Hundred Lives Book, Stone Bridge Village.
Early in the morning, Xiaoqing had just opened the door when a cold wind swept past.
The girl's fair, tender neck shrank back into her collar, and she instinctively hugged her clothes tighter around herself.
It was only the beginning of the eleventh month, and the morning wind already had a bite to it.
Compared with most years, this winter seemed to have come on faster and harder.
Xiaoqing turned and looked at her sister, lying in bed.
Her sister was still curled up under the quilt, asleep.
"Sister... time to get up, sister..."
Xiaoqing went to the bedside and gently shook her sister's shoulder.
"Mmm..." Bai Ruxue answered drowsily, without opening her eyes at all; she only buried her head deeper into the quilt.
"Sister, aren't you going to the market? If we don't go soon, there'll be no vegetables left."
Xiaoqing was rather puzzled, in fact.
For some reason, her sister seemed even more given to sleep this winter.
True, hibernation was in a snake's nature.
But her sister's cultivation was already very high. By rights, she should not be getting drowsy this early...
Even she herself was not sleepy yet.
"Sister, are you all right?" Xiaoqing asked worriedly. "Has something gone wrong with your cultivation again?"
"I'm fine, Xiaoqing. Your sister's just a little sleepy... I'm getting up now..."
By sheer force of will, Bai Ruxue sat up in bed. A strand of hair slid across her cheek and curled against the high rise and fall of her chest.
She was sitting up, but she swayed where she sat, eyes not open at all, as though she might flop back down the next moment.
Xiaoqing whipped the quilt off her.
Cold air rushed in under the covers, and Bai Ruxue's delicate body gave a shudder.
This time the woman was truly awake.
As usual, the two sisters went to the market in Huang Village for vegetables, then came home to sweep the yard, hang the washing out to dry, and prepare the ingredients and light the fire for cooking.
If there was nothing pressing, Bai Ruxue would also pour tea for Xiao Mo and knead his shoulders.
She had always done such things, of course.
But Xiaoqing had noticed that ever since Brother Xiao came back that time, the bond between her sister and Brother Xiao seemed to have grown closer. The look in her sister's eyes when she watched him had turned gentler—gentler in a way that was hard to put into words.
Before anyone noticed, the twelfth month had arrived.
As the weather grew colder, Bai Ruxue grew sleepier and sleepier.
The truth was, Bai Ruxue had no idea what was the matter with her. She simply felt terribly drowsy, and in the previous two years it had never been like this.
With the New Year approaching, every household grew busy.
Xiao Mo's household most of all.
In past years it was the village chief who wrote the Spring Festival couplets for everyone. But this year Stone Bridge Village had produced a xieyuan, and everyone hoped Xiao Mo would write theirs, so that their homes might catch a little of his literary air.
Naturally, Xiao Mo did not refuse.
I grew up eating food from every household in this village. What's a few couplets, compared to that?
The villagers did not take them for free, though—they all brought Xiao Mo chickens, ducks, fish, meat and the like. He declined several times, but there was simply no arguing with the aunties and grannies of the village...
"Ruxue, are you all right?"
One day, as Xiao Mo was writing couplets in the courtyard, he saw Bai Ruxue nodding off over the clothes she was mending, her head bobbing like a chicken pecking at rice.
Those lovely peach-blossom eyes of hers looked ready to shut.
"Huh?"
At the sound of Xiao Mo's voice, Bai Ruxue gave a violent start and snapped wide awake.
"N-nothing... nothing's wrong..." Bai Ruxue shook her head. "Ah! Your blue robe! How did I stitch it like this..."
Xiao Mo smiled. "It doesn't matter if the stitching's off. You look half asleep—just don't prick your hand. Go take a nap, Ruxue."
"No, no." Bai Ruxue shook her head. "The New Year is in eight days, and I still have so much to do. I'm not sleepy."
With that, she glanced at the sky. "How is it almost noon already..."
Bai Ruxue hurriedly set the robe down on the table and ran into the kitchen. "Xiao Mo, I'll go cook first—I'll finish mending your clothes this afternoon."
Watching the woman's back, Xiao Mo felt a stir of doubt.
He knew snakes needed to hibernate, but Xiaoqing was in fine spirits—she had even gone off with Aunt Wang to collect eggs that morning.
So why was Ruxue, whose cultivation was higher, the one in poor shape?
In the kitchen, Bai Ruxue splashed handful after handful of water on her little face.
Droplets slid slowly down her smooth cheeks.
Looking at her reflection in the water vat, she knit her slender brows. "What on earth is wrong with me these days?"
Last year she had not grown drowsy and gone into hibernation until mid-January, and she had woken after sleeping for half a month.
Yet now it was only the twelfth month...
"No. I can't fall asleep..."
Bai Ruxue smacked her own little cheeks hard.
She had a feeling that this hibernation would be different from all the ones before.
She could not have said how it would be different, but her heart was filled with unease.
"Just get through this winter! Once spring comes, I won't want to sleep anymore!"
Bai Ruxue clenched her little fists and cheered herself on.
"Next spring, when Xiao Mo comes back from the metropolitan examination, he'll marry me..."
Over the days that followed, whenever drowsiness came over Bai Ruxue, she would bite down hard on a red chili.
She really did not like spicy food, but one bite and she was instantly wide awake.
The twenty-sixth of the twelfth month: only three days left until the New Year.
A letter arrived from the capital.
And it was Magistrate Sun himself who came to Stone Bridge Village to hand it over.
The sender was a Hanlin of the present court—the revered elder scholar Zhang Qianzhi, Mr. Zhang.
After reading Mr. Zhang's letter, something like helplessness crossed Xiao Mo's face.
"Xiao Mo, did Mr. Zhang have something to say?" Seeing his rather complicated expression, Magistrate Sun asked.
Xiao Mo put the letter away. "Mr. Zhang hopes I'll set out for the capital right after the New Year. He wants to see me before the middle of the second month."
"That's good news!" Magistrate Sun said cheerfully. "I hear Mr. Zhang is to take up the post of prefect of Beihai Province after the New Year—the middle of the second month, I'd guess. If he wants to see you before he leaves for his post, you can see how highly he regards you. So why do you look so torn, Xiao Mo?"
Xiao Mo smiled. "I'd like to spend a little more time with my family."
"Ah... Xiao Mo, valuing your bonds is a fine thing, but an invitation from Mr. Zhang is what every scholar in Great Qi dreams of. You're still young—you'll have plenty of years to spend with your family."
"Besides, the metropolitan examination is at the start of the third month. You'd only be leaving half a month early. It's no great matter—don't go being foolish about this..."
Xiao Mo bowed with his hands clasped before him. "This student understands."
"Mm. As long as you do."
Magistrate Sun patted Xiao Mo on the shoulder.
"I've heard from your village chief that you mean to marry the Bai girl once you're back from the examination."
"The day you pass with honors, you'll ride a red horse with a red flower pinned to your breast, with a grand, lavish bridal procession and lanterns hung the length and breadth of the city.
The two of you—talent and beauty—will be a fine tale told all through Jiangnan Province!"