Decocting medicine is a delicate craft — like threading a needle — and Chen Ping'an plied it with method and care, lost within the work, a strange and nameless joy radiating from the youth.
But the black-clad girl was no patient soul. In truth, apart from practicing the blade and the sword, she could muster interest in almost nothing. In her small years she had left her home behind and roamed the four corners of the world on her own, living rough, so the empty, bare little cottage of a boy with not a stick of furniture caused her no discomfort at all — she had slept in the wind and eaten in the rain so often that even the most fastidious soul, dragged through storm and weather, would learn to abandon all fuss and precision.
The girl asked: "And your left hand — is it all right?"
Chen Ping'an, his left hand bound in cotton bandage, had brought a bowl of medicine over with both hands, and once the girl took it from him he smiled: "It's nothing. Before I came back to the lane, I found some herbs, pounded them, and smeared them over the wound. When I worked at the kilns I treated cuts and bruises and the like with the same remedy, tried and true every time. It's a secret prescription an old man of the Yang family shop told me long ago, but back then I promised him not to spread it around; otherwise, Miss Ning, travelling the whole wide world as you do, you might well find it of use. If you'd like it, I can go find that old man from the Yang shop and beseech him for it. Only today I was in such a haste to reach the apothecary that I didn't lay eyes on him — I can only hope he'd stepped away for a moment."
As the girl drank the medicine, that pair of long brows of hers, which resembled not the willow leaf but the narrow blade, knit into the faintest frown; yet she drained the draught without a change of face, handed the porcelain bowl back to the waiting straw-sandaled youth, and muttered: "Goody-two-shoes. No wonder you're poor as a church mouse — well deserved, being pushed around the way you are."
Before the youth could even react, the girl added: "Don't mind me. I'm plain-spoken."
What the girl likely did not know was that the last remark stung all the more.
Chen Ping'an opened his mouth, then closed it.
The black-clad girl wiped the residue of the medicine from the corner of her mouth with her thumb, then sat up straight and said gravely: "That sage who now holds this domain of heaven and earth — the one you call your schoolteacher — though he has a mind to finish clearing up after you, so you'll live out your days free of peril, you must know that human strength always runs out, and even a sage is no exception. All the more so, that Master Qi's own situation is not good — he's rather like a clay Bodhisattva crossing a river, barely saving his own skin. What I fear is that afterward he can't spare the care for your life or death. As for me, Ning Yao, in all my dealings I repay a single drop of kindness with a whole spring; and should a man glare at me, I will repay him eye for eye!"
Human strength runs out — repay a drop with a spring — eye for an eye — a clay Bodhisattva crossing a river…
At such a moment the girl's heart brimmed with a secret pride all her own. Listen, listen — is what I've just said not full of learning?
A pity only that beside Chen Ping'an's door dwelt a well-read seed of the classics, who every day, morning and dusk, would declaim the words of the sages to keep his will clear — in Song Jixin's own account, "I nourish my vast vital spirit." So Chen Ping'an had seen a pig run even if he'd never eaten its meat; those literary turns of phrase of the bookish were no mystery to him, and even the recondite words, parsed by context, he could guess at almost all.
The girl fixed her gaze on Chen Ping'an, trying to find in the youth's face shock, admiration, or puzzlement — but Chen Ping'an wore, exasperatingly, an expression that said plainly, "I follow you, miss, do go on."
The girl was disheartened to the bone; her vaunting, eager air lost its edge at once, and she said grumpily: "Take for instance, I saved you a life, so afterward, of my own doing, I'll help you kill Fu Nanhua of Old Dragon City, or Liu Zhimao of Letter Scroll Lake. But if you want both of them dead, to abolish all future trouble, then you'll have to loosen your purse to quiet the disaster — because a chance meeting by water like ours gives us no bond so deep as that. So you'd use a bag of gold-essence copper coins as my fee."
The girl promptly pointed a finger at that bag of Spring-Greeting coins: "This bag, for example — that one I rather fancy. The other two, the Offering and the Warding, their coin-styles aren't pretty, and their cast inscriptions don't please me either."
