“Black sky yellow earth, vast universe all chaos; sun and moon wax and wane, constellations spread through the sky; cold comes, heat leaves, fall harvests winter keeps; extra days make a month, add it up and you find the solstice …”
As he sways back and forth through the morning recitation, checking against the “Thousand Character Classic” issued by the Illustrious Hall, Duan Ling learns one character after another during the first fortnight until he knows the greater part of them.
The teacher points at one phrase with the punishment ruler, and Duan Ling reads it aloud; the teacher points at another, Duan Ling reads it once more aloud — rinse and repeat.
“What’s this one?” The teacher asks.
“Lord,” Duan Ling sits up straight and answers.
“And this?” The teacher points at another.
He can’t answer it, and the teacher bestows a slap to Duan Ling’s palm with his ruler. Duan Ling endures it, not daring to yelp out loud, his palm stinging with painful heat.
“Jade torus.” The teacher crisscrosses through rows of school children, saying offhandedly, “Like the Jade Torus of He, or the ‘bi’ in Yubiguan.2Elegant gentleman, like jade tablet like jade torus.3 Next one.”
Duan Ling keeps rubbing his hands, pressing his left hand onto the ice-cold porcelain side of his brush-washing cup. The teacher goes around asking the students questions one by one, also gifting slaps with his ruler one by one. The overcast sky grows darker, but it’s only when the bell rings outside does the teacher say, “Class dismissed.”
The kids erupt in boisterous cheers and take to their heels. It’s the first day of the month, the day they get to go home for their days off. Carriages and whinnying horses crowd the street outside the Illustrious Hall, forming an impenetrable mass; many children stick their heads out to look around as though looking forward to a festival. Duan Ling has been waiting all this time — waiting for Lang Junxia to come get him. The first few days were downright torture, but as the holiday approached somehow his agitation has calmed.
The gatekeeper chants their names out one by one, and anyone whose name is called is picked up; many climb onto the fence to look around, but they’re driven down again, beaten or threatened to the ground by their ruler-yielding headmaster.
Duan Ling stands on the steps, looking out at the street on tiptoes. Lang Junxia is always taller, like a crane standing among a flock of chickens, so he’ll be able to see him right away, but Lang Junxia isn’t here.
He must be stuck behind the traffic in the alley. It’ll probably take some time before Lang Junxia can come into the alley on a horse.
“Yuan Estate — young master Yuan.”
“Lin family —”
The gatekeeper belts out the names and the children go out one by one, leaving the name plaques that hang by their waist in the Hall’s safekeeping. There are less and less children left in the front courtyard, and Duan Ling starts to think that Lang Junxia Is probably held up by something.
“Cai family — young master Cai.”
Cai Yan comes out and nods at the other schoolchildren. Duan Ling is still looking around, so he spots Cai Yan right away. Cai Yan waves back at him. “Where’s your dad?”
“He’ll be here soon.” Duan Ling doesn’t explain to Cai Yan that the one coming to get him isn’t his dad. Cai Yan walks out of the front gate, and a young man on a great big horse lets Cai Yan sit in front of him and takes him away. Duan Ling stares at the young man on the horse with envy; the man shoots Duan Ling an indifferent glance before turning and making the horse trot away.
Half an hour later, only about a dozen of them are left in the courtyard, and the alley outside the Illustrious Hall is getting less and less crowded. When the gatekeeper finishes calling out the last name, the only ones still standing where they began are Duan Ling and the youth who banged him against the bell. Tired from standing, Duan Ling has moved to sit on the steps, and the youth has switched to his other leg as he leans on the front gates, looking outside.
The headmaster and the teachers have changed clothes, and they pass by in front of Duan Ling. They cup their hands at each other, and opening their respective umbrellas, they head home for the holidays.
The gatekeeper closes the front gates. The very last ray of sunset turns a dark purple, casting shadows of pine trees by the wall.
The gatekeeper says, “Leave your name plaques here. If anyone comes later naturally we’ll let them in to get you.”
The youth walks over first and hands in the wooden plaque hanging by his waist, but he doesn’t go, just stands there absently watching. Duan Ling notices that the name “Borjigin Batu” is carved on the plaque.
“Then what do we do?” Duan Ling asks, a bit apprehensively. He looks up trying to find the young man named Batu to find that he has already left.
The gatekeeper replies, “Go to the dining hall and get some dinner. Once you’re done, keep waiting, do whatever you’re supposed to be doing. If no one comes to get you, bring your bedding to the second floor of the library at night and sleep there.”
Duan Ling has been waiting for nearly a fortnight and all the hopes that filled his heart have fallen through. He’s never felt so dejected, yet he still believes that Lang Junxia will come. After all, Lang Junxia has never missed an appointment before, and has always been as good as his word. Maybe he’s being kept back by something, momentarily occupied and can’t get away.
Duan Ling returns to his room, tidies up his things, then he hears the bell in the front courtyard again. It tugs at his heart and he rushes over to see. From far away he catches a glimpse of Batu’s back as he leaves.
Duan Ling suddenly gets it. Batu is calling him to go have dinner.
Whatever youthful resentment between them is already long forgotten; hatred comes quickly, and is forgotten just as quickly. Duan Ling no longer feels any kind of enmity towards him. On the contrary, he feels some measure of mutual commiseration.
During these two days off, around six workers will stay behind to take care of things. The kitchen has made a giant pot of stew, and they line up to get their food, the gatekeeper included. Two oil lamps are lit in the dining hall, and only one table is set. Duan Ling walks over with his bowl of food. When Batu sees that there’s no place for him to sit, he scoots over a bit to give him room.
