Prologue

I am a tree spirit, born in the snowfall of December, at the summit of Fulong Mountain. Married.

The place before me — with its flowers, grass, and courtyard — is the little shop that sustains my existence in the mortal world. The shop has a peculiar name: “Bu Ting” — Never Stop.

It is tucked away at the end of a quiet alley. Walk a few minutes outward, and you reach the bustling, noisy main street. The reason I set my heart on this spot at first glance was falling in love with that tranquil stillness nestled within all the commotion. And so, even a tree spirit’s life can strike a balance between activity and repose, holding both at once. When the weather is fine, looking out through my window, I can see skies ablaze with clouds or glittering with starlight, and the people — or other beings — coming and going, vivid and varied. I love drinking tea while watching them, because behind every face, there hides a story, interesting or otherwise.

Once upon a time, Never Stop was a dessert shop. But some guests came not for those charming sweets — they came simply to share a cup of tea with me. A cup called “Fu Sheng” — Floating Life.

This tea is exceedingly bitter upon first sip, and few can endure it. Nearly everyone who has drunk it wrinkles their brow — yet they love it, because in the end, within that cup, they find their way through whatever knot had bound them.

My Never Stop ran as a business for one year. Then, that winter, I closed it. I solemnly announced the permanent closure of Never Stop Dessert Shop — because I was getting married. To a rebellious dragon who had slipped out from the East Sea Dragon Clan. I was going to wash my hands and cook for him, honeymoon across the whole world, stop listening to other people’s stories, and go live my own.

Time is always both fast and slow. The honeymoon lasted a year — there were pleasant surprises and sweetness, there were heart-stopping moments — but what I hadn’t expected was that I would miss home.

Never Stop is my home. In this mortal world of red dust, the place my heart clings to whether I will it or not.

And so, I came back.

Too many long days, too much right and wrong, grace and grudge — all of it had left my little shop worn and dilapidated. It took me a full several days to clean and restore Never Stop to order, naturally with a few conscripted free laborers lending their help.

The black cat called Xuan scared off all the mice and cockroaches for me. The fox A’Tou tidied up the entire courtyard full of flowers, plants, and trees, and even kindly broke ground on a vegetable plot for me — planted with green onions. The bone spirit Gu Wuming, being the strongest of the lot, had no trouble with the heavy work: filling holes, patching leaks, fixing the roof. As for my notorious, immortal old comrade — that so-called celestial wine official of the heavens, Jiu Jue — he threw himself into arranging the space and placing the furniture with great enthusiasm. Not only did he hang gauzy curtains dripping with artistic ambiance absolutely everywhere, he also fitted out the counter in my main hall to look like a first-class bar, and was unbearably smug and pleased with himself about it. If it weren’t for the fact that his services were free, I would have wrapped him up in those very curtains into a mummy, sent him off by courier across the province, never to return.

I had said it: Never Stop Dessert Shop was closed forever. So the Never Stop of now would no longer be running a dessert business.

It is now five seventeen in the afternoon. I stand at the shop entrance, holding a feather duster, lightly sweeping the lantern hanging beneath the eaves. The last ray of winter sunlight passes through it — seen from afar, it is a hazy, luminous blue-green, like wisps of light smoke diffusing through the air. Up close, a thin layer of blue-green gauze lies over slender bamboo ribs, as though a piece had been cut from the sky just after the rain clears, gently gathered and wrapped around itself — forming this lantern of graceful lines, simple yet ethereal.

I recognize this blue-green gauze. It is called “Soft Mist Luo” — an exceedingly rare fabric. In ancient times, wealthy and noble families used it to make garments and curtains, but I had never heard of anyone using it for a lantern. The reason is simple: it would far too easily be burned.

And yet I received precisely this gift — a lantern made of Soft Mist Luo. Apart from its otherworldly, delicate beauty and exquisite craftsmanship, it also bore writing in pale ink, in an elegant and free-spirited hand. On one side, two large characters: “Bu Ting.” On the other side, four lines of small text —

Pause your steps, let me pour you tea, One evening’s dream of floating life. Go your way, ask no more questions — White clouds stretch on without end.

To this day I cannot guess who had the taste to rework Wang Wei’s poem like this. The lantern’s appearance was equally mysterious — on the very day I had finished cleaning Never Stop, I went outside to throw away rubbish, and there it lay at the front gate, without even a box, bearing only a plain sticky note with a few sparse words: Congratulations on the reopening of Never Stop. No signature. A gift delivered to my door for free — why would I refuse it? All the more so because I loved those lines of verse upon it. I loved them from the very first reading.

In truth, before this lantern appeared, I had not yet decided what sort of business the new Never Stop would do. But as I cheerfully hung the lantern beneath the eaves, I suddenly made up my mind: from today, Never Stop Dessert Shop would officially transform into Never Stop Inn.

Once, I said I had always been running — always searching for the place where I most wanted to stop. Now I had found it, and I had stopped. But in this world there are far too many people similar to me, still running, still searching — perhaps anxious, perhaps exhausted, perhaps wounded, perhaps all of the above at once, with nowhere to shelter.

And so, before they are ready to stop, perhaps they might rest a while in my inn, and then set out again.

That said — not a single coin of the lodging fee can be waived. And per the old rules, I only accept gold. Pure gold!

And so, the tree spirit innkeeper’s Never Stop Inn quietly opened for business — in the still alley’s end, in the winter dusk…

1

I am furious! Very, very furious! The feather duster in my hand has been itching countless times to swat at the squat, plump, rotund… dragon — covered in purple scales, no longer than two feet from head to tail — that is riding around on the automatic sweeping machine.

This wretch went and spent my money on online shopping again! And bought four flying-saucer-looking, flashy, utterly useless pieces of junk — automatic sweeping machines that can’t even deal with a single sunflower seed shell — all because I warned him that if he wanted to stay in my shop, he needed to work diligently, at the very minimum sweeping the floor every day. The result: riding these spinning, rolling sweepers all over the room has become his most cherished form of entertainment over the past two days.

Though I am furious, though I would rather not dwell on him — I am an honest spirit. This dragon currently in its juvenile form is my one-hundred-percent genuine husband: Ao Chi.

He wasn’t always like this foolish creature. After the East Sea Dragon Clan reaches adulthood, most spend the majority of their time in the form of a handsome man or beautiful woman. As the legitimate grandson of the East Sea Dragon King, Ao Chi was naturally among the finest of that group — once refined and graceful, arrogant and domineering, his complex history of grievances and romance with me enough to fill a long novel. However, not long ago we encountered an accident, and in order to save me, something went wrong with the dragon pearl inside him — his magic was completely depleted and his body was dragged back into its juvenile form. Apparently this state would persist for at least a year. So his current purpose in life is to leech off my side, leech off Never Stop, idle away every day, infuriate me, and do so with absolute entitlement.

But anger aside, I must smile like spring blossoms right now. Domestic matters must never affect business — that is a matter of principle. In front of guests, the innkeeper must always appear serene and gracious, calm and composed. That is what it means to be professional. So set down the feather duster and attain instant enlightenment.

I stand behind the counter, smiling as I register the young man before me — dressed all in black from head to toe — stealing occasional glances at him.

January weather: this city has already grown cold, yet he is dressed so lightly — black shirt, black trousers, black shoes and black socks. On his fair-skinned face sits a pair of black-tinted sunglasses. I rather fear that if the lights went out, he would vanish entirely.

He entered Never Stop just as night was falling, trailing a full coil of cold air that lingered long before dispersing. He carried a worn, battered little leather case in one hand, which made him look lonely and wretched. Someone like this — would he actually have any gold to give me…

Sure enough, once the check-in registration was complete and it came time to collect the deposit, the taciturn man suddenly said: “I have heard of you. It must be — Shaluo.”

“Oh, is that so. But that cannot be grounds for reducing the room fee.” I smiled and slid the deposit receipt across to him. “I only accept gold. The amount is clearly stated. Thank you.”

“The lantern at the entrance is rather distinctive — especially at night. It looks like a warm expanse of sky.” He did not take the receipt, speaking slowly. “Never Stop is a very good place.”

“Performing literary airs won’t earn you a discount either!” I continued smiling. “Gold. Thank you.”

“Could I give it when I leave?” He finally became direct. “Or perhaps I could offer something else as a deposit for now.”

“Your leather case doesn’t look particularly valuable.” I glanced at his case. Its surface bore various faded colors, more worn and weathered than its owner.

“Not that.” The man smiled faintly and gripped the case a little more tightly. “When you have a free moment, come to my room.”

I hurriedly glanced sideways. Ao Chi, who had been so absorbed in playing with the sweeping machines earlier, was now fast asleep in front of the space heater beneath the counter. Only then did I breathe a sigh of relief. If this little vinegar jar of mine were to overhear a not-entirely-unattractive young man saying such things to me, he might well hurl a sweeping machine at the fellow’s face…

“I’m sorry — I am a person of simple and upright character. I will not have any illicit relations with guests.” I cleared my throat. “If you do not follow my rules, Never Stop is not a place where you can stay.”

He laughed aloud. “What I mean is — I’ve heard you love listening to stories. I’ll use a story as my deposit. Of course, if coming to my room feels inconvenient, we can find somewhere else to sit.”