Then the girl tilted her chin up. "If, besides closing this piece of business, you're willing to pay me two bags of coins, then I'll settle Old Dragon City and Cloud Mist Mountain for you. Of course, if I die early by Liu Zhimao's hand, then forget the whole matter, for at this moment my cultivation is not high: of the Nine Martial Realms I've only just climbed into the sixth, and as a pure martial artist my body's tough endurance has yet to amount to much; and as for the fifteen stories of the cultivation climb, fifteen thresholds, I've reached only the Dragon Gate of the Central Five. Within the elixir chamber I have six paintings, and have not yet succeeded in dotting the dragon's eye, nor sent the Celestial Maiden ascending…"
At this, Chen Ping'an was truly muddled, quite at sea.
The girl flared with indignation and chagrin; her low realm had long been a mark of shame to her, and Chen Ping'an's blank dolt-face of "Miss, do explain it all to me again" struck, without doubt, at her sorest wound.
Seeing the girl's gloomy countenance, Chen Ping'an, fool though he might be, understood the situation boded ill, and hastened to change the subject: "How is it, miss, that you were hurt so gravely before, and now you've recovered, it seems, by more than half?"
The girl let her brows sink a little, folded her arms, and said in a hoarse voice: "At the time I was truly near death. Had Daoist Lu not saved me, I would have… Well — in any case, I owe you a great, great favor, and I ought still less to extort you while the house is burning, to make you hand over three bags of gold-essence copper coins. My life, the life of Ning Yao, is not to be measured against wretches of Liu Zhimao's ilk. So the fault is mine; count all I've said as nothing. Once I leave this town, I'll do my utmost, strive my best to see to those lingering worries for you. But I'll be straight with you and say it beforehand: I, Ning Yao, will weigh my strength against the task, and I will not go throw away my life on a certain death merely to trade one life for another."
It was, apparently, a thing rare beyond price — this lowering of the head and admission of fault from the girl — and so her spirits sank to the depths.
Chen Ping'an asked: "And which bag is the Offering coins?"
The girl pointed at one of the golden embroidered purses.
Chen Ping'an fished out three coins from within, closed them into his palm, then, with his arm, swept the three purses across to the girl's front, and smiled: "Here — they're for you."
The girl was struck dumb. Only after a long while did she come back to herself and ask: "Chen Ping'an, were you hit in the head by a door panel when you were little?"
Chen Ping'an said, helplessly: "No. But when I was a boy herding cattle for others, the cattle's tails would often whip me."
The girl abruptly flew into a rage, slammed the table, and demanded: "Do you fancy me?!"
Chen Ping'an was stupefied, wooden as a block.
The girl split into a grin and stuck out her thumb at him: "Fine taste!"
Then she curled that thumb round to point at herself and declared, radiant: "But I could hardly agree to it. The man I, Ning Yao, fancy must be the greatest sword immortal in all the world! The whole world! The greatest! A great sword immortal! No matter Dao Ancestor or Buddha, no matter the Most Holy of the Confucian line — before a single sword of his they must bow, they must make way!"
Chen Ping'an flushed red to the ears and scratched his head. "Miss Ning, you misread me — I don't fancy you…"
The girl raised an eyebrow, thought a moment, leaned her body forward, squinted one eye, raised a hand, and pinched a hair's-breadth of space between thumb and forefinger, asking in a small, uncertain voice: "Not even this much liking?"
Chen Ping'an, cut and dried, said in a resolute tone: "None! Rest assured, Miss Ning!"
The girl withdrew her hand, let out a weighty sigh, and said with pity: "Chen Ping'an, even should you by some luck marry a wife someday, you'll likely one of the soft-headed lot."
Chen Ping'an sat across the table, beaming: "So long as she's a good soul, that's all that matters."
The girl made no comment on this.
Midling well-off, small gains to be content with, striving to fly high — as her mother said, these things come of each one's separate fated lot, with no necessary high or low between them.
