Chapter 327: The Return-to-Place Seal

The woman stood beneath the lamp, but did not walk toward them.

She wore a faded gray cotton-padded jacket. Her hair was pinned up behind her head with a wooden hairpin, and she carried a bamboo basket in one hand. When the wind blew, a corner of the blue cloth covering the basket lifted, revealing several withered sprigs of angelica root.

White Reed stopped.

The memories she had just recovered were incomplete. She remembered only firelight, red cord, and the words, “Take your younger brother and go.” But as soon as the face beneath the lamp appeared, a voice sounded softly in the depths of her memory:

“Seven-niang, the medicine is ready.”

The woman’s lips moved in time with that voice.

“Come back.”

White Reed’s shoulders trembled.

But Lu Yuan looked toward the snow first.

There was a woman’s shadow beneath the lamp.

It stretched a long way, all the way to the stele at the town entrance. But there were no footprints beneath her feet, and the surrounding snow had not been trampled.

“Don’t go over there,” Lu Yuan said.

White Reed did not move.

“I know.”

The woman lifted her bamboo basket and turned to walk into town.

“It’s cold. Let’s go home first.”

With each step she took, another lamp lit up ahead. The people beneath the lamps also raised their heads one after another: an old man leaning on a cane, a woman holding a child, a young man carrying a book chest. Their faces were indistinct, but each wore a wooden tablet on their chest.

Every tablet bore just one character:

“Gu.”

Xu Erxiao tightened his grip on the iron shovel.

“Does everyone in this town have the surname Gu?”

“At least the area near the old ancestral shrine was a Gu family settlement,” Wang Cheng’an said. “But there’s no way everyone would have only a surname left.”

Lin Zhaoxuan raised a hand and flicked out a line of ink.

The ink line swept past the nearest lamp, and the old man in its light suddenly turned around. His blurred face had no features, only a line of tiny characters written vertically:

“Collateral branch of the Gu family, name lost.”

The ink line circled the lamp post once, revealing an old inscription at its base.

“North Street, White River Town. Herb Shop lamp.”

Song Qinghe raised her lamp to illuminate it.

When the green flame touched the white lamp, the old man’s outline beneath it immediately faded. The remnant shadow of a Herb Shop sign emerged behind him, with the words “Lan’s Shop” faintly visible.

“It isn’t a person,” Song Qinghe said. “It’s a name-shadow left behind by an old shop.”

Zhou Heng looked into town.

“What about that woman?”

“Not necessarily.”

Lu Yuan took out the letter Gu Lanzhi had left behind.

The wax seal had already split along a crack, but Gu Changgeng had warned him not to open it beside the bridge. They had crossed the bridge now, but still had not truly entered White River Town.

He did not open the letter in a hurry. First, he went to the broken stele.

Only the character “White” remained in the place name on the stele. The other two characters had been deeply chiseled away. Black ash had gathered in the chisel marks, as if someone had repeatedly burned the place.

Wang Cheng’an took out a thin sheet of paper, laid it over the stele, and gently made a rubbing.

The first words to emerge on the paper were not “White River Town,” but another line of old characters, buried beneath the later place name:

“Orchid Branch Ward.”

White Reed repeated softly, “Orchid Branch Ward.”

The woman beneath the lamp stopped.

With her back to everyone, she held the bamboo basket in her hands, which swayed slightly.

“Was this place originally named after her?” Xu Erxiao asked.

“It could also just be someone with the same name,” Wang Cheng’an said. “Let’s not decide yet.”

More words emerged on the rubbing.

“Orchid Branch Ward, formerly a place for taking in orphaned children without household registration.” “Managed by the Gu family.” “Later incorporated into North Street, White River Town.” “Old registers moved to the Gu family ancestral shrine.”

Beside the final line was a six-petaled plum-blossom seal.

The seal was incomplete.

The petal representing “kin” had been dug out.

White Reed looked at the angelica root in the woman’s hand.

“Orchid Branch wasn’t the name she was given at birth.”

“Do you remember something?” Lu Yuan asked.

“She worked at the Herb Shop.”

White Reed pressed a hand to her temple.

“Someone called her Fourth Lady Gu. Later, she adopted many children without household registration, and people in town started calling her Orchid Branch.”

“Orchid Branch was the name of a medicinal herb, and the name she chose for herself.”

Lu Yuan looked at the old inscription on the stele.

Gu Lanzhi.

White Reed.

Both of them had chosen new names for themselves from medicinal herbs.

At last, the woman in town turned around.

“Seven-niang, you remember.”

A faint smile appeared on her face.

White Reed’s eyes reddened, but she remained where she was.

“Who are you?”

“I’m your mother.”

“What proof do you have?”

The woman’s smile froze for a moment.

The Gu family name-shadows beneath the surrounding lamps all turned their heads in unison.

