Hua Mulan

Part One · The Scroll

Long ago in northern China, a respectable family lived in a small village beside a wide and dusty road. The father, Hua Hu, had once served as a soldier, and a stiff leg still reminded him of those difficult years. His daughter Mulan was the quietest member of the household, and she spent most evenings helping her mother at the loom. When everyone was asleep, however, she often crept into the courtyard to study her father's old spear. She wondered what it would feel like to hold something so heavy, and whether she could ever become as courageous as he had been.

One cold morning a messenger galloped into the village carrying a message from the emperor. A huge army was being gathered, he explained, and every family was required to send one man to join it. The village elder read the names aloud, and when he reached the name of Hua, the entire room went silent. Mulan's father was far too old for the journey, and her little brother was still a young child who regularly lost his shoes. The family had no grown son at all, and the messenger tapped his foot on the doorstep.

That night the lamp burned late in the Hua house. Mulan sat at her loom, but her hands refused to weave, and the unfinished cloth lay motionless in her lap. She could hear her mother sighing in the next room and her father coughing as he tried to hide his worry. Mulan did not feel like a hero, because she felt small and scared. Yet the longer she sat there, the clearer the answer became. Somebody had to go, and the only person who could possibly go was her. She stood up and quietly announced, "Then I will be the one."

The following morning she walked to the market with a little purse of coins and bought a fine horse, a saddle, a bridle, and a long leather whip. Her mother wept and begged her to reconsider, while her father insisted that the idea was impossible. Mulan listened respectfully to both of them, and then she explained her plan. Women were forbidden to join the emperor's army, so she would travel disguised as a young man. She would keep her real name secret, hide her hair beneath a heavy helmet, and practice her deepest voice each night until she could say "Hello" without squeaking.

Part Two · The Camp

Mulan departed at dawn, before the rooster had even crowed, and her mother stood in the doorway until the road disappeared around a bend in the hills. By evening the young traveler reached the great river, where the water roared and the wind smelled of mud and distant rain. She made camp beneath a willow tree and listened to the powerful current. She missed her parents' voices so badly that her chest ached. Across the water, a horse whinnied, and she could hear soldiers singing to keep their courage up. Mulan took a deep breath, pulled her helmet down, and reminded herself that she was a soldier now.

The army camp was a huge sea of tents, smoke, and noisy conversation. A tall sergeant with a scar on his chin looked her over from head to foot. "You are thin," he remarked, "and your voice is rather high. Can you actually ride?" Mulan lowered her voice as far as it would go, which was not very far. "I can ride faster than anyone here," she growled, and then coughed, as if she had swallowed a frog. To her astonishment, the sergeant burst out laughing and pointed her toward the horse lines, where she was given a bed in a crowded tent and a bowl of warm millet porridge.

Training was much harder than anything she had ever attempted. She learned to march in step with hundreds of strangers, to string a heavy bow, and to sleep sitting upright in the saddle, while her arms trembled and her blisters broke open. She also learned the rest of the soldier's job, which included burping on command, spitting in a straight line, and stomping around the campfire without apologizing. She was terrible at all three. Her tentmates cheered her on anyway, and a boy named Wen taught her to belch the whole alphabet, which she privately thought was the greatest day of her life.

Each night, after the other recruits had fallen asleep, Mulan practiced alone in the darkness. She was not the strongest soldier in the camp, but she watched and listened, and she noticed details that other people overlooked. She could tell which horses would go lame first and which paths turned to mud after rain. Soon the sergeant began asking for her opinion, and her tentmates nicknamed her the Careful One. The nickname was almost too good. One afternoon, at the river, three soldiers decided to bathe together, and Mulan realized in horror that she was about to be caught.

She froze on the bank with her heart pounding. Then she shouted, in her gruffest voice, "I cannot bathe with anyone, because I snore underwater!" The three soldiers stared at her. "Nobody snores underwater," said Wen slowly. "I do," said Mulan. "It is very loud. It frightens the fish." It was the silliest excuse in the history of the army, and it worked, because nobody wanted to argue with a person who might snore underwater. After that, the Careful One bathed alone, upstream, and the fish were left in peace.