Only her father held a differing view on this: what is not in your fate, do not force — yet not forcing does not mean not seeking at all; seek one must, and if in the end the seeking comes to naught, that is another matter altogether.
Naturally, her father would never dare say such things to his wife to her face.
Chen Ping'an asked idly: "Did Miss Ning come seeking fortune in our town as well?"
The girl did not play coy in the least: "I spent every bit of my fortune, amassed through all my adventures, plus one favor owed, to trade for this place in the town. But I'm not like the others — I don't seek fortune or fate. I only want someone to forge a sword for me, and, if it can be managed, to my liking. Whether it's keen or not, whether it can bear a sea of sword-qi — all that is of a far lesser matter."
Chen Ping'an was puzzled. "Forge a sword?"
The girl said: "That blacksmith, Master Ruan — he has a great name hereabouts, and keeps an 'immovable rule': only one sword every thirty years. The reason he was willing to come fill Qi Jingchun's shoes is that he judged this place well suited to lighting a forge and casting swords. I'll go try my luck, see if he's willing to forge a sword for me. If truly it can't be managed, then I'm out of options, and I'll take it as my bad luck."
Chen Ping'an smiled: "Good souls earn good rewards."
The girl said, listless: "No recourse."
She glanced at the youth. "Doesn't your left hand hurt?"
Chen Ping'an blinked. "It hurts, of course."
She doubted it: "Then how is it you don't look as though it hurts."
Chen Ping'an said, as a matter of course: "Even if I rolled on the ground shrieking my head off, it would still hurt all the same."
The girl slapped a palm to her forehead. "Truly no recourse. Hard as my father, you are — only you're a far cry from his talents."
Chen Ping'an smiled and said nothing, watching quietly the courtyard beyond the doorway.
The girl pushed the three purses back across the table. "I don't want them."
Chen Ping'an drew back his gaze and said softly: "Miss Ning, have you considered that keeping them may not be a good thing for me? Since meeting Master Qi, I'm only the more certain of this."
Once the girl settled on a decision she never changed it again. She shook her head: "Then that's your affair, nothing to do with me. I've thought it through: this debt of a saving of my life, I shall repay someday, and I will not cheat on it in the least, to be worthy of the name 'Ning Yao'! But in these years, you must stay well, don't go dying by a slip of carelessness. Just weather this stretch of time…"
The youth, who had been easy to talk to all along, broke into the girl's words for the first time of his own accord: "It was Daoist Lu who saved you, Miss Ning, so you needn't feel you owe me anything. If I hadn't thought myself as good as dead at the time, and hadn't wanted to let Daoist Lu do a little more for my parents, I wouldn't have opened the door at all."
The girl snorted coldly: "That's your affair!"
The youth smiled and echoed her words: "That's your affair."
They locked eyes, each at an impasse.
Wondrous to say, it was the girl who yielded first, and complained, nursing a headache: "Suppose you do fancy me — truly, I can't consent to it."
Chen Ping'an clutched his head in both hands.
Stuck with such a single-track, strange girl, he too had no recourse.
At that moment someone climbed over the courtyard wall and dropped into the yard. No need to guess who would do such a thing — it was Liu Xianyang. He trotted on up to the threshold and was about to bellow at the top of his lungs when it seemed a hand closed on his throat and not a word would come out.
Chen Ping'an rose at once, came to Liu Xianyang's side, and said in a low voice: "Could I come stay at your place these next couple of days? This young lady may be lodging here with me."
Liu Xianyang shoved Chen Ping'an's head aside, and, rubbing his hands together eagerly like a fly cleaning its legs, cooed: "Miss, my house is spacious, and furnished with everything. If you don't scorn it, come stay at my place — how about it?"
The black-clad girl, back turned to them both, said flatly: "I scorn it."