Hundreds of wooden tablets bearing only the character “Gu” clinked softly against one another, making a dense rustling sound.

“What proof does a daughter need to recognize her mother?”

White Reed gripped the red cord around her wrist.

“She does.”

“I remember that her name was Gu Lanzhi, and I remember her telling me to take Lu Yuan and go. But that only proves I met her. It doesn’t prove that you’re her.”

The woman slowly lowered her head.

“When you were little, you hated bitter medicine. You always left a mouthful at the bottom of the bowl.”

White Reed’s expression changed.

“When you were seven, you broke your wooden hairpin and secretly buried it behind the stove.”

“When you tied the red cord around your younger brother, you always tied the knot backward.”

One after another, she listed deeply private details from the past.

White Reed’s breathing grew more and more rapid.

But Lu Yuan asked, “Where did she first call you Seven-niang?”

The woman beneath the lamp looked at him.

“Who are you?”

“Lu Yuan.”

There was not the slightest change in her eyes.

“So it’s you.”

Lu Yuan stared at her face.

“If Gu Lanzhi had really carried me out of the fire, she wouldn’t have recognized me only after hearing my name.”

The woman fell silent.

A crack suddenly split the bamboo basket in her hands.

There was no angelica root beneath the blue cloth.

Only a sheet of paper covered in old memories.

White Reed’s childhood habit of drinking medicine, her broken hairpin, the way she tied the red cord, all of it had been written down on those sheets.

Xu Erxiao stepped forward.

“Using things the dead left behind to impersonate the living again.”

The woman’s face began to peel away.

First the corners of her eyes, then her lips, and finally her entire face slid off her head like water-soaked window paper. There was no flesh and blood behind it, only a white lamp embedded in her neck.

Two characters were carved into the wick:

“Proof of Kin.”

White Reed looked at the face lying in the snow. She neither stepped back nor cried.

She only asked, “Who wrote these old memories down for you?”

Many overlapping voices came from the white lamp.

“The Gu family’s old ancestral shrine.”

“Everyone Gu Lanzhi adopted left behind a memory.”

“When the memories match, that proves it’s the person herself.”

“Nonsense,” Wang Cheng’an said.

“Ten people remembering her doesn’t mean that ten memories pieced together make her.”

He wrote in the corrections register:

“The figure resembling Gu Lanzhi seen at White River Town’s entrance was pieced together from old memories by the Proof of Kin lamp. It was not the person herself. Her words are only clues.”

The moment the ink touched the page, the gray cotton-padded jacket collapsed into the snow.

The white lamp in the neck rolled twice, but its flame did not go out. At the same time, every Gu family name-shadow around them took a step forward.

“Proof of Kin activated.”

“Gu family descendants, please enter the ancestral shrine.”

“Others may not enter.”

The seven lamps at the town entrance all turned toward White Reed.

But beneath the snow at the other six people’s feet, a ring of black lines emerged, as if it meant to keep them outside town.

White Reed lowered her head to look at the ring of lines.

“It’s only letting me in.”

“The travel pass said the name ledger verifies one person first, then the evidence register verifies another,” Wang Cheng’an said. “Now that we’ve reached White River Town, it wants to split us up again.”

Lu Yuan drew his sword and pressed it against the black lines.

“No one goes in alone.”

The voice from the white lamp said:

“The Gu family ancestral shrine recognizes only Gu family blood.”

Xu Erxiao sneered. “A moment ago, it was pretending to be her mother. Why doesn’t it even need to check whether she’s Gu family now?”

The white lamp abruptly turned toward him.

Xu Erxiao didn’t back down. He patted the wooden tablet inside his clothes.

“My mother’s surname was Liu, and mine’s Xu. By your logic, which side do I belong to?”

“Those related through the maternal line may enter.”

“Then why can’t Brother Lu enter? Gu Lanzhi personally accepted him as her child.”

The white lamp said nothing.

The relations they had only just separated on the bridge, blood relation, adoption, and traveling together, were being forcibly lumped back together here under a single label: “Gu family.”

Wang Cheng’an went to the edge of the black lines and spread the corrections register across the snow.

“Kinship is divided into four categories.” “Blood relation, adoption, marriage, and chosen companions.” “If the Gu family ancestral shrine is investigating Gu Lanzhi’s past, everyone involved may enter to verify the evidence.” “Witnesses may not be rejected based on surname alone.”

When he finished writing, he pressed the safekeeping seal into the snow.

Cinnabar seeped into the black lines.

The ring of black lines immediately broke at one point.

Lin Zhaoxuan sent his ink line through the gap and wrapped it around the stele at the town entrance. Song Qinghe’s green lamp shone through next, widening the break until one person could pass through.

The white lamp shook violently.

“If outsiders enter the shrine, the kinship register will fall into disorder.”

“It’s already disordered enough,” Zhou Heng said.

