On an evening in the early spring of Jian'an 13 (208 CE), the wind behind the western hill of Bowangpo (博望坡) blew backward.

The small dot of red ink that Shanfu (單福) had pressed onto the map two days before, and the single character 火 beside it, began to move this evening behind that hill. Guan Yu (關羽) and Zhang Fei (張飛) lay hidden at the northern and southern ends of the western hill. Before them, bundles of dry reed and resin that Shanfu had set in advance were stacked in neat rows.

Liu Bei (劉備) stood at the eastern mouth of Bowangpo. A white robe, light silver armor, a light blade at his waist. The night before, Shanfu had fastened a small slip to the side of his saddle. The slip bore two characters. 短退. Withdraw, briefly.

From the north, the troops of Cao Ren's (曹仁) subordinates, the brothers Lü Kuang (呂曠) and Lü Xiang (呂翔), entered the eastern mouth of Bowangpo. Five thousand men. The vanguard banner flapped large inside the dust.

As Shanfu's slip had instructed, Liu Bei drew back briefly. Lü Kuang shouted aloud.

"Liu Bei flees! Strike!"

The Lü brothers' force split into two streams and poured into the narrow valley of Bowangpo. Dry reed and resin already lay upon the valley floor. To the soldiers' eyes, it looked only like dry grass.

At the center of the valley, Liu Bei turned his horse. That turn was the signal. From the northern end of the western hill, Guan Yu's Green Dragon Blade came down first. At the same instant, from the southern end, Zhang Fei's Eight-Serpent Spear (八蛇矛) came down.

When the descent of the two weapons had ended, behind Guan Yu and Zhang Fei a band of soldiers flung lit torches all at once. The reed and resin spread across the floor of Bowangpo flared up together.

The fire rose higher and faster than expected, because tonight's wind blew backward. Shanfu had told them this single thing two days before. Tonight's wind will go from north to south. Light first at the northern end. Guan Yu lit first, and Zhang Fei followed behind his fire.

On horseback, Lü Kuang wavered. Around him, his soldiers could not rush into the flames and stepped back. At that moment, Liu Bei's cavalry had already sealed the eastern mouth of the valley.

Lü Xiang turned his horse and rode east. At the eastern mouth, Liu Bei swung his blade in person. Lü Xiang's right arm fell first. Then his body came down from the horse. Lü Kuang, beneath Guan Yu's Green Dragon Blade, was split in two with the sound of a single stroke.

Within the narrow valley of Bowangpo, a force of five thousand scattered in less than half a day. Fewer than a hundred returned north alive.

In the evening after the battle, Liu Bei, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, and Shanfu stood together upon the western hill. Below, the last strand of the fire was slowly dying down. The smell that follows reed and resin burning was a strange mingling of sweet and bitter.

Zhang Fei drew a large breath.

"Master Shan. One victory in six years. Six years."

Shanfu smiled. The smile was short but firm.

"General Yide. This is not a victory of six years, but the first stroke of a victory across thirty years to come. Tonight's fire dies here. But the smell of this fire — this very night, quietly — reaches Cao Ren's camp in the north, Cao Cao's (曹操) Chancellor's residence at Xudu (許都), and even the inside of a thatched hall on Wolonggang (臥龍崗) at Nanyang (南陽)."

Liu Bei was long silent. Then he asked quietly.

"Master Shan. The one inside that hall, how will he smell this fire tonight?"

"General. He will not smell the smell first. He will hear the direction of the wind first. When he hears that tonight's wind went from north to south, he will already guess under whose command this fire was lit."

Beside the four men upon the hill, the last thin smoke of Bowang's fire drifted south. Whether that smoke reached the afternoon nap inside the thatched hall on Wolonggang, eight hundred li to the south, none of the four could know tonight. But it was clear that the first stroke of a sentence that had begun to reach there had come down from this Bowangpo this evening.

Wolong will come to know. Wolong will come to hear.

The two sentences did not leave Shanfu's mouth tonight either. Only, inside the slender book in his hand, one line was written small: First fire at Bowang. North wind toward the south. The first stroke of the forty-seventh year.

Behind them, Zhang Fei laughed, large. Inside that laugh, a weight pressed down for six years had at last come loose.

—