Snow Empress sat up. Her movements were composed; she straightened her collar, and when she got out of bed and put on her shoes, the curve of her back was natural, without aggravating any of her old injuries. She straightened up, patted the creases on her clothes, and glanced up at him.
"Let's eat first," she said, "Then you'll come with me to town. I need to buy something."
Yin Wujou didn't ask what they were buying. He opened the window a little wider, letting in more morning light and crisp, cool air. Two sparrows were chirping in the old locust tree, their voices soft and fragmented, like millet scattered in the air. He stood by the window waiting for Snow Empress to put on her outer robe and fasten her belt. When the two of them pushed open the door and went out, Daoist Yun had just finished chopping the last piece of firewood. The axe was still stuck in the stake. He straightened up and looked at them.
"Awake?" He blew on his frozen, red hands to his mouth. "There's porridge in the pot. The old Daoist priest kept the charcoal fire burning in the stove all night. You can help yourselves. I'll go get the bucket of water from the well."
Snow Empress stood still. She watched as Daoist Yun lifted the wooden bucket from the well. The water sloshed as he did so, the morning light scattering into tiny white dots on the surface. Suddenly, she called out to him, " Daoist Yun."
Daoist Yun turned around, carrying the bucket. "Hmm?"
Thank you.
Daoist Yun paused for a moment. He stood on the muddy ground between the well and the kitchen, carrying a bucket. Dew soaked the hem of his old cotton robe, and the morning breeze slipped through his empty sleeves. He sighed, switched the bucket to his other hand, turned his back, and walked towards the kitchen, waving his empty hand as he went. "No need to thank me. The ribs were given to me on credit by Butcher Liu from the front street. You can settle the bill yourself later."
Snow Empress gave a soft "hmm" and followed him to the kitchen. Yin Wujou walked at the very back. When he passed the well, he reached out and touched the stone on the edge of the well—it was cold and damp. There was still a small, round, dry mark on the stone where the jade box had been placed the night before, as if something had sat there all night and then left.
The kitchen was warm and cozy. Daoist Yun stirred up the embers in the stove and added two thin pieces of firewood, causing the flames to leap up and sizzle as they heated the bottom of the pot. The millet porridge was so thick that chopsticks could stand upright in it. Daoist Yun also cut a plate of pickled radish strips and placed it in the center of the table. The three of them sat around the low table, knee to knee, bowl to bowl. As the hot porridge went down, the chill was squeezed out of their pores, and warmth spread through their backs.
After drinking most of a bowl of porridge Snow Empress put the bowl down and took out the jade box from her bosom, placing it on the table. The lid of the jade box was opened, and the two small, transparent stones inside lay quietly at the bottom of the box. Having lost their icy blue luster, they looked like the most ordinary quartz pebbles picked up from the riverbank. Only when held in one's hand could one feel a faint, dissipating chill.
"These two items are the source of the Spirit Line in my heart meridian." Snow Empress flicked the small stone with her finger. "If the thread breaks, they're useless. But I've kept them because they're still useful."
Daoist Yun peeked out, but didn't touch it. "What's the use?"
"As a prelude." Snow Empress closed the lid and put it back in her bosom. "I have an old acquaintance who owes me a debt. The lingering chill in these two stones is connected to something on him. I'll use these as a token to find him; he won't deny it."
Yin Wujou scraped the last layer of rice skin from the porridge and swallowed it, then placed the bowl on the table. "What kind of old acquaintance is this?"
Snow Empress glanced at him. "A man who sells information. He used to run a teahouse on Yanbei Circuit, acting as a middleman in the black market for spiritual veins. Later, he offended someone he shouldn't have and went into hiding, but I know where he is. His eyes can see through the secrets of spiritual veins; I need him to look into something for me."
"What is that?"
Snow Empress tapped her fingers lightly twice on the edge of the table. "Although the thread on my body has been removed, I need to know who planted it. The spell used to plant the thread leaves a mark, which remains on the root of the spiritual vein and cannot be removed even after the thread is peeled off. That person can recognize it."
The kitchen was quiet for a moment. The fire in the stove crackled, and the steam from the porridge pot condensed into a thin white film on the windowpane. Daoist Yun placed his chopsticks on the rim of his bowl, unusually not interrupting with vague remarks. "You mean, that green thing, someone deliberately planted it in your heart meridian?"
Snow Empress didn't answer directly. She looked down at the little bit of porridge left in her bowl, a few grains of rice skin floating on the surface, slowly swirling in the slightest movement. "It's been here since I can remember," she said. "I always thought it was a congenital problem, a matter of constitution. But last night, when the array peeled it off, I saw it—the end was tied with a slipknot. The slipknot was tied artificially, not naturally."
Yin Wujou rubbed his thumb against the edge of the table. He had felt something was wrong when he used the willow-leaf Spirit Line to cut the slipknot last night—if the spirit threads Entanglement, the knot should be loose and irregular, but that loop was extremely neat, and the sensation of the blade tip sliding over it clearly told him that it was something woven, with each thread precisely pressed into a fixed position, like a rope carefully woven into flesh.
"So you said yesterday, 'It's really clean now,'" he said. "It's not just that the wire was removed, it's that for the first time you confirmed where that wire came from."
Snow Empress nodded. "The thread has been removed, but the person who planted it is still here. I need to find him—not for revenge, I don't have the time for that—I need to ask him why. Only after I get to the bottom of it can this matter truly be put to rest."
Daoist Yun sat silently for a long time, then suddenly pushed the plate of pickled radish strips on the table towards Snow Empress: "Eat a few more bites before you go out. It's a twenty-mile round trip through the mountains to and from town, and you lost most of your blood last night. You can't walk on an empty stomach."
Snow Empress glanced at him, picked up a radish strip, and took a small bite. Dark brown sauce smeared on the corner of her mouth. Yin Wujou pulled a neatly folded coarse cloth from his sleeve and handed it to her. She took it, wiped her mouth, and handed it back. Daoist Yun, watching this scene, twitched his eyelids twice, then lowered his head, finished the last two mouthfuls of porridge in his bowl, got up, and went behind the stove to clean the pots and pans, muttering incoherently, "This old Daoist didn't see anything."
The two went out when the sun was high in the treetops. Daoist Yun stood at the gate to see them off, still clutching a handful of unfinished straw rope in his hand, and squatting at his feet was the yellow dog that had somehow slipped over from someone's house, its tail sweeping back and forth on the muddy ground, leaving a small, semi-circular bald mark.
"Be back before dark," Daoist Yun said. "This old Daoist really went to town to buy yellow wine today."
"Hmm." Snow Empress glanced back at him, then turned and walked down the path.