Starry River of the Sky

  “You’re late,” Master Chao said as Rendi and Peiyi walked down the stairs. “We have a new guest.”

  “A new guest?” Peiyi said in surprise. Rendi was also surprised. The sky’s moaning had kept him awake most of the night, and he had heard no one arrive. “Did he come in the night?”

  “No,” Master Chao said. “Arrived early this morning, alone, on foot, and paid for a room for a whole month. She said she may stay longer.”

  “She?” Rendi said. The word spurted from him in surprise. It was unheard of for a woman to be staying alone at an inn, much less one who came on foot and stayed for longer than a night.

  “Yes,” Master Chao said, “and she wants her breakfast brought to her room. Make sure you ask her if she wants all her meals there.”

  “What is she doing here?” Peiyi asked. “And for so long?”

  “That’s not our business,” Master Chao said, quickly shaking his head at Peiyi. “She paid for her room and meals. That is all that concerns us.”

  Peiyi looked at Rendi, but he did not return her gaze. He hoped he looked bored and uninterested, even though inside he was as curious as she was.

  CHAPTER

  5

  “I’ll help you bring up the breakfast,” Peiyi said to Rendi. He wasn’t fooled. He knew she just wanted to peek at their new, mysterious guest. But he said nothing and handed her the covered cup of tea.

  The new female guest was standing at the window in the finest room of the inn, the same window Rendi had flung dust out of. Her back was toward them, and she stood against the yellow sunlight. The darkness of her silhouette reminded Rendi of the moonless sky that cried at him at night.

  “Your breakfast,” Rendi said, “Madame…”

  “Madame Chang,” the woman said. Her serene voice seemed out of place in the hot room, already baking in the summer sun. “Tell me,” Madame Chang said without turning, “what did you name the stone field where the mountain was?”

  “The Stone Pancake,” Peiyi said, pleased that this new guest already knew the story. “It was my ancestor who moved the mountain!”

  “Really?” Madame Chang said, and she turned and looked at them. Rendi and Peiyi gaped.

  Madame Chang did not look like any woman Rendi had ever seen before. She was not like the painted ladies of the court, who giggled and swayed like flowers as the wind blew. Nor did she resemble a broad-shouldered peasant woman, thick and browned by the sun. Her features were fine and smooth, as if she had been carved from ivory, and the light in her dark eyes made them shine like stars. She stood with the elegance of a willow tree, and even though she wore the cotton robes of a commoner, both Rendi and Peiyi felt as if they should kowtow before her.

  Peiyi’s eyes were as large as lychees, and it took a moment before Rendi realized that they were both staring.

  “Master Chao would like to know if you want all your meals brought to you in your room,” Rendi said.

  “It’s cooler in the dining room,” Peiyi said, and then with an attempt at a grown-up air, “but it’s hot everywhere, these days.”

  “Yes, it is,” Madame Chang agreed with a smile. “But at least it’s not as hot as when there were six suns in the sky.”

  “Six suns?” Peiyi asked.

  “You don’t know the story?” Madame Chang asked, looking from Peiyi to Rendi. Both shook their heads.

  THE STORY OF THE SIX SUNS

  Long ago, so long that only the sky, mountains, and water can truly remember, six suns appeared in the sky. These six suns caused great suffering and devastation to the earth. Rain boiled away before ever touching the ground. The trees and plants withered, leaving behind only the scorched earth, burned and brown. All the villagers were forced to live like worms, crowding into an ancient dark hole in one of the hills. As they began to starve, they also began to despair.

  But then a rumor began to murmur at night, perhaps sent by the Spirit of the Mountain above. “The one marked with power can save you,” it whispered. “The one who bears the mark of power can save you.”

  The people looked at one another in confusion until a man stepped forward. His name was WangYi, and he was the strongest, bravest, and quickest of all men. He had already done many great deeds. They said he had tamed the flooding water serpent with just the fierceness of his eyes, and he had killed the single-toothed earth giant with his mighty strength. But more than that, WangYi had an unusual scar on his forehead. It looked like the character wang, a symbol of power.

  “It must be WangYi whom the Spirit of the Mountain meant,” the people said. “The scar is the mark of power!”