Embarrassed, I raised an eyebrow, gave no definite answer, and slid the registration form toward him. “Sign and put your fingerprint here!” This is my rule: at the very bottom of the registration form, each guest signs their name and presses their fingerprint themselves. That way, if they ever slip out while I’m still asleep, I have a means of tracking them down through their fingerprint, to the ends of the earth. Those who owe money will not escape. This is a tree spirit’s stubbornness and conviction.

As he picked up the pen, there was an inconspicuous groping motion — just a brief one. I am a sharp-eyed tree spirit; details so often contain entire worlds.

“You cannot see?” I looked at those pitch-black lenses on his face — in them, my own mildly surprised expression looked back at me.

“I thought you had already noticed when I came in.” He smiled and handed back the completed registration form. “Yes. I cannot see.”

I said nothing, lifted my head toward the ceiling and called out: “Chi Pian’er! Get down here and take the guest to his room!”

A white paper figure, no taller than three inches, leapt down from the ceiling, landed on the counter, and in a shrill, piping voice told him: “Follow me!” It then took to the air, floating along and turning back to say to the man as it flew: “Handsome sir, if you want hot water, ask the innkeeper! If the toilet’s clogged, ask the innkeeper! If you can’t get online, ask the innkeeper — it’s definitely because she forgot to pay the internet bill! And I charge a tip for showing the way!”

A pin shot out of my hand like lightning, striking Chi Pian’er squarely on its behind. With a yelp it pulled out the pin and bellowed at me: “If you keep abusing your staff I’m reporting you to the labor bureau!”

I picked up a lighter and tossed it a few times. Said nothing.

Chi Pian’er saw it and immediately behaved, fawning on the man: “Handsome sir, do be careful — I’ll turn the lights on for you, watch the step, no tip required!”

Chi Pian’er loves tips but fears fire. One of its catchphrases is: “I utterly despise lighters!”

A shop run by a tree spirit is naturally not going to have ordinary staff. Before, my helpers were Fatty and Skinny. Now they are gone. Until I find better workers, Chi Pian’er has reluctantly become one of my staff. Apart from loving gossip, peeping, and scheming, it has no other abilities. When it misbehaves, I like to threaten it with the lighter, or use it as a bookmark wedged in the very last page of the Kangxi Dictionary. As for its origins — I have a detailed account in a top-secret Never Stop personnel file. Since it is top secret, I will say no more for now. In short, this paper figure is a little spirit that requires threats in order to grow.

Toward Chi Pian’er — this decidedly non-human creature — he showed not the slightest surprise, silently following it to the guest room in the rear courtyard.

I have always had this feeling: the guests who come to Never Stop are not ordinary people.

The registration form he had signed still lay spread out before me. Upon it, in neat and orderly strokes, was his name — Wuyi.

I carried the sleeping Ao Chi back to his own bed, then returned to the counter. Never Stop is different from other inns — it does not operate around the clock. At midnight precisely, I close up. Opening hours are not fixed; I open whenever I wake up.

Five minutes to midnight, I went out to close the front gate. Just as Wuyi had said, the lantern under my eaves was the only warm light in all of this winter night. In truth, this lantern has no bulb inside, no candle — nothing at all. Yet it simply glows, its halo the color of pale blue sky and light cloud, framing the two large characters “Never Stop” upon it. Distance seems to lose all meaning before it; far-off places seem to see it just the same.

I rubbed my hands together and turned back inside. I found Wuyi standing before the counter, still clutching his worn leather case.

I had actually planned to go find him once the door was closed. The deposit wasn’t the important thing — it had simply been too long since I’d listened to someone else’s story. Besides, he was Never Stop Inn’s very first guest.

“Can’t sleep. A little thirsty.” Though he could not see, he turned to face precisely where I was standing.

I led him to the table beneath the window across from the counter and said: “If you don’t mind being even less able to sleep afterwards, I can offer you some tea.” I left only one lamp on overhead, its light falling just over our table and the cup of tea steaming gently upon it.

He took a sip. As I had expected, he frowned and said: “Bitter.”

“The fact that you didn’t spit it straight back out already puts you ahead of most.” I smiled, lifting my own cup. Mine was certainly not tea — it was warm milk. I am a spirit who knows how to take care of herself. Late-night tea is for the ones who carry something heavy on their hearts.

He took another sip and asked: “What is this tea called? I have never tasted anything like it elsewhere.”

“Fu Sheng — Floating Life.” I answered. “Only at Never Stop will you find this tea.”

He nodded thoughtfully, set down his cup, placed the little leather case — which had not left his side for a moment, treasured as it was — on the table, then turned his head to the side and pressed his ear against it, listening intently.

I quietly drank my milk, watching his strange behavior.

“Spring is nearly here, isn’t it?” He suddenly lifted his head and asked me an even stranger question.

Outside the window, the north wind howled.

I answered him with the most clichéd line there is: “Now that winter has come, can spring be far behind?”

This trite saying made him unexpectedly happy, as though he had glimpsed some hope that was close at hand.

The temperature outside dropped sharply. There beneath the window, the two of us — thanks to the warm tea and warm milk — temporarily forgot that winter existed at all…

2

“Everyone says the little tailor of Red Flower Street only wears black clothes. Why is that?”

“They don’t show dirt.”

“Hee hee, you sound just like a maidservant in our estate — she also only wears black.”

“Mm.”

“You’re not from Yizhou. Why did you decide to stay here?”

“Someone lent me a sheltering eave and a lantern. We sat on either side of a door and talked all night about plum blossoms and falling snow. So when dawn came, I decided to stay.”

His scissors moved deftly over the fabric with a soft, rasping sound. Across from him, a young girl dressed as a maidservant in blue covered her mouth and laughed, asking: “Just like that?”

“How complicated should it need to be?” He was focused entirely on his hands — on how to transform a plain piece of fabric into a beautiful garment. That was the only thing occupying his attention right now. Besides, he had always been a simple person.

Wandering from one place to another, forgetting each place as he left it — sometimes he would encounter interesting people along the way and sit down for a few cups of wine, exchanging pleasantries, never asking about their background or even their name. If someone asked for his, he would invent one on the spot, or spin some tale of his life. What did it matter? By daybreak everyone had gone their separate ways, and truth or lie made no difference. He had lived this way for many years.

Snow was rare in Yizhou, but this year was once again an exception. Three days in a row — nothing like the great northern snowfalls, yet enough to blanket rooftops and streets in white. Looking carefully, one could see slender icicles hanging from the eaves and treetops. Everyone, young and old, was delighted. “A timely snow promises a good harvest” — and the children were beside themselves with excitement, gathering snow from every corner to play with. The mischievous ones hurled snowballs at any passing stranger; the quieter ones crouched nearby patiently molding a comical snowman into shape.

Between cuts, he would occasionally look up at the lively scenes and people outside the window, smile to himself, then return to his work.

This same time last year, snow had also fallen on Yizhou. A snowfall had caught hold of his urge to keep moving on.

The wanderer stopped. And so, some days after the snow ended, a little tailor appeared in Yizhou city — on a small street called Red Flower Street, renting a narrow little room. A curtain divided it in two: one half for sleeping, one half for his trade. He wrote two large characters on paper — Zhiyi, “Making Clothes” — and pasted them on the grey wall beside the front door. He hadn’t even given the place a name.

Over the course of a year, the narrow and obscure Red Flower Street went from barely a soul passing through to a steady stream of people coming and going. The people of Yizhou — especially the young women, whether from official families or common folk — all said that the little tailor on Red Flower Street had craftsmanship of the very first order. More and more girls came to have their greatest wish fulfilled: to have the Red Flower Street tailor make them a dress and blouse.

Strangely, in a prosperous place like Yizhou, tailor shops were everywhere — over a hundred, easily. Take the largest one on West Street, the Jinyi Embroidery House: its tailors were highly skilled, making clothes exclusively for the city’s high officials and nobles. It was said that even imperial relatives from Chang’an sent people to commission new clothes from here. This shop had always been the busiest, the largest establishment for clothing in all of Yizhou. The Prefectural Governor’s entire family had their wardrobes handled by the Jinyi Embroidery House. Yet after the little tailor of Red Flower Street appeared, the Jinyi Embroidery House’s reign as the sole preeminent shop was gradually challenged.

Customers said the clothes he made were unusually well-fitted and beautiful — put them on and even the most unremarkable face seemed to come alive with a vivid glow. And his prices were low. For any business person, customers streaming in would naturally be most welcome — but his rule was: one month, one garment. Even if dozens of customers stood outside with silver in hand, eagerly waiting, he would simply smile and see them off. The rules are the rules, he would say. If they are easily broken, what is the point of having them?

The piece he is working on now is the twelfth garment. At the start of the month, the eldest daughter of the Wang Family — the wealthiest family in Yizhou, residing in the East City Manor — had sent a maidservant to him carrying a length of brocade, requesting a dress and blouse, to be completed before the Lantern Festival without fail.

Before this, he had never accepted a customer who specified a deadline. A garment must be made well before it can be delivered — rushing is bad for the mood and bad for the craft. Yet he had accepted the Wang young lady’s commission.

