Ming Huazhang looked down and met Ming Huashang’s eyes for a moment. An absurd reason — but somehow, coming from Jiang Ling, it was entirely convincing.

With a mind like his, he certainly did not seem capable of hatching any kind of scheme.

Ming Huazhang fell silent, and by his silence, gave his consent. Ren Yao thought about having to lodge in the courtyard of this pampered fool and could not get over her own reluctance: “But…”

Ming Huashang cut smoothly across what Ren Yao was about to say: “Ren Jiejie — safety comes first.”

Ren Yao met Ming Huashang’s gaze, thought about the fact that it had been Jiang Ling himself who had helped her to her feet just now, and finally yielded.

Their bedroom had a corpse in it. Ming Huashang had no desire to touch anything in that room, and Ren Yao felt the same. They gathered only their personal clothing and, under cover of the night, moved together with Ming Huazhang and Xie Jichuan into Jiang Ling’s courtyard.

Jiang Ling’s accommodations were truly lavish. The courtyard alone was twice the size of theirs: three main rooms facing the front, two wing rooms on each side, all the fine furnishings and bed curtains supplied within — everything ready once given a clean.

Jiang Ling welcomed them into the main hall and said, “Please sit. I’ll have the servants prepare the empty rooms. The east room of the main building is where Baobao stays. The rest of the rooms — take your pick.”

Jiang Ling gave instructions with the casual authority of someone whose father had both power and money. Even the two commandery princes who were heirs to the throne likely did not enjoy treatment comparable to his. All four of Ming Huazhang’s party could have taken a room each, with rooms to spare.

Ming Huashang and Ren Yao had already talked it over on the way — they would share, as before. Ming Huashang said, “Thank you, Young Lord Jiang. Ren Jiejie and I will take the east wing room. But — may I see Baobao?”

No issue there. Jiang Ling immediately had word sent and the lynx brought over.

Felines rest by day and become alert at night. Right now was exactly when the lynx was at his most spirited. The great cat came padding in with the unhurried, regal stride of his kind. As he entered and recognized Ming Huazhang and Ren Yao as the ones who had challenged him before, he let out a low growl, lowered his body, and made a rumbling sound in his throat.

“Baobao, don’t be tense — these are all guests.” Jiang Ling gave the lynx a familiar wave. Ming Huashang smiled at him and tried to show she meant no harm, but to little visible effect.

The lynx kept his eyes on them and moved warily toward Jiang Ling. Jiang Ling was enormously devoted to his Baobao — he pet his head, scratched under his chin, and if not for the animal’s sheer size, he would have wanted to cradle him in his arms. The lynx half-closed his eyes, a comfortable purring rising in his throat.

Ming Huashang looked at those long and fluffy ears and felt her palms itch a little. For some reason she felt certain the fur would be wonderfully soft to the touch. She asked with anticipation: “I’ve heard lynxes hunt at night?”

“That’s right.” Jiang Ling called his cat-keeper over to ask: “How long did Baobao sleep today? Has he been fed?”

The cat-keeper was a person of Western appearance with a well-practiced command of the language of the Han. After Jiang Ling had heard the report, he seemed satisfied enough: “Not enough meat to be found up here in the mountains. Poor Baobao will have to make do for now. Baobao — tonight’s the night we’re counting on you. If a ghost shows up, don’t hold back — bite it as hard as you like. But don’t bite it to death — leave it with one breath so this young master can see.”

Ming Huashang nodded enthusiastically throughout: “Exactly right. But can he tell us apart from outsiders? He shouldn’t end up startling the servants we brought.”

Jiang Ling gave a dismissive sound and looked at Ming Huashang with a raised chin and lofty condescension: “What a low opinion to have of Baobao. He may not be able to speak, but he is very clever.”

Ming Huashang looked at Jiang Ling, who did not seem especially clever, and could only hope that this was true. She said a few genuine words of flattery, then called Zhao Cai and Ruyi in and said: “Baobao, take a good look at these two. Their names are Zhao Cai and Ruyi. They are our own people — you must not frighten them.”

Zhao Cai and Ruyi, seeing so large a wild creature, could not stop their legs from going weak even knowing it was domesticated. The lynx’s grey-green eyes swept past them with a cold and dangerous air, and it was anyone’s guess whether he had understood or not.

Jiang Ling, however, heard the maids’ names, paused, and turned to Ming Huashang with genuine feeling: “The names you’ve given your maids are wonderful — very auspicious.”

“I know!” Ming Huashang, as if having found a kindred spirit, was moved to excitement: “I’ve always thought so too! Finally someone understands me.”

“Why not make them a matching pair?”

“They are a matching pair. Jin Bao and Jixiang are back home.”