  But when WangYi stepped on the scorched earth and gazed at the six suns, he knew his strength and fierceness would not help. He had to stand in the shade of the mountain, for the ground lit by the suns burned his feet. Everything on earth was suffering—even the giant tree next to the mountain seemed to be withering. WangYi realized that he could not fight the suns. His only hope was to shoot them down from the sky.

  So he shot his arrows at the suns, pulling his mighty crescent bow so that it made the shape of a full moon. But no matter how powerfully he pulled, the arrows could not reach. Over and over he shot, until the shade of the mountain disappeared as the suns moved overhead. Finally, with only six arrows left in his case, WangYi was forced to dip his feet in water to cool them. He looked down in defeat.

  It was then that he saw his reflection in the pool. The great lake had shrunk because of the heat, but the shade of the mountain had saved it from completely vanishing. There was still enough water for him to see the six suns reflected in it.

  “I will shoot them here!” WangYi said. And with his back to the mountain, he quickly placed an arrow in his bow and shot at the reflection of one of the suns. As the arrow flew into the water, a sun sank from the sky. WangYi fitted another arrow and shot again. Another sun fell.

  Immediately, the people felt a change in the temperature. They crawled out from the hole to watch WangYi shoot the third sun and then the fourth. But as everyone cheered, WangYi’s wife thought quickly.

  “If he shoots all the suns,” she realized, “we will be forever in darkness.”

  So, knowing better than to disturb her husband’s concentration, she crept behind WangYi as he prepared his arrow for the fifth sun. With all eyes on WangYi, only the mountain saw her as she silently took the sixth and last arrow from his case and swiftly hid it in her sleeve. As a result, after shooting the fifth sun, WangYi found his case empty and laid down his bow.

  This is why there is now one sun.

  “Well, that one sun is hot enough,” Rendi said. The guest room had grown even hotter during the story, and a drop of sweat rolled down his forehead like a falling grain of rice.

  “That is true,” Madame Chang said, and she looked out the window at the dry, yellowing earth below. Then she looked again at Peiyi and Rendi. “Please tell Master Chao I will take the rest of my meals downstairs with the other guests. I think I would enjoy the company.”

  Rendi didn’t think Madame Chang would much enjoy the company of old, slow-witted Mr. Shan, the inn’s one regular mealtime guest, but he refrained from saying so. Instead, both he and Peiyi bowed respectfully and left the room.

  CHAPTER

  6

  “You couldn’t teach a pig how to snore!” Widow Yan snapped.

  “I wouldn’t have to,” Master Chao roared. “I would just let it follow your example!”

  In the garden, Rendi sighed. He was unsure which was worse, the sky’s wailing at night or the screeching of Master Chao and Widow Yan during the day, for Master Chao and Widow Yan were fighting yet again. He did not know what caused the first argument between the two neighbors or when it had been, but every day was full of their quarrels.

  Rendi returned to his weeding, though truly it was the snails he was tending. The inn’s garden was not really a garden. It was a snail haven. As soon as a green shoot sprang from the dirt, snails covered it like a warty plague. Any surviving
leaves were also ravaged, and the partially eaten greenery looked like delicate paper cuttings decorating the dark wall.

  The only garden that was worse was the one on the other side of that wall. Snails also reveled in Widow Yan’s garden. Their shells adorned her plants like brown berries. The only things more plentiful than Master Chao’s and Widow Yan’s snails were their insults to each other.

  A door slammed, and Rendi saw MeiLan, Widow Yan’s daughter, come out of the house next door, drooping like a magpie with a broken wing. That meant Peiyi was sure to come out and try to sneak a visit. Rendi knew Peiyi had formed a secret friendship with the older girl, admiring her like the mother and sisters she didn’t have. MeiLan was pretty and gentle, with long hair tied up smoothly in a woven clasp and skin like a fresh peach. To little Peiyi, who went about constantly with bruised knees and tangled hair, MeiLan seemed a fine lady.

  And sure enough, there was Peiyi now, taking advantage of her father’s distraction, stealing out of the inn and over the low wall. Perfect, Rendi thought wickedly as the girls greeted each other. He began gathering snails and arranging them on the wall. When he was done, Peiyi would be so annoyed.

