It was the morning of the fourth day since his return from the banquet at Xiangyang (襄陽).

Liu Bei (劉備) went out to the well behind the magistrate's office to wash his face. He splashed a dipper of cold water across his face, and the hem of his robe was soaked through. As he bent one knee to straighten the wet hem, the inner side of his thigh pressed down more heavily than usual. Even after he straightened the knee, that heaviness did not soon leave.

Liu Bei drew his back upright. Back in his room, he took off his outer robe alone before the wall. He lifted the hem of his undergarment a little and looked down, silent, at the inner side of his right thigh.

The flesh, quietly but plainly, had come back.

The inner side of that thigh had once been a place where a single strand of firm muscle stood. Today, a softer layer of flesh had taken its seat there. It was not the inner thigh of a man who often rides. It was the inner thigh of a man who had long ceased to ride.

Seven years at Xinye (新野). In those seven years he had ridden Dilu (的盧) a few times, but he had not ridden into a great battlefield (戰場). He had gone out hunting beyond the wall, yet he had not crossed a hundred li in a single ride. In the space between those days, the flesh on the inner side of his thigh had slowly filled back the place where it had once been carved down.

Liu Bei looked at that flesh for a long while. Then he smiled — a brief smile. After the brief smile came a long silence.

Just then the door opened. Guan Yu (關羽) came in. A towel was in Liu Bei's hand, and naturally he let the hem of the undergarment fall.

"Brother. Finished washing?"

Guan Yu was the usual Guan Yu. He seemed both to have noticed, and not to have noticed, that something in Liu Bei's face had changed. Liu Bei gave a small nod, and then spoke softly.

"Yunchang (雲長). This morning, I saw something on the inner side of my thigh."

"What was it, Brother?"

"Flesh that had grown back."

Guan Yu did not answer for a moment. He looked into Liu Bei's face. The end of his long beard stirred lightly. Within his eyes, a very old strand of understanding lifted its head.

"Brother. Did tears come this morning?"

Liu Bei did not answer for a moment. Then he nodded — a short nod.

"A little."

"Even if only a little, that little is the heaviest single drop of seven years."

Guan Yu took a seat — the chair across from Liu Bei. The two sat in silence for a long while. Outside, two sparrows called briefly from the eaves.

Liu Bei spoke first. His voice was a shade lower than usual.

"Yunchang. When I swallowed that one sentence under the mulberry in Zhuoxian at twenty-eight, I did not know a day would come when this flesh would return to the inner side of my thigh. This morning at forty-seven, looking at it, I felt I must ask again what I owe to the man of twenty-eight."

Guan Yu folded his hands upon his knees. He said nothing. Wordlessness was the deepest courtesy in this room today.

That afternoon, Liu Bei went out to the back yard and spent a long time tending the saddle of Dilu. The leather had stiffened under seven years' sun. Liu Bei rubbed a handful of oil between his palms and slowly stroked every corner of the saddle down.

Zhang Fei (張飛) saw the scene from across the yard and said nothing. He only went into the shed and slowly wiped away the thin film of rust long settled along the edge of his Eight-Serpent Spear (八蛇矛).

Guan Yu stayed in the room, took up a brush, and wrote four characters on a sheet of paper.

髀肉復生.

He set those four characters quietly upon Liu Bei's desk, then took up his Green Dragon Blade and went out to the back yard. The sound of his blade had not rung in this courtyard for a long time. This afternoon, it rang out again, and long.

That night, before sleep, Liu Bei looked down once more at the four characters on the desk.

髀肉復生.

Upon those four characters, the lamplight drew a long shadow. Liu Bei picked up the paper and, in his own hand, added a small line beside them.

歲月不待人, The years do not wait for a man.

Having written that line, he folded the paper and placed it deep in the breast of his robe. That his stride on tomorrow morning's round of the back yard would not be the stride of the past seven years — this he already knew tonight.

A strand of flesh that had grown back on the inner side of his thigh was, tonight, inside his chest, being carved down once more.

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