“This is for you?” Wanruo took the little embroidered pouch and peered inside.
The old woman surprised her by standing up. “This will help you,” she said, then limped away on bent knees.
“Grandmother!” Wanruo called after her, hand outstretched.
The woman only waved once, a dismissive motion that told Wanruo not to follow. Puzzled, Wanruo unfastened the pouch. Inside were two thin sheets of paper—talisman paper, stamped and folded with inked symbols.
Wanruo glanced after the old woman’s receding figure, shrugged without understanding, tucked the talismans back into the pouch, and made her way back to Shan’an Quarter.
She returned to her room cradling a bundle of skewers. No sign of Wanzi. “Wanzi! Wanzi?” she called, careful and soft.
Silence answered for a few beats, until Wanruo deliberately complained in a loud, teasing voice, “What a shame — delicious skewers and no one to share them with!”
In a blur, Wanzi sprang to the doorway, foam and drool threatening to spill from his mouth. “Where? Where are they?” he begged, eyes wild.
At the sight of the food, he lunged, but Wanruo hid it behind her back and scolded him, “You greedy little glutton! I called you—why didn’t you come when I called? Now you only show up when you smell food. Shame on you!”
Wanzi’s pupils went wide. He cowered, all indignation evaporating into a petulant whine. “You have the nerve to scold me? I nearly starved in here and you didn’t care! Hmph!”
“Well, whose fault is that? You didn’t follow me!” Wanruo snapped.
“You had a demon beside you — who’d dare come near?” Wanzi blurted out, drawing on the fright he’d been taught to voice.
At the thought of Bai Chen, Wanruo shivered and muttered, “Yeah… he is scary.”
“Fine. Consider these payback,” she said, producing the skewers and handing them over. The two of them sat on the floor with a clatter, gnawing and crunching away.
At the Wei residence, the household was in chaos over Qin Manman’s sudden collapse. The physician who had been called in was at sea—he had never seen a malady like this and could only shake his head.
“I’ve not encountered such a thing before,” the doctor said helplessly. “My guess is cholera. It strikes quick, and in her state she may not last the night.”
“What can we do? Is there no cure?” Chancellor Wei demanded.
The doctor bowed his head. “Forgive me, my skills are inadequate here.”
Cholera. The word spread through the house like a chill wind; everyone with any sense retreated from the room. Even Qin Jiang left, unwilling to be near the sickness. Only Madam Zhang remained by the girl’s bedside.
Seeing the chance, Madam Wei’s voice rose, panicked and practical. “If it truly is cholera, it will spread through this household. Dismiss them all at once!”
Zhang Shi fell to her knees, begging. “Please, Chancellor, do not cast us out yet. There’s no confirmed diagnosis. Perhaps she was touched by something unclean… If the physician cannot cure her, maybe a Daoist or a medium could. Please—”
Chancellor Wei’s brow tightened, then he barked an order. “Summon Daoists, exorcists—anyone who can help. Post a notice: whoever cures the miss shall be handsomely rewarded.”
Within hours the corridors were full of men in robes, bell-bearers, chanting monks, and self-styled shamans of every sort. Madam Wei’s hair turned grey with the torrent of claims and counterclaims. Each new “expert” performed his rite: someone danced and beat drums, another turned about mumbling to invisible guests, others hawked powders and pungent salves. The household endured a long, feverish day.
By sundown Qin Manman’s condition had worsened—flesh blistering, pain dragging keening cries from her lips. The self-appointed saviors were shooed out one by one.
The last to remain was an unassuming, middle-aged man, neither handsome nor shabby—a soothsayer of middling repute, a half-adept. He glanced at the girl on the bed and spoke bluntly.
“This is no ordinary malady,” he said. “It’s a curse—someone has put a poison charm upon her. Whoever did this knows powerful things.”
Zhang Shi seized on the words. “Master, please—save my daughter. I will do anything.”
The soothsayer shrugged helplessly. “My power does not reach deep enough to lift such a curse.”
Hope left Zhang Shi like air from a punctured bellows. She sank to the floor, numb.
Then the man’s gaze sharpened. “However… your family has a connection to the spirit-world. I read that an ancestor or kin once served as a spirit-medium. If such a lineage still exists among the living, they might have a way.”
At the mention of the medium, Zhang Shi’s eyes brightened with sudden recall. “Yes—my mother-in-law, Madam Yin. She… she served as a medium. But she’s gone…”
“No,” the soothsayer said. “The spirit-line may still have a living trunk. That’s the only lead I can give.” He turned to go.
Zhang Shi, desperate, pressed a pouch of silver into his hand and clung to the hope like a drowning person to a rope. Then, with a trembling certainty, she thought of Wanruo — the girl who had once tormented her and who had lived beside that old woman for years. If anyone had learned tricks from Madam Yin, it would be Wanruo.
That thought pushed Zhang Shi out the door straight to Shan’an Quarter.
She arrived as dusk deepened. Shan’an was nearly closing. Yun Jiu was pulling the shutters down when she saw Zhang Shi pacing at the gate.
“Can I help you?” Yun Jiu asked, suspicious.
“Wanruo—where is she?” Zhang Shi hissed, glancing about as if someone might overhear.
“Who are you? What business have you with her?”
Zhang Shi’s gaze darted and softened at the mention of kin. “I’m her aunt. Please, let me in. It’s urgent.”
Yun Jiu hesitated, then, with a nod, let her wait. But Zhang Shi didn’t wait politely—she followed Yun Jiu all the way to Wanruo’s room and, before anyone could stop her, burst in.
“Wanruo! Please—please help Manman!” Zhang Shi dropped to her knees before Wanruo, hands clasped, voice thick with tears. The sudden display startled both Wanruo and Yun Jiu.
“You—how did you get here?” Yun Jiu demanded.
Wanruo put her hand to her chest as if to steady her racing heart. “You know people get frightened to death like that,” she scolded, half-angry, half-relieved.
“I had no other choice,” Zhang Shi sobbed. “I was afraid you wouldn’t come if I asked properly. Please—Manman is dying!”
Wanruo had never seen Zhang Shi reduced to such pleading. The woman who had once been so arrogant now wept like a child. Wanruo’s resolve hardened. “All right—stand up. Tell me everything from the start.”
Zhang Shi poured out the tale. Wanruo did not know what she could do, but time was razor-thin.
She grabbed her cloak. Yun Jiu and Wanzi scrambled to follow. They hurried to the Wei residence.
What Wanruo found there stopped her breath.