled things with the red flower society long ago."yan shook with anger. one of the other lead escortsbroke in to mediate: "anyway, the red flower society'sleader died last month," he said. "they've lost theirman in command, so who is there to settle with? andanother thing, where is the proof that jiao wasmurdered by the red flower society? when you find themand they deny the charge, what are you going to do?""yes," said tong changing his tack. "we daren'tprovoke them, but surely we've got enough guts tobully a few muslims. this little toy we've snatched isas precious to them as life itself. in the future, ifgeneral zhao ever wants money from them, or cattle andsheep, do you think they'd dare to refuse? i tell youyan, stop thinking about that little xibao of yours.

when we get back to beijing, you should ask generalzhao to give you a little muslim girl to be yourmistress. then you can really..."before he could finish, a piece of mud brick flew outof nowhere and lodged itself in his mouth. two of theother lead escorts snatched up their weapons andrushed outside while yan picked up his five elementwheels and looked warily around. his younger brothercame running in, and both stood together, not daringto move for fear of falling into some trap. tong spatout the piece of mud and began swearing.

the two other lead escorts, tai and qian, rushed inthrough the door. "the little bastard's gone," one ofthem said. "there's no sign of him."lu had observed the whole incident and laughedinwardly at the helpless expression on tong's face.

then he saw a shadow darting across the rafters in acorner of the dining hall, and went slowly outside. itwas already growing dark, but he spotted a figure leapoff the corner of the roof, land noiselessly, andspeed off eastwards.

lu wanted to know who had treated tong to a mouthfulof mud and, making use of lightness kung fu * (* atype of kung fu that makes extra-fast running andsuper-human leaps possible.), he followed, the teacupstill in his hand. the pace was fast, but the personhe was following was not aware of his presence.

lu's quarry had a slim figure and moved daintily,almost like a girl. they crossed a hill and anink-black forest loomed ahead. the person aheadslipped into the trees with lu close behind.

underneath, the ground was covered with dead leavesand twigs which crackled as he stepped on them. afraidof giving himself away, he slowed down. just then, themoon broke through the clouds and a shaft of clearlight shone down through the branches, covering theearth with jumbled ghostly shadows. in the distance hesaw the flash of a yellow gown, and his quarry movedout of the forest.

he followed to the edge of the trees. beyond was alarge expanse of grass on which were pitched eight ornine tents. his curiosity got the better of him, andhe decided to go and have a look. he waited until twoguards had turned away, then jumped across with a'swallow gliding over water' leap and landed among thetents. crouching low, he ran to the back of thelargest tent, pitched in the centre. inside, he couldhear people talking agitatedly in the muslim language.

he had lived in the border areas for many years, andunderstood some of what was said. carefully, he liftedup the corner of the canvas and looked inside.

the tent was lit by two oil lamps under which a largenumber of people were seated on carpets. he recognisedthem as the muslim caravan that had passed them thatday. the yellow-robed girl stood up and drew a daggerfrom her waist. she cut the index finger of her lefthand with the tip of the blade and let several dropsof blood fall into a cup of horse's milk wine. thenone-by-one, every muslim in the tent did likewise. thetall muslim that the girl had called father raised thewine cup and made a short speech of which lu couldonly understand something about 'the koran' and 'ourhomeland'. the yellow-robed girl spoke after him, hervoice crisp and clear, and concluded by saying:

"if the sacred koran is not recovered, i swear neverto return to our homeland." the muslims lustilyrepeated the oath. in the dim light, lu could seedetermination and anger on every face.

the group belonged to one of the richest and mostpowerful of the nomadic muslim tribes of the tianshanmountains, numbering nearly 200,000 people. the tallman was muzhuolun, the leader of the tribe; a strongfighter, fair and just, he was greatly loved by hispeople. the yellow-robed girl was his daughter, huoqingtong.

the tribe lived by nomadic herding and contentedlytravelled the great desert. but as the power of themanchu court extended into the muslim areas, itsdemands for taxes increased. at first, muzhuolun wentout of his way to comply, and worked hard to meet thedemands. but the manchu officials were insatiable andmade life impossible for the tribe. on severaloccasions, muzhuolun sent missions to the manchu courtto appeal for a reduction of taxes. but far fromachieving a reduction, the missions only served toarouse the court's suspicions. general zhao wei wasgiven an imperial order to supervise military affairsin the muslim areas and he discovered that the tribeowned an ancient hand-written koran, originallybrought from the sacred city of mecca, which they hadtreasured for generations. the general decided to getthe koran to use to blackmail the muslims intosubmission and he dispatched a number of top fighterswho stole it while muzhuolun was out on a longjourney. the muslims had organised a group to recoverthe sacred book.

lu decided that the muslims' plotting had nothing todo with him, and he carefully stood up to return tothe inn. at that instant, huo qingtong noticed him.

"there's someone outside," she whispered to her fatherand shot out of the tent in time to see a shadowrunning fast for the trees. with a wave of her hand,she sent a steel dart speeding after him.

lu heard the projectile coming and leant slightly toone side. as it passed, he stretched out the indexfinger of his right hand and, carefully calculatingthe speed and direction of the dart, tapped it gentlyas it passed so that it fell into the teacup he washolding. then without looking back, he made use of hislightness kung fu and almost flew back to the inn,where he went straight to his room. he took the dartout of the cup and saw it was made of pure steel witha feather attached to it. he threw it into his bag.