Poetry Chants, Saber Howls – Chapter 28
by Little PandaTen Years of Flowing Water, a Return to the Old City; A Bright-Moon Night, Into New Lodgings (Part 5)
Chongming produced a property deed from her bosom.
Chang Ping stared at the writing on it for who knew how long before slowly coming back to herself. Only then did she finally believe that the woman before her was truly, indisputably the owner of this estate. “Did you live here before?” she asked, bewildered.
Chongming shook her head. “I bought this place.”
They can actually sell a ruin like this? Who on earth swindled you, you poor sucker? Chang Ping’s questions only multiplied. She was about to press further when Chongming went on, “I’m not used to sharing a roof with people. Tonight, you ladies had best find other lodging.”
Chang Ping said, “If I could have found somewhere to stay, I wouldn’t have brought them here. This estate is huge anyway — there ought to be plenty of rooms. Just let these ladies rest here for a single night. We can’t leave until the curfew lifts.”
Chongming fell silent at that, as if sunk in thought.
The others found this odd. Though they had all only just met Chongming and knew little of her, what they had seen on the street earlier told them she was open-hearted, with a chivalrous streak. What could be so difficult about lending a roof for one night? Ling Suihan hated nothing more than begging favors from strangers. Whatever the reason, the moment she sensed the woman’s reluctance, she had no wish to stay on, thick-skinned. “In that case, I won’t intrude. Farewell.”
With that she turned and walked off without a moment’s hesitation — any random rooftop would serve for a night’s sleep.
Chongming watched her back, brow creasing. “Wait.”
Ling Suihan hesitated an instant, then stopped and looked back.
Chongming deliberated. “It’s late. Where could you go now? If you don’t mind it, then stay the night. But come morning, please find somewhere else.”
Beneath a cold crescent moon in the sky, a few chill stars flickered, their light mingling with the lanterns in the women’s hands. They carried their lamps through the gate and looked around — and understood that Chang Ping’s earlier description of the place’s “poor condition” had been generous to a fault.
The courtyard lay strewn with broken tiles and overgrown weeds; the trunks of several willows had snapped and fallen across their path, leaving hardly anywhere to set a foot. Suddenly a black shape streaked past their feet — nothing but a large rat, black-furred all over.
Chang Ping caught the disgust in everyone’s eyes and coughed dryly. “I’ve only been here once before myself. Who knew that after a few years the place would have gotten into even more of a state… Don’t blame me. The inns nearby won’t take you, and this was all I could think of. Bear with it for now — filthy and chaotic as it is, one night here still beats twenty strokes of the bamboo.” She paused, then curiosity got the better of her and she asked Chongming, “But… how much did you pay for this estate? Do you really mean to live here for good?”
By now Chongming had recovered her easy smile, one that carried a certain carefree air of being at home wherever she found herself. “I rather like it, actually. Doesn’t it have a certain wild charm?”
Unfortunately, when they stepped at random into a room beneath the eaves, they found the interior even worse than the courtyard: the ridge-beam sagged askew, cobwebs hung everywhere, and a few broken tables and ruined chairs sat under a thick layer of dust. Xie Yuanjue took out a handkerchief, wiped the dust from a chair, and sat down at the table. She opened her small medicine chest, drew out several strips of white cloth, and shaped them into a little nest, settling the fledgling bird inside. Then she gazed out at the starlit sky, in no hurry to treat Yin Teng’s wounds.
Yin Teng waited a while, then couldn’t help calling out, “Doctor Xie.”
Xie Yuanjue still ignored her, asking Chang Ping instead, “Do the restaurants and taverns here all close this early?”
Though Chang’an enforced a night curfew, what it forbade was movement on the great streets; within the wards themselves enforcement was loose, and commoners were free to move about. By rights, the shops inside a ward should have been at their liveliest at this very hour.
Chang Ping laughed at the question. “It’s not that they close early — it’s that Wuri Ward doesn’t have any restaurants or taverns at all.”