He pulled out his sword and thrust it into the gap, prying the black lines completely apart.

All seven crossed the boundary together.

As soon as they stepped into White River Town, the Black Bridge behind them was swallowed by snow and fog. They could no longer see Gu Changgeng in the distance, and could only occasionally hear the clinking of name tablets.

There were no lamps lit by living people in town.

The doors of the houses along both sides of the street were shut tight. The window paper was torn, and snow had piled up to the thresholds. The lamps that had lit up earlier all hung in midair, without lamp posts or anyone carrying them.

Beneath every lamp was a Gu family name-shadow.

They did not block the way. They only slowly turned their heads as the seven passed.

Xu Erxiao lowered his voice. “Is everyone here dead?”

“Not necessarily,” Song Qinghe said. “The town may just be an old shadow preserved by the ancestral shrine. The real White River Town might not even be on this street anymore.”

“So the road isn’t real either?”

“The road is real. Time may not be.”

After they had walked a while, a knock suddenly sounded from beside the street.

A wooden door with a Herb Shop sign hanging above it opened a crack.

An old hand reached out from inside.

“Has Orchid Branch come back?”

White Reed stopped.

Lu Yuan asked first, “Who are you?”

The person inside did not answer. They only placed a chipped medicine bowl on the threshold.

A five-petaled plum blossom was carved into the bottom of the bowl.

“She still hasn’t paid for the medicine.”

“How much does she owe?”

“Three names.”

Xu Erxiao’s expression darkened.

“Medicine paid for with names?”

The old person inside the door coughed twice.

“One child, one prescription.” “Three prescriptions, three names.” “She took the children away but didn’t leave their names behind.”

White Reed crouched to look at the bowl.

A layer of dark brown medicine residue remained inside. Three fingerprints of different sizes marked the rim. One belonged to an adult, while the other two clearly belonged to children.

She did not touch it. She only asked, “Who prescribed the medicine?”

“The Gu family pharmacy.”

“Who boiled it?”

“Gu Lanzhi.”

“Who drank it?”

The person inside fell silent.

Wang Cheng’an took out a blank sheet of paper and held it close to the medicine bowl.

Three lines of old writing slowly appeared beneath the medicine residue:

“One child with a fever, name unknown.” “One girl burned by fire, called herself Seven-niang.” “One unconscious boy, traveling with the girl.”

Beneath the third line was another sentence:

“Medicine fees charged to Orchid Branch’s account. Do not use the children’s names as payment.”

Xu Erxiao slapped his thigh.

“Doesn’t that spell it out clearly? She never agreed to pay with their names!”

The old person’s hand immediately withdrew.

The wooden door began to close, but Zhou Heng wedged the gap open with his scabbard.

“We haven’t finished asking about the account.”

The sound of pages turning came from inside.

“The Gu family ancestral shrine has the master ledger.”

“The pharmacy only collects payment for medicine.”

“The medicine fees can be paid,” Wang Cheng’an said. “Provide the ingredients, date, and price at the time, and we’ll calculate each item separately.”

“Names aren’t money.”

He placed the copied record from the medicine bowl on the threshold.

“Medicine fees owed by Gu Lanzhi, pending verification.” “The three children may not be used to settle the debt.”

There was no further sound from inside.

A moment later, a rusty copper coin rolled out through the crack in the door and stopped at White Reed’s feet.

The character “Lan” was carved on the front of the coin. A burn mark scarred the back.

White Reed wrapped the coin together with the medicine bowl.

“These belonged to her.”

“Record them as evidence first,” Wang Cheng’an said.

The wooden door finally closed.

But the Herb Shop sign fell from the eaves. On its reverse side was a rough map of the town.

At the center of the map was the Gu family ancestral shrine.

Six buildings were drawn around it.

A pharmacy, a birthing room, a clan school, a contract office, a charity granary, and a ferry lodge.

They corresponded to five of the six categories: name, household, contract, object, road, and kin. Only “kin” was missing.

“The kinship register is in the ancestral shrine,” White Reed said.

“The first section of the main register is there too,” Lu Yuan said.

They followed the map deeper into North Street.

The closer they came to the ancestral shrine, the more name-shadows appeared beneath the lamps. At first, they still retained the outlines of people. Later, all that remained was a piece of clothing, a pair of shoes, or a carrying basket.

The character “Gu” was written on every old object.

There were no names.

Wang Cheng’an recorded their locations as they went.

“Third house on North Street, one man’s garment, Gu family, name lost.” “Beside the well, a pair of wooden clogs, for a woman, name lost.” “Outside the clan school, one book bag, for a child, name lost.”

He stopped writing at the seventeenth entry.

A small wooden horse lay in the snow ahead.

A faded red cord was tied around its neck, and two shallow characters were carved into its belly:

“Little Yuan.”

Lu Yuan stopped.