That day, he had held this length of cloth — Moonlit Cloud Brocade — and sat alone before the window for a long while, his fingers tracing again and again over the beautiful patterns winding across it, with delicate care. This fabric was called Moonlit Cloud Brocade because its color was different by day and by night. In daylight it looked like an ordinary piece of brocade, its color almost dull, nearly dark. Only in the night would it reveal a white like moonlight, bearing a faint luminous halo. Legend had it that whoever wore it, no matter how plain their appearance, would become radiant as the moon — like an immortal, a divine consort. But over the years, Moonlit Cloud Brocade had remained nothing more than legend. Some said it was not of the mortal world at all — a treasure woven by a spirit with magical powers, something no ordinary person could ever hope to see. Even with such legends circulating, countless weavers had dreamed of beholding its splendor. And yet, this thing that seemed to belong to the realm of immortals had appeared before him with startling ease.

If this truly belonged to the Wang young lady, she most likely had no idea that what she possessed was the once-in-a-millennium Moonlit Cloud Brocade — she would have taken it for just another piece of silk among the family’s countless bolts of fine fabric, casually handing it off to a maidservant.

Not knowing what one has is a pity in any age.

The real reason he had accepted the commission ostensibly from the Wang young lady, however, was entirely because of the person who had come to find him.

It had been raining that day. When she came hurrying in, she was soaked through to the skin, mud all over her shoes, holding a parcel wrapped layer after layer in oilpaper clutched tightly to her chest. He was carefully pressing a garment he had just finished. She did not enter — she stood timidly at the window, raising one sleeve as though wiping rain from her face, but in truth deliberately covering herself, and said cautiously: “Tailor, I… my mistress would like to commission a dress. It must be finished before the Lantern Festival.”

Then, hands frozen red as carrots, trembling slightly, she passed the parcel in through the window.

“Come inside to speak.” He set down the iron and looked at the figure outside.

“No need.” She stubbornly held up the parcel, face turned forcefully to one side, avoiding his gaze.

“If you don’t tell me your mistress’s measurements, how am I to cut the cloth?” he said, mildly.

She flushed and said: “My mistress’s figure is similar to mine.”

“But I have not seen your full appearance.” He smiled gently. “The window only shows half of you.”

She hesitated for some time, deeply reluctant yet holding some expectation — she shuffled inside, head bowed as low as it could go.

“Lift your head. There’s no need to be so timid. It is only a garment.” He said: “If you hunch like that, how can I take proper measure?”

In truth, he never used a measuring tape. One look at a person’s figure and the garment was already complete in his mind.

She had no choice but to comply.

The room was well-lit — he kept several lamps burning, even in the daytime, so that not even the eye of a needle would be missed.

The reason his garments satisfied his customers so well was simply this: care, attention — and perhaps a touch of natural gift. No other secret.

In that bright light, her face was fully revealed, nowhere to hide. It was an entirely unremarkable face — one might even say it was unattractive. Small eyes, a flat nose, thick freckles. And crucially, her left eye was blind — a grey-white iris, completely devoid of life, utterly unlike the right. Her figure too was short and slight, with none of the graceful curves of a young woman. Her coarse black dress was covered in stains, its dull, lifeless color like a dark cloud clinging to her body.

He studied her for only a moment, then looked away and said: “That will do.”

She looked as though she had been pardoned, and moved to flee.

“Wait!” He called her back, and placed an umbrella in her hands.

“Tailor…” She froze in the doorway, holding the umbrella, wanting to go yet not daring to.

“What is your name?” he asked, his expression natural and composed.

She mumbled: “Xiao Kang…”

“The ‘kang’ in ‘health and peace’?”

“No… the ‘kang’ in ‘chaff and dregs’…” Her voice was smaller than a mosquito’s.

“A charming name.” He smiled, glanced outside, and said: “The rain makes the roads slippery. Take care on your way. Come the night before the Lantern Festival to collect your mistress’s garment.”

She came back to herself and fled as if running for her life.

He returned inside, looked at the parcel she had passed to him — and felt a faint tremor of anxiety. As he unwrapped it, he silently hoped that inside there would be only an ordinary piece of cloth.

When the Moonlit Cloud Brocade appeared before his eyes, he slumped back into his chair, a wordless disappointment and helplessness washing over him.

He had been in Yizhou for nearly a year. It was the first time he had furrowed his brow so deeply.

“Hey, hey! Tailor!” The blue-clad maidservant across from him, seeing him drift off, reminded him: “This garment absolutely must be finished before the Lantern Festival! Otherwise my mistress will certainly punish me!”

He emerged from the brief reverie and nodded: “Come to collect it in three days.”

“That soon?!” The maidservant was overjoyed, clapping her hands. “My mistress will be so pleased! I never expected you to take on our mistress’s order in the first place, and I certainly didn’t expect it to be ready so quickly. Afterwards our eldest young lady will surely give you extra payment as a reward!”

He smiled without speaking.

“Oh my, I really must hurry back — Xiao Kang is waiting for me to bring medicine!” This maidservant had come in chattering nonstop with curious questions from the moment she arrived. Now she saw how dark it had grown outside, jumped up, and made to rush out.

“Just a moment.” He stopped her. “Is the Xiao Kang in your household unwell?”

“Oh, you know her?” the maidservant asked in return.

“We crossed paths once at the market.” He glossed over it.

“She’s not ill — it’s just that our eldest young lady had her beaten a hundred times with a rod. Worse than being sick.” The maidservant sighed. “It seems the young lady lost a jade bracelet, and they searched everywhere in the estate and still couldn’t find it. Someone said they saw Xiao Kang going into the young lady’s chambers, so naturally the young lady had her interrogated. But Xiao Kang insisted she hadn’t stolen anything. The young lady had no choice but to give her a hundred strokes and leave it at that. The poor thing — after that kind of ordeal, Xiao Kang is only half alive.” She grew sadder as she spoke. “Xiao Kang has been in the estate for several years now. She’s frail, and her looks are not winning — she’s always done nothing but rough work in the rear courtyard. A quiet and honest soul, she is.” She lowered her voice. “But our eldest young lady is naturally haughty and has a strange temper. Countless people in the estate have been punished by her for no good reason. Who would have thought it would be Xiao Kang’s turn this time.”

“I see.” He nodded, then asked, as casually as ever: “Does the estate have some celebration planned for the Lantern Festival? Otherwise why would your mistress be in such a hurry to have new clothes made?”

“No celebration at all.” The maidservant’s words came quickly. “Apparently the Prefectural Governor of Chenzhou and his wife are coming to visit the estate on that day — our master seems to be related to them. Don’t really know why they’re coming. Anyway, the whole estate has been preparing for their arrival lately. Exhausting. Oh, I really must go.”

The sky had grown dark. The children who had been playing outside were long gone — the relentlessly falling snowflakes had sent everyone home early.

He closed the door and did not return to his work. Instead, he went to his bed and retrieved from beneath his pillow the carefully wrapped Moonlit Cloud Brocade — to this day, it was still a piece of cloth. He had not cut it by a single thread.

He sat in silence until deep in the night, then suddenly rose, extinguished all the lamps in the room, and went out.

The snow grew heavier and heavier, piling thick on the streets. He walked quickly — quickly as flight — stepping over the snow without leaving a trace.

3

“Somebody help — there’s someone inside the wall! I saw him fly right out of it! He’s an immortal! No, no — he’s a demon!”

A filthy, incoherent vagrant was dragged away by several constables, his dirty fingers pointing incredulously at the alley receding further and further behind him, and at the crumbling old residence within it. Who among the residents of Qinhuai Nan’an would believe a vagrant who was constantly dead drunk and sheltering in that old alley? That alley had once been the barracks used exclusively by the troops guarding Shitou City during the kingdom of Wu. Afterwards, it went uninhabited for years and years. The local authorities had considered converting it to residential housing, but the project fell through for lack of funds. There was also a rumor that some people had seen soldiers in black, long dead, wandering the alley at night — all very mysterious. In any case, apart from drunks and vagrants, as well as a few swallows and mice that had made nests there, the alley received virtually no visitors.

That there should be an immortal in a place like this — that would truly be something beyond all reason! The vagrant’s cries gradually faded into the cold evening wind. No one would take his ravings seriously. Everyone was a normal person.

The third-to-last house in the alley: cobwebs swaying beneath the beams, weeds overrunning the courtyard, old objects in disarray, a solitary old tree silently facing a grey wall for many long years.

A perfectly ordinary wall — whatever you noticed, you would never notice this one, its colors flaking, its condition precarious.

A small mouse scurried past the base of the wall — and had very bad luck indeed, for a leg stepping out of the wall trod squarely on its tail. It let out a pained squeak.

“Stop right there!” An aged and stern voice came from within the wall. The foot hesitated for a moment, then withdrew. The mouse bolted. In the moonlit night, the old house was as it always was.

He stood before this towering gate, absolutely still, unwilling to turn around. The brilliant sun overhead, the birdsong and fragrant flowers behind him, the eternally murmuring water — these were the last things he wished to see at this moment.

On the other side of this gate was a wall — a wall that existed in the mortal world, completely without drawing attention. Before that incident occurred, he had never thought of crossing to the other side of the gate. This paradise-like, flawless world was his home.

“You are doing something utterly pointless!” Standing behind him was his maternal grandfather, also the leader of their clan. He always liked to stroke the two white eyebrows that hung to his shoulders. Kindly and benevolent, his black robe embroidered with gold was always magnificent and grand. But not when he was angry — and as now, when he was, he looked like a white-haired old demon in black, frantic and at a complete loss.

He said nothing for a long while. Eventually a few words were squeezed out: “I just want to go look.”

