Lin Cuiying pressed the axe blade against Zhang Ergou's Adam's apple, drawing blood. "Have your men throw the knife into the well."
"You bitch, you're asking for it!" Zhang Ergou shouted, his neck stiff, when he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his neck.
The cold, rusty smell seeped into the wound, and Zhang Ergou finally saw the fierce glint in the woman's eyes.
The look in her eyes was strikingly similar to that of the mother wolf he had seen in Beishan two years ago—when she was driven to the brink of despair, she carried the bones of her cubs and bit through the throats of passing merchants.
"The knife! Throw the knife into the well!" he yelled at the top of his lungs, beads of sweat dripping from his nose onto the axe blade.
The three henchmen looked at each other, then slowly threw the rusty machete into the well. The sound of the blade hitting the bluestone well rim startled the crows in the trees.
Lin Cuiying grabbed Zhang Ergou by the back of his collar and asked, looking down, "Are you still going to marry him?"
Zhang Ergou forced a shrill, eerie laugh: "The marriage certificates, stamped by the county government, are all ready..."
The axe blade trembled violently.
Lin Cuiying's knuckles turned white from clenching her fists as she turned to look at Granny Wang cowering in the corner.
Suddenly, Granny Wang pulled a piece of yellow hemp paper from her sleeve. The scarlet official seal gleamed in the twilight: "It's written in black and white..."
She slumped into a pile of chicken droppings, laughing through tears, "The marriage certificate was personally approved by the county government; if you dare disobey, you're committing rebellion!"
At this moment, Lin Cuiying released the axe handle, and Zhang Ergou collapsed to the ground, coughing like a rag doll.
She snatched the yellow hemp paper from Granny Wang's hand, unfolded it, and the stench of ink mixed with poultry excrement hit her nostrils.
Several lines of words were crookedly crawling on the yellowed paper, and the bright red official seal was stamped right on the word "voluntary" in "Lin Cuiying voluntarily married Zhang Ergou".
"Who is that vile hussy trying to impress?" Granny Wang, leaning against the wall, scrambled to her feet, wiping her mouth with her chicken-dung-stained sleeve. "Does she really think she's some kind of literary genius descended from heaven, able to read and write?"
Hearing her mother-in-law say this, Liu shrank her neck and nodded in agreement.
Although the original owner was illiterate, she recognized most of the characters used in this era.
Lin Cuiying trembled as she held the marriage certificate between two fingers, intending to tear it up in one swift motion.
But then he thought, Zhang Ergou said that the marriage certificate had been stamped at the county government office. If he went to get a replacement later, wouldn't that be a loss?
Lin Cuiying turned to look at Zhang Ergou, who was still crawling on the ground, and held the axe blade horizontally to Zhang Ergou's crotch.
"Voluntary, right?" She slowly applied pressure with the tip of her shoe against Zhang Ergou's shinbone. "How about I voluntarily become a widow again?"
The courtyard fell into a deathly silence. The cold glint of the axe blade reflected on Zhang Ergou's contorted face, his Adam's apple bobbing violently beneath the rusty iron, and the foul-smelling liquid seeping down his trousers and soaking the yellow earth.
Three or five greenbottle flies scurried out of the chicken coop and buzzed around the puddle.
"B-Big sister..." Zhang Ergou trembled like a leaf, his mud-covered fingernails digging into the ground, "Don't...don't be impulsive..."
Lin Cuiying's boots ground against Zhang Ergou's kneecap, making a half-circle motion, while the axe blade grazed the crotch of his coarse cloth trousers, making a tearing sound.
"I'm willing! I'm willing to annul the engagement!" Zhang Ergou suddenly yelled, his Adam's apple bleeding from the axe blade.
His fingers spasmed as he dug into the mud, the blood seeping from under his fingernails mixing with urine stains and leaving dark red lines on the yellow soil.
Three greenbottle flies landed on the axe handle, but were shaken off by Lin Cuiying's wrist flick.
"How is this voluntary?" As she leaned forward, stray hairs brushed against Zhang Ergou's nose, and the chicken feathers clinging to the ends of her hair trembled slightly with her breath.
