The following week atypical stars aligned and Dan’er found herself with a rare free evening. She took to haunting the mezzanine of Hundred Flowers House–too tired to face society but not tired enough to sleep–and eventually drifted into Sister Lianhua’s room. There the maiden, seated at a dressing table rubbing mali ointment onto her dry elbows, beckoned.
“The magistrate came today,” Sister Lianhua remarked, handing over a sandalwood comb. “Took so long to settle the bill I must’ve died and reincarnated at least three times.”
“It’s considered a grave punishment to be reborn in the same body,” observed Dan’er. She dutifully raked the comb through the maiden’s thick unraveled ebony hair.
Sister Lianhua winked at her through the dressing table mirror. “Not if you’re me.”
The firelit, foggy reflection of Sister Lianhua’s pink-rouged cheeks, rose-papered lips, and peeking collar bones appeared nearly ethereal in the bronze mirror propped on the table. An admirably demure veneer, Dan’er now knew, overlaying a disquieting penchant for reckless chaos. The maiden hadn't required much coaxing to play Bomen’s lure. And at their last debrief she had vibrated with such whole-body zeal speaking on subterfuge that Dan’er began to pity her timid scholar beau. Chawen certainly didn't deserve her.
After tending her arms to her satisfaction, Sister Lianhua scraped together a gob of translucent white ointment about the width and depth of a thumbnail, and consumed it. She scraped up another similar amount and offered it to Dan’er. The girls exchanged surreptitious glances before Dan’er methodically sucked it from her finger.
The maiden cleared her throat while capping the ointment jar. “Chawen and I are betrothed,” she announced brightly.
Shock, fast and severe, cracked through thin aversion, exposing a sense of loss so profound it made Dan’er’s stomach drop. “Congratulations,” Dan’er choked out. Then, feeling inadequate, she added as an affirmation: “He certainly doesn’t deserve you.”
The maiden hugged her arms around herself, letting out a besotted squeal. “He’s going to make me famous. Immortalize me in literature like the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai.”
“I must confess I’ve yet to read any of Chawen’s writings,” Dan’er politely replied, mentally scrabbling to reposition herself in the shifting landscape. Determined to remain friends if nothing more. Her attempts to continue brushing the maiden’s hair were thwarted by Sister Lianhua’s inability to stay still.
Swaying from side to side, Sister Lianhua conceded: “There is room for improvement. But rubies cannot be mined from an absence of dirt. I’ve also been helping restructure some poems,” she added offhandedly.
Carefully, Dan’er set the comb down, masking the deep breaths taken to gather and compress her flailing emotions. Then the mali peaked, subsuming her in warm folds of euphoric entanglement. Her countenance melted and she felt each tensing and relaxing muscle. Her dry, gritty mouth burst forth: “I’ll always love you,” and the words tasted bittersweet with the release of something dear. “You saved me,” she confessed. “Gave me back my will.”
Sister Lianhua turned around in her seat. Her right hand reached out and clutched the back of Dan’er’s head, sending tingles radiating crownwards and spinewards. She pulled them close. The loose black hair framing her pale face, cascading naturally and naked of baubles, made Dan’er’s heart swell. Dan’er wanted to meld, not as a unification of individuals but as a reassemblage of a higher self.
“You are my kindred sister,” Sister Lianhua pronounced solemnly, and Dan’er’s ears pricked at the airy undertone in her mellifluous voice. “Do you remember what I told you the first time you had me deliver osmanthus cakes to the magistrate?”
Dan’er nodded, her eyes wide and intently focusing. “Be bigger.”
The corner of Sister Lianhua’s mouth quirked Dan’er’s heart off rhythm. Then the maiden rose from her chair. Beneath oil lamps she moved vibrant and dreamlike, each minute movement burning an afterimage in the air, trailing past to present through the room. The elongated chain of duplicate figures, many-headed and multi-limbed, undulated its way to a shelf and returned with a lidded celadon jar the size of a human skull.
“What is this?” Dan’er asked, receiving the container from a fan of hands.
A pair of petals blinked in dual blooms of hazel irises tipped white. “It’s gu.”
And in her right mind Dan’er would have thrown the jar with a jolt, would have immediately regretted unleashing its contents inside closed quarters. Instead she stood immobile, holding the cool glaze under her fingertips and felt–or rather imagined–the vibrations of its occupants devouring one another within, concentrating their toxins into a sole survivor. This was old dark magic.
“One victor’s bite to the magistrate’s person and all his wealth will be yours,” Sister Lianhua elucidated. A pleated ribbon of red lips folded back into a single, smiling pair.
“Where did you get the specimens?” Dan’er inquired flatly. The mali motion blur began to clear but her sense of horror remained inaccessible.
The maiden settled back into her chair and resumed swaying, then proceeded to rub hands up and down the smooth gray silk covering her thighs. “The centipede was easy,” she began. “The apothecarist keeps live ones in the back of his shop, and is very generous with his wares when distracted. The snake was a bit annoying.” She tilted her head and frowned in memory. “Had to root through a dozen termite mounds and rodent holes before ousting one. The scorpion was the hardest. Scouring rocky cliffs by moonlight. But Chawen was so helpful,” she added thoughtfully, and sighed in contentment. “He’s such a sweetheart.”
Windy cliffs, reflected Dan’er. Robes flapping in the breeze like a butterfly kite. She numbly eyed the gray-green jar, mumbled unsurely: “Will this help me?” Through the empathic bliss haze all retribution fantasies seemed faintly callous and wholly insignificant.
Sister Lianhua suddenly sprang up and grabbed Dan’er by the shoulders. “Listen to me,” she said with unexpected urgency. “The magistrate doesn't get to sit in my House, meticulously counting his money all day, when he’s stolen everything from you. The sooner you take back what’s yours, the sooner you can begin rebuilding your life. Revive your family name. Maybe even find a cure for your father.” A hand lifted to stroke Dan’er’s cheek and Dan’er leaned into its velvet warmth. “The situation is big, laotong, so you have to be bigger. I can take care of the aftermath but the gu must be administered by your hand. Can you do it?” The maiden caught Dan’er’s gaze and bobbed her head encouragingly.
Dan’er nodded back for the sake of beautiful synchrony.