“Going to look is not allowed either!” His grandfather jabbed at him with the walking staff as if he were lying on the ground.

“She is alone out there.” He ground his teeth.

“She is no longer one of us.” His grandfather’s staff stilled. “Three pieces of Moonlit Cloud Brocade — she ruined two of them. And not only that — she brought shame and disgrace upon our entire clan, leaving us with an everlasting reputation for ill. Imprisoning her was the lightest possible punishment. And you —”

He suddenly turned and fell to his knees before his grandfather with a thud. “Grandfather, secretly letting her go was my fault. But you have imprisoned her since the Western Zhou dynasty. She has repented every day. She already knows she was wrong. Why can’t she be given one more chance?”

“If she had truly known her wrongdoing, why, after you secretly released her, did she steal the third piece of Moonlit Cloud Brocade and vanish without a trace?!” His grandfather’s long eyebrows trembled with fury. He jabbed a finger at his grandson’s forehead. “You foolish child — Grandfather has told you many times: whatever face a person wears, it is only a face. Until she understands this truth, she will not leave her cage. Do you think you saved her?” He lifted his eyes to the gate that connected two worlds and helped his grandson to his feet. He sighed: “She is not worthy of being the one your heart is set upon. The household has so many fine women — do not be so obstinate. Moreover, there are still many garments to be finished and delivered to those who deserve them. You should put your mind to what truly matters.”

“She stole the Moonlit Cloud Brocade?” He could not bring himself to believe it. To believe it would be to drive a knife directly into his own heart.

“Has Grandfather ever falsely accused anyone?” The old man, seeing his grandson’s reaction, let out a quiet breath of relief and patted his shoulder. “This is how she repays you. And at the same time, she must face the final consequence that this act brings upon her.”

His home — always blue sky and white clouds, no mournful wind or cold rain, no long dark nights, no scorching heat or bitter cold. But today, all of these existed — inside his silent body.

“I am getting on in years. I cannot watch over you every moment. You are grown now — don’t run off at the slightest urge. You see — yesterday your altercation with the gatekeeper was witnessed by a stranger outside. Fortunately they dismissed it as the ravings of a madman. But if someone with spiritual power and cultivation had learned of our whereabouts, the trouble would have been endless.” Believing his grandson had finally come to his senses, he softened his tone. “Come back. You are my only grandson.”

He gently moved aside the hand his grandfather had placed on his shoulder. He said: “I will go and retrieve the Moonlit Cloud Brocade.”

“No need.” His grandfather waved the suggestion away. The expression on the old man’s face was a mixture of deep grief and long calculation. “I have already done something to it. If anyone takes away this one remaining piece of Moonlit Cloud Brocade without permission — the moment she leaves our home — the fabric will die, and it can no longer serve her. Furthermore, she can never return. This home no longer wants her. And she — she will no longer need any memory connected to her past.”

His heart gave a start. His fists clenched quietly at his sides.

“Regard her as though she never existed. From now on, she is beyond the gate, and you are within it. The two paths will never cross again.” His grandfather looked up to the sky with a sigh. “The moment she first put on the Moonlit Cloud Brocade, she could never take it off again.”

He walked back with his grandfather in silence all the way.

A few young girls in black gauze skirts came running lightly down from a covered bridge, bowed to him, said “Clan leader, good day,” then stole a glance at the young man beside the grandfather, their cheeks flushing red. They floated away, leaving only the song of orioles and the twitter of swallows, stirring the willows at the bridge’s edge and sending ripples across the clear water.

In this home, whether man or woman, there was no distinction between beautiful and ugly — for every one of them was lovely. Even if one day they reached the grandfather’s advanced age, they would still be an upright and handsome elder, without a trace of unsightliness.

Only one thing: the clothes they wore were always of a single color — black. Because whatever color cloth they put on, it turned black upon their bodies.

Their greatest gift was making garments. Sometimes they wove the fabric themselves; sometimes they purchased cloth from beyond the gate. The various garments they produced were delivered, mostly on moonlit nights, to people beyond the gate who had no clothes to wear. Those poor souls, convinced that a bodhisattva had appeared to bless them, were overcome with gratitude.

This was what Grandfather used to say: we are spirits, but we are no different from immortals. A single garment is also a compassionate heart.

Was this kind of life not good?

And so he could not understand her actions, nor her ideals.

The Moonlit Cloud Brocade was a divine object woven by his ancestors through secret arts — it was alive, and each piece could only be used once.

Put on a garment made of Moonlit Cloud Brocade, and no matter how hideous you were, you would possess a beauty that could topple kingdoms and cities. At transforming the worthless into the wondrous, it was without equal. It was the clan’s greatest treasure, of which there were only three pieces.

When she stole the first piece of Moonlit Cloud Brocade, the Shang dynasty was walking the road to ruin. She and King Zhou were inseparable — pools of wine and forests of meat, song and revelry at the Deer Terrace. The name Daji became legendary in its beauty — and its destruction of King Zhou’s realm. When King Wu’s armies broke the city, King Zhou set himself ablaze and she fled, not forgetting even as she ran to shift all blame onto an unfortunate fox spirit.

She believed she had hidden well. In the end, she was found by her own family. The “dead” Moonlit Cloud Brocade was retrieved; she was forced back into her true form. The grandfather was furious. She wept and pleaded bitterly. Considering it her first offense, the grandfather punished her: chained at the ankle, she was sent to the Fallen Blossom Terrace to sweep fallen petals for two hundred and sixty-five years.

Everyone believed her heart had finally settled. Kindhearted Grandfather freed her.

When she stole the second piece of Moonlit Cloud Brocade, King You of Zhou’s kingdom was already tottering on the brink. To bring a smile to her face, he lit the beacon fires to deceive his lords.

The night before she and her king fled to Mount Li, she was brought back.

The grandfather scolded the family members who had tracked her down — useless lot, taking so long to find this wretched creature — and punished them by forbidding food for a month. As for her: imprisoned for life, no possibility of pardon.

He remembered how every time he went to see her, she would be weeping, curled into the darkest corner of her cell, unwilling to face him.

You are already one of the loveliest of the household. Why must you want the Moonlit Cloud Brocade? he asked her.

Her answer was: Still not enough.

How much would be enough?

I want those men beyond the gate who hold all the world in their hands to become utterly entranced by a single glance at me.

Is beyond the gate really that much better?

I am weary of life here — a pool of stagnant water. Moonlit cold and snow, rushing about to deliver clothes to the poor — it is far less satisfying than making a man’s head roll with a single displeased glance.

He had meant to say: you have changed. Or: you have desecrated the Moonlit Cloud Brocade. Or perhaps: you have made your face into the most vicious of weapons.

But he said nothing of it, and left the cell with a heavy heart.

So many years had passed. He had believed she had truly settled. Every day in her cell she cut cloth and sewed garments. The look in her eyes when she turned to him had once again become clear and clean, like before.

That day, she said with sorrowful despair: Release me, I beg you. Let us go and live beyond the gate together. Grandfather will never forgive me — do you truly mean to let me grow old and die alone in this lightless place?

He couldn’t. Of course he couldn’t. In his heart, her sentence had been over long ago. Toward those we cherish, it is always easy to be lenient — even indulgent. This is not something peculiar to spirits, immortals, or mortals. It is the same everywhere.

And so he risked stealing the grandfather’s key, and let her go.

She said that after she escaped, she would wait for him at a teahouse outside the city. Once he was certain there were no pursuers, he should come find her there.

In truth, there were no pursuers. The grandfather had not even lost his temper over the matter — he merely said, let her go. It was only when he learned that his grandson intended to leave home to look for her that the old man erupted.

The grandfather had believed the truth would stop his feet.

Today, the last thing he said to his grandfather was: “I know what I need to do.”

That night, the night watchman passing the mouth of the alley saw a dark shadow burst out of the third-to-last old house in the alley, and flash across the enormous full moon like lightning.

A little over a month later, a gaunt, angular Daoist came to the alley, the half-mad vagrant trailing behind him.

“Where is the demon?” The Daoist flicked his horsetail whisk, his every movement a performance of studied righteousness.

“Third-to-last house from the end! In the wall!” The vagrant pointed in the exact direction.

That very night, a great fire broke out in one of the houses in the alley. The startled residents came rushing in, but the flames were too fierce for anyone to approach. They could only watch helplessly as the inferno raged, consoling themselves that the house was uninhabited. Yet clearly it was an empty residence — and yet people heard screaming and wailing from inside the fire, the whole thing utterly chaotic.

Only when dawn came did the fire gradually die out. And then everyone witnessed something deeply strange — the house that should have burned to ash was entirely unharmed. Not even the cobwebs beneath the beams had been disturbed. Yet the roaring, all-night blaze had been witnessed by their own eyes. Everyone looked at one another in bafflement — had they all shared the same dream of the house on fire?

The bolder few walked into the house and looked around — not a trace of fire anywhere. The only difference was that the grey wall that had faced the old tree had crumbled: broken bricks and rubble, shattered and strewn about. Among the white and grey debris appeared small dark shapes — examined up close, they were dead swallows, large and small, numbering several dozen. The largest one had white feathers on its crown, and even had two long, long eyebrows grown over its eyes.