White Reed recognized it too.

“This is yours.”

Lu Yuan crouched but did not reach for it at once.

There were no footprints beside the wooden horse, but a small piece of burned cloth was pinned beneath its base. Its color matched the lining of Gu Changgeng’s old carriage.

“Check where it came from first.”

White Reed took out the red cord and brought it close to the knot around the wooden horse’s neck.

The two knots were exactly the same.

Xu Erxiao took out the burned piece of carriage shaft and compared it with the red paint beneath the wooden horse. A tiny spot of the same paint remained on the horse’s tail.

“Looks like it fell off that carriage,” he said.

Song Qinghe shone her lamp over the horse’s belly.

Beneath the characters “Little Yuan,” another, fainter line of carving appeared:

“A gift from Orchid Branch.”

Only then did Lu Yuan pick up the wooden horse.

The wood was cold to the touch.

But as soon as he gripped its belly, a woman’s voice suddenly sounded in his ear:

“Little Yuan, no matter how fast a horse runs, it must remember where to return.”

Then came a girl’s voice.

“He doesn’t know the way. I’ll lead him.”

Finally, a child began to cry.

Firelight flashed before Lu Yuan’s eyes.

He saw Gu Lanzhi kneeling on the ground, placing the wooden horse in a boy’s arms. White Reed, or Gu Qiniang as she had been called then, stood beside them, with no red cord around her wrist yet.

“Seven-niang, give this to him.”

“Why?”

“If he wakes up and can’t find his mother, let him look at the wooden horse.”

“A wooden horse isn’t a mother.”

“But the wooden horse will lead him back.”

The memory vanished in an instant.

When Lu Yuan opened his eyes, the crack on the wooden horse’s base had cut a fine line into his palm.

No blood fell.

But the wooden horse lit up on its own.

Every white lamp in town turned toward them at once.

A deep sound of a door opening came from the direction of the ancestral shrine.

A woman’s voice rang out in the distance:

“Little Yuan, come home.”

White Reed immediately pressed down on the wooden horse.

“Don’t answer.”

Lu Yuan nodded.

The ancestral shrine’s main doors slowly opened.

There were no offering tables or spirit tablets inside, only a very long corridor. Countless portraits of women hung along both sides. Beneath every portrait were the characters “Gu family woman.”

The faces in the portraits were almost identical.

Every one of them was Gu Lanzhi.

Xu Erxiao drew a sharp breath.

“What’s this supposed to be?”

“The kinship register is looking for someone who can acknowledge every relationship,” Song Qinghe said. “Gu Lanzhi adopted many children and protected the names of many women without household registration. So the kinship register has pressed everyone connected to her into a single face.”

Wang Cheng’an looked toward the end of the corridor.

A huge white spirit tablet stood there.

It bore no name, only a line of characters:

“Shared Name of the Gu Family Mothers.”

Anger surfaced on White Reed’s face.

“It’s written every mother as the same person.”

“That’s the easiest way,” Lu Yuan said. “When children can’t find their mothers, they all belong to the Gu family. When women can’t find their original names, they all become Gu Lanzhi.”

“Which means none of them have really been found,” Wang Cheng’an said.

The seven entered the ancestral shrine.

The doors closed behind them.

The portraits on both sides all opened their eyes.

“Seven-niang.”

“Little Yuan.”

“You’re back.”

Countless Gu Lanzhis called out to them at once.

Some voices were gentle, some old, some choked with tears, and others merely repeated the same words mechanically.

White Reed stood among the portraits and lifted her head.

“Which one of you is Gu Lanzhi?”

Every portrait answered at once:

“I am.”

“What was she called as a child?”

Half the portraits said, “Fourth Lady Gu.”

The other half said, “Orchid Branch.”

Several others said, “Nameless.”

“Where did she come from?”

The portraits’ answers grew even more chaotic.

“White River Town.”

“Liu Family Gully.”

“Within the Pass.”

“The fire.”

“The Gu family ancestral shrine.”

Every answer could be true, and none could prove which Gu Lanzhi was the one and only person.

White Reed did not continue asking.

She took out the old “Orchid Branch Ward” inscription she had rubbed at the town entrance, the pharmacy’s copper coin, and the picture of the snowy mountains Gu Lanzhi had drawn. One by one, she placed them in the center of the corridor.

“These are things she left behind.”

The eyes in the portraits all turned toward the pieces of evidence.

“Manager of Orchid Branch Ward.” “Debtor to the pharmacy.” “Adopter of children.” “Mother of the Gu family’s eldest daughter.” “Adoptive mother of Lu Yuan.”

White Reed shook her head.

“These are things she did.”

“They aren’t all that she was.”

Lu Yuan placed the wooden horse beside the snowy mountain picture.

“Gu Lanzhi gave me the wooden horse and adopted me as her son.”

“But