“Lan?”
Lan jolted. Her eyes snapped open. She wasn’t sure how much time had passed. Around her, the air had cooled. Clouds swept over the stars. The bamboo forest seemed to have quieted. The song—where was the song? “Yes?” she said and was horrified to hear her words slur with sleep.
“You fell asleep,” Zen said in disbelief.
“I—” She swallowed and decided to own it. “Sorry.”
“Do you understand that rules and customs are one of the first aspects you will learn at the school?” The practitioner was indignant. “There is a literalbookof them, namedthe Classic of Society—otherwise known asKontencian Analects.And each school has its own principles engraved in stone, to which youmustadhere. Any effrontery will be punished by the ferule.”
Lan had no idea what a ferule was, but she imagined being spanked by a stern-looking version of Madam Meng. “Well, we’re not at your school yet,” she muttered.
This seemed to incense the practitioner further. “Do or don’t, there are no excuses, and no shortcuts to the Way. If my instruction has the effect of putting you to sleep, then letus—”
“No!” Lan said quickly.
She’d never been the most studious or the most hardworking back at the Teahouse; she’d been known for cutting corners on her chores and learning songs and performancesat the last minute. Ying had only sighed at her antics.You talk your way out of everything, with your fast wit and silver tongue,she’d said.Those of us born with slower minds must work harder to survive.
The memory fell through her mind like ashes, twisting her heart with guilt. Here she was, alive when others were not, with a gods-sent chance to learnpractitioning,and already she was thinking of shortcuts and making light of her situation.
Selfish.
Coward.
“Please, Zen,” she said, quieter this time. “Let me try again.”
The practitioner regarded her, eyes narrowed. He sighed. “If you can manage it, search for the feeling of…of that Peach Blossom Room,” he said. “Was that the first time your connection to qì fully manifested?”
No.“Yes.” She shrank back from his gaze, which had intensified with curiosity.
“Interesting,” he said. “See if you can find it.”
Lan nodded. This time, when she closed her eyes, she loosed a breath—and instead of reaching outside, she reached inward.
To the memory of Ying, bright-eyed and red-cheeked, stumbling into the Teahouse with a batch of freshly picked lychees from the fruit vendor’s son down King Alessander’s Road. Ying, carmine-painted lips curving into a smile as she twirled in her soft camellia dress.
Ying, red spilling like petals from the gash down her middle.Please…please leave her alone!
The burning in Lan’s eyes had spread to her forehead, snaking to her temples and down, down to her heart. Her heart pounded as emotions she’d locked away roared to life again. The world fell away from her, the grass, the wind, the ground disappearing in the tides of her grief.
The memory shifted, and she stood in a white-ash world, snow weeping from the skies. Ahead, a figure in a long páo trailing rivers of tears…and a song. It drifted to Lan, faint as the notion of spring in the dead of winter, stirring the strings of her soul.
The figure turned, and it was at once her mother and not: a rendition of what Mama had looked like, wreathed in ice and shadows. Its eyes were infinitely sad, and the fingers that plucked the woodlute played a song both familiar and forgotten.
You have finally awoken,the illusion of her mother said quietly,Sòng Lián.
Mama,Lan whispered.
Our kingdom has fallen; our final lines of defense have been breached. I place my last hopes in you. Hidden away behind a Boundary Seal at Guarded Mountain is something that you, and only you, can find.The illusion raised a hand, and there, from the sweep of her long sleeves, fell a character Lan had carved into her memory: the Seal on her arm.
Guarded Mountain? I don’t understand,Lan cried.How do I find it?
Follow my song to Guarded Mountain.The voice grew faint; the snow, the sky—the dream was beginning to break, darkness pouring in through the edges.Follow my song, and you will find me…
The vision shattered with a streak of blinding white light. When Lan opened her eyes again, she and Zen were no longer alone.
The fox spirit yao crept into the village at night in human form, beguiling the hearts of men and luring them into its cave, where it consumed their souls.
—“The Fox Spirit,”Hin Village Folktales: A Collection