While Duan Ling is hesitating, Batu looks a bit annoyed but he finally opens his mouth to say, “I’m not going to hit you. Sit. You that scared of me?”
Duan Ling thinks to himself, who’s scared of you? His pride will make it kind of hard for him to simply sit down but he can’t exactly eat out of his bowl standing up and so he has no choice but to sit down next to Batu.
What if Lang Junxia really won’t come? Duan Ling’s heart is at sixes and sevens, but he turns around and consoles himself right away — Lang Junxia will definitely come. In all likelihood the Viburnum may just be keeping him late for dinner and drinks, and he can’t just leave.
Perhaps Lang Junxia is drunk, and once he sobers up he’ll come get him.
After dinner, Duan Ling returns to his room to wait for a while longer. During days off the Illustrious Hall saves on charcoal by keeping the braziers unlit, making the room as cold as an ice cellar, and Duan Ling can’t sit still, pacing back and forth. Recalling the gatekeeper telling him that they’re staying the night in the library, he thinks there must be a fire and a place where he can warm up, thereupon he rolls up his bedding, picks them up with some difficulty, and takes them all the way through the back courtyard to the library.
All the servants are already there, their bedding spread throughout the first floor. There’s a charcoal stove outside the corner of the building that never goes out, sharing a chimney with the kitchen, and the buried heated pipes provide all the dehumidifying that the book pavilion, the bamboo-scrolls room, and the room where long scrolls are kept may need to prevent moisture or the freezing temperature from breaking down old scrolls and documents, preventing solid ink from cracking.
As soon as Duan Ling comes in, a worker tells him, “Young master, you’re a scholar. Please go to the second floor.
Even though the second floor is dark and gloomy, it’s very warm. Outside the carved window panels the snow scene looks as bright as in daytime; snowflakes cast their flowing, fragmentary shadows on the near-transparent window paper, creating a soft glowing light. Great tall bookshelves tower above them row on row, and a single lantern is lit on a wide wooden table beneath their crisscrossing shadows,
All around them on the shelves are book collections, long scrolls, and wooden-strips tied together into scrolls. When the Liao emperor invaded the south during his southern expedition, he thoroughly plundered the Han capital. As he was exceedingly fond of books and documents, he shipped it all away, storing them in Shangjing, Zhongjing, and Xijing.4 There are even authentic calligraphy from great masters of the previous dynasties among these.
Before the battle of Huai River,5 all these books used to be stored in the Chen Emperor’s imperial academy library, and ordinary people would never get the chance to see them. But now they’re covered in the dust of history, quietly standing in the dim yellow light of a single lamp, their covers concealing who knows how many sages’ souls since ancient time.
In the light, Batu spreads out his bedding and puts down a pillow. Duan Ling can’t make up his mind whether he should go over there, but Batu doesn’t even bother giving him a single glance before heading to the shelves to pick out a book. It’s just like the proverb says, enemies are doomed to meet on narrow roads … Duan Ling thinks that even though he hasn’t thought of Batu as anything like an archenemy, he just feels somewhat uneasy. Batu probably feels the same — neither child thinks they need to ignore the other, it’s just that neither one of them wants to be the first to suggest they make peace.
Thus Duan Ling folds out his own bedding on the other side of the long table, with a lamp between them like the middle line that divides a chess board — a line neither will cross. He too, goes to find a book to pass the time better while he waits for Lang Junxia to come.
Duan Ling has just barely started learning to read, so reading is quite straining. He can only read books with a lot of pictures in them. Accidentally coming across a copy of “Plant Encyclopedia” filled with bizarre illustrations of myriad medicinal ingredients and insects, Duan Ling can’t help but laugh as he reads. On looking up though he realises that across the table, Batu is staring at him.
Batu seems even less in the mood to read than Duan Ling; he’s touching one book one moment and flipping another the next. There’s a pile of books before him, each one’s pages are flipped no more than a few pages before it’s discarded to one side. Batu changes the way he sits, scratches his neck, then a bit later he takes off his top and ties his outer garment around his waist to sit there bare to the waist, then it’s no time again before he finds it too cold, and he throw the blanket half over himself — looking like an unkempt hooligan.
Even Duan Ling is losing the motivation to read while watching him. He yawns, half sprawled on the table, and stares off into space. From a distant alleyway, a watchman’s clappers clap out the hour through the snow storm; it’s three hours to midnight already and Lang Junxia still isn’t here.
— Maybe he won’t come at all tonight.
Suddenly Duan Ling is overcome with a motley collection of thoughts. He thinks, and thinks some more; it’s been more than a month since Lang Junxia carried him out of the Duan family home, and Duan Ling has been thinking everyday. Over time he’s learned a great deal of things, but he still doesn’t know why Lang Junxia took him out of there.
My name is Duan Ling, my dad is Duan Sheng … Duan Ling repeats these words over and over in his head. Did Lang Junxia bring him to Shangjing because he was entrusted by “Duan Sheng” to do so? If that’s the case, why doesn’t my dad come see me? Before Lang Junxia left, he said, “I still have work to do,” well what sort of work is it? Maybe he’s not all that important in Lang Junxia’s eyes — he’s just the same as a kitten or a puppy, a matter over and done with once he’s settled. Lang Junxia would send Duan Ling’s dad a letter, and whether he lives or dies, Lang Junxia has fulfilled his duty to the utmost.