No one could explain why there were so many swallows beneath a collapsed wall. Some said these swallows were the souls of the soldiers who had once been garrisoned here, for those soldiers had always worn black battle-garments. Others said the swallows were spirits that hid inside this wall by day, recovering their strength, then transformed into human forms at night to stir up trouble.

In any case, this incident was treated as a small curiosity, and then forgotten. In those times, people could barely manage their own affairs. Who would spare a thought for a few swallows?

It is said that later some people moved into that alley — people of high rank and noble families. Whether their surname was Wang or Xie, their arrival brought luster to the alley and secured its place in history. The strange fire and the dead swallows were swept by the wind into the river of time within the songs of grand households, and left no trace.

Those who slept in the streets kept coming and going, coming and going. Not a few froze to death in the cold nights. Only — no one ever quietly left a warm garment beside them again on moonlit nights.

4

The Wang Manor was vast — vast enough to get lost in. And tonight was no ordinary night at all: every manservant and maidservant in the estate was in a frantic bustle, carrying lanterns back and forth between the large and small chambers, searching in panic for their eldest young lady.

The master of the Wang household was stamping his feet with anxiety. The Prefectural Governor would be arriving shortly, and his daughter was spoiled and willful at the best of times — but this critical juncture — the Wang family’s lifelong glory and its pinnacle position in officialdom all hinged on her. And at this most crucial moment, his daughter had vanished!

For him, however, finding her was easy.

The highest rooftop of the Wang Manor: out of reach of the lamplight, the moon hidden just behind the clouds, the rooftop utterly silent — not even the sound of breathing. This had become the safest place.

Xiao Kang sat on snow that had frozen solid, trembling with cold. Beside her, the missing Wang eldest young lady lay with wide-open eyes. On her smooth and full forehead was a large gaping wound, the blood already congealed. Her beautiful face was whiter than snow.

He did not even need to check for breath to know this woman’s fate.

“It wasn’t me.” Xiao Kang slowly lifted her head, though she still could not bring herself to look at him. “She came alone to my room. She poured lamp oil over me and said that if I didn’t hand over her jade bracelet, she would burn me. But I truly did not steal her bracelet.”

He said nothing, waiting quietly for her to continue.

“She was the one who…” Her gaze fell upon the corpse of the Wang young lady and immediately recoiled in terror. “She was the one who accidentally stepped on the oil spilled on the floor and slipped — knocked her head on the corner of the cabinet — and then she was just… dead. I was terrified. Strength came from nowhere — and though I had the young lady in my arms she felt weightless, like she was floating — I seemed to drift lightly up onto the rooftop.” She finished rambling, and then asked without reason: “Do you believe me…”

He crouched down and gently stroked her ice-cold cheek. “You are a swallow. Of course you can fly.”

“A swallow?” Something in these words struck at something deep inside her, though she could not grasp what, or why. She looked up at him for a moment, then immediately looked down again, murmuring anxiously: “What do we do now… the master will surely have me killed…”

He sighed inwardly. Grandfather never spoke falsehoods — indeed, he had taken her memories away.

But if she had truly forgotten everything, why was this the one thing she could not forget — he reached into his chest and drew out the Moonlit Cloud Brocade. It was still beautiful. But when that dim, grey aura settled over it like a ghost, the brightness of the moon was extinguished.

“Mine…” She saw it and snatched it away at once, then looked at it in confusion. “Why is it still just a piece of cloth?”

The look in his eyes as he watched her held a measure of sorrow, a measure of disappointment.

“How did you come to have this cloth?” he asked.

She pressed the Moonlit Cloud Brocade tightly to her chest and shook her head: “I don’t know. It has always simply been there. No matter where I have gone, it has gone with me — never parted from me. I have only it. Only it.”

When he saw the glimmer of tears in her one remaining eye, he felt something tighten in his throat. Lifting his sleeve, he wiped the tear tracks and grime from her face, and said softly: “Why did you come to find me? And why bring this thing you treasure so dearly and give it to me?”

She choked, and it was a long while before she trembled out the words: “I just felt… you were the only one I could go to.”

“Do you know me?” He cupped her unsightly face in his hands without the slightest distaste.

This time she did not immediately turn and hide. She stared at his face in a daze, then nodded slowly: “Last year, on a snowy night. I was on one side of the door, you were on the other.”

A small flame in his eyes quietly went out. Her memory of him reached only as far back as last year.

From the time he left home to the time he found her, dynasties had changed and the face of the land had been transformed countless times — he had known that finding her would take a long time, but not that it would take long enough for the world to pass into the reign of the Tang. His grandfather had stripped away her memories and severed the scent that marked her as a swallow spirit. There was no shortcut. He had simply walked through city after city, crossed mountain range after mountain range, drawing close to every person who might be her — suffering disappointment again and again, then summoning the will to walk the next stretch of road. He had been so single-mindedly focused that he forgot to measure the time.

No memories — so be it. An utterly changed face — so be it. If he drew near, he could still recognize her. It was instinct, it was nature — just as she, who remembered nothing, could not forget that Moonlit Cloud Brocade.

A knot, before it is untied, is never forgotten.

One year ago, the night snow in Yizhou had stopped him outside a courtyard wall.

The snow was so heavy — like geese feathers. He sat outside that tightly shut courtyard gate, sheltering under its overhanging eave, drinking the last of the spirits in his gourd.

A faint, delicate fragrance drifted out through the crack in the gate. He had not drunk enough to be drunk, and of course he could smell it. He happened to have nothing else to do, so he turned and peered through the gap in the gate — and, without warning, found a pair of eyes on the other side, also peering out.

His gourd slipped from his fingers and rolled down the steps.

The person behind the gate was clearly startled by him, and asked with a trembling voice: “Who is it outside?”

He cleared his throat and said: “A passerby. The snow is heavy. Can’t move on.”

It was a long while before her voice came from behind the gate: “Where have you come from?”

“I entered through the West Gate, crossed the Three-Li Bridge, and arrived here. Any further back than that I can’t remember.” He answered honestly.

“You have never been to Yizhou before?” Her voice carried a faint note of surprise.

“Never.” He knew the source of her surprise but did not reveal it. “Why do you ask?”

“You looked familiar somehow.” She pressed close to the gate to look at him more carefully, yet could make nothing out. Why ask so many questions about someone else anyway — she didn’t even remember where she herself had come from. She would walk through a place and then forget it.

“What is your honored family name, miss?” He looked up at the courtyard gate — though it was only a side entrance to the rear courtyard, it was by no means shabby, clearly no ordinary household.

“The servants of the estate have no family name.” She said softly.

“I see.” He heard the sound of the night watchman’s drum coming from the distance. “The night is already deep. Why haven’t you gone to sleep, miss?”

“Only when they’ve all gone to sleep can I come out and enjoy the snow and admire the flowers.” At this, the faint sadness in her voice disappeared, and her words carried an unusual lightness. “The plum blossoms in the rear courtyard have bloomed — so fragrant and beautiful.”

“Is admiring flowers not something one does in the daytime?” He shifted his angle and, sure enough, caught a glimpse through the crack in the gate of several branches of red plum blossoms in full bloom against the snow. In the lamplight from the distant buildings, the fallen snow was whiter, the petals more vivid. The fragrance just now had been theirs.

A long silence fell behind the gate. He thought she had gone.

“The daytime is not mine.” A sigh floated out from within. “People will always laugh at me. Someone like me — what right do I have to admire flowers and snow? To even look would be an affront. I should stay in the servants’ quarters with the filth and coarse work. That is my proper place.” She lowered her voice. “What kind of person are you? You need only appreciate the flowers. Where does profanation come in?”

“Do you like looking at plum blossoms too?” She changed the subject.

“Only when it is snowing are plum blossoms at their most beautiful.” He answered.

“It must be very dark outside?”

“Yes.”

A small sound came from behind the gate — and then, carefully and tentatively, a crack opened — a lit lantern was extended out through the gap.

“Take it. But don’t come close — and don’t think about coming inside. Stay on your side of the gate.” She hid herself behind the crack.

Across the gate, across the door — there always had to be a gate between them.

He accepted the lantern with a rueful smile.

The courtyard gate hurriedly swung shut again.

“I’ll return it at dawn.” He held this lantern with its dancing flame, leaned against the gate, and sat down, savoring the faint warmth and light.

“When dawn comes, you must hurry and go — make absolutely sure you don’t fall asleep! If they find you there, they won’t just chase you away — they’ll beat you with a stick!” She whispered her careful warning.

He smiled. “Thank you for lending me a sheltering eave and a lantern.”

“And thank you for keeping me company while I admired the flowers.” She was utterly sincere — even through the gate, it was as though one could feel the smile at the corners of her lips. “When dawn comes, will you be moving on again?”

He held the lantern up a little higher, studying it carefully, and said: “I won’t be moving on. I’m going to stay in Yizhou.”

“Really? Why stay?” Behind the gate came an inexplicable joy.

“Haven’t decided yet. Perhaps I’ll set up a little stall, making clothes.” He looked toward the crack in the gate. “Cutting cloth is the only thing I know how to do.”

Until dawn when the snow had stopped and he left, she never opened the gate again — refusing to let him see her face. This did not matter. She was here. That was enough.

“You have always been hiding — a year ago, you hid behind your gate; a year later, you hid outside my window.” He recalled the day she had come to find him on her own. “You didn’t even dare admit that you wanted a garment made for yourself.”