Liu Xianyang bared his teeth wryly, and, gazing at that slender, beguiling, blade-girt back, refused to give up: "Miss, you wouldn't know — before this, two gangs cornered me down at the gallery bridge, weeping and wailing for me to sell them my ancestral heirloom. I refused them all. And by ill luck, that bunch almost got me cursed out of house and home by Master Ruan. I can see you're a foreigner come to try your luck in the town. I, Liu Xianyang, may not end up selling it to you, either, but to let you lucky a look, to widen your eyes — that I can surely do!"
Ning Yao remained frigid: "Not needed."
Liu Xianyang plopped himself down in the seat Chen Ping'an had occupied, and, catching sight of the black-clad girl's face, said with eyes shining: "Miss, don't stand on ceremony. Chen Ping'an and I can squeeze into this tumbledown shack; once you move into my great house, you'll feel no more constraint, like being cooped up with no room even to lay your hands and feet."
Ning Yao answered, stiff-faced: "The good intention's accepted; now go cool yourself off somewhere!"
Liu Xianyang, unabashed, rose and said: "Right then — a golden nest or silver nest can't beat one's own thatched nest. Understood, understood."
Liu Xianyang dragged Chen Ping'an to the outside of the threshold and nudged the youth with his elbow: "What's this all about?"
Chen Ping'an said, awkwardly: "Too tangled to explain in a couple of words. Just tell me — can I come stay at your place or not?"
Liu Xianyang rolled his eyes. "What's to can or cannot about it, but you'll have to promise me this: keep an eye on Zhigui, and above all don't let that little beast Song Jixin force his way and ravage her. When the time comes, you'll have to help me guard the virtue of my future wife!"
Chen Ping'an answered without a moment's hesitation: "Don't even think it!"
Liu Xianyang clapped him on the shoulder and said, earnestly: "Consider it a deal, then."
From inside the house the black-clad girl turned her head and said suddenly: "Do you know you were born a sword-shape out of nature? That porcelain buyer, when you turned nine, did not take you away — most likely he meant for you to draw in more spiritual energy here in this place. That choice was right. So at Master Ruan's, you must seize your chance and make him accept you as a disciple. Remember, at the very least a disciple of his inner chamber; best of all a direct, hallowed heir. As for a shut-door disciple with all secrets passed down in private — don't indulge the hope; your bone and talent have not risen to such a spectacular degree."
Liu Xianyang nodded with a wide grin, mumbling "yes, yes" even as he turned back to Chen Ping'an, pointing at the girl in the house, then at his own head.
Chen Ping'an said: "She speaks the truth; take it to heart."
Liu Xianyang dropped his jests, fell silent, and said in a low voice: "I think something's off. Those two gangs at the gallery bridge — care to guess who led the way for them? That scoundrel Lu Zhengchun of Fortune & Rank Street! It's a case of a weasel wishing a hen a happy New Year. It's not as though I'm in a fool's grasp for money; why on earth would I trade with them? Besides, that armor is an heirloom passed down through my family for generations. If I sold it, then whenever I dream of my grandfather, wouldn't he give me a scolding that near kills me!"
Hearing all this, Chen Ping'an braced himself as for a mighty foe. "You must be careful! Lu Zhengchun and those foreigners — they're not to be trifled with!"
The youth turned and asked: "Miss Ning, do you know the provenance of those folk?"
The black-clad girl nodded: "The old man and the little girl — they come from Zhengyang Mountain, counting as a proper, orthodox sect of your Baoping Continent. The old man is not quite human… in short, he is a hundred times more formidable than Fu Nanhua or Cai Jinjian. That matron and her son are no simpletons either — after all, for folk to enter the town in such company, they are certainly not ordinary well-off folk. That matron's depths run deep, and the little boy shows no gentle heart either. So I advise your friend to hurry and get Master Ruan to claim him as a disciple — that's as good as a charm of protection hanging on his side. In this town, no matter how high one's backing, no matter how thick one's connections, no one yet dares to test his strength against a sage."
Chen Ping'an asked Liu Xianyang: "And have you any hope of becoming Master Ruan's disciple?"