Duan Ling lies on his bedding, tossing and turning, and his mind gives him a near hopeless thought — maybe Lang Junxia is never going to come.
What reason does Lang Junxia have that he must come get Duan Ling? They’re neither family nor old friends; is he supposed to come get Duan Ling just because he promised he would?
Duan Ling reaches beneath his lapel, his fingers caressing the jade arc inside the cloth pouch, and an ineffable sorrow wells up in his heart that refuses to go, dragging him down into deeper and deeper despair. Maybe Lang Junxia has been lying to him all along; the same way that when his mother passed away the cook told him that maybe his dad would come. And so Duan Ling waited for him for a long, long time, but his dad didn’t come either.
Maybe Lang Junxia is also like that. Maybe those words were nothing more than words to cheer up a child. He probably won’t come back.
Duan Ling buries his face in the blankets as his mind spirals, trying to make himself feel better.
Batu hears the noise, and observes Duan Ling with puzzlement through the narrow gap beneath the short table. Watching how Duan Ling keeps twitching about under the covers, he nimbly flips himself onto the table and slides to the other end.
“Hey.” Batu says next to Duan Ling’s ear. “You crying? Why’re you crying?”
Duan Ling ignores him. Batu kneels on the table on one knee, gripping the edge, straining to bend down and open Duan Ling’s covers, but Duan Ling has a tight grip on them.
Batu sticks out a bare foot from atop the table and gives Duan Ling’s blanket a kick, then he rolls off the table, and rips the blanket open to reveal Duan Ling’s face. Duan Ling isn’t crying, just frowning real hard with a deep furrow between his brows.
Batu sits down cross-legged and watches Duan Ling carefully. Duan Ling stares back at Batu. The look in both their eyes seemingly contain an odd-sort of tacit understanding. Finally, Duan Ling turns away.
“Don’t cry.” Batu says, “Bear with it. Suck it up.”
Batu’s words are impatient words, but he doesn’t sound at all like he’s looking down on Duan Ling — he’s saying it like that’s also how he got over things.
He reaches out, puts a hand on Duan Ling’s head, and slowly strokes down. Then he gives Duan Ling’s arm a pat.
Suddenly, Duan Ling feels a lot better.
That day, Batu is ten, and Duan Ling is eight and a half; lamplight flickers in the library, a single flame as small as a bean that penetrates through a sky filled with snow, illuminating Duan Ling’s new memories. The snow seems to have covered his dark past, and in this very moment his troubles are vividly altered.
The distinct line of light that divides Batu and Duan Ling appears to divide them into two distinct worlds. Strangely, Duan Ling finds that his past memories have become blurry; he no longer clings to the beatings and the ridicule the Duans gave him, and the marks that hunger has carved into his bones seem to lessen.
“Your name is Duan Ling. Your dad is Duan Sheng.”
With that single stroke of Lang Junxia’s brush, the stains and spots that sullied the plain white paper of Duan Ling’s life vanished one by one, but perhaps it was instead concealed by a deeper shade of ink. What troubles him now are no longer what used to trouble him.
“He doesn’t want you anymore,” Batu says lackadaisically.
Duan Ling and Batu lean against the table shoulder to shoulder, sitting on the floor hugging their blankets, staring out blankly at the painting hanging across from the book pavilion.
“He promised me he’d come,” Duan Ling says stubbornly.
“My mom said that in the kind of world we live in, no one really belongs to you.” Batu stares at the painting, gold and green intertwining in a depiction of Cangzhou prefecture. He says unhurriedly, “Wife and children, parents and brothers, falcons flying in the sky, fine horses galloping along the ground, gifts bestowed by the Khan himself …”
“… And nothing is promised to you, either. The only thing you can be sure of is yourself.” Batu is looking down, cracking his knuckles, saying this as though he’s thoroughly unconcerned.
Duan Ling turns his head to watch Batu. There’s a natural stench of sheep on him that blends into his long-unwashed animal-skin gown. His hair is greasy too.
“Is he your dad?” Batu asks.
Duan Ling shakes his head.
Batu tries again. “A retainer?”
Duan Ling shakes his head. Batu looks perplexed. “Don’t tell me he really is the child-kept husband6 your family arranged? Where’s your dad? Your mom?”
Duan Ling is still just shaking his head; Batu stops trying to press the issue.
A long time passes.
“I don’t have a dad.” Duan Ling says to Batu, “I’m a bastard.”
The truth is, he knows that when Lang Junxia tells him your dad’s named Duan Sheng it could be nothing more than a made-up excuse. Otherwise, why has he never brought up this “Duan Sheng”?
“How about you?” Duan Ling asks.
Batu nods. “My dad abandoned me long ago. He said he’d bring me home once a month, but now it’s been more than three months since I’ve seen him.”
“They’re all just lies.” Duan Ling says to Batu, “If you don’t believe them, you won’t be fooled.”
Batu sounds disinterested. “Yeah, but I’d still believe it occasionally.”
“Are you fooled a lot too?” Duan Ling asks.
“Not really.” Batu turns over; he lies on the floor, meeting Duan Ling’s eyes. “I used to be, a lot. Not so much now. But if you knew … why’d you still believe him?”
Duan Ling stops talking. He once thought Lang Junxia would never lie to him. After all, he’s not like other people.