Xie Yuanjue was silent a long moment; her fine brows knit, almost imperceptibly, before she finally rose and turned to Yin Teng’s injuries. A while later she untied her bundle, took out brush and ink, and wrote out three prescriptions. “These wounds aren’t serious — apply the medicine and they’ll heal. I’ve already examined the fledgling too; its wing is only lightly hurt, nothing life-threatening. But here… is there no medical hall or apothecary either?”
“Of course not. Unless it’s some serious illness, people just endure what they can. Who’d open an apothecary here?”
Chang Ping answered offhandedly, not noticing Xie Yuanjue’s deepening puzzlement — still less realizing that her last few remarks had overturned the doctor’s assumptions several times over. Tilting her head, she thought for a while, then went on, “The nearest apothecary to here is one in Ganquan Ward. Can you wait until tomorrow, Lady Yin?”
Yin Teng nodded. “I’ll be fine. Just being able to rest here is enough.”
Throughout their conversation Chongming had leaned by the window, her gaze fixed on a room across the way, half-hidden in swaying tree shadows. Hearing this, she very nearly blurted out “I’ll go” — but the words stopped at her lips, and visible hesitation crossed her face.
Ling Suihan spoke first. “No need to wait until tomorrow. I’ll go buy the medicine.”
Chang Ping said, “But Ganquan Ward’s gates are already shut at this hour.”
“If they’re shut, then there’s no need to use the gates.” Ling Suihan picked up the prescriptions from the table and asked Xie Yuanjue, “Why are there three?”
“The third is for repelling insects and rats. Have the apothecary’s assistant grind those herbs into powder.”
Ling Suihan nodded, her gaze still resting on Xie Yuanjue’s pale profile. From the moment Xie Yuanjue had asked Chang Ping about nearby restaurants and taverns, her eyes had not left the doctor’s face. She asked again, “Anything else you need?”
Xie Yuanjue pointed at the fledgling wrapped in its white cloth. “Bring something it can eat.”
“Besides that?”
“Nothing.” Xie Yuanjue wondered inwardly — why had she suddenly grown so long-winded?
Ling Suihan finally asked no more. She walked out the door, sprang upward, touched down and rose again several times in midair, and vanished into the vast night.
“Incredible!” Chang Ping watched, dumbfounded, marveling aloud. “I thought the Golden Phoenix was the only person alive with lightness skill like that.”
“It’s certainly first-rate lightness skill,” Xie Yuanjue said, “but there should be quite a few in the jianghu at her level — it can’t be called peerless.” Though she had lived secluded in a valley with her master since childhood, the jianghu masters who came to Longevity Valley seeking treatment over the years had been many, and her knowledge of the martial arts was naturally no ordinary thing. She paused slightly, turned her head to glance at Chongming by the window, thoughtful.
For the first time Chang Ping felt the fathomless depth of jianghu folk. It struck her, all at once, that there wasn’t much use in her staying. She smiled. “In that case, rest well, all of you. I’m heading home — whatever needs sorting out, we can discuss it tomorrow.”
She took her leave of them and walked out of the estate. In the dilapidated room only Xie Yuanjue, Chongming, and Yin Teng remained.
The night wind rustled. In early spring, the cold ran deep. Xie Yuanjue closed her eyes as if resting them a while, but the pain between her brows grew ever more visible — and at the very instant she could no longer conceal it, her eyes snapped open and she rose. “The method for applying the medicine is written on the paper as well. After that, nothing more requires me. I’ll go rest now.”
“Doctor Xie—” To her surprise, Chongming and Yin Teng called out to stop her almost in the same breath, and her feet had to halt.
“What is it?”
Yin Teng hesitated. “Earlier I heard Gentleman Chang say that you came here to lodge only because you couldn’t stay at an inn. But aren’t inns precisely the place for lodging travelers? Why wouldn’t they take you in?”