"Divorce! Divorce right now!" Zhang Ergou hissed, the veins on his neck bulging as he slammed the axe blade deeper. Blood dripped down the rust, mingling with the strong smell of urine as it seeped into the soil.
Lin Cuiying grabbed his greasy hair and slammed it against the edge of the bluestone well: "Write a divorce agreement."
"Write...I..." Zhang Ergou's rough voice choked with sobs, his face smeared with snot, "Little sister...I...can't...write..."
It would be strange if Zhang Ergou, who has been lazy and good-for-nothing for over thirty years, could write.
Lin Cuiying turned to look at Zhang Ergou's three henchmen, "Can you write?"
The three henchmen shook their heads vigorously, and the shortest one bumped his lower back against the well edge, his cheeks twitching as he shrank behind his companions.
The tall, thin man's Adam's apple bobbed three times as he stammered, "We...we can't even write our own names."
"He ran all the way to town to find a ghostwriter, and he hasn't returned in half an hour—" Lin Cuiying grabbed Zhang Ergou's ear and shoved him towards the well, "Then chop him up and feed him to the wild dogs."
The tall, thin man stumbled and knocked over the fence, tearing a hole in his trouser leg.
The other two were about to follow when Lin Cuiying stopped them with her axe: "You two stay here. If you dare to take even half a step out, use this to carve your own tombstone."
After saying this, he picked up a piece of broken tile and kicked it in front of the other person.
As the two henchmen crouched down against the wall, shaking their legs, a sparrow startled from under the eaves crashed into a spider web.
"It's time to settle your score." Lin Cuiying flicked her wrist to shake off the blood and rust from the axe blade, then turned to look at Granny Wang.
Granny Wang, her hem covered in chicken droppings, shrank back against the mud wall, saying, "You... don't come any closer..."
Suddenly, her eyes darted around, and she grabbed Liu's arm and pulled her forward sharply.
Liu staggered and fell in front of the chicken coop, her hair half-loose and hanging over her ears.
Her hands, covered in grass clippings, had barely touched the ground when Granny Wang kicked her in the heel: "Aren't you going to shield your mother-in-law!"
"Brother...Sister-in-law..."
Liu's knees trembled violently as they hit the edge of the chicken coop, and she had to swallow three times before she could squeeze out a trembling sound like a mosquito's hum.
She chewed the words "old hag" against her back teeth with the tip of her tongue and swallowed them.
Lin Cuiying hooked Liu's clothes aside and stood directly in front of Granny Wang, saying, "Take out the betrothal money."
Old Granny Wang forced a smile onto her sallow face: "What color is there...?"
The axe blade grazed the earlobe and cleaved into the earthen wall, shaking down a shower of dust.
Granny Wang's pupils shrank to the size of pinpoints, and she rubbed the back of her head against the earthen wall, leaving a gray mark.
Lin Cuiying placed the axe blade directly on Wang Pozi's nose, "I'll ask one last time, where is the bride price?"
Granny Wang's head was already pressed against the mud wall with no way out. "In...inside the house..."
"Go and get it."
Granny Wang trembled as she retrieved a gray cloth bundle from inside the house, which Lin Cuiying snatched away.
Before I could even open it, a flurry of footsteps suddenly erupted outside the fence, startling the chickens into fluttering about in all directions.
"Brother Er Gou!" The tall, thin man burst through the courtyard gate with a hoarse voice, and six burly men with menacing faces rushed in, covered in dust.
"This little wench?" The scarred man at the front spat out a mouthful of yellow phlegm, his thumb brushing against the machete slung at his waist.
Five men followed closely behind him, each holding a carrying pole and facing Lin Cuiying.
Suddenly, Granny Wang rolled on the ground, crying out, "Hero, save me! This vile woman is trying to harm my whole family!"
Zhang Ergou, who was lying on the ground, saw the person who came and raised his neck as if convulsing.
The bloody gash on his neck still reeked of blood, but his mouth twisted into a wide grin that reached his ears. "My men are here!"
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