The night grows darker, and the only noise left in the world is that of snowflakes falling. They lie there, one on his stomach and one on his back, the blankets smelling of Batu, the body odor of young men. They don’t even know when they end up falling asleep. Duan Ling doesn’t have much hope anymore; he knows that Lang Junxia won’t come tomorrow, and he won’t come the day after tomorrow either. It’s exactly like the way adults often used his non-existent dad to lie to him when he was still with the Duans.
“Hey, bastard, your dad’s here to get you!”
They said those words countless times, and at first Duan Ling fell for it every time, but he got smarter and stopped trusting them. But the adults got smarter too, and came up with novel ways to fool him. Sometimes they’d tell him a guest had arrived and Lady Duan had called for him to see the guest, and so Duan Ling would run there filled with expectation only to dirty the sitting room with his shoes and of course he’d end up getting beaten again.
Sometimes they’d pretend to whisper at each other in front of Duan Ling, and as though accidentally divulge just the tiniest bit of information. In the end they’d laugh in satisfaction at his reaction and disperse in the hubbub — they all loved to watch him cry.
From now on, he’ll be abandoned here, but school is a much better place than the Duan home. In comparison, on this point at least, Duan Ling is quite satisfied. One must be satisfied with one’s lot; that’s something a scabby Buddhist monk told him when he came begging for alms. Even though in the end the monk also died in Shangzi …
Duan Ling’s dream wanders and digresses, filled with a serene, peaceful atmosphere. But just as he starts dreaming of that river in Shangzi, the green of it at the cusp of spring turning to summer glittering with golden sunlight, Batu shakes him awake.
“Hey,” Batu says, “someone’s here to get you.”
Drowsy-eyed, Duan Ling looks all sleepy. Another hand falls onto him but Batu vigilantly blocks it.
“Is it him?” Batu asks.
Lang Junxia says softly, “Duan Ling, I’ve come to get you.”
Duan Ling startles with a shudder and opens his eyes. He stares at Lang Junxia incredulously, then looks at Batu.
Batu holds the lamp and shines its light into Lang Junxia’s face suspiciously. Lang Junxia looks uncomfortable about the light in his face, but Batu is worried that Duan Ling can end up being kidnapped by someone who doesn’t have anything to do with him, so he keeps asking, “Is it him or not?”
Duan Ling replies, “It’s him.” And he reaches out to wrap his arms around Lang Junxia’s neck, making Lang Junxia pick him up.
“Thank you for looking after him,” Lang Junxia says to Batu.
Batu looks obviously annoyed and sets the lamp down. Duan Ling is so sleepy that he can barely open his eyes; he wants to say something to Batu, but Batu burrows his way beneath the table back to his own bedding, and with a flip of his blankets he hides his face completely behind them.
Through the snowstorm, all of Shangjing is asleep as they meet the coldest time of the year. Lang Junxia wraps Duan Ling in a blanket and spurs their horse at full speed. With the bitingly cold wind, Duan Ling wakes a little, and he notices that they’re not heading to the Viburnum so he asks, “Where’re we going?”
“New home,” Lang Junxia answers offhandedly. He seems to have a lot on his mind.
New home! Duan Ling is all at once fully awake. He thinks, no wonder Lang Junxia is late — he was actually setting up their new home.
He raises his head to look at Lang Junxia, and thinks he looks quite pale. He must be tired.
“Are you sleepy?” Duan Ling can feel Lang Junxia leaning on him, and reaching up, Duan Ling strokes his head.
“No.” Lang Junxia seems quite drowsy. After Duan Ling wakes him, he tries his hardest to stay awake.
“Have you eaten?” Duan Ling asks.
“Yeah,” Lang Junxia answers, and wraps an arm around Duan Ling. His hand is very cold, not at all like how it usually is.
“Where’s the new home?”
Lang Junxia doesn’t say anything. Beneath them, the horse makes a turn into a secluded alley through the deserted marketplace, and in the deep darkness of the night they enter a courtyard. Overjoyed, Duan Ling doesn’t even wait for Lang Junxia to get the horse settled before dashing into the house with a cheer.
The door of the new residence hasn’t been locked; the inside of the place looks dilapidated, a single courtyard surrounded by six rooms and one connecting veranda. The lantern that should be hanging outside the doors isn’t lit; it lies discarded behind the gates. Duan Ling asks, “Are we going to live here from now on?”
“Yes,” Lang Junxia answers simply. Duan Ling faces the courtyard and begins to laugh; he can hear Lang Junxia closing and barring the doors behind him.
Then immediately, there is a crash and Lang Junxia collapses, crushing a trellis that hasn’t been set up, falling into a pile of snow.
Duan Ling turns around in shock, and finds Lang Junxia sprawled on the ground, motionless.
I do not monetise my hobby translations, but if you’d like to support my work generally or support my light novel habit, you can either buy me a coffee or commission me. This is also to note that if you read this anywhere else than on tumblr, do come to my tumblr. It’s ad-free. ↩︎
Yubiguan is written with the characters “jade, jade-torus, gate”. ↩︎
He missed a line in the middle. “Like bronze like tin.” There is actually a whole poem in the Book of Songs that describes what a beautiful gentleman is supposed to be like. Link to a translation, not mine. ↩︎
Shangjing, Zhongjing, and Xijing means Greater/upper capital, central capital, and western capital respectively. (See ref page for map.) ↩︎
It’s a river on the northern border of Southern Chen on the map. (On the eastern edge.) This has nothing to do with the historic Battle of Huai River. ↩︎
Child-kept husband isn’t really a word; usually it’s child-kept wife. You can read about tongyangxi here. ↩︎
“Black sky yellow earth, vast universe all chaos; sun and moon wax and wane, constellations spread through the sky; cold comes, heat leaves, fall harvests winter keeps; extra days make a month, add it up and you find the solstice …”
As he sways back and forth through the morning recitation, checking against the “Thousand Character Classic” issued by the Illustrious Hall, Duan Ling learns one character after another during the first fortnight until he knows the greater part of them.
