Lin Xiao and his companions had all grown up in Chang’an, and that city was full of tales about ghosts and demons — the blue-faced, fang-toothed yaksha, for instance, rumored to be monstrously ugly with eyes as large as copper bells, prowling Chang’an at midnight and, upon encountering late-night travelers, swinging the hell-axes it wielded without mercy to lop off their heads.
When Lin Xiao was young, he had been absorbed in the study of letters and the practice of martial arts, and his mother had kept a strict watch over him, never telling him such stories. But Lin Xiao had a wet nurse — a woman called Nanny Wen, who was Chang Rong’s mother — whose mind was a bottomless store of ghost tales that she often told to Lin Xiao.
“If you encounter a child skipping rope in the middle of the night in nothing but a bellyband, little young master, you must keep well away.”
Nanny Wen’s face was clear and fair, and her clothes carried the clean fragrance of lily of the valley. Lin Xiao nestled his face into her embrace, drowsy and half-asleep. “But why?” Chang Rong, who was nearby with the hungry longing look of someone gazing at something just out of reach, could not help asking — she was his mother, after all, and how he wished it were him she was holding at that moment. He restrained himself, gently plucking at the hem of her sleeve, trying to inch himself closer.
“Hush—” his mother gestured for him to be quiet. “The young master has fallen asleep.”
“I’m not asleep yet.” Lin Xiao lifted his head in haste, his bright, glimmering eyes like the most radiant stars in the night sky. “I’m not asleep, Nanny — please go on! Why must we keep well away from the skipping child?”
This child! Nanny Wen laughed, and reached out to stroke Lin Xiao’s pale, jade-smooth face. “Because, you see, the skipping child will ask any passerby: ‘How many times did I just skip? Were you counting for me?’ If the traveler, without thinking, answers with a number — it’s all over. For that child is in fact a vengeful ghost come to claim a soul, and the number the traveler gives becomes the date on which the ghost will come to collect theirs!”
“Hsss—” Little Lin Xiao and little Chang Rong drew a sharp, simultaneous breath of cold air.
Lin Xiao’s vision flickered, and his nurse’s face dissolved into another — a young girl of about fourteen or fifteen, with a pair of eyes as dark and deep as a well. The moonlight reflected off the surface of the stream, casting her face in full and luminous detail: skin translucent and dewy white, features small and delicately chiseled, her full lips seductive and appealing — though their color was far too scarlet, and in the moonlight, that hue was rather unsettling.
Chang Rong leapt to his feet in an instant and, without stopping to think, positioned himself in front of Lin Xiao. He barked at the young woman: “Who are you?!”
The young woman raised her head and calmly studied Lin Xiao and his group. The valley was utterly silent, and everyone held their breath, afraid that in the next moment the woman might shed her human form and transform into a vengeful demon.
After a long pause, the young woman simply smiled as if nothing were the matter, made no move at all, and bent back down to wash her long hair in the stream.
“You—” Chang Rong, with the bone-deep, reckless spirit of kill the ghost if it’s a ghost, kill the god if it’s a god surging up in him, was about to step forward — when the Daoist, rushing in from the side, grabbed him and held him back. The Daoist’s voice was a little unsteady; he said in a shaking tone: “Don’t… don’t provoke her. Did you not see that the mountain wind stopped the moment this woman appeared, and even the hundred ghosts ceased their wailing? Most likely… most likely this is their Demon Queen. To enrage it now would be inviting death to come sooner rather than later, would it not?”
Lin Xiao and his companions had all passed through battlefields. Young as they were, they had slept in desolate mountains and ancient burial grounds on campaigns, and had seen more than a few severed heads and limbs on the field of battle.
Eerie as the scene before them was, a soldier’s discipline had allowed all of them to recover their composure swiftly once the initial shock had passed.
“A Demon Queen?” Lin Xiao frowned. This young woman appeared alone in a mountain of ill omen and was utterly unmoved by the terrifying and ominous atmosphere of the night — she was clearly no ordinary, delicate woman. And yet if one were to say she was a ghost or demon… Lin Xiao thought back to the uninhabited village he had seen in the daytime. No — this woman carried none of that village’s pervasive atmosphere of hopelessness and grief.
“Whatever she may be — Demon Queen or Monster Queen—” After watching for a moment and seeing that the woman showed no sign of intending to block their way, Lin Xiao decided to meet the situation with composure and steadiness. He said in a low voice to Chang Rong and the others: “To hesitate is to invite trouble. Getting down the mountain is what matters. Daoist, did you not say that fording this stream would bring us to the foot of the mountain? Let us delay no longer — we leave now.”
As he spoke, Lin Xiao incidentally touched the object he carried on his chest. Good — it was still there. The cargo he was transporting on this particular journey was far too valuable; he had absolutely no wish for further complications.
“Yes, yes, indeed,” the Daoist said, nodding rapidly like a pestle in a mortar while keeping his eyes fixed nervously on the young woman by the stream. “Just ahead — less than half a li away. Once we ford this stream, we will be out of the mountain.” As he spoke, a light of hope rekindled in his eyes and his bearing suggested he was eager to press forward — yet he was still wary of the woman and could not quite bring himself to take the first step.
Chang Rong had no patience for his cowering, hesitating manner. He leaned down, grabbed the Daoist in one clean motion, tossed him onto the horse, snapped the reins, and led the way forward.
Lin Xiao and the others followed immediately behind.
As they passed the young woman, Lin Xiao could not help slowing his pace, bowing his head to look at her with guarded attention.
He saw that she had already drawn her hair out of the stream and draped it over one shoulder, combing through it with slender fingers. The black hair against her snow-white wrists — it should have been a pleasing and beautiful picture, yet at this moment in this place, it only struck one as eerie.
