◎Past Life · Second Meeting◎

In the fifteenth year of Yongning, the Candle-Burning Case erupted.

Incense curled slowly from a glazed Boshan censer, white smoke coalescing into all manner of shapes in the air; the moment the hall doors opened even a crack, it scattered and vanished.

Zhou Tan knelt in Xuande Hall, swallowing the “Lone Wild Goose” wine bestowed upon him by Song Chang.

The Emperor lowered his head, looking at this young official toward whom he harbored such complicated feelings, and asked, “Is there anything else you desire?”

Zhou Tan bowed his head and thought for a moment. “This subject has a betrothal with the young lady of the Qu household. I ask Your Majesty to grant permission for the marriage to proceed.”

By raising the matter himself, he had, in effect, exposed his own vulnerability. Song Chang nodded with satisfaction. “As you wish.”

“However—”

He drew out the word. “Your reputation these days is not exactly pleasant to hear. Your father-in-law should no longer serve at court.”

Zhou Tan closed his eyes and bowed his head to the floor. “As you command.”

He still had time before his release to try to save the Qu family. Though his current reputation made him unfit to take a wife, the Qu family had once had an unfulfilled betrothal arrangement with him; if he did not shield them now, he feared Qu Cheng’s sentence would fall more heavily than others’.

The moment he left the palace, he went to pay his respects at the Qu household, only to find that Madam Qu’s funeral was already underway.

Beneath a tree of pure white apricot blossoms, he saw his betrothed wife for the first time.

She was beautiful — dressed in plain white mourning hemp, her long black hair gathered up with silk ribbon, standing against the wind beneath the pale shadow of apricot blossoms, blending into the whiteness of the world itself, like a sliver of glittering fresh snow that might melt away with a single breath.

Beautiful, translucent, fragile.

When Gu Zhiyan had arranged this match for him, he had proudly told him he was certain to love his future wife.

Zhou Tan had read her poetry, and had indeed felt a quiet joy in it.

The betrothal gifts were not due until late spring, but he could not restrain himself, and had sent two jars of apricot wine he had brewed himself during the New Year.

Her maid had sent back a lovers’ knot in return.

He thought of her name — Jiayi, a beautiful wish.

But things too beautiful were never meant to last.

She turned to face him, faintly surprised, seeming to wonder who he was. When her gaze fell on his wounds, understanding dawned. She walked slowly toward him and bowed. “Lord Zhou.”

Apricot blossoms fell upon his shoulders. He had nothing to say, and could only manage, “My condolences.”

She lowered her eyes, lashes trembling faintly, and he stepped closer. “I have already asked His Majesty for your hand. Once your mother’s affairs are settled, you and I will marry… I will secure your father’s release. Set your mind at ease.”

She answered politely, “If it is not too much trouble for my lord…”

“It is no trouble.”

Once Qu Cheng was released from prison, he flew into a rage, declaring outright that he would rather die in prison than accept the mercy of a man who had betrayed his own teacher and forefathers. When Zhou Tan came to deliver the betrothal gifts, Qu Cheng seized a porcelain cup at hand and hurled it at his temple; the bruise had not faded even by their wedding night.

His reputation being what it was, very few guests were willing to attend. Having dealt with what little company there was, he returned to their chamber. His new bride gently lowered the round fan she held, and in the dim red glow of the candlelight, a beautiful face was revealed.

Zhou Tan lowered his eyes, saying with some bitterness, though still courteous, “Please rest well. I…”

Before he could finish, the woman’s cold fingers brushed against the bruise on his temple.

He heard her ask, “Does it hurt?”

Two simple words — yet it had been so very, very long since anyone had asked him such a thing.

For reasons he could not name, Zhou Tan suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of grievance. He fought back the sting in his nose, though a faint redness crept to the corners of his eyes. He nodded, then shook his head.

After a long while, he finally forced out, “If you and I do not marry, I fear His Majesty’s displeasure will fall on you… Now that Lord Qu has been released, if you are unwilling, I will write a letter of separation, and after some time has passed…”

“Who said I am unwilling?”

Having said this, her cheeks flushed slightly. She took ointment from beside the bed and gently applied it to his wound. “My father is the most upright of men; he has mistaken you for a villain and cannot easily be persuaded otherwise for now. I truly apologize. Give it some time, and I will go back and try to talk to him again…”

Overwhelmed by a vast sense of bewilderment and emptiness, his lips trembled as he asked, “You… believe I am not a villain?”