The teacher points at one phrase with the punishment ruler, and Duan Ling reads it aloud; the teacher points at another, Duan Ling reads it once more aloud — rinse and repeat.
“What’s this one?” The teacher asks.
“Lord,” Duan Ling sits up straight and answers.
“And this?” The teacher points at another.
He can’t answer it, and the teacher bestows a slap to Duan Ling’s palm with his ruler. Duan Ling endures it, not daring to yelp out loud, his palm stinging with painful heat.
“Jade torus.” The teacher crisscrosses through rows of school children, saying offhandedly, “Like the Jade Torus of He, or the ‘bi’ in Yubiguan.2Elegant gentleman, like jade tablet like jade torus.3 Next one.”
Duan Ling keeps rubbing his hands, pressing his left hand onto the ice-cold porcelain side of his brush-washing cup. The teacher goes around asking the students questions one by one, also gifting slaps with his ruler one by one. The overcast sky grows darker, but it’s only when the bell rings outside does the teacher say, “Class dismissed.”
The kids erupt in boisterous cheers and take to their heels. It’s the first day of the month, the day they get to go home for their days off. Carriages and whinnying horses crowd the street outside the Illustrious Hall, forming an impenetrable mass; many children stick their heads out to look around as though looking forward to a festival. Duan Ling has been waiting all this time — waiting for Lang Junxia to come get him. The first few days were downright torture, but as the holiday approached somehow his agitation has calmed.
The gatekeeper chants their names out one by one, and anyone whose name is called is picked up; many climb onto the fence to look around, but they’re driven down again, beaten or threatened to the ground by their ruler-yielding headmaster.
Duan Ling stands on the steps, looking out at the street on tiptoes. Lang Junxia is always taller, like a crane standing among a flock of chickens, so he’ll be able to see him right away, but Lang Junxia isn’t here.
He must be stuck behind the traffic in the alley. It’ll probably take some time before Lang Junxia can come into the alley on a horse.
“Yuan Estate — young master Yuan.”
“Lin family —”
The gatekeeper belts out the names and the children go out one by one, leaving the name plaques that hang by their waist in the Hall’s safekeeping. There are less and less children left in the front courtyard, and Duan Ling starts to think that Lang Junxia Is probably held up by something.
“Cai family — young master Cai.”
Cai Yan comes out and nods at the other schoolchildren. Duan Ling is still looking around, so he spots Cai Yan right away. Cai Yan waves back at him. “Where’s your dad?”
“He’ll be here soon.” Duan Ling doesn’t explain to Cai Yan that the one coming to get him isn’t his dad. Cai Yan walks out of the front gate, and a young man on a great big horse lets Cai Yan sit in front of him and takes him away. Duan Ling stares at the young man on the horse with envy; the man shoots Duan Ling an indifferent glance before turning and making the horse trot away.
Half an hour later, only about a dozen of them are left in the courtyard, and the alley outside the Illustrious Hall is getting less and less crowded. When the gatekeeper finishes calling out the last name, the only ones still standing where they began are Duan Ling and the youth who banged him against the bell. Tired from standing, Duan Ling has moved to sit on the steps, and the youth has switched to his other leg as he leans on the front gates, looking outside.
The headmaster and the teachers have changed clothes, and they pass by in front of Duan Ling. They cup their hands at each other, and opening their respective umbrellas, they head home for the holidays.
The gatekeeper closes the front gates. The very last ray of sunset turns a dark purple, casting shadows of pine trees by the wall.
The gatekeeper says, “Leave your name plaques here. If anyone comes later naturally we’ll let them in to get you.”
The youth walks over first and hands in the wooden plaque hanging by his waist, but he doesn’t go, just stands there absently watching. Duan Ling notices that the name “Borjigin Batu” is carved on the plaque.
“Then what do we do?” Duan Ling asks, a bit apprehensively. He looks up trying to find the young man named Batu to find that he has already left.
The gatekeeper replies, “Go to the dining hall and get some dinner. Once you’re done, keep waiting, do whatever you’re supposed to be doing. If no one comes to get you, bring your bedding to the second floor of the library at night and sleep there.”
Duan Ling has been waiting for nearly a fortnight and all the hopes that filled his heart have fallen through. He’s never felt so dejected, yet he still believes that Lang Junxia will come. After all, Lang Junxia has never missed an appointment before, and has always been as good as his word. Maybe he’s being kept back by something, momentarily occupied and can’t get away.
Duan Ling returns to his room, tidies up his things, then he hears the bell in the front courtyard again. It tugs at his heart and he rushes over to see. From far away he catches a glimpse of Batu’s back as he leaves.
Duan Ling suddenly gets it. Batu is calling him to go have dinner.
Whatever youthful resentment between them is already long forgotten; hatred comes quickly, and is forgotten just as quickly. Duan Ling no longer feels any kind of enmity towards him. On the contrary, he feels some measure of mutual commiseration.
During these two days off, around six workers will stay behind to take care of things. The kitchen has made a giant pot of stew, and they line up to get their food, the gatekeeper included. Two oil lamps are lit in the dining hall, and only one table is set. Duan Ling walks over with his bowl of food. When Batu sees that there’s no place for him to sit, he scoots over a bit to give him room.