Jiang Ling and Ming Huashang wore identical expressions of having met a long-lost soulmate, of rare and perfect understanding. Ming Huazhang gave a faint, deliberate cough and cut sharply across this exchange: “Feihong Garden is growing increasingly unsettled. Tonight, everyone must keep sharp — man or woman, no one is to go outside alone.”

This caught Jiang Ling’s attention. “So — how did the body end up in your room?”

“First: that was a corpse, not a female ghost.” Ming Huazhang began, unhurried. “Second: this afternoon, someone was eavesdropping outside our room. In retrospect, one cannot rule out the possibility that the eavesdropping was deliberately used to draw us away, so someone could get into the room and arrange things inside.”

This afternoon, Ming Huazhang and Ren Yao had gone to chase the person down, while Ming Huashang and Xie Jichuan followed after them. The servants and maids they had brought had all gone out to watch the commotion as well. Then came the audience with Princess Taiping and the confrontation, which consumed a great deal of time — no one had paid any attention to the courtyard. It had given the person working behind the scenes the perfect window to bring the body in and deliberately hide it beneath the covers.

Jiang Ling was not especially concerned with whether it was a female ghost or a female corpse. He asked with lively interest: “The first two bodies were both hung in the most conspicuous places. This one was moved into your room. Even if the intent was to frighten someone — with so many guests here in Feihong Garden, why pick you specifically? What did you do to earn such particular attention from the ghost?”

Xie Jichuan let his brow furrow discreetly. Moving the body into their courtyard was a brazen act of provocation. Whether the four of them wanted it or not, they were now on the same vessel. Finding the killer meant both solving the mystery and protecting themselves. But Jiang Ling was a complete outsider — was it safe to tell him the details of the case?

Ming Huazhang gave a small, quiet shake of his head toward Xie Jichuan and then addressed Jiang Ling with candor: “I am asking myself the same question. That the victim was precisely the maidservant we had questioned that very morning — if this is a coincidence, it is one too convenient to believe. The person behind this is surely not selecting victims at random. There must be a pattern.”

Ming Huazhang’s gaze moved briefly to the lynx resting on Jiang Ling’s knee. He thought: a person who could earn an animal’s trust was surely a person of honest nature. Right now, the enemy was hidden while they were exposed — gaining one more ally was never a bad thing. And Jiang Ling’s father was Princess Taiping’s right hand; Jiang Ling himself moved freely throughout Feihong Garden. In what followed, their search for the killer might well require his help.

Since Ming Huazhang had laid it out this way, Xie Jichuan saw no point in holding back either, and continued: “Whatever the aim, the other party was able to bring a corpse into the room — which means they know this villa extremely well and are likely a familiar face to most of its inhabitants. I checked the room: there was no sign of forced entry through any door or window. During the Hour of the Rooster, everyone was drawn to Princess Taiping’s presence, leaving the villa with few people about. The other party very likely acted during that window. Even so — dragging a corpse openly through the villa would be far too conspicuous. I believe it is very probable that Lianxin was lured to somewhere nearby first, and then killed.”

Jiang Ling thought it over and found it reasonable. He rubbed his jaw and clicked his tongue, his mood impossible to read: “So what you’re saying is that the killer is not a ghost?”

Obviously not. Ming Huazhang said, “That is my view as well. But I’m also certain that anyone with the ability to call a maidservant out would be a very long list in this villa, and the killer cannot yet be determined. They have already had the gall to put a corpse in our quarters — proof of their arrogance. If we do not expose them soon, there is no knowing what they will do next.”

All the talk went round and round, and while some shape of a picture seemed to be emerging, pressing any further revealed only a blank. Ren Yao grew more impatient by the moment: “After all of this, we still don’t know who the other party is. Are we just going to let that villain do as he pleases?”

Xie Jichuan appeared perfectly at ease, with no sign of any anxiety whatsoever: “Without hard evidence, who would dare offend the servants of Princess Taiping?”

Ren Yao was blocked for a moment, then asked: “What about sneaking in and searching their rooms secretly? I don’t believe those blackguards left no trace behind at all.”

Xie Jichuan sighed: “Searching covertly is one thing — but there are so many people in Feihong Garden. Does one search them one by one?”

After all that, everything circled back to the beginning. Ming Huazhang looked at Ming Huashang — she seemed dazed and low on energy. “It is late. Let us rest first. Everything else can be thought through tomorrow.”

When Jiang Ling learned it was not a ghost doing the killing, he felt some degree of disappointment — but a serial killer who had murdered three women in succession sounded thrilling enough in its own right, and he was already cracking his knuckles, eager for the murderer to come to their courtyard tonight.

It was fortunate that Ming Huashang and Ren Yao did not know what was going through Jiang Ling’s mind. The two women returned to their room, where the maids had already wiped down all the furnishings in the guest quarters. Ren Yao looked at the neatly laid bedding and still felt her heart trembling with residual dread: “Are you not sleeping?”