Liu Xianyang fretted, hedging: "Well — it just so happens that on that very first day I went as an apprentice helper, the way Master Ruan looked at me was much like Old Man Yao's look back then — he'll likely observe me for a stretch, then decide whether to take a disciple or no. Only…"
Chen Ping'an glared at him fiercely.
Liu Xianyang gave an apologetic giggle: "It's only that Master Ruan has a jewel of a daughter who can eat like nobody's business, and it fair flabbergasted me, so I had a few little jests. Little did I dream that when that girl swings her hammer at the forge, she does it with a ferocious flourish — and yet in ordinary company she's so shy and bashful it's beyond words. How was I to know she'd take a joke so poorly? I went and made her cry, and then, by bad luck, her father caught us red-handed, and the look he turned on me went all wrong. There goes any hope of being taken as disciple. But seeing as I never much thought of being anyone's beast of burden as a disciple anyway — having waited on one old man's temper as perverse as Old Man Yao's put the two of us through enough — I was only after a bowl of rice at the forge, you see…"
Chen Ping'an raised his head, black-faced.
Liu Xianyang, who stood a good half head taller than the straw-sandaled youth, bowed his head and dared not meet his gaze.
This scene left Ning Yao baffled.
It was, too, her first glimpse of Chen Ping'an truly angry.
Chen Ping'an asked in a low voice: "When you went past the old locust tree, did any locust leaves turn up on your person for no reason at all?"
Liu Xianyang shook his head: "None. What I got was that fortune-telling daoist, the one forever stealing glances at the lady, who came telling me some ill-omened talk. I all but smashed his stall to pieces."
Chen Ping'an's face changed slightly, his brows knotting tight. Turning to the house, he asked: "Miss Ning, as an exchange, would three bags of gold-essence copper coins do? And would it land you in grave trouble? On this point, do please make it clear to me beforehand."
The black-clad girl considered carefully. "The trouble is not slight, but the problem's no great thing. Still, these next two days you must be careful; tell your friend not to go tearing about all over town, for at the moment my situation is hardly good."
She went on: "Two gangs, two bags of coins. The matter of getting Master Ruan to accept a disciple — that's another bag. In short, for as many pieces of business as I see done, so many bags I take. Rest easy: since I've agreed, I'm assured of at least two bags by way of income."
Chen Ping'an raced into the house and, quick as a flash, shoved the spring-greeting bag and the rest — two bags in all — at the girl. "Take them."
The girl was by nature no procrastinator; she accepted without demur, tucked the two bags of coins away, then said with a smile that failed to reach her eyes: "There are plenty under heaven who claw money into their own purses, but one of your sort who delights in playing the money-scattering boy?"
This time the youth did not argue; he nodded and smiled: "Money matters a great deal — matters a very, very great deal."
Liu Xianyang, who had all along been kept in the dark, fretted: "Chen Ping'an, have you lost your wits? Why hand her money? Two whole bags of copper coins — how long would that see you through?"
Chen Ping'an said irritably: "It's my money — what's it to you?"
Liu Xianyang said, with perfect confidence: "Your money is my money, isn't it? Think it over: if I came borrowing from you, would you have the face to hound me for repayment?"
Chen Ping'an said not a word, sinking into thought.
Liu Xianyang, too, realized his quips were ill-timed, and fell silent.
For a moment the atmosphere in the room grew heavy.
At last Chen Ping'an asked: "Miss Ning, you truly won't, because of this, be…"
The black-clad girl glanced at the white-sheathed longsword on the table and nodded: "No problem!"
Then, unable to hold back, she said: "So fussy and indecisive — aren't you annoying? And you still say you're not a goody-two-shoes?"
Chen Ping'an smiled.
Liu Xianyang thought it over, and said nothing.
The tall youth buried his words deep in his belly, thinking to himself — miss, you've probably never seen the other side of this fellow.
Chen Ping'an rarely had days when he was hard to talk to; but when those days came, Chen Ping'an truly became very hard to talk to.
Liu Xianyang had seen it before.
And Song Jixin, next door, had likely seen it, too.