While Duan Ling is hesitating, Batu looks a bit annoyed but he finally opens his mouth to say, “I’m not going to hit you. Sit. You that scared of me?”
Duan Ling thinks to himself, who’s scared of you? His pride will make it kind of hard for him to simply sit down but he can’t exactly eat out of his bowl standing up and so he has no choice but to sit down next to Batu.
What if Lang Junxia really won’t come? Duan Ling’s heart is at sixes and sevens, but he turns around and consoles himself right away — Lang Junxia will definitely come. In all likelihood the Viburnum may just be keeping him late for dinner and drinks, and he can’t just leave.
Perhaps Lang Junxia is drunk, and once he sobers up he’ll come get him.
After dinner, Duan Ling returns to his room to wait for a while longer. During days off the Illustrious Hall saves on charcoal by keeping the braziers unlit, making the room as cold as an ice cellar, and Duan Ling can’t sit still, pacing back and forth. Recalling the gatekeeper telling him that they’re staying the night in the library, he thinks there must be a fire and a place where he can warm up, thereupon he rolls up his bedding, picks them up with some difficulty, and takes them all the way through the back courtyard to the library.
All the servants are already there, their bedding spread throughout the first floor. There’s a charcoal stove outside the corner of the building that never goes out, sharing a chimney with the kitchen, and the buried heated pipes provide all the dehumidifying that the book pavilion, the bamboo-scrolls room, and the room where long scrolls are kept may need to prevent moisture or the freezing temperature from breaking down old scrolls and documents, preventing solid ink from cracking.
As soon as Duan Ling comes in, a worker tells him, “Young master, you’re a scholar. Please go to the second floor.
Even though the second floor is dark and gloomy, it’s very warm. Outside the carved window panels the snow scene looks as bright as in daytime; snowflakes cast their flowing, fragmentary shadows on the near-transparent window paper, creating a soft glowing light. Great tall bookshelves tower above them row on row, and a single lantern is lit on a wide wooden table beneath their crisscrossing shadows,
All around them on the shelves are book collections, long scrolls, and wooden-strips tied together into scrolls. When the Liao emperor invaded the south during his southern expedition, he thoroughly plundered the Han capital. As he was exceedingly fond of books and documents, he shipped it all away, storing them in Shangjing, Zhongjing, and Xijing.4 There are even authentic calligraphy from great masters of the previous dynasties among these.
Before the battle of Huai River,5 all these books used to be stored in the Chen Emperor’s imperial academy library, and ordinary people would never get the chance to see them. But now they’re covered in the dust of history, quietly standing in the dim yellow light of a single lamp, their covers concealing who knows how many sages’ souls since ancient time.
In the light, Batu spreads out his bedding and puts down a pillow. Duan Ling can’t make up his mind whether he should go over there, but Batu doesn’t even bother giving him a single glance before heading to the shelves to pick out a book. It’s just like the proverb says, enemies are doomed to meet on narrow roads … Duan Ling thinks that even though he hasn’t thought of Batu as anything like an archenemy, he just feels somewhat uneasy. Batu probably feels the same — neither child thinks they need to ignore the other, it’s just that neither one of them wants to be the first to suggest they make peace.
Thus Duan Ling folds out his own bedding on the other side of the long table, with a lamp between them like the middle line that divides a chess board — a line neither will cross. He too, goes to find a book to pass the time better while he waits for Lang Junxia to come.
Duan Ling has just barely started learning to read, so reading is quite straining. He can only read books with a lot of pictures in them. Accidentally coming across a copy of “Plant Encyclopedia” filled with bizarre illustrations of myriad medicinal ingredients and insects, Duan Ling can’t help but laugh as he reads. On looking up though he realises that across the table, Batu is staring at him.
Batu seems even less in the mood to read than Duan Ling; he’s touching one book one moment and flipping another the next. There’s a pile of books before him, each one’s pages are flipped no more than a few pages before it’s discarded to one side. Batu changes the way he sits, scratches his neck, then a bit later he takes off his top and ties his outer garment around his waist to sit there bare to the waist, then it’s no time again before he finds it too cold, and he throw the blanket half over himself — looking like an unkempt hooligan.
Even Duan Ling is losing the motivation to read while watching him. He yawns, half sprawled on the table, and stares off into space. From a distant alleyway, a watchman’s clappers clap out the hour through the snow storm; it’s three hours to midnight already and Lang Junxia still isn’t here.
— Maybe he won’t come at all tonight.
Suddenly Duan Ling is overcome with a motley collection of thoughts. He thinks, and thinks some more; it’s been more than a month since Lang Junxia carried him out of the Duan family home, and Duan Ling has been thinking everyday. Over time he’s learned a great deal of things, but he still doesn’t know why Lang Junxia took him out of there.
My name is Duan Ling, my dad is Duan Sheng … Duan Ling repeats these words over and over in his head. Did Lang Junxia bring him to Shangjing because he was entrusted by “Duan Sheng” to do so? If that’s the case, why doesn’t my dad come see me? Before Lang Junxia left, he said, “I still have work to do,” well what sort of work is it? Maybe he’s not all that important in Lang Junxia’s eyes — he’s just the same as a kitten or a puppy, a matter over and done with once he’s settled. Lang Junxia would send Duan Ling’s dad a letter, and whether he lives or dies, Lang Junxia has fulfilled his duty to the utmost.
Duan Ling lies on his bedding, tossing and turning, and his mind gives him a near hopeless thought — maybe Lang Junxia is never going to come.
What reason does Lang Junxia have that he must come get Duan Ling? They’re neither family nor old friends; is he supposed to come get Duan Ling just because he promised he would?
Duan Ling reaches beneath his lapel, his fingers caressing the jade arc inside the cloth pouch, and an ineffable sorrow wells up in his heart that refuses to go, dragging him down into deeper and deeper despair. Maybe Lang Junxia has been lying to him all along; the same way that when his mother passed away the cook told him that maybe his dad would come. And so Duan Ling waited for him for a long, long time, but his dad didn’t come either.
Maybe Lang Junxia is also like that. Maybe those words were nothing more than words to cheer up a child. He probably won’t come back.
Duan Ling buries his face in the blankets as his mind spirals, trying to make himself feel better.
Batu hears the noise, and observes Duan Ling with puzzlement through the narrow gap beneath the short table. Watching how Duan Ling keeps twitching about under the covers, he nimbly flips himself onto the table and slides to the other end.
“Hey.” Batu says next to Duan Ling’s ear. “You crying? Why’re you crying?”
Duan Ling ignores him. Batu kneels on the table on one knee, gripping the edge, straining to bend down and open Duan Ling’s covers, but Duan Ling has a tight grip on them.
Batu sticks out a bare foot from atop the table and gives Duan Ling’s blanket a kick, then he rolls off the table, and rips the blanket open to reveal Duan Ling’s face. Duan Ling isn’t crying, just frowning real hard with a deep furrow between his brows.
Batu sits down cross-legged and watches Duan Ling carefully. Duan Ling stares back at Batu. The look in both their eyes seemingly contain an odd-sort of tacit understanding. Finally, Duan Ling turns away.
“Don’t cry.” Batu says, “Bear with it. Suck it up.”
Batu’s words are impatient words, but he doesn’t sound at all like he’s looking down on Duan Ling — he’s saying it like that’s also how he got over things.
He reaches out, puts a hand on Duan Ling’s head, and slowly strokes down. Then he gives Duan Ling’s arm a pat.
Suddenly, Duan Ling feels a lot better.
That day, Batu is ten, and Duan Ling is eight and a half; lamplight flickers in the library, a single flame as small as a bean that penetrates through a sky filled with snow, illuminating Duan Ling’s new memories. The snow seems to have covered his dark past, and in this very moment his troubles are vividly altered.
The distinct line of light that divides Batu and Duan Ling appears to divide them into two distinct worlds. Strangely, Duan Ling finds that his past memories have become blurry; he no longer clings to the beatings and the ridicule the Duans gave him, and the marks that hunger has carved into his bones seem to lessen.
“Your name is Duan Ling. Your dad is Duan Sheng.”
With that single stroke of Lang Junxia’s brush, the stains and spots that sullied the plain white paper of Duan Ling’s life vanished one by one, but perhaps it was instead concealed by a deeper shade of ink. What troubles him now are no longer what used to trouble him.
“He doesn’t want you anymore,” Batu says lackadaisically.
Duan Ling and Batu lean against the table shoulder to shoulder, sitting on the floor hugging their blankets, staring out blankly at the painting hanging across from the book pavilion.
“He promised me he’d come,” Duan Ling says stubbornly.
“My mom said that in the kind of world we live in, no one really belongs to you.” Batu stares at the painting, gold and green intertwining in a depiction of Cangzhou prefecture. He says unhurriedly, “Wife and children, parents and brothers, falcons flying in the sky, fine horses galloping along the ground, gifts bestowed by the Khan himself …”
“… And nothing is promised to you, either. The only thing you can be sure of is yourself.” Batu is looking down, cracking his knuckles, saying this as though he’s thoroughly unconcerned.
Duan Ling turns his head to watch Batu. There’s a natural stench of sheep on him that blends into his long-unwashed animal-skin gown. His hair is greasy too.
“Is he your dad?” Batu asks.
Duan Ling shakes his head.
Batu tries again. “A retainer?”
Duan Ling shakes his head. Batu looks perplexed. “Don’t tell me he really is the child-kept husband6 your family arranged? Where’s your dad? Your mom?”
Duan Ling is still just shaking his head; Batu stops trying to press the issue.
A long time passes.
“I don’t have a dad.” Duan Ling says to Batu, “I’m a bastard.”
The truth is, he knows that when Lang Junxia tells him your dad’s named Duan Sheng it could be nothing more than a made-up excuse. Otherwise, why has he never brought up this “Duan Sheng”?
“How about you?” Duan Ling asks.
Batu nods. “My dad abandoned me long ago. He said he’d bring me home once a month, but now it’s been more than three months since I’ve seen him.”
“They’re all just lies.” Duan Ling says to Batu, “If you don’t believe them, you won’t be fooled.”
Batu sounds disinterested. “Yeah, but I’d still believe it occasionally.”
“Are you fooled a lot too?” Duan Ling asks.
“Not really.” Batu turns over; he lies on the floor, meeting Duan Ling’s eyes. “I used to be, a lot. Not so much now. But if you knew … why’d you still believe him?”
Duan Ling stops talking. He once thought Lang Junxia would never lie to him. After all, he’s not like other people.
The night grows darker, and the only noise left in the world is that of snowflakes falling. They lie there, one on his stomach and one on his back, the blankets smelling of Batu, the body odor of young men. They don’t even know when they end up falling asleep. Duan Ling doesn’t have much hope anymore; he knows that Lang Junxia won’t come tomorrow, and he won’t come the day after tomorrow either. It’s exactly like the way adults often used his non-existent dad to lie to him when he was still with the Duans.
“Hey, bastard, your dad’s here to get you!”
They said those words countless times, and at first Duan Ling fell for it every time, but he got smarter and stopped trusting them. But the adults got smarter too, and came up with novel ways to fool him. Sometimes they’d tell him a guest had arrived and Lady Duan had called for him to see the guest, and so Duan Ling would run there filled with expectation only to dirty the sitting room with his shoes and of course he’d end up getting beaten again.
Sometimes they’d pretend to whisper at each other in front of Duan Ling, and as though accidentally divulge just the tiniest bit of information. In the end they’d laugh in satisfaction at his reaction and disperse in the hubbub — they all loved to watch him cry.
From now on, he’ll be abandoned here, but school is a much better place than the Duan home. In comparison, on this point at least, Duan Ling is quite satisfied. One must be satisfied with one’s lot; that’s something a scabby Buddhist monk told him when he came begging for alms. Even though in the end the monk also died in Shangzi …
Duan Ling’s dream wanders and digresses, filled with a serene, peaceful atmosphere. But just as he starts dreaming of that river in Shangzi, the green of it at the cusp of spring turning to summer glittering with golden sunlight, Batu shakes him awake.
“Hey,” Batu says, “someone’s here to get you.”
Drowsy-eyed, Duan Ling looks all sleepy. Another hand falls onto him but Batu vigilantly blocks it.
“Is it him?” Batu asks.
Lang Junxia says softly, “Duan Ling, I’ve come to get you.”
Duan Ling startles with a shudder and opens his eyes. He stares at Lang Junxia incredulously, then looks at Batu.
Batu holds the lamp and shines its light into Lang Junxia’s face suspiciously. Lang Junxia looks uncomfortable about the light in his face, but Batu is worried that Duan Ling can end up being kidnapped by someone who doesn’t have anything to do with him, so he keeps asking, “Is it him or not?”
Duan Ling replies, “It’s him.” And he reaches out to wrap his arms around Lang Junxia’s neck, making Lang Junxia pick him up.
“Thank you for looking after him,” Lang Junxia says to Batu.
Batu looks obviously annoyed and sets the lamp down. Duan Ling is so sleepy that he can barely open his eyes; he wants to say something to Batu, but Batu burrows his way beneath the table back to his own bedding, and with a flip of his blankets he hides his face completely behind them.
Through the snowstorm, all of Shangjing is asleep as they meet the coldest time of the year. Lang Junxia wraps Duan Ling in a blanket and spurs their horse at full speed. With the bitingly cold wind, Duan Ling wakes a little, and he notices that they’re not heading to the Viburnum so he asks, “Where’re we going?”
“New home,” Lang Junxia answers offhandedly. He seems to have a lot on his mind.
New home! Duan Ling is all at once fully awake. He thinks, no wonder Lang Junxia is late — he was actually setting up their new home.
He raises his head to look at Lang Junxia, and thinks he looks quite pale. He must be tired.
“Are you sleepy?” Duan Ling can feel Lang Junxia leaning on him, and reaching up, Duan Ling strokes his head.
“No.” Lang Junxia seems quite drowsy. After Duan Ling wakes him, he tries his hardest to stay awake.
“Have you eaten?” Duan Ling asks.
“Yeah,” Lang Junxia answers, and wraps an arm around Duan Ling. His hand is very cold, not at all like how it usually is.
“Where’s the new home?”
Lang Junxia doesn’t say anything. Beneath them, the horse makes a turn into a secluded alley through the deserted marketplace, and in the deep darkness of the night they enter a courtyard. Overjoyed, Duan Ling doesn’t even wait for Lang Junxia to get the horse settled before dashing into the house with a cheer.
The door of the new residence hasn’t been locked; the inside of the place looks dilapidated, a single courtyard surrounded by six rooms and one connecting veranda. The lantern that should be hanging outside the doors isn’t lit; it lies discarded behind the gates. Duan Ling asks, “Are we going to live here from now on?”
“Yes,” Lang Junxia answers simply. Duan Ling faces the courtyard and begins to laugh; he can hear Lang Junxia closing and barring the doors behind him.
Then immediately, there is a crash and Lang Junxia collapses, crushing a trellis that hasn’t been set up, falling into a pile of snow.
Duan Ling turns around in shock, and finds Lang Junxia sprawled on the ground, motionless.
I do not monetise my hobby translations, but if you’d like to support my work generally or support my light novel habit, you can either buy me a coffee or commission me. This is also to note that if you read this anywhere else than on tumblr, do come to my tumblr. It’s ad-free. ↩︎
Yubiguan is written with the characters “jade, jade-torus, gate”. ↩︎
He missed a line in the middle. “Like bronze like tin.” There is actually a whole poem in the Book of Songs that describes what a beautiful gentleman is supposed to be like. Link to a translation, not mine. ↩︎
Shangjing, Zhongjing, and Xijing means Greater/upper capital, central capital, and western capital respectively. (See ref page for map.) ↩︎
It’s a river on the northern border of Southern Chen on the map. (On the eastern edge.) This has nothing to do with the historic Battle of Huai River. ↩︎
Child-kept husband isn’t really a word; usually it’s child-kept wife. You can read about tongyangxi here. ↩︎