Sensing Lin Xiao’s gaze, the woman turned her eyes toward him, and after a brief moment she broke into a half-smile — neither quite smiling nor not.
This young woman was extremely beautiful. When she did not smile, she was like red plum blossoms glazed with white frost: beautiful, certainly, yet cold and aloof, with little of living warmth or spirit. When she smiled, it was as though spring had returned to the earth, the white frost melting into morning dew, ten thousand red plum trees bursting into bloom at once — her beauty vivid and tender, captivating beyond description.
Lin Xiao steadied his composure, coolly withdrew his gaze, cracked the reins, and quickly forded the stream.
Half a short hour later, the Daoist was beginning to sweat at his temples with anxiety. “What is happening? The exit was right behind this great rock — just the day before yesterday I came down through this very opening. How can it not be found now?”
Chang Rong flung his riding crop down in resigned despair and dropped to the ground. “Forget it, forget it — at worst we spend the night in this wilderness and work out how to leave tomorrow. I refuse to believe that with so many of us, all of us capable fighters, anyone can do a thing to us.”
A thought struck him, and he jumped back up and pulled some dried provisions and a water flask out of the pack on his chest, handing them to Lin Xiao. “My lord, we haven’t eaten for most of a day. Rough as it is out here in the wilds, eat a few bites first to fill your stomach — we’ll make it up when we get back to Chang’an tomorrow.”
If we can get back to Chang’an. Lin Xiao took the water pouch and drank a mouthful, feeling not the least bit optimistic. He turned over the events of the day in his mind, and an unusual thought kept flickering through the edges of his consciousness — he strained to catch hold of it, but his train of thought slipped through his fingers like water, impossible to grasp.
What was it that felt wrong?
He raised his head and looked toward the young woman on the far side of the stream — and was startled to discover that at some unknown moment she had seated herself on a nearby boulder. A stick was revolving in her hand, and she was watching this side of the stream with a relaxed, unhurried composure.
Lin Xiao’s heart stirred. He made a discreet count of his men — still eight, not one more or fewer. Whatever situation might arise tonight, so long as all nine of them remained united as one, any difficulty could be addressed.
Having made up his mind, Lin Xiao turned to Chang Rong and the others. “Night has fallen and the path ahead is uncertain. Let us not persist in trying to force our way down the mountain. This is what I propose: everyone is clearly exhausted. This area is reasonably open. We will pitch our tents here and pass the night, then deliberate further come morning.”
The Daoist, seeing that Lin Xiao and his companions were entertaining the idea of abandoning their attempt to descend, became so agitated he could not keep still. “This absolutely cannot be! Gentlemen! This mountain must not be stayed in overnight! This humble Daoist is not speaking empty words — the malevolent forces on this mountain are quite real and of a most vicious nature! If we remain here tonight, I fear not one of us will survive!”
“Then does the Daoist have a method to get down the mountain?” Chang Rong said without patience. “We want to go back to Chang’an and have a proper meal too — who wants to spend the night out in this wilderness? But we can’t spend the whole night spinning around this valley like headless flies, can we? I suggest you save your energy, Daoist.”
The Daoist sputtered, having no answer.
Chang Rong and the others paid him no further mind and began dividing up to pitch their tents.
Following Lin Xiao’s arrangement — to guard against anything arising in the night and to ensure they could look out for one another — everyone was divided into pairs. Lin Xiao and Chang Rong shared one tent; the Daoist was paired with Wei Bo in another.
The young woman on the opposite bank watched Lin Xiao and his men at work without stirring from her place, yet showed no sign of any unusual behavior.
Once the arrangements were complete, everyone built a fire on the open ground and gathered around it for warmth.
Moonlight bathed the valley, silvering everything in the mountains. Seeing that the faces around him were all tinged with loneliness, Lin Xiao felt a stir in his heart and smiled. “It’s a long night — how about we drink wine and play drinking games to pass the time? Who was it that claimed to have brought good wine? No need to keep it hidden away any longer — bring it out.”
Chang Rong and the others agreed at once with enthusiasm. Wei Bo laughingly produced a flask from inside his robe, and the group surged forward as one.
Lin Xiao stood to one side, smiling as he watched them joke and laugh, and after a moment’s thought drew the sword from his waist and began to polish the blade gently with his sleeve.
The Daoist beside him stared at Lin Xiao unblinkingly, first offering an admiring: “What a fine sword!” and then: “There’s a faint shimmer of five-colored light along the blade — surely this is no ordinary object?”
Chang Rong had exceptionally keen ears. Hearing the Daoist’s words, he turned his head and laughed: “Of course not! That sword is an ancient divine blade — said to be able to slay demons and vanquish evil spirits. And it’s seen battle with its masters across the generations. It’s a rare treasure in all the world!”
The Daoist’s eyes flickered upon hearing this, and he moved to speak — but lifting his head, he met Lin Xiao’s gaze, which held a quiet, meaningful weight. His heart gave a jolt, and he swallowed back the words that had been about to leave his lips.
Lin Xiao laughed coldly to himself, and was just about to rise and return to his tent when suddenly he heard Chang Rong and the others break out in a clamor.
He turned back in guarded alertness and, taking in what lay before him, could not help but stare in surprise.
The young woman — who should still have been on the other bank — had crossed over at some unknown moment and was now staring with perfectly guileless attention at the wine flask in Chang Rong’s hands. Seeing the startled looks everyone turned on her, she broke into a radiant smile, clapped her hands, and exclaimed: “What wonderful wine! What wonderful wine!”