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Chen Honghui was not the kind to walk rashly into a situation. He wasn’t like Yao with his fists barreling forward, or Po who had his eyes only on the next meal, or Ling with his romanticism blurring all rational thought, or Cricket with his tendency towards obliviousness. If anything, Honghui was the one to step away and observe from a distance. He would bide his time and wait, if he must, for the answers to present themselves – as, often enough, they had a tendency to do.
Hua Jun had been a puzzle for a long time, but when he had been revealed to be a she, one Hua Mulan, Honghui’s mind had snapped the missing elements into place to form the full picture. Ah, he realized when he faced Mulan as her true self, there you are.
It had been easier to accept her as she was, a woman whose cup runneth over with qi as only true warriors could, than it had been when she had been masquerading as a man. One warrior to another, he recognized her as the equal that she was.
But his realization – that she was indeed the courageous, funny, and smart woman she would have wanted if she had been a man ready to choose a bride – came too late, as these things do, because she went home to her family and he returned to his training as a soldier in the Imperial Army.
It was only on the cusp of winter, right before the first frost set into the ground, that he was able to get leave and travel to Mulan’s rural village to pay a much-needed visit. Honghui had to urge his horse faster through the passes and across the dirt paths so that he might glimpse that woman who had crept into his heart before he had even realized he had left the door wide open for her to walk through.
But what if he was too late? What if she had been matched to another already? Or, perhaps even more pressing, what if she had rethought the emperor’s offer and accepted the invitation to join the emperor’s personal guard? Whatever his standing in the army, Honghui did not think he would be able to follow her there past all those doors. He was only a farmer’s son, hardly a renowned warrior’s heir or even a hero who had saved the empire.
All he had were his armor, his sword, his horse, and his good name. There was little else.
Hua Mulan will not think lesser of you, he said to himself as his horse galloped over the ground and made a good pace, given the length of their journey. She sees you as a friend and a comrade.
But that thought did little to satisfy him because friend and comrade were so impersonal compared to other terms, such as those of endearment. Of closeness. Of things resembling desire and their ends.
If he started to talk like that, her father would probably lop Honghui’s head off clean from his shoulders before he could utter even another syllable.
Honghui would worry about his first meeting with Hua Zhou later. For now, he just needed to find the village before dusk.
By the time the sun had begun its arc through the sky, Honghui could see thatched homes in the distance. He couldn’t help the wide smile tugging at his lips. How odd, that he could be so enamored when he had lived with the idea of Mulan as a woman longer than he had actually known her as one personally. But his father had always told him: if you knew, then you knew.
And Honghui knew that Mulan would be far more to him than just a passing ghost in his life. He had told her, brushing his fingertips against her hand, that they would meet again. That he would be glad for it.
He just hoped he had made enough of an impression over their time training and the battle that had united them as a force for her to remember him.
Upon approaching the village, Honghui dismounted and led the horse slowly down the dirt road. His eyes scanned his surroundings, as only his army training had prepared him to do for the rest of his life, before he entered the main gate structure that was the only heralding that this was indeed a commune for family living. Strangers peered at him through narrowed eyes, and he supposed that was only right: they still lived in dangerous times, after all. People were still wary and afraid of the things – the people – that were unknown to them.
Honghui just hoped that someone would be friendly enough to locate the Hua family home.
No one made a move to engage with him, so he moved through the village and stopped only to let his horse drink water from a waiting trough. Honghui wiped a hand across his brow, his eyes still studying all that was around him. People bustled in small groups, bartering and collecting wares and gossiping. Honghui’s gaze then fell on a young woman selling what looked like weaver’s work, all in bright colors that probably took much time and practice to dye correctly.
“You do fine work,” he said, approaching as nonthreateningly as possible, while the girl’s eyes lifted to meet his. A fine blush tinged her cheeks.
“Are you looking to buy anything today, sir?” she asked, gesturing to baskets and cloth that certainly looked worth whatever price she might have been asking.
Regretfully, he shook his head. “I’m only looking today, but maybe I’ll buy something tomorrow. I plan on staying at least a few days.”
“Oh!” the young woman exclaimed with enthusiasm that might have knocked Honghui over if it had been a physical force. “We don’t get many visitors! From where have you come?”
“I just finished my training with the Imperial Army,” he said. “I had some time off, so I decided to do a bit of traveling.”
Instead of looking impressed – as Honghui might have expected a girl from a small village to be – the girl offered a small hum of noise. “We appreciate everything you do, sir. But you’re not the first soldier I’ve seen as of late.”