Ming Huashang was staring into the night, lost in thought. When she heard Ren Yao speak, she murmured a sound of acknowledgment and said: “Ren Jiejie, you sleep first. I still need to think for a while.”

Ren Yao already had a headache just thinking about that tangled mess of a case. Seeing that Ming Huashang was set on staying up, she shrugged and did not push further. She steeled herself and went to turn back the covers. Beneath them was clean and empty — not a thing out of place. Ren Yao quietly exhaled, washed up quickly, and went to sleep.

Ming Huashang sat by the window for a long time. Candlelight danced in her eyes, and in its glow those eyes grew ever more luminous, shining and bright.

She seemed to have entered a deep, wordless stillness, like a monk sunk in meditation.

During their discussion of the case earlier, Ming Huashang had not said a word. Before her eyes rose a procession of dark, hollow craters. Those women — hanging, lying still — had stared out with wide, sightless gazes, as though trying to say something.

And Ming Huashang could not help thinking: in the moment those expressions were made, the only witness was the killer. If she could understand what Chi Lan, Wei Zi, and Lianxin had been thinking at the end — might she be able to borrow their eyes and “see” the killer through them?

The more Ming Huashang thought, the less she could sit still. Not here — to truly understand them, she needed to think as they had thought, and see what they had seen. But outside was pitch black, and Ming Huashang truly did not have the nerve to go out alone. Should she wait until tomorrow?

But by tomorrow, when it was light, the world would no longer be the world Chi Lan and Wei Zi had seen.

Just as Ming Huashang was caught between the two choices, a sound of a door opening carried in from outside. Faint enough to be buried in the wind, it was nearly impossible to detect — but Ming Huashang had been holding herself alert to the outside world, and she noticed it at once.

Ming Huashang eased her door open a crack and looked out just in time to see Ming Huazhang walking through the corridor toward her. Ming Huazhang noticed the door had opened. Their eyes met, and both of them paused.

Ming Huazhang’s brow drew slightly together: “Why are you still not asleep?”

Ming Huashang felt a little sheepish and gave an awkward little laugh. “Second Elder Brother, where are you going?”

“To find the location where Lianxin died.” Ming Huazhang said. “He moved her body into our courtyard — the scene of the crime must be nearby.”

The moment Ming Huashang heard it, she said at once: “Second Elder Brother, let me come with you!”

“No.” Ming Huazhang refused without a moment’s thought. “Outside is too dangerous. You should be asleep.”

“With Second Elder Brother here, what danger could there be?” Seeing that Ming Huazhang was still unmoved, Ming Huashang put on her most pitiful expression and made her case: “If you are not here, I won’t be able to sleep. And if you go out alone, I will worry about you. Please, Elder Brother — just let me come!”

Ming Huashang grabbed his arm and wore him down with relentless persistence, making it clear she would not let him leave until he agreed. Afraid that she would sneak after him once he walked away, Ming Huazhang finally gave in: “All right. But you must be obedient — no wandering off, and no going anywhere alone.”

Ming Huashang’s eyes lit up at once with an eagerness words could not contain. She bounced up high with joy and threw her arms around Ming Huazhang in a tight embrace: “Thank you, Second Elder Brother — you are the best!”

Ming Huazhang had been caught around the waist without warning. He froze, and before he could say anything, Ming Huashang had already let go and was bouncing back inside for her cape.

He was left standing there, his hand half-raised, not sure whether to put it down or say anything. Ming Huashang dressed quickly and came back out. Ming Huazhang looked at her for a moment, something hovering at the edge of his words, then let his hand fall quietly and treated the whole thing as though it had not happened.

Ming Huashang pulled the door shut carefully, so as not to wake Ren Yao inside. She drew her cape tight and asked, “Second Elder Brother, where do we go first?”

In front of the Duke, she had always made a practice of asking for what she wanted with pouts and persistence, doubling her efforts if the first round did not work. The impulsive gesture born of an overly excited moment did not register with her as anything to dwell on. Ming Huazhang pressed the feeling down and said in the same calm, easy tone: “Let us first go back to look at our previous quarters.”

When the others had come to stir up trouble earlier, and then again when he had to see Ming Huashang to somewhere safe, there had been no time to examine the scene around the body properly. Now that the night was deep and still and no one would disturb them, he could look as carefully as he liked.

Ming Huashang nodded, then let her lips part slightly — she wanted to say something, but seemed to hesitate. Ming Huazhang noticed and asked, “Is there something on your mind? Say it.”

Ming Huashang said, a little self-consciously, “Second Elder Brother — could you first come with me to look at the places where Chi Lan and Wei Zi were found?”

“Have you discovered something?”

“No.” Ming Huashang shook her head. “But I keep feeling that the killer left a great many traces of her mind in those places. If I could place myself there — put myself in their position — I might be able to guess what the killer was thinking.”