  “Have you heard from Jiming?” MeiLan asked Peiyi.

  “No,” Peiyi said, her voice suddenly full of sorrow.

  “Maybe he is too busy,” MeiLan said with a sad sort of laugh. “Maybe he is in the city having a grand time, with a fine job and a wife.”

  “A wife?” Peiyi exclaimed. “No! Jiming couldn’t get married that fast.”

  “One never knows,” MeiLan said with a shrug.

  “He wouldn’t!” Peiyi almost shouted, and then she said in a soft voice that made Rendi’s ears prickle, and he almost stopped organizing the snails, “He wouldn’t have forgotten about you.”

  The older girl said nothing and looked off into the distance, as if searching for the end of the scorched, stone plain that stretched before them. Rendi continued to place the snails on the wall. So far, the snails just spelled out PEIYI.

  “MeiLan,” Peiyi said, “could you show me your wedding jewelry again?”

  Peiyi’s eager eyes made MeiLan smile. Like a flitting bird, she went into the house, returning with a dark red wooden box with vases of peonies painted on one side.

  Sitting down, MeiLan carefully placed the box on her lap and, with an air of grand formality, threw back the lid. Peiyi squealed in excitement and pleasure. Rendi was pleased too, for now the snails were saying PEIYI IS A.

  “This will be for my hair,” MeiLan said, fastening a gilded metal comb ornamented with flowers made of pearls and jewels into Peiyi’s hair. The ornaments sparkled with a hundred rainbows in the brilliant sun. MeiLan dangled glittering gold pieces. “These will be my earrings.”

  “Can I see that again too?” Peiyi said, pointing to an embroidered silk purse.

  “Ah, my treasure of treasures,” MeiLan said, taking it out carefully with grand reverence. “I will not get married without it.”

  It was a jade bracelet. As Rendi proudly finished arranging the snails, which now said PEIYI IS A MELONHEAD in bold characters on the wall, he looked up and saw MeiLan holding a simple, smooth circle of green without carvings or extra adornments. The vivid emerald-green color shone through to the edges of the bracelet and had a beauty and elegance that even the harsh sun could not cheapen. Rendi admired it more than MeiLan’s ornate haircomb.

  “Now, tell me the story too!” Peiyi begged.

  What story? Rendi thought. How could there be a story about a bracelet?

  “It is not much of a story,” MeiLan said. “I don’t know why you like to hear it so often.”

  “I just do,” Peiyi said. “Please!”

  MeiLan laughed, and Rendi, in spite of himself, listened.

  THE STORY OF THE JADE BRACELET

  When I was about your age, my father became very ill. He knew he was dying, and one day he called me over to his bed and gave me this jade bracelet. It had been his mother’s and his grandmother’s before that, and he had been keeping it for me. But now it was mine. “It’s part of your wedding dowry,” he said to me. “For when you get married someday. It’s very, very valuable, so make sure you take good care of it.”

  Soon afterward, he died, and I began to wear the bracelet all the time. It was too big for me, and it was much too fine to wear every day, but I couldn’t help it. It reminded me of my father, and seeing the glossy green circle on my arm made me feel like he was still with me. But my mother would yell at me. “You’re going to lose it,” she said. “Put it away someplace safe.”

  I didn’t listen to her. Instead, I wore it all day and even to sleep, hiding it under my sleeve so she wouldn’t see. But she was right. Because, one day, I did lose it.

  I wasn’t sure when or how, but when I realized it was gone, I felt as if my father had died again. I didn’t say a word to my mother, who would have been horrified as well as angry, but just waited until nightfall to sneak out of the house to look for it.

  Had I lost it when I was feeding the chickens? Or working in the garden? Or, horror of horrors, when I was getting water from the well? In the moonlight, I searched on my hands and knees throughout the yard, tears streaming down my cheeks. As the moon began to swim in the sky, I started to despair, and I could not help my sniffling.

  “What’s wrong with you?” a voice said.

  It was the Chao boy—your brother, Jiming. He was sitting on the garden wall in the silver light of the moon and looking at me as if I were a curious animal. I knew I wasn’t supposed to talk to him, because he was a Chao, but I didn’t care. My misery overwhelmed my pride and anger. “I lost my bracelet,” I almost wailed.