“I can only wear black clothes. I always have.” She bit her lip. “Whatever color I put on, it turns black on my body. I have never dared tell anyone — I could only lie, saying that black clothes don’t show dirt. On every festival day, everyone wears their colorful finery to celebrate, and I can only hide in my room, envying them in secret. I can never stay too long in one place. I fear that people will discover this secret. I only know that I have been alive for a very long time, that I have walked through many places, and in every place I have done only the work that others refused to do.” She paused, and tears fell onto the Moonlit Cloud Brocade in her arms. “It has always been with me. Only when no one is around do I dare take it out to look at and touch. I often dream that it has become a beautiful garment and I put it on and look in a mirror — and the me in the mirror is as beautiful as an immortal. Yet I am certain this is not merely a dream. Do you know — countless times I have stood outside tailor’s shops, holding it, and yet could never bring myself to take a single step inside. I feared those mocking eyes and voices, sharp as knives. But you — you are different from them.”

Was this what Grandfather called the consequence she had to face?

Once, incomparable beauty had brought her the glory of the Deer Terrace, the so-called “honor” of the beacon fires. And now — no memories, no power, unable to return to her true form, trapped in an ugly face, drifting through the world of mortals, enduring contempt and abuse.

One year ago, outside her gate, he had decided to stay for a year. A year spent proving whether, after all those countless ages, she had truly taken off that garment — the Moonlit Cloud Brocade of the heart. If she had, he would be very glad, immeasurably glad, and then take her away and end all her suffering.

That year as a tailor, every time a customer arrived, his heart would give a sharp jump — only when he confirmed it was not her would he relax.

He knew: if she had still not taken it off, she would inevitably come to find him.

The bond between them was buried in the deepest place within each other — even without memories, even without power, it would still be there. He had been watching her for a long while. At last he asked the question whose answer he feared most: “Why did you wait until a year had passed before coming to have a garment made?”

“At the Lantern Festival, the Prefectural Governor of Chenzhou was coming to the estate. He and my master are cousins.” She wiped her tears and spoke slowly. “I heard Caifeng, from the eldest young lady’s chambers, say that the Prefectural Governor is coming to Yizhou to acknowledge a daughter.”

“What of it?” He did not understand.

“The Prefectural Governor has close ties with Princess Tong’an the Elder. The princess had intended to betroth the Governor’s daughter to Prince Jin, Li Zhi, as his consort. But before the good match could be made, the young lady died of illness.” She twisted and twisted at the hem of her garment. “The Prefectural Governor was unwilling to lose this marriage prospect, and so he thought of his cousin’s daughter. Apparently our young lady is about the same age as the Governor’s daughter, and their appearances are quite similar. Furthermore, Prince Jin had never met this young lady, so…”

“So the Prefectural Governor intended to commit a deception — to use his own cousin’s daughter in place of his real daughter, to be married to Li Zhi.” He suddenly understood, then added: “But such a secret — how would Caifeng have known of it?”

“Caifeng is the eldest young lady’s personal maidservant. And the young lady has always been willful and careless with her words, while the master dotes on her excessively. Father and daughter have no secrets from each other — it seems she was unable to contain her elation after learning of the plan and let it slip.” Her eyes grew a little anxious. “Afterwards, Caifeng was boasting to a close sister that she would soon be going to Chang’an to live in wealth and splendor — that with the young lady becoming a royal consort, she, as the personal maidservant, would certainly accompany her as part of the dowry. I was on the other side of the wall, and heard every word clearly. But after that day, Caifeng and this sister of hers disappeared. No one in the estate mentioned them again.”

He was silent for a long while. He looked once more at the Wang eldest young lady’s already-rigid body, and felt the strength draining from his body, bit by bit.

“The reason you wanted your new garment before the Lantern Festival was to appear — as if by chance — before the Prefectural Governor when he arrived, in a way that would stun everyone present. Is that right?”

She instinctively shook her head, then nodded, flustered and incoherent: “I… I know this is not a dream. Once this cloth becomes a garment, I will be a different person. I do not dare to hope for too much — even if I could only be a maidservant who accompanies the dowry, that would be better than secretly sneaking glances at flowers and snow the way I do now.”

“You still believe a face can buy you whatever future you wish for?” He sighed, deeply, deeply.

She would never be able to take off the Moonlit Cloud Brocade — had Grandfather been right after all?

“I…” She bit her lip again. It was a long time before she nodded. “You are not me. You cannot understand my pain. I have nothing — not even memories. I don’t know how old I am. Every place I walk through, I forget. The only things I can remember, besides my own face and others’ mockery, are just — this.” She held the Moonlit Cloud Brocade more tightly still, and tears fell again. “But — what do we do now? The young lady is dead…”

Yes. I cannot understand you. The only thing I can do is believe you, again and again.

He looked at her body — curled into such a small thing, so withered and despairing — and said: “Come with me.”

5

Flying, for him, was the easiest thing in the world — as easy as walking.

In an unmarked stretch of wilderness, he gave the Wang eldest young lady a proper burial and offered a silent apology to this unlucky woman in his heart.

Then, carrying her — three souls out of place, six spirits gone — he returned to Red Flower Street, to his tailor’s shop.

He poured her a cup of hot tea, then brought a basin of warm water. Carefully he wiped her face and found a comb, patiently working her tangled hair, strand by strand, into order.

She continued to resist looking at the bronze mirror before her, her body still trembling faintly.

“Xiao Kang — listen carefully.” His fingers paused at her temple. “When dawn comes, you will be the Wang family’s eldest young lady.”

Her eyes flew open. She turned to stare at him. “What did you say?”

“Before dawn, I will make your garment.” He smiled a little. “This is the last garment I will ever make.”

“You… you’re leaving?” She heard the note of parting in his voice.

“Yes.” He continued moving the comb, watching her gradually tidied reflection in the bronze mirror. “I think you will be leaving before long too.”

She did not know what to say. The fluster and unease made her blank eyes come alive.

He set down the comb, looking at her in the mirror, and said: “Tell me — do you think it is better to be a person, or a swallow who can fly freely wherever the wind takes it?”

“A person.” She answered without a second’s hesitation.

“Why?” A flicker of something briefly dimmed in his eyes.

“Swallows are so easily killed by people’s slingshots.” She answered with a vacant gaze, as though something were stirring in the depths of her heart — yet she could not grasp what.

He smiled bitterly.

Perhaps she was right. His grandfather — and all his family — their home: wasn’t it destroyed in a single night at the hands of a single Daoist? Simply because they were spirits, beings that did not belong to the mortal world. In the eyes of Daoists, a spirit was a spirit, and had to be destroyed — in the name of righteousness.

“Sleep for a while. It will be better by dawn.” He rose, tucking the Moonlit Cloud Brocade into his chest, and walked toward the inner room.

Grandfather had spoken the truth — the Moonlit Cloud Brocade was already dead. But he knew how to bring it back to life, and make it better than before, more wondrous than before.

Xiao Kang fell into an exhausted sleep, the lamplight falling over her restless yet expectant face.

At dawn, the snow had stopped too.

A brand-new, moon-white garment was spread before her, luminous and shifting with beauty.

She was stunned.

“Put it on.” His voice came from behind the cloth curtain.

She threw off her old clothes without a moment to lose. In an instant, the legendary, incomparable Moonlit Cloud Brocade had settled gently against her skin.

Yet, a moment later, the beautiful garment carried a faint warmth — and became transparent, disappeared — or rather, dissolved into her skin.

In the bronze mirror: the ugly, wretched Xiao Kang was gone. In her place stood a young woman slender and graceful, of extraordinary beauty, her loveliness like an immortal descended to earth — the Wang family’s eldest young lady.

She pressed her hands to her own face in joyful astonishment, her excitement so great she wanted to shout and leap, even forgetting that she was completely unclothed.

From behind the curtain, an ordinary red skirt came flying out.

“Put it on. It is cold.” His voice, filtered through the curtain, sounded slightly muffled — and somehow distant.

Flushed with excitement, she fumbled the dress on in a rush — and then discovered that the red dress was still red. It had not turned black, as it always used to.

She covered her mouth in startled wonder and lifted her foot to step through the curtain toward him.

“Stop!” He halted her movement with an absolute command. “Now — turn around. Walk out the front door, and then — go home.”

He had frightened her. She stood frozen in place, staring at the curtain.

“Your path is beyond this door.” His tone softened. “Go.”

She stood in a daze for a long while, then slowly turned — and looked back once more. “Thank you!”

Then she ran out quickly, without much lingering, her bearing light and agile as a nimble swallow.

Only when the sound of her had faded entirely did he slowly pull the curtain aside. A black cloth was bound over his eyes — and beneath it, traces of deep red seeped through.

“That night, I went to that teahouse. But you were not there.” He murmured quietly.

6

He began wandering again.

Still walking from one place to the next, forgetting each place as he left it — inventing names when drinking and making merry with strangers, talking idly of this and that. Sometimes luck was with him and he would be invited to rest somewhere warm and comfortable. But more often than not, when he was tired, he would rest beneath whatever eave happened to be nearest.

People had thrown steamed buns or copper coins at him. Others had welcomed him with a stick.

The only thing different from before: he now carried a white cane in his hand.

The tapping sound traveled from one city to the next.

He no longer made clothes. Instead, he told fortunes — pronouncing judgments on good and ill fate.

