"Let's go." Snow Empress gently nudged the horse's belly, and the green horse continued forward, bypassing the pile of rubble. Yin Wujou followed, and as they passed the pile of rubble, he glanced at the soil exposed between the stones—a dark brown mixed with fine mica flakes, completely different from the light gray rock debris around the mountain pass. The soil had been brought from elsewhere; someone had buried an array artifact on the narrow path of this mountain pass half a day ago, set something there, and then returned to remove it themselves.
He noted down the texture and color of the soil. It might not be useful, but remembering is better than forgetting.
After leaving the mountain pass, it gradually grew dark. The chestnut horse, which had been running all afternoon, began to sweat slightly, and a layer of fine, shiny beads appeared on its neck, gleaming softly in the setting sun. At the fork in the road ahead, Snow Empress slowed down, hesitated for a moment, and then chose the slightly narrower path on the right.
"There's a place to stay up ahead," she said. "I passed by once ten years ago. An old woman ran a small shop by the roadside where we could rest for the night. The horse is tired, and we don't have many flatbreads left. Let's replenish our supplies before we continue."
Yin Wujou had no objection. After the two horses turned onto the narrow road on the right, they ran for about three or four miles, and sure enough, a small courtyard appeared by the roadside. The courtyard wall was made of broken stones and was only half a person high. The gate was open, and inside were three low earthen houses with thick thatched roofs. In the courtyard, a hunchbacked old woman with a full head of white hair was squatting on the ground, burning a clay stove. On the stove sat a black pottery jar, from which white steam rose. The air was filled with the smell of herbs and rice porridge mixed together.
"Grandma." Snow Empress dismounted at the courtyard gate and draped the reins over the low wall. "I'm just passing by and would like to ask for lodging for the night. Do you have any food or horse feed?"
The old woman lifted her wrinkled, walnut-like face and glanced at her, her cloudy eyes slowly swirling in their sockets. "Yes," she said, her voice hoarse like sandpaper scraping the bottom of a pot, "There's porridge on the stove, and the manger is in the back. Fifteen coins per person."
Snow Empress took thirty coins and placed them into the old woman's outstretched hand. The hand was wrinkled and dry, the five fingers bent into claw shapes, the knuckles large and deformed, but the palm was warm, and the nails were short and neatly trimmed. After receiving the money, the old woman turned and walked into the house, humming a muffled tune as she went, the melody rising and falling, like a song whose lyrics had been mostly forgotten being picked up and sung in fragments.
Snow Empress stood in the courtyard for a while. Dusk had completely fallen, but the clay stove in the courtyard was still burning. The white steam from the black pottery pot took on a rare warm yellow hue in the dimming light, like a cluster of flattened flames slowly rising. She stood by the stove and stretched out her hands to warm them. The heat of the charcoal fire warmed her palms from a distance of several inches, and the flow of the vital energy in her meridians was accelerated by this external warmth. A very faint, warm luster appeared on the surface of her entire arm.
Yin Wujou led the horse to the hindquarters, tied it up, added hay and water, and when he returned, Snow Empress was already sitting on a low stool in the courtyard, holding a rough porcelain bowl and drinking from the pot of boiling water. He sat down beside her, and the old woman brought out another bowl from the house and handed it to him. The bowl contained thick rice porridge, mixed with some unknown herbs, with a bluish tinge in color and a unique aroma that was both faintly bitter and sweet at the end.
"Thank you, Grandma." Yin Wujou accepted the bowl with both hands.
The old woman sat down beside him, took out a pipe from her bosom, lit it, and took a puff. The smoke was a thicker grayish-blue in the twilight. After slowly taking two more puffs, she suddenly spoke, "You two, one of you has just opened your Water Spirit Root, and the other has just awakened your Spirit Vision. If you take this road east, are you going to the Capital?"
Snow Empress paused slightly, her hand holding the bowl still. "How did Grandma figure that out?"
The old woman exhaled a puff of smoke, the grayish-blue smoke slowly dissipating between the two. "When I was young, I swept the archives of the Imperial City Bureau's Spirit Vein Bureau for three years. Those who sweep can see everything, but they're not allowed to speak." She took the pipe from her mouth, tapped the ash on the stool leg, and filled a new bowl with tobacco. "Are you going to Capital to find someone or something?"
"We're looking for someone," Snow Empress said. "Someone surnamed Pei, the registrar who was dismissed from the Spirit Vein Bureau ten years ago."
The old woman paused for a moment as she struck the flint to light her cigarette. It took two sparks to ignite the Mars. She took a deep drag, the smoke making her cough twice. She wiped her mouth with her sleeve. " Pei Yuan," she said, her voice, already hoarse from the smoke, growing even deeper. " Pei Yuan didn't leave the Capital. After being dismissed, he was transferred to the Imperial Astronomical Bureau branch in the western suburbs to look after the storeroom. The Spirit Vein Bureau's files were lost, and they couldn't let him go; they had to keep him under their watchful eyes. He's been sweeping the storeroom at the Imperial Astronomical Bureau for ten years, just like I used to sweep the archives. He can see everything, but he's not allowed to say a word."
Snow Empress placed the bowl of porridge on her lap, her gaze fixed on the old woman. "Is Pei Yuan still alive?"
The old woman took a drag of her cigarette and slowly exhaled. "He's alive. But if you want to see him, you'll first need a night watch token for the Imperial Astronomical Bureau's storeroom. The storeroom is locked after nightfall, and you can't get in without the token. You can visit during the day under official pretexts, but you're going to check the old files of the Spirit Vein Bureau, so you'll have to follow the daytime procedure. By noon, someone will report your purpose back to the Imperial City Bureau. You won't live past dawn."
After she finished speaking, she stood up, picked up her pipe, and slowly walked back into the house. The door closed behind her with a soft, sigh-like sound of the wooden hinges rubbing together. Only Snow Empress and Yin Wujou remained in the courtyard, along with the slowly burning charcoal fire in the clay stove. Steam still rose from the bowl of porridge, but it was completely dark. The starlight and the warm yellow glow of the charcoal fire intertwined to create a shimmering halo between the two of them.
"Night duty token." Yin Wujou finished the last mouthful of porridge in his bowl, resting the rim on his lap. "How do I take it?"
Snow Empress ran her thumb along the rough surface of the pottery rim of the bowl. "I Dao Yi someone who has a night watch token from the Imperial Astronomical Bureau. The token is rotated monthly, and after the person on duty finishes, the token is locked in the Director's study. I can go find the Director."
You know him.
"We don't really know each other," Snow Empress said. "He owes me a favor. Three years ago in Yanbei, he was being chased, and I took a knife for him. He's the kind of person who repays favors, so he won't refuse if I ask for the token back."
Yin Wujou collected the two bowls and washed them with clean water in the basin in the corner of the courtyard. The water was bone-chillingly cold, and his fingers quickly went numb after being immersed in it. But by scrubbing the rim of the bowls, he went over the diagram of the stack of mugwort paper in his mind again. The night duty token was in the Imperial Astronomical Bureau's storeroom—meaning they had to retrieve a token from the Director's study in a place with night patrols, protective arrays, and layers upon layers of official regulations. Then, at some point late at night, they would sneak into the storeroom, find Pei Yuan, and find out how the dossier from ten years ago was lost and the identity of the informant.