Xie Yuanjue had no wish to explain much. “There was a misunderstanding with the authorities today. The inns nearby didn’t dare let me stay.”
Yin Teng asked at once, “What kind of misunderstanding?”
Everyone has their curiosity. Her pressing the question was not in itself strange — but Xie Yuanjue seemed to recall something; her heart stirred abruptly, and she turned to meet the woman’s eyes, patiently recounting the whole affair. With both their attentions fixed on each other, neither noticed the abrupt change in Chongming’s expression beside them.
When Xie Yuanjue finished, Yin Teng lowered her eyes and was silent a while before saying slowly, “So that’s it — no wonder the Iron Eagle Guard misunderstood you. Knowing Peng Lie is an outlaw who stops at no crime, why did you save him?”
This question Xie Yuanjue had answered more times than she could count, and she answered it once more now without a trace of impatience. “I’m a doctor. He was my patient.”
Yin Teng said, “A doctor is free. A patient you don’t wish to treat — I doubt anyone can force you to treat him.”
“True. No matter who he was, I did want to treat his wounds.” Xie Yuanjue admitted it frankly, then couldn’t help asking, “Do you have a grudge against Peng Lie?”
Yin Teng smiled faintly, making her malformed features look stranger still. “You think too much of it, Doctor. I’ve never met Peng Lie. It’s only… when I went to find my relative today, I learned she had moved house. I asked the neighbors why, and they all said it was because her home was burgled not long ago — years of savings cleaned out completely. She could no longer afford the rent there and had to find somewhere else. And the thief who carried off her household’s wealth, they say, was none other than the famous notorious outlaw Peng Lie. Doctor, when you were treating Peng Lie’s wounds — did you find… was he carrying anything on him?”
Xie Yuanjue deliberated a moment, then shook her head.
Yin Teng continued, “What I mean needn’t be treasure. My relative is a born book-lover, and her home holds many ancient books and rare editions1. As I see it, losing gold and jewels wouldn’t grieve her overmuch — but if her collection were lost, it would break her heart. Doctor, when you treated Peng Lie’s wounds, did you notice any books on him?”
Xie Yuanjue shook her head once more.
Yin Teng asked no further.
Xie Yuanjue looked toward Chongming. “You had something to ask me too?”
Chongming said, “Your face doesn’t look well. Today… did the Iron Eagle Guard give you trouble?”
Seeing her halting manner, Xie Yuanjue understood her meaning at once and said evenly, “They had no proof, only suspicions. They didn’t dare actually arrest me. I wasn’t injured.”
In the eyes of ordinary people, a doctor falling ill is a rare, almost unthinkable thing — especially a physician as skilled as Xie Yuanjue, who could treat even the wounds of the Nine Curves Palm. So as Chongming watched her face grow ever paler, she couldn’t help suspecting internal injury — and though Xie Yuanjue’s answer was the plain truth, Chongming half believed and half doubted, guilt rising in her heart, and she fell silent.
Xie Yuanjue said, “Nothing more you want to ask?”
Chongming smiled. “I still want to ask — which room are you sleeping in?”
Xie Yuanjue returned the question. “Aren’t all the rooms here the same?”
Chongming said, “Then let me take you to the room next door.”
The neighboring room proved just as ruinous, a smell of mold drifting through the air. Xie Yuanjue entered, shut the door, and walked to the low couch beneath the window. She regarded the cobwebs on the sill, the black grime on the couch, drew one deep breath, took several strips of white cloth from her medicine chest to lay over it, and only then sat down cross-legged, closed her eyes, and turned her inner power to regulating her breath.
The sound of the wind in the night sky, the chirring of insects in the grass — all of it grew sharper in that moment, flowing into her ears.
After an unknowable span, another set of footsteps, faint almost beyond perception, approached from afar. Her eyes flew open and she turned to look out the window. “Ling Suihan… why is it you?”
“I brought you something.”
Outside the window, the young woman lifted a food box in her left hand.
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