She looked at him with mild surprise, then shook her head, continuing to carefully apply the medicine.

“You are a good man.”

Once the medicine was applied, the red candle crackled and sparked. His lips trembled, but no words came. In the end, it was she who sighed softly first, then broke into a smile. “Today is our wedding day, and from now on everything begins anew. I don’t like my current name, husband… would you give me a new one?”

Zhou Tan sat at his desk, dipped his brush in the fresh ink she had ground for him, and asked thoughtfully, “What does my wife wish for?”

Her eyes lit up, then dimmed again as she considered. “In my maiden years, I read a great many books, and I truly wished I could travel across the vast rivers and mountains of this land with my own eyes to see them… but I was frail from childhood, and my mother said I could never travel far. If only I could become a butterfly, a lone crane… but never mind — even living creatures have their hardships. I won’t be greedy. Let me simply be a speck of dust, riding the wind, wandering freely through the blue-green clouds of the sky… even if I lived only from dawn to dusk, I think I would feel boundless freedom.”

Zhou Tan wrote, carefully and precisely, the character “悠” (yōu — leisurely, boundless) on the rice paper.

“What my wife wishes for, I too have long considered,” he said quietly. “It is only that I have not yet accomplished enough — I cannot yet be a man who remains unmoved by the whole world’s praise, undaunted by the whole world’s condemnation. My spirit is not yet truly free, let alone this mortal body of flesh and bone. I can only entrust my feelings to a single drifting cloud.”

She picked up the paper. “A single cloud drifts on and on, boundless — you are Xiaobai (Dawn White), and I am Youyou (Boundless)… how fitting. I like this name.”

“But…” her tone shifted, “my childhood name was Yilian. Call me A’Lian instead, husband — that’s what my mother used to call me.”

“Very well.”

Zhou Tan paused for a moment, then removed the white jade ring he always wore on his finger, a gift left to him by his teacher, and gave it to her. “My teacher told me this was meant for the person most important to me.”

She accepted it, sat at the desk, took up a small pair of scissors to cut and bind a lock of their hair together as newlyweds, then blew out the candle.

From that day on, whenever Zhou Tan returned home, a lamp would be lit at the gate of Pine Wind Pavilion.

The back garden was pitch black, and not long after he had moved in, he could never see clearly on his way home at night. Now that he had a bright lamp waiting for him, however faint, it burned as bright as daylight in his heart.

His new wife treated him with the utmost respect and courtesy, raising the tray to eye level as she served him.

Such good fortune — he had never even dared to imagine it.

But he was not fortunate enough. Before their peaceful days had lasted very long, new troubles arose.

During the Candle-Burning Case, the Ren family, with whom he had once lodged, was implicated. Afterward, he sold off his belongings to buy the release of his uncle by marriage — who had always treated him and his younger brother with great kindness — so that he could recover at home.

Yet Ren Shiming, sitting for the autumn examinations, was struck from the passing list precisely because of Zhou Tan’s tarnished reputation.

Kneeling before the ancestral hall, Zhou Tan saw Ren Shiming, his eyes red, yet not crying — instead turning to comfort him. “Elder Brother, don’t be sad. This isn’t your fault. Even without taking the exams, I’ll do just fine.”

Fortunately, Zhou Yang had already joined the army before the Candle-Burning Case broke out, or there was no telling what further trouble he might have suffered.

Zhou Tan understood this was Fu Qingnian’s doing.

And so he walked once more into that small courtyard, Qifeng.

Qu You had no idea what he was so occupied with; she only noticed that he grew thinner and more haggard by the day. She did not understand enough to help in any greater way, and could only bring him a bowl of plain porridge each night.

In the end, he was still too soft-hearted, too young. Even as he fought Fu Qingnian to the death, the moment his enemy found even the smallest weakness to exploit, he was rendered utterly helpless.

The Ren household was emptied out. Ren Pingsheng died in an unexplained assassination, and his aunt took Ren Shiming back to Jinling.

A case broke out in the capital that shook the entire court. Song Chang, listening to Fu Qingnian, allowed the blame to fall upon an innocent civil official — a man who had studied alongside Qu Cheng — and in the end, Qu Cheng too was implicated and exiled.

