Chapter 1: Rain Rings the Bell (Part 1)
Wind and rain darkened the sky, mist dampening the lanterns.
A young man knelt, his robes trailing on the ground. As raindrops splattered against the threshold, a long whip lashed across his back. A bloodstain blossomed on his clothing. The tendons in his neck strained, but he endured the pain in silence.
“How could I have raised such a wretch! Ni Qinglan, tell me, have you forgotten all of our ancestral precepts?!” Another lash of the whip followed.
“Forgotten? Not entirely.”
The young man’s words clashed with his otherwise formal and serious tone.
Ni Zhun, consumed by rage, turned even paler upon hearing this. “What did you say! Do you know what they are saying about you outside? That you have an illicit relationship with that He Liu Shi, that you are secretly exchanging affections! You have utterly disgraced our Ni family!”
“He Liu Shi is over thirty, and our Lan’er is only sixteen. Surely, my lord, you don’t believe those rumors and gossips? He Liu Shi’s health has been poor since giving birth, suffering from constant lochia. Her husband’s family refused to seek medical treatment for her, so she had no other choice but to…”
“You taught him well!”
Cen Shi entered, her skirt barely brushing the threshold. Before she could finish her sentence, Ni Zhun turned and glared at her. “He, a proper young man, dabbles in gynecology, and now he dares, in my absence, to privately treat He Liu Shi! He completely disregards the propriety between men and women! Now the He family is about to sue him, claiming he had an affair with He Liu Shi!”
Ni Zhun’s furious roar almost drowned out the rumble of thunder. The young girl, kept outside the door by a servant, saw Cen Shi’s apricot-yellow skirt flutter slightly as she calmly replied, “Haven’t you already taken care of the matter with the county magistrate?”
“Zi Shu!”
Ni Zhun seemed to have reached his limit, unable to bear the identical composure of the mother and son. “Do you even realize that by treating He Liu Shi, his reputation is ruined!”
“Is it a doctor’s duty to stand idly by and watch someone die?”
As Ni Zhun’s voice fell, the young man behind him spoke again. Ni Zhun turned and lashed him several times with the whip. The sound grated against the young girl’s eardrums, yet she didn’t hear a single sound from Ni Qinglan.
Cen Shi noticed her and glanced at the servant girl by the door. The servant immediately stepped out, picked up the child, and before she could open her umbrella and step into the courtyard, the sound of hurried footsteps splashing through the rain grew closer. The servant looked up and saw it was the old steward. He shielded his head with one hand and rushed over, shouting before he even reached the steps, “My Lord! Something’s happened!”
Ni Zhun, still in a fit of rage, turned and barked, “There’s no order left in this household!”
“My Lord…”
The old steward flinched, lowering his hand as raindrops pelted his face. “The young servant sent to buy incense and candles said that He Liu Shi, unable to bear the abuse from her husband’s family, has drowned herself in the river!”
At these words, Ni Zhun’s hand trembled, and the whip fell to the ground.
The night rain intensified. Cicadas, unable to withstand the downpour, fell from the trees, silent in the shadows.
The young girl watched as the blood-soaked young man in the ancestral hall turned around, beads of sweat glistening on his temples and nose. The flickering candlelight illuminated his stunned expression.
After a long silence, Ni Zhun looked again at Ni Qinglan kneeling on the floor. The anger had drained from his face, replaced by a helpless cynicism. “Boy, take a good look. You thought you were defying medical convention to save her, but you ended up harming her.”
Ni Zhun was too drained to even strike him again.
The night rain continued relentlessly. Ni Qinglan knelt in the ancestral hall for half the night, his knees numb. Suddenly, he heard a creak. He snapped back to attention and turned his head. Catching an unexpected glimpse, the usually serious young man couldn’t help but twitch the corners of his lips.
The little girl didn’t have the strength to fully push open the heavy wooden door, so she squeezed sideways through the narrow gap.
She had come in the middle of the night, her outer robe improperly tied. Ni Qinglan raised a hand towards her. “A-Xi, come here.”
Ni Su immediately and obediently ran to him, whispering, “Brother.”
Ni Qinglan absently hummed in response, retying her sash as he spoke. “Why aren’t you sleeping? What are you doing here? Didn’t you say you were afraid of the ancestral hall because it’s full of ghosts?”
“That’s why I came to accompany you, Brother.”
Ni Su pulled a cushion over and squeezed in beside him, not daring to look at the rows of dark, lacquered ancestral tablets behind the altar.
“Brother, does it hurt?”
She looked at the bloody welts on Ni Qinglan’s back.
“If it didn’t hurt, I’d be a ghost.” Ni Qinglan, wise beyond his years, pulled out a piece of oiled paper containing malt candy and offered it to her. “Take this and go back.”
Ni Su took the candy, broke it in half, and held a piece to his lips. Then she placed the small pillow she had brought under his knees.
“You always hate hard pillows, and this is the only one you like. Why are you willing to give it to me?” Ni Qinglan’s heart warmed. He reached out and stroked her head.
“If Brother is in trouble, I’m naturally willing to.”
Ni Su looked up at him. “Mama Qian said that if Brother admits his mistake, he won’t be beaten.”
Mama Qian was Ni Su’s nursemaid.
“Does A-Xi also think I was wrong to save her that day?” Ni Qinglan ate the half piece of malt candy. His throat, parched from hours without water, felt scratchy.
The day Ni Qinglan went out of the city to provide free medical care to the villagers, He Liu Shi, staggering, had stopped his carriage on the mountain path. The woman cried and writhed in pain, pleading, “Doctor, save me.”
Every step she took left a trail of blood. Ni Su, inside the carriage, saw the winding bloodstains behind her and lost her appetite for the pastries she was eating.
“She was in so much pain, but after Brother examined her and gave her the bitter medicine, she wasn’t in pain anymore.”
Ni Su remembered the woman holding the bitter medicine with joy, as if it were honeyed water.
“But A-Xi,”
Raindrops pattered against the window, and Ni Qinglan’s voice grew more uncertain. “Did you hear? She drowned herself.”
Still just a sixteen-year-old boy, Ni Qinglan couldn’t find a way to reconcile with such an event.
“She wasn’t in pain anymore, why did she die?”
Ni Su, only eight or nine years old, couldn’t fully grasp the meaning of “death,” but she knew that when people died, they became the dark, thin tablets behind the ancestral altar, bearing only names, no faces or voices.
“Because I, a man, treated He Liu Shi for a woman’s private ailment.”
“But why can’t men treat women?” Ni Su cupped her face in her hands, asking innocently.
It wasn’t that they couldn’t treat women, but they couldn’t treat private ailments.
However, Ni Qinglan didn’t have the heart to explain this to his little sister. He lowered his eyes, the swaying shadows of the trees in the courtyard falling through the window screen onto the floor tiles in front of him. “Who knows why.”
The rain continued to fall, relentless and pouring.
Ni Su looked at her brother’s profile and suddenly stood up.
Ni Qinglan looked up, meeting his little sister’s clear, innocent eyes. She was so small, the lamplight falling on her shoulders. She spoke in a crisp voice, “Brother, I’m a girl. If I learn our family’s skills like you, will I be able to keep them from hurting and dying?”
Them.
Ni Qinglan was taken aback.
In the rain-swept ancestral hall, the young man studied his little sister’s tender and innocent face. He smiled faintly and ruffled her hair. “If A-Xi has such aspirations, they will surely not hurt, and they will surely not die.”
The rain gradually subsided. A raindrop struck the window with a sharp sound. Ni Su, her temples damp with sweat, opened her eyes and woke up.
“Miss, did the noise wake you?” Xing Zhu, the maid who had just latched the vermillion window, turned around and spoke softly. “It’s snowing outside. I was afraid the cold air would get into the room and you’d catch a chill.”
Although it was early spring, shortly after the New Year, the weather hadn’t yet warmed.
Seeing Ni Su nestled silently in the covers, Xing Zhu came to the bedside with concern. “Miss, what’s wrong?”
“I dreamt of Brother.”
Ni Su seemed to have just woken up. She rubbed her eyes and sat up.
Xing Zhu hurriedly fetched clothes from the wooden rack and helped Ni Su dress. “The winter examinations have been over for two months. With our Young Master’s abilities, he must have passed. Perhaps the news will arrive soon!”
The journey from the capital to Que County took more than two months, so news traveled slowly. Ni Qinglan had been away from Que County for half a year, and only a couple of letters had arrived home.
Dressed and washed, Ni Su left her room. The old steward, hunched over, came from the moon gate entwined with green vines, too preoccupied to wipe his sweat. “Miss, Second Master and his family are here. Madam told you to stay in your room.”
He waved to the servant boy below to hand the food box to Xing Zhu, then added, “Madam won’t be having breakfast with you this morning either.”
“What is Second Master doing here at this hour?” Xing Zhu frowned and muttered.
The old steward only listened to Madam. Seeing his silence, Ni Su knew her second uncle’s visit boded ill; otherwise, her mother wouldn’t have asked her to stay in her room.
Green bamboo stood solitary by the courtyard wall. Spring snow, fine as dust, drifted through the hall. Cen Shi sat calmly in the main hall. Mama Qian, the servant woman beside her, offered a bowl of tea at the opportune moment. Cen Shi accepted it but didn’t drink, letting the warmth of the bowl seep into her palms. Her voice was cold and indifferent. “So early in the morning, and on such a cold day, Second Brother brings his entire family to my widow’s quarters. Are you taking pity on my loneliness and bringing some liveliness?”
“Sister-in-law, things were busy during the New Year, and our families didn’t get together. We came today to celebrate the New Year together, what do you think?” Ni Zong, the second master of the Ni family, shifted his gaze without speaking. Liu Shi, his wife, who sat beside him holding a teacup, always had a smile on her face. Unable to bear the coldness in the room, she hurriedly spoke in a conciliatory tone. However, as she turned, she saw Ni Zong glaring at her.
Liu Shi faltered and lowered her head in silence.
Cen Shi watched coldly and slowly said, “I always eat lightly here, and I haven’t prepared anything special. I don’t know if you and your family will find it palatable.”
Liu Shi looked at Ni Zong, trying to decide whether she should reply, but then she saw Ni Zong stand up and put down his teacup. “Sister-in-law, why don’t I see my little niece?”
“The young miss developed a fever before dawn. She took medicine and is still asleep,” Mama Qian said.
“A fever?”
Ni Zong stroked his beard. “What a coincidence. As soon as we arrive, she falls ill.”
“What are you implying, Second Master?” Mama Qian took Cen Shi’s lukewarm tea. “If the young miss weren’t ill, she would certainly come out to greet the guests.”
The words “greet the guests” were intended to remind Ni Zong that the second and main branches of the family had already separated.
Ni Zong snorted coldly, glancing at her before addressing Cen Shi. “Sister-in-law, I must say, you are too kind and lenient. Not only are your old servants unruly, but even my niece is becoming increasingly improper.”
“Do you know what Ni Su has been doing outside?” Ni Zong paced back and forth. “She associates with those low-class midwives! What kind of family are we, and what is her status? Such a lack of self-respect! Sister-in-law, tell me, if word of this spreads, what will outsiders think of our Ni family?”
“Second Master, you must have proof before you speak. You can’t just slander our young miss without any basis,” Mama Qian said, as Cen Shi remained silent.
“Who’s slandering her? Sister-in-law, you can call her out and ask her yourself. Did she go to Zao Hua Village yesterday? Did she help a peasant woman give birth at a farmer’s house, together with that midwife?” Ni Zong ignored the old servant and stared at Cen Shi. “Sister-in-law, I have to say, a concubine-born daughter like her isn’t worth your protection. You only took her under your wing after her mother died. Do you really treat her as your own flesh and blood?”