A blind man making a living with old divination sticks and kindly-intended fabrications was always an easier way to get by…

Word of her reached him in bits and pieces no matter where he went.

When he was drinking in a small town, he heard people say that she had smoothly become the consort of Prince Jin. That Li Zhi fellow was thoroughly besotted with his new wife’s beauty — unable to stop thinking of her, not wanting to be apart from her for a moment.

He drank his wine and continued discussing with his tablemates just how big the head of the butcher’s son in the neighboring village was. He laughed heartily.

When he was fast asleep under the riverside willows of a grand and prosperous city, Li Shimin died. Li Zhi became Emperor. She, as Prince Jin’s consort, naturally transitioned from the position of consort to that of Empress Wang — mother of the realm.

A fly buzzed across his face. He waved it away in annoyance, turned over, and went back to sleep.

When he sat behind his fortune-telling stall on an unremarkable little street, patiently listening to an angry widow recount her husband’s many faults, a woman by the name of Wu Meiniang was gaining an ever-growing reputation in the imperial palace in Chang’an. It was said she was Li Zhi’s new favorite.

He listened to the widow with a smile, divined her fortune carefully, and told her where her missing husband had gone.

When he was strolling idly along the edges of the paddy fields in the countryside, inside the palace, Noble Consort Wu and Empress Wang fought their open and hidden battle, great and thunderous.

He discussed the year’s harvest with an old farmer in the countryside. His sightless eyes, however, would from time to time drift in the direction of Chang’an.

When yet another winter came, he walked into Chang’an. The sun had not yet risen, and even on this street beneath the feet of the Son of Heaven, figures were sparse.

At this time, the greatest news in all of Chang’an was that the Emperor had deposed Empress Wang and installed Noble Consort Wu as the new Empress.

That evening, in Chang’an, the son of a blacksmith told his father that when he had gone out just now to relieve himself, he had seen the man walking slowly ahead of him in the alley suddenly transform into a swallow and fly toward the imperial palace. For this, he received a thrashing from his father.

In the deepest, coldest cell of the forbidden palace, she studied him for a long while before recognizing who he was.

Cold hard chains had worn away her still-translucent skin. Beneath her thin garments, in addition to her delicately beautiful body, there were countless wounds, long and short — some new, some old.

“What happened to your eyes?” Even now she could not hold his gaze for long. An inexpressible guilt moved through her, though she could not tell why — or what she might have done to him that she no longer remembered.

He smiled. “My eyes are on you.”

She took this as a form of humor and gave a pained smile. “I always knew — you were not an ordinary person. That first time I saw you through the crack in the gate, I knew. You could help me.”

“Do you think I helped you, or harmed you?” He crouched down and gently traced her face with his fingers. “You have grown so much thinner.”

She was silent for a long while, staring at the cold desolation of the cell, imagining the song and dance beyond it. Then, suddenly, she laughed.

“No matter what face a person wears — it is only a face.” She said this, and then turned and looked at him with a smile. “Tailor — just like when I was so ugly back then, you were still willing to wipe my face and comb my hair. Wasn’t that so?”

His heart — as if pierced by a thorn.

No matter what face a person wears — it is only a face.

The Moonlit Cloud Brocade: she had never been able to take it off, because she wore it upon her heart, and it covered her eyes.

But now — might it be worth trying to see?

“Do you remember the question I asked you that night?” He sat down beside her, shoulder to shoulder. “Would you choose to be a person, or a swallow?”

He was, a little, afraid of her answer.

“They are the same.” Still without a moment’s hesitation. Then she pointed to her own chest. “If this — this part of me — is at peace, being a person or being a swallow are both good.”

He lowered his eyes and smiled.

“And you — would you choose to be a person or a swallow?” She turned the question on him.

“Either way, it doesn’t matter much.” He shrugged, in a rare flash of playfulness. “If I want to walk, I’ll be a person. If I want to fly, I’ll be a swallow. Free and easy — what could be better?”

“I envy you.” She laughed, from the heart. “All right. You should go back now. I don’t want you to see me with my head struck off. Wu Meiniang will not let me go. And as for the Emperor…” She sighed. “I thought beauty could hold his heart — but in this world, I am not the only one with beauty. When the old goes, the new comes. There is no end to it.”

He said nothing. The two of them sat side by side in the cell, lost in thought, staring at the black wall across from them.

“It is time.” When the faintest edge of dawn touched the sky, he took her hand.

When the first ray of morning light fell upon the towering Tang imperial palace, a swallow took flight from somewhere within — carrying in its beak a tiny gleaming object. It flew out into the tranquil sky, leaving behind a point growing ever smaller and more distant.

That day, yet another great matter erupted within the palace: the long-imprisoned Empress Wang was found dead in her cell. Yet her face was serene, as though in slumber. Even more astonishing — upon the Empress’s body, she was clothed in a moon-white garment of a kind no one had ever seen. But the moment anyone reached out to touch it, the garment dissolved into white ash and fell to the ground without a trace.

The Empress Wu was furious. She had the Empress Wang’s remains mutilated — hands and feet severed, the body sealed in a wine vessel — to vent her rage, and sternly forbade anyone from spreading the truth. It was only when the court historian was compelled to record that Empress Wang had been executed personally by her that the matter was finally put to rest.

That day, the Empress Wu stood with satisfaction at the highest point of the imperial palace, looking down over the realm that belonged to her husband, and inwardly laughed with cold contempt at her utterly defeated enemy: One who relies on nothing but a face cannot obtain anything.

And with this same thought, she also delivered herself a fierce, silent warning.

7

My milk had long been finished, yet I was still holding the cup.

Wuyi’s tea was also finished — he had actually drunk it all.

“What is in there?” I put down my cup and fixed my eyes on the worn leather case he had been guarding so carefully all this while.

“Have a listen.” He pushed the case toward me.

I looked at this grimy thing, pulled out a paper napkin to wipe it clean, then mimicked what he had done — pressed my ear to it, thinking: if he dares play tricks on me, I’ll let Ao Chi out to bite him to death!

The material of the case turned out to be surprisingly soft, and where my ear touched it there was a warm warmth. Inside the case, something seemed to be moving — and at intervals, a sound like the rustling of wings.

“This is…” I lifted my head.

“Open it.” He smiled gently. “Haven’t you been wanting to open it for a long time? And there is inside it the thing you want most.”

My eyes instantly lit up with a golden glow. I pressed down the clasp, full of anticipation, and slowly, slowly lifted the lid.

A third of a second later — I was dumbfounded. My heart crumbled. What do you mean the thing I want most is inside?! Not a single scrap of gold! Only two pitch-black, ridiculous little swallows — one bigger, one smaller — spinning their little eyes and occasionally lazily stretching their wings. And beneath their feet, a swallow’s nest that was actually rather beautifully constructed.

“You liar!” I was about to demand an accounting from the fellow across from me — but before I could, this fellow shuddered and, like a balloon that had suddenly been deflated, shrank to a height of three inches in the blink of an eye. A wisp of white mist flew out of him and into the larger of the two swallows in the box. Then, across from me, there remained only a three-inch black straw figure.

I had spent an entire night drinking milk and tea with a straw figure…

“It is not what you are thinking.” The larger swallow in the case hopped onto the edge of the case and looked up at me, speaking. “My power was long ago insufficient to let me take human form. That is why I used a straw figure as my substitute. You understand — with a false person as cover, we are considerably safer. After all, with this actual body of mine, even a small child could crush me to death.”

“All right. That part I can understand. What I don’t understand is — you can hop, you can fly, you can talk. Wherever you wanted to take your girlfriend to play, why couldn’t you? What did you have to come and find me for?!” I glared hard at this shape-shifting creature.

Wuyi turned to glance at the other swallow beside him and said: “You know — Grandfather made it so she could never regain her identity as a swallow spirit. This means she is a fully living person — and if she dies, she dies. There is no second chance. I spent a great deal of effort to carry her primordial soul out from the body of Empress Wang. Over the course of a thousand years, I have taken careful care of her, watching her hatch from a swallow’s egg into a nestling, and grow into what she is now. Though she still has no memory of the past and cannot use any magic arts, at least she is alive and well. Given more time, she may be able to recover all her abilities as a swallow spirit.”

“Mmm.” I nodded. “But I still don’t know why you’ve come to find me!”

Wuyi simply hopped up onto my shoulder and said quietly: “I am close to dying.”

“You’re lying to me again!” I frowned. This fellow was lively and vigorous — he didn’t look anything like someone about to die. He was definitely fishing for sympathy.

“Does every dying spirit need to hang their head in misery before you’ll believe them?” He sighed, tilted his head close to my ear, and said: “I used my eyes to resurrect the Moonlit Cloud Brocade. Then I used magic to make her look like the Wang eldest young lady. Then I went to her cell to save her primordial soul. Then I used my own power to ‘hatch’ her back into life. Then I spent a thousand years taking care of her… I am only a spirit, not an indestructible iron man. You can see for yourself — I am now too weak even to control a straw figure.”

I still could not hear the grief of a dying creature in his voice, but I had begun to believe him, a little.

“But a swallow spirit’s death is different from that of other spirits. As long as my primordial soul remains within my true body, this so-called death will simply mean becoming an ordinary swallow — one who cannot speak, cannot use magic arts, with a below-average level of intelligence.” He hopped back into the case and continued: “But she is different. Her life has only just begun. And so I am hoping that you can take her in, here in your shop — until she is capable of protecting herself.”