Part Three · The Long March

The army marched north through mountain passes where the snow lay deep and the wind cut like a knife. At night the sentries stamped their boots to stay warm, and the cold air carried the distant sound of wolves. Mulan thought about the loom at home and the warm kitchen, her mother's cooking, and her father's slow, steady laugh. But she kept moving forward. Twelve winters passed in this fashion, followed by twelve springs, and the faces around her campfire gradually changed. The old ballad says that the campaigns were numerous and the roads were endless. Mulan simply marched, rode, and performed her duty without complaining.

Her cleverness protected the company on more than one occasion. One evening the scouts reported that the enemy had camped on the far side of a narrow gorge, and the sergeant planned a direct charge. Mulan, however, had spent the whole afternoon studying the landscape. She had noticed that the stream was shallow upstream and that the wind blew steadily from the east. "If we cross at the high ford and burn damp straw," she suggested, "the thick smoke will hide us." The officers looked doubtful, but nobody had a better idea, and the sergeant said that it was the strangest plan he had ever heard.

That night the company crept toward the high ford in perfect silence, with their horses' hooves wrapped in rags. Across the gorge, the enemy's campfires glowed like a field of orange stars. Mulan lit the damp straw, and white smoke poured down the valley and rolled across the water, thick as milk, so that nobody could see their own hands. A horn sounded in the dark, and then another. Mulan held her breath. Then the whole company splashed across the ford and surrounded the camp before the enemy had finished yawning. Nobody on either side was hurt, and by dawn the war had changed.

After that night, even the generals knew her name, although they never discovered her secret. She was promoted again and again, and her saddlebag grew heavy with honors: a bronze badge, a bolt of silk, and a letter of praise sealed with red wax. She never boasted about any of them. One cold evening she lay awake counting the years, and she realized that twelve of them had gone by since she had left. Her father would be much older now. Her brother would be nearly grown. She wondered if her mother still watched the road.

At last the wonderful news arrived that the fighting was over, and the northern tribes had agreed to a lasting peace. The soldiers cheered and embraced one another. Mulan cheered as well, but her heart pounded with worry as much as joy, because she had guarded her secret for twelve years. The emperor himself summoned the heroes to his grand hall, and Mulan walked in with her head held high. The room was filled with gold ornaments and crimson banners. The emperor gazed down at her with kind, curious eyes and asked what reward she desired for her long service.

Part Four · The Ride Home

The emperor offered her almost anything she could imagine. He could appoint her a minister of state, give her a chest of gold, or build her a grand house in the capital with servants and a beautiful garden. Every person in the hall waited for her answer. Mulan bowed deeply and spoke in a clear, steady voice. "Your Majesty, I do not wish to become a minister," she said. "I only ask for a swift horse, so that I may carry myself home to my family." Some of the court thought her foolish, while others thought she was the wisest soldier they had ever met.

The emperor granted her wish gladly. The horse was tall and powerful, and its mane shone like silver in the morning light. Mulan rode for many days, past the mountains and across the great river, with the wind in her face. At the top of the final hill she stopped and gazed down at the little white houses of her home. A thin ribbon of smoke rose from her mother's chimney. Her mother hurried to the gate, leaning on a walking stick, and her father stood beside her, older but still tall. Her heart nearly overflowed.

In her own room Mulan changed out of her uniform, combed her long hair, and put on the bright silk dress that she had worn as a girl. She painted a tiny yellow flower on her forehead, as young women did in those days. Then she stepped outside to greet the soldiers who had traveled home with her. They stared at her in amazement. The scarred sergeant dropped his reins, and Wen dropped his jaw. "We marched beside you for twelve years," one of them whispered, "and we never knew you were a woman."

Mulan only laughed. "When two rabbits run side by side," she said, "nobody can tell which is which. It is how they run that matters." The sergeant cleared his throat and studied his boots. "Well," he said gruffly, "I will confess something. I knew in the first week. Nobody that careful has ever been a boy." Mulan stared at him. "Then why did you never say anything?" "You were the best soldier I ever had," said the sergeant. "I was not about to lose her." And from the tent behind them, very quietly, Wen began to belch the alphabet.