Honghui froze as his hand hovered over a cloth scarf dyed in yellows and pinks. “Oh?” He tried to sound conversational instead of forceful. “Why had they come?”
The young woman smiled softly. “They came to see my sister, in fact.”
This time Honghui could not school his expression in time as his mouth dropped open in a way that might have been construed as rude. “Your sister?”
The young woman nodded. “Hua Mulan. She’s been the talk of the village and beyond these last few months.”
”Where is she? Please take me to her. I desperately want to see her.”
But he could not say those words. If the father would chop his head off, then Honghui imagined the younger sister might throw her wares at him before he retreated. He honestly would have expected no less from the sister of Hua Mulan.
“Is she well?” The words slipped out before he could stop them, and he lifted his gaze to see the younger sister’s eyes widening.
“Were you her comrade?” she asked in a rush. “What is your name?”
A smile flitted across his lips. “Tell me yours first, little bird.”
“My name is Hua Xiu,” she said, her voice formal as she bowed her head over her joined hands in a show of reverence. “It’s an honor to meet one of my sister’s fellow soldiers. She says she could not have accomplished so much without the help of her fellow warriors.”
Honghui’s smile only grew. “And we would not be alive without her. I’d say we have an even score in that regard.”
The girl’s head then rose out of its bow. She cocked her head at him and peered at him as if he were a curious sight indeed. “Now, sir, I must ask: who are you?”
“Chen Honghui,” he said. Then, perhaps a bit too rashly, he asked, “Have you heard of me?”
The girl could barely contain her grin. “Your name may have come up once or twice.”
Honghui was liking this young woman more and more. “Do you think I can see her?” he asked, his voice lowered so no one could overhear him.
Hua Xiu nodded, positively gleeful in her delight over his impulsive journey to see her sister. She pointed a finger across the village square. “She went to our family shrine,” she said. Then she actually had the nerve to wink at him. “I think you can catch her before she heads home.”
Honghui didn’t need to be told twice. He picked up the yellow-and-pink scarf and threw down silver coins that would probably pay for a few days’ meals. “I’ll be taking this with me,” he said before trotting off in the direction of the Hua family shrine.
“Good luck!” Hua Xiu called after him, as if she didn’t care who heard her.
While playing the part of Hua Jun, Mulan had told Honghui in passing that her family’s guardian was a phoenix, so it was easy enough to locate the shrine – with a pecular-looking phoenix statue that had one wing broken off. Before he could take that in and what it might mean, he saw in the distance that a familiar figure was walking away, out into the village outskirts.
“Hua Mulan!”
The figure turned instantly, as if she could have sensed him on the wind rather than just hearing her name pass his lips in a shout.
“Honghui,” Mulan said, as if she couldn’t believe her eyes. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you, of course,” he said, running up to her and feeling the nervous energy surge through him as much as he felt utter joy upon seeing her. He wasn’t even trying to hide it because, who knew, perhaps she could sense his emotions with her qi. She had done so much more in tenser situations than these. And he was positively radiating with the happiness he felt to have found her after so long apart.
Her eyes ducked from meeting his gaze, and he didn’t need qi to know she was nervous to see him. Who could blame her, after all, since she probably didn’t think a young warrior would follow up with his promise to meet her again.
But here he was. Standing before her. Waiting for any hint that she might feel the same as he did.
“I feel like I’ve just seen a ghost,” she admitted in a whisper, and he couldn’t help the laugh that fell from his mouth. She looked at him with an accusing look for only a moment before her lips twitched and betrayed her own mirth.
“I’m all flesh and blood,” he said, opening up his arms to his sides and flexing them for show. Then he held out his hand anew in front of her, palm up, ready to take her hand if she would offer it again. “Do you want to touch me to know I’m real?”
Like the last time, her fingertips brushed his palm before they retreated like they had felt a shock. He felt a tingle up his own arm and didn’t know if that was her qi or something much more normal.
They had a long way to go before they knew for sure, Honghui figured.
Then Mulan’s face lifted to show him her smile, as sweet and bright as a sunrise breaking over the horizon on a winter’s morning. “Would you like to come to our home for dinner?” she asked, her voice a tiny bit hopeful.
“I’d want nothing more,” Honghui said. And there was no denying that he meant every single word.
Then he followed behind Mulan’s form leading the way, and every time she looked back at him – he knew he had found another kind of home to keep and cherish for all his life.