His intention, I had already surmised.

Honestly, I think — even if you don’t turn into an ordinary swallow, your intelligence isn’t that impressive to begin with. Who would trade away a pair of eyes in exchange for a garment? Who would indulge the one they love, time and time again, as they committed the same mistake?

These words I swallowed back. I did not say them. The fellow before me was a swallow spirit about to die, after all.

Wuyi, seeing me drifting in thought, spoke as though he had heard what was in my heart: “Are you calling me an idiot?”

“Yes!” I said bluntly. “But I might do the same idiotic thing myself.”

I meant every word of both those statements.

Every tragedy is always divided into two parts — a fairy tale and a reality. Two doomed kings gave her the first. And Wu Meiniang gave her the perfect second.

Wuyi’s “indulgence” of her was nothing more than wanting her to walk all the way to that final chapter herself. Until she was willing to take off the Moonlit Cloud Brocade of her heart, her suffering could not end.

The same is true for you and me: if we want to live safely and contentedly in this world, let us stop always thinking about our own Moonlit Cloud Brocade. What lies within the chest, and above the neck — that is what deserves our diligent cultivation and sincere care. A face is only a face.

“Would you spend that much time helping someone else take off a garment?” He gave a soft laugh.

“If it came to that, I’d skin them alive! And don’t change the subject.” I gave him a sideways look and studied the other one in the case. “Taking her in is not entirely out of the question. We’ll call it long-term lodging — and since it is lodging, the room fee cannot be waived!”

He struck a pose of literary melancholy, drooping his head with dejection: “I am a disabled swallow who cannot see… all I have is my feelings…”

“Don’t you come talking to me about feelings! Talk gold!” I let out a humph. “Not even a literary swallow gets a discount from me!”

He lifted his head and beat his chest with his wing: “But I have a heart of gold right here! Gold!”

When a foolish swallow deadpans its way through a debt settlement with a “heart of gold,” I have to admit — it won.

“Look — if you take us in, your Never Stop will have no pests. We are beneficial birds that eat insects. In the summer you’ll save on mosquito repellent!” He continued his shameless speech.

“Wait a moment — what do you mean by ‘take us in’?” I cut him off quickly.

He sighed: “Even if I die and become an ordinary swallow, I still need somewhere to be. Look — I have even prepared the nest already. All you need to do is hang it under the eaves. Very convenient.” He glanced at the one beside him. “Even if I can no longer remember her, I will stay as close to her as I can.”

All right. Since the creature is nearly dead, what is there to begrudge.

Alas — but I am still torn. Of all the good people and good spirits in this world, why is it that they insist on leaning on me?

“I came looking for you last year, but Never Stop had closed.” Wuyi looked around at my new shop. A swallow has no expressions — yet I always felt he was smiling. “There is nowhere more worthy of trust than this place. That you were able to reopen — that is very, very good.”

Words of praise are the hardest to resist — they make one float off into the clouds and make foolish decisions!

I slapped the table. “In any case — if I ever find a single mosquito in Never Stop come summer, I will pull out one of your feathers! No arguing, no protests!”

Deal!

Epilogue

Beneath the eaves of Never Stop, there was now a lantern — and a swallow’s nest.

One female and one male — two ridiculous little swallows — chirped and chattered every day in their nest, speaking things only they could understand.

I placed a small water bowl beside the nest, climbing a ladder in person each day to change the water. And not ordinary water, either — I had kindly added a special blend of my own nutritional supplement, to replenish their daily energy.

Every time I went up to change the water, Wuyi — who no longer knew who I was — would poke his head out and peck gently twice on the back of my hand, then turn back and continue preening his partner’s feathers. Sometimes, when there was no one about, they would slip through my window together and land on my shoulder, studying with great interest the fashion magazine I was holding, and offer their commentary on the garments inside.

Swallows who know how to read magazines — not so low in intelligence after all. But then I quickly recalled: they are swallow spirits — the most gifted tailors among all spirits. Even though Wuyi had “died,” the instinct surely remains. What a shame — if the swallow spirit clan had not been wiped out by a meddlesome and wretched Daoist, if Wuyi and all of them had continued as they were, just think of how many beautiful garments I might have had to wear!

Well — I do not know what will become of these two creatures in the future. For now, they are doing well. I’ve heard that at night, Wuyi wraps his wings around his partner, and the two of them, in the gentle glow of the lantern, nestle close together and drift into a deep sleep.

Chi Pian’er sneaked out in the middle of the night to peep, then came back and reported this to me.

When it comes to peeping, Chi Pian’er is always, without fail, self-motivated.

Still — when swallow murmuring fills the eaves, it feels as though winter is departing sooner. I wonder — this pair, when next winter comes, will they be like other swallows and fly south to somewhere warmer?

If so, would I not have to send bodyguards along? Everyone knows that unscrupulous bird-catchers are everywhere.

But let’s set aside the bird-catchers for a moment — right here in my Never Stop, there is a hot-headed wretch to deal with first!

Just now, when I went up to change the water, I found the nest was empty. It was absolutely not the hour when they would be foraging, and even when foraging, it was always only Wuyi who went out.

I suspected a cat. But I had clearly placed a protective barrier around the nest — no creature besides those who belong to Never Stop could approach their home.

Chi Pian’er and I searched the whole building. In the end it was Chi Pian’er who was sharp — quickly reporting that the two of them were in the rear courtyard.

I rushed over. There was Ao Chi — who had grown bored of the sweeping machines — holding Wuyi in one claw and a slingshot in the other, facing a stack of cardboard boxes piled opposite him.

Right. I had nearly forgotten — that wretch had spent my money again to buy himself an iPad 2, and had been completely absorbed in Angry Birds for days.

My broom came down hard on Ao Chi’s head.

“I was only testing the feasibility of a real-life Angry Birds! And besides, they’re not ordinary birds!” Ao Chi rubbed the lump rising on his head, aggrieved and whining.

I had somehow managed to forget: this fellow was once a scourge of the world — the kind who would flood an entire city just to enjoy a satisfying bath. This great idler who eats without working — what mischief wouldn’t he cook up just to entertain himself?

I turned my head and called loudly toward the kitchen: “Zhao Gongzi!!”

My second helper swept out of the kitchen at lightning speed, draped in a full black hooded cloak, and appeared before me in an instant.

My second helper was very tall. Though he went by the name Zhao Gongzi, he was not a person — beneath the cloak was a set of white armor. As for the origins of this walking suit of armor, I have that on record in my top-secret personnel file, so I need not go into it. In short, he told me he was the battle armor of Zhao Zilong, the great general of the Three Kingdoms, and that he had always missed his master very much. As for the name Zhao Gongzi — I gave it to him offhandedly. He is very, very fond of it. From this I deduce that his feelings for Zhao Zilong are something quite extraordinary…

“Take this fellow to the kitchen. He doesn’t leave until he’s cut ten pounds of onions.” I said calmly to Zhao Gongzi.

“Yes, innkeeper.” Zhao Gongzi was far more obedient than Chi Pian’er — and far more honest. Crucially, he had never once tried to discuss anything related to wages with me. I hold him in very high esteem.

What followed was simple: the mighty Zhao Gongzi gripped Ao Chi by the back of the neck and strode toward the kitchen.

“I am the innkeeper’s husband — which makes me your employer too!” Ao Chi kicked the air, indignant.

“I am sorry. I have only one innkeeper. I listen only to her. She is the one who took me in.” Zhao Gongzi answered steadily.

“I hold grudges, you know! I hold very serious grudges!” Ao Chi continued to kick and struggle.

“Ten pounds of onions must be cut.” Zhao Gongzi answered steadily.

“When I recover my true form I will absolutely represent the East Sea Dragon Clan in destroying you!”

“Say that again when you’ve recovered.”

“Can I skip the onions?!”

“Not a chance.”

Listening to their warm exchange, I held the rescued Wuyi and his partner, laughing quietly as I made my way outside, climbed the ladder, and carefully placed them back in their nest.

To comfort these two who had been given quite a fright, I sang them a song with great feeling —

Little swallow, dressed in patterned wings, every spring you come to this place.

When I finished singing, however, I noticed they seemed even more terrified than before… Ah well.

I climbed down the ladder and sat under my own eaves, giving a long, satisfied stretch.

I thought of the other night, when I had neurotically asked Ao Chi: “If I weren’t the way I am — if I were ugly as a pig — would you still have married me?”

He was busy battling Angry Birds on his iPad 2 and said, without looking up: “If you turned as ugly as those green pigs, but still had the nerve to slap me in the face the way you did — I think I would probably still have married you.”

He still remembered the day we first met, all those years ago — when I, undaunted by power or force, had openly resisted and made a point of disciplining him…

I laughed quietly to myself.

Above my head, Wuyi and his partner were chatting again, in the last tail of winter, in the noon sunlight. To hear such a sound — it is very hard not to feel happy.

On a whim, I found a stub of chalk and wrote on the wall closest to the nest, in one vigorous sweep —

Wild weeds and flowers beside the Vermillion Sparrow Bridge, evening sun slants low above the mouth of Wuyi Alley. The swallows that once graced the halls of Wang and Xie — now fly into the homes of ordinary folk.

Then I looked at my crooked handwriting and the face of my home, and reflected: poetry truly does come from life. Hee hee.