Zhou Tan did everything in his power to protect those around him, but his enemies took pleasure in tormenting him; the more desperately he tried to protect something, the more determined they were to take it from him.

Qu You once again put on white mourning garments.

He knelt before the candlelight of the ancestral hall, barely able to straighten his back, his fingers gripping the coarse prayer cushion until they bled.

“It’s all my fault…”

“It’s my fault, for being too weak, too incompetent. I tried so hard to protect the people I care about, and in the end I accomplished nothing… If I had known it would come to this, I never should have gotten close to them, never should have cared for them — even if they were strangers to me now, as long as they were safe, as long as they were safe.”

“A’Lian, I have brought ruin upon you.”

Qu You wiped the tears from her cheeks and listened to his voice, thick with self-blame.

“I have ruined you, ruined your father… a man like me should never have taken a wife at all.”

She wrapped her trembling, helpless husband in her arms.

“It is not Xiaobai’s fault.”

“It is the law that is unjust, heaven that is unfair, letting treacherous men run rampant and destroy good officials… If someone means to harm you, they will find a thousand reasons, a thousand methods — how could you possibly guard against them all? It is not Xiaobai’s fault…”

As she spoke, her tears fell one after another onto Zhou Tan’s neck, scalding hot.

He held her tightly and wept aloud.

“I, Tan, swear I will avenge this day… I will kill Chancellor Fu with my own hands. I will spend every ounce of strength I have left to cleanse this court, to build laws that are strict and just. I swear this will come to pass!”

She never learned exactly what happened afterward.

Fu Qingnian died under mysterious circumstances, and Zhou Tan was demoted and exiled to Ruo Prefecture.

She happily packed their belongings and set the household in order.

“We can finally go see the world together!”

“I want to stand on the tall city walls at the frontier and watch the sunset, watch the sunrise, every single day, together with you… I want to see the Singing Sand Dunes, the Crescent Moon Spring, watch the long river beneath the setting sun, the lone plume of smoke rising from a distant village.”

Before their departure, Qu You went to Xiuqing Temple to worship.

The day she went was ill-fated — the sky was dark and gloomy, and snow began falling the moment she passed through the mountain gate. Her maid hurried to drape a thick cloak over her shoulders.

She pressed a handkerchief to her mouth as she coughed, and watched a vivid bloom of blood slowly spread across the cloth.

She knew then — the Singing Sand Dunes, the Crescent Moon Spring — she likely would never have the chance to see them.

Ever since her father’s imprisonment and her mother’s death, she had managed the household inside and out, her health growing worse by the day. Later, upon receiving the terrible news of her father, and worrying day and night over Zhou Tan, her condition had worsened further, until she could not go a single day without medicine.

She had long heard from Gao Yunyue that Xiuqing Temple on Ting Mountain was known for answering prayers, but had never found the time to visit.

The golden statue of the Buddha gazed down at her with lowered eyes. She burned incense, and suddenly recalled a conversation with Zhou Tan before their departure.

Have you ever been to Xiuqing Temple?

No, but I once went to a temple in Lin’an. When I was fourteen, I spent a great deal of money burning two “may all go well” incense sticks to make a wish.

And… did it do anything?

Yes — it taught me that praying to gods and Buddhas is entirely useless. I suppose that counts as a great effect.

Qu You laughed despite herself, but still bowed respectfully to the Buddha and closed her eyes to pray.

She thought of many things.

She wished for her health to improve, so she could accompany Zhou Tan to see this vast world; she wished for a court that was clean and just, laws that were fair, and for Zhou Tan to fulfill his ambitions and leave his name in history.

She wished to become someone… who could truly help him — to at least understand the sorrow behind his sighs, to grasp the weight behind his troubled gaze.

After much thought, all she could say was, “This believer wishes only to remain by my husband’s side a little longer, and then a little longer still.”

“I wish for true freedom… to see, a thousand years from now, how he appears in the history books, to see whether this land will change even in the smallest way because of his efforts.”

In early March, Zhou Tan and she set out together on the long journey to Ruo Prefecture.

Qu You suspected that Zhou Tan had likely already seen through her disguise of wellness, but since she never spoke of it, he never pointed it out either — the two of them deceiving themselves together, pretending not to notice her pallor and thinness, though he personally fed her medicine every single day.

They traveled for a very, very long time.

One day, the walls of Ruo Prefecture finally came into view. She struggled out of the carriage to sit beside him on the wheel ruts.

Though it was already the fourth month, snow had fallen at the border.

She gazed at the tall black walls, leaning against Zhou Tan, and said happily, “The sun seen from these walls must be more beautiful than the one in the capital.”

Zhou Tan said nothing.

She continued on her own. “Xiaobai, do you know — to me, you are like a wooden boat. When the Way cannot be practiced, one drifts upon the sea; no matter when, no matter where, as long as I close my eyes, I can drift across the vast ocean together with you.”

“Don’t be sad… year after year, like the swallow of the spring festival, drifting across the boundless sea, coming to rest beneath the eaves. You… need not dwell on what lies beyond yourself; stay close to me a while longer.”

Only I, this weary traveler south of the river, worn and withered, can no longer bear to hear the hurried pipes and layered strings.

“To me, you are…” Zhou Tan’s voice shook badly; it took him a long while to finish the sentence, “…the one singular beauty amid all this endless white snow.”

She was the small, hard-won hope he had scraped and struggled for through the darkest, snow-swept nights.

A tune too high finds few who can sing along.

Light shares the same bright day.

Qu You used the last of her strength to curve her lips into a smile. “Is that so?”

She closed her eyes and murmured softly, “I must go on ahead… I’ll walk the road of reincarnation first, and find the way for you. I’ll go and feel true freedom in your place. I want to go a hundred years, a thousand years from now, and see what the rumors, what the history books, say of us — see whether your vow has come true…”

“Very well,” Zhou Tan answered with a smile, snowflakes falling onto his lashes and melting at once — whether it was melted snow or tears that fell, he could not say. “You must remember to come back and tell me.”

“I will. I promise, I will.”

Zhou Tan tightened his arms around her, the city walls casting dark shadows across his vision. “In our next life, don’t fall ill again… I would gladly bear your sickness in your place, even if it meant dying young.”

She did not try to stop him; she had little strength left.

“Then I too would gladly exhaust myself entirely for your sake, working until my very last breath.”

She did not know whether he had heard her.

“Beside the feast and song… lay out the mat and pillow first, and let me… sleep once I am drunk.”

In her hazy consciousness, she felt herself truly transform into a butterfly — the butterfly from Zhuangzi’s dream, for she herself no longer knew whether this was dream or reality.

She drifted up and away from that body, floating off to witness the years that followed.

Zhou Tan returned to court from Ruo Prefecture, slew the deposed crown prince with his own hand, and helped Emperor Ming ascend the throne.

He began the difficult work of reform, revising the statutes again and again.

Rumors spread, accusing him of flattering and misleading the sovereign.

Emperor Ming grew suspicious. After being stripped of his chancellorship a second time, Zhou Tan emerged from the imperial prison covered in wounds, and returned to Lin’an utterly alone.

Passing by Clear Creek, he wrote a poem in mourning.

Clear Creek washed by fresh rain, I drift and send off her old robe.

Passing the clear creek outside the city, fresh spring rain fell once more. Alone and adrift like a wandering skiff, I could only send an old robe to the riverside to mourn my departed love.

Trees wither, bones revealed; snow melts, the world made new.

When the trees shed their leaves, I remember again the day I buried you with my own hands; your beautiful spirit has long since departed, leaving only bones behind. The heavy snow is nearly melted, and I too am like the snow — once I have left this place, the whole world will be made anew.

All things pass in a glance, born and dying in the same breath.

Zhou Tan died beneath the apricot blossom tree at his old residence in Lin’an, the white jade ring still clutched in his hand as he passed.

“If there is a next life…”

“Do not meet me again. Do not fall in love with me again.”

“I will keep my distance from everything I love, so long as you are all safe and well — even in death, I will have no regrets.”

They had simply loved each other quietly amid this difficult world; their greatest wish had only ever been to face every snowfall together.

But white snow falling in March never lasts through the night; it hurries away, rising and dissolving, turning into the next rain to fall upon the world.

It comes, and then it goes, leaving no trace behind — one more flowering season come and gone.