  “Well, can you stop crying about it?” he said, and motioned to the inn where a loud howling echoed. “My baby sister has been crying and crying for hours, and I came out here to get away from it.”

  “I’ll stop crying when I find my bracelet!” I said to him.

  “Fine,” he said, and he jumped from the wall. He got down next to me and started to help me look. “If it’s the only way to get some peace here.”

  So we crawled in the grass, like two crickets in the night. Neither of us said much, but even as we searched in silence, I was grateful he was there. I had always been told that the Chao boy and his family were awful, but right then, with the round moon glowing above, he didn’t seem so bad.

  And when Jiming found the bracelet next to the sleeping rooster, I knew he was not bad at all. “Is this it?” he asked, holding the bracelet in the air so that it mirrored the circle of the moon. I was so happy! I jumped up and hugged him, and then I laughed because he looked so surprised. As soon as the bracelet was in my hands, I ran inside to put it someplace safe—without even saying goodbye. But as I left, we both knew we were friends.

  “I was a baby then,” Peiyi said proudly. “My crying helped you and Jiming become friends.”

  “Yes,” MeiLan said, “and we’ve been friends all these years, though we had to keep it secret from our parents.”

  “They probably wouldn’t like us being friends either,” Peiyi said.

  “No,” MeiLan said absently. She held the bracelet before her as if she could see her future through its hole. Softly, to herself, she repeated, “I will not get married without it.”

  “Peiyi!” Master Chao called from the inn. The fight with Widow Yan must have ended, for now the shouts were for Peiyi. “Where are you?”

  Both girls looked up, alarmed. With haste, Peiyi removed the comb, and MeiLan put the bracelet back into its pouch and in her box. Then, scampering like a rabbit, Peiyi crossed over to the inn’s yard, running past Rendi and the wall without a second glance.

  Rendi stared. The wall was blank; his carefully arranged message of PEIYI IS A MELONHEAD was gone. For, without his noticing, the snails had slowly crawled back to the shelter of the shaded garden, leaving only a trail of ooze behind them.

  CHAPTER

  7

  The sun was finally beg
inning to dip in the sky, and Widow Yan was frying her famous fermented tofu. It was strange how something that smelled so foul could taste so delicious. The joke about fermented tofu was that the more disgusting it smelled, the more delicious it was. Widow Yan’s tofu seemed to be proof of this, as an odor reminiscent of rotting garbage mixed with an unemptied chamber pot reeked from it. Rendi could not think of anything that smelled more unpleasant, but he had often seen MeiLan sneak some of the tofu over the wall to Peiyi, who ate it with rapture.

  Rendi brought the teacups to the table, setting them down one by one with a solid thud. With each thump, Master Chao groaned.

  “Oh, my head!” Master Chao said, placing the palm of his hand to his forehead. “Please give me some quiet and some peace!”

  Rendi grimaced. He needed peace more than Master Chao. Every day, he had to listen to the innkeeper’s petty bickering, and at night the sky’s crying tormented him. Rendi was starting to believe the sounds were all in his head. Was he going crazy? He tried not to think about it.

  “I suppose one person’s noise is another’s friendly sound,” Madame Chang said, turning to Mr. Shan at the table. “Much like the story of the rooster’s cries to the sun, is it not?”

  Mr. Shan started, jerked out of his thoughts for a moment. Rendi frowned and rolled his eyes. That afternoon, Rendi had watched when Madame Chang first saw old Mr. Shan, with his long white beard, hobbling on his cane through the door. She had gone straight to him, smiling, and took his hand into hers.

  In return, Mr. Shan had stared at her vaguely as if seeing her in a fog. Then he shook his head, sat down at his table, where his food was waiting, and immediately began chewing with an absentminded air. Rendi was surprised how graciously Madame Chang treated such a snub. Her smile waned, but instead of being insulted, her eyes softened, and she sat down next to him, pouring his tea. She had been kind and gentle to Mr. Shan, insisting on sitting with him at lunch, and now dinner, as if he were a beloved grandfather. Rendi couldn’t understand it.