A soft, silent shower covered Jinghai. On higher altitudes, mist curling into graceful hands left behind lingering caresses, and the whole of Mysterious Mountains stretching farther down north of Jinghai, forthright like hawkish soldiers overrun in a high-tide of rushing waves of clouds and mist, welcomed yet another brief shower. Peaks after peaks were soon shadowed underneath misty rain and foggy screens, and murky downpour lingered further on, as if noting a silent plea of summer's end.
It was the ninth month of the year; after three more this year would end too. No festivity, no new remarkable gatherings were on the horizon and Jinghai at this time of the year had fallen into a slothful slumber lulled by its wetlands and soaking greenery steeped in mud.
Carriages and carts dotted its roads. Some dragged by hands, some pulled along by beasts. Some overturned into muddied and rain-washed pathways. A few tired and flustered faces gathered around one such carriage, crowding together to gain some heat as they stood shivering in the cold. They waited as they had no other way out but to wait. They could only pray for a random passerby to come and carry their words to bring helpers from the town while they soaked in the rain. So, they stood shivering in the rain and hoped.
Another such unfortunate fellow, a young master, sat more comfortably in his broken carriage awaiting rescue.
Draped in his fur, sometime peeking through the carriages now wet bamboo screens and curtain, sometime cursing at the weather in an almost indecipherable tone, while seeking some warmth from his hand-held brazier inside the carriage, he knew all too well that he was hopelessly waiting hours before any help could arrive in any form. Each screech would throw him off, with a rising expectation, to be immediately smothered too as he'd glimpse something else driving past him— this time, it was the loud rattle of rolling wheels created by a few peasants riding their ox-drawn carriages.
"Ha, what a waste—! As if heaven mandates my head be smeared in mud." The Second young master whispered to the wind. His tall back looked wistful as he gazed ahead at the road leading to Jinghai's Town Gate, chasing distant gray backs. "Mother...I hope she hasn't started yet."
Soon rain covered his vision.
Often paper umbrellas could be seen floating like colorful shadows from one end of the alley to another, but seldom out from the town gate or even in suburbs. Festive reds, cheerful yellows and some supporting imitations of famous paintings, various umbrellas floated around like hundreds of flowers blooming in spring misted over like a ghost painting. From one shopfront, people hopped to another, hoping to remain as un-wet as humanly possible in such a cumbersome weather, till the black tiled eaves of all visible shop fronts were filled with random strangers seeking refuge or running away in haste. Rain pitter-pattered on.
A few bare-bodied slaves ran along rushing to their young master's rescue. And soon they were shivering and shaking in front of him, some of them scurrying to bear the weight of carriage wheels stuck inside mud while he screamed his lungs out with anger.
"What? A carriage couldn't be arranged? Then why did you rush here without arranging something!? Don't tell me the house has every carriage occupied—what did you say? You're saying every one of them is engaged?! All of them?! Ha! Are you taking me for a fool?!!"
And thus, his voice echoed in the valley losing its shrill timbre as it reached farther and farther down south.
In the outskirts of the town southwards, there it was the worst hit. Continuous rain of three weeks, unsparing of the day or night had seeped into fields stretching all around the valley. A gloom had settled in; melancholic blues filled the valley's undulating hills and ravines. As far as the eyes could see, the land appeared as a sea overarching the heavens. It stretched on and on, farther till it melted away down into the opposite range of bluish gray Mysterious Mountains far into the southern horizon.
Forest and foliage, fresh and lush green forked sparingly. The rain had washed off their dusty paleness and once again filled them with choicest of hues. The landscape had regained its mesmerizing colors and the mountains had turned a stark blue, sharply contrasting with the rolling white mist, while the sea-like fields were turning softer and reflective as silence settled in, like finely cut pieces of an enamoring mirror capturing a piece of the moving heaven above in its breast. When a softer shower fell over it creating round ripples everywhere, the effect turned ethereal...
Greens could be said to have become a bit greener and the town livelier by the time Second young master and his servants found their way back.
Despite the unfortunate weather, the roads were getting busier; shops opened, carriages and carts carrying wooden boxes and people with burdens on their shoulders started crowding Jinghai. Even the small river running through the middle of the town, although flooded with muddied water and red of the washed down mountain soil, had begun to get busier. Hordes of flower sellers, vegetable and fish sellers with their baskets of freshly picked bunches of water-lilies and lotus pods and leafy greens and baskets of jumping rainbow trout, sat atop their boats and rowed downstream while haggling with their customers.
While outside hawkers pitched up their voices a notch higher, inside shaded mansions of nobles a similar kind of chattering of servants could be heard. Rows after rows of maids and servants were filing here and there in a set rhythm in Wei Jia as if some hand was pulling their string from above, guiding them, restricting their paces, restraining their actions, keeping anyone from sticking out of tune. The rhythm itself was fine, but often a strange artificiality dawned upon the servants' features.
"No, no, no! Oh, heavens! You—Hong Tao! Tao'er look at your steps, will you? Look at the time! Look at what you have done! The mistress has been waiting for so long now, both of her feet have gone cold in wait. There have been no words, no messages. Who among you knows if the Second Young master has returned yet or not? You should be ashamed! Would you care to rush out and look for him and see where he is now? Why hasn't he come home when all those slaves have been sent for so long? Everyone else is worried, but you. No, run for heaven's sake! The young master is late—look at this rain! It doesn't intend to stop, does it? The soup will be cold soon…Oh my heaven! Guests have started pouring in too–!"
Thus, the voice fell like a small pebble falling into still water.
Still, like a timbre broken off in a jerk and rescinding in the same manner, a Yellow-Tailed Warbler's song broke upon a magnolia branch drooping under the shower. It wasn't the flowering season yet its leaves shook with passion of a quenched thirst; the day was mellow, and the tune was heartening. Where did it break off to? No one could tell.
Soon, rows of maids dressed in fine silks of modest cut went to east and to the west, to north and to south, and to each direction on their bidding. The rhythm had dawned upon them once more, all the more absorbed and grievous.
Somewhere a little splatter of feet echoed, and then silence lingered in a vacant courtyard.
A man bowed his head, kneeling respectfully before his mistress.
"Second Mistress, I have done what you desired. Second young master will remain confined till our mission is complete. Are there any other orders, miss?"
"Shitou…Do you think I am being too cruel?" Draped in a lavender shawl, the woman carefully tucked a freshly pruned flower into her bun, sitting in front of a bronze mirror. She waited for a reply while gazing into her face but when silence filled the chamber, she closed her eyes, and a sneer graced her lips. "A mother, Shitou, can do anything for her child. Even if it means angering the gods and demons. If such blasphemy can achieve my goals, I am willing to fight even the Gods!"
"Miss!!"
"Don't persuade me anymore. It is time. If one of them must die...it cannot be my daughter. I refuse! I refuse to sacrifice her."
She stood up and walked out of her chamber, leading a group of maids behind her.
Outside, the rain ceased and rolling from eaves fell murky dark droplets, rolling down in sheets of silvery sparkling train, down onto the stoned marbled floors. It was a solemn picture yet equally mesmerizing in its unsettling uncanniness. Silence descended, then a shout emerged suddenly as if one had embroiled another in its existence. Everything fitted perfectly in an unceasingly mellow space.
***
Through white floating curtains sliding off the canopy of her bed, Wei Zhiruo looked up, still lying on her aching back. Her hazy mind though, rushing past everything, escaping all spatial fastenings of the courtyards and its forted manor, observed the town's walls and its mighty looking gates and its overbearing towers. Odd people, odd buildings met her vision. Her sight lingered a little upon walls still embracing traces of ancient wars, a few scratches and a few mortifying marks etched by weapons.
She rose up, flew high and looked down. She took in all the rushing vigor of the small town, its bitterness and sweetness, its multifaceted chaos and liveliness, she felt its taste linger on her tongue and felt its strain enduring over her ears. For a moment she ceased to be anything but a speck of floating dust roaming over a halo of the past, stringless, unfathomable heights gripping her present and future, as it all melted in a single pot. A strange feeling engulfed her senses and then, as if chiding her willfulness her aching soul snatched her back.
"Cough-cough-cough!!!"
The figure on the bed sat up, shaking with vexation.
"How…?"
Wei Zhiruo heard her own breath coming out in clear, audible wheezing. Her pale face was framed by her thick and black hair, which veiled her face as she tried to lean against the wooden headboard, cushioning her back against cloud-like soft pillows. A deep confusion flickering on her features was quite easily distinguishable against the almost paranoid staleness present in her eyes.
Floating in the early morning sunlight, dust hovered around the room. A few windows were parted open unceremoniously, without taking into account the health of the occupant. Naturally, this carelessness caused aches to erupt in her bones anew, making her feel everything touching her skin feel like a silent blow. As she kept staring blankly, the windows started letting in a faint drizzle and turbid smell of broken soil and crushed leaves and a faintly nostalgic smell tickled into her nose. It was raining, like many rains of her previous life. But the world in which it rained was different.
She traced her hollow cheeks, chasing away chill lingering over them. Two blue orbs burned with discomfort, then many other emotions swirled in them. Soon they settled down, leaving them hollow and dull, shadow less, mirthless, unapologetically apathetic.
She felt it. She knew it too. This was not her own—this room, this boudoir.
Somewhere in the room lay a delicate piece of embroidery, stacked together with piles of colored threads, a wooden frame still mounted with a piece of fabric, and silk rolls. Pearl beads hanging around her bed enclosed the view along with the parted muslin curtains, soft and embroidered with silvery totems of birds and auspicious clouds, which rose with the blowing wind teasingly.
By the door a latticed wooden screen hid the bed from the direct view. Anyone entering through the main door opening into the western walls would only see the tables and chairs and seats readied for welcoming guests, but not the inner part of the chamber. Crafted with luxurious rosewood, latticed window screens were parted open, but there was much missing. Empty spaces filled her vision. The room itself was full of a unique taste of incoherent extravagance and unpretentious barrenness.
Not like the palace at all.
It wasn't luxurious enough. Bright enough. Familiar enough…cough! And the smell that wafted here held a strange sweetness of herbs, lingering, covering a slightly muted moldy smell of rot. Strangely enough, this place, this chamber was altogether brimming with human weaknesses. Human interest, human taste and…what was this faint weirdness, this incongruity?
'No, it's not the palace at all. There is nothing like this there.'
Wei Zhiruo straightened up slowly like a few invisible strings were tugging her up, playing her like a marionette, forcing her to rise up from her death.
Suddenly her eyes found a few shards of broken jars scattered over the floor...
But then a sudden chiming of charms strung to the pearl strings suddenly interrupted her thoughts, recapturing her wandering senses.
Wei Zhiruo closed her eyes and lulled the deep ache in her heart. She patted her bosom and coughed again.
In fact, she knew something was off about the whole thing. The biggest giveaway had always been her body, her hands, her arms. Pale, small and weak. Yes, she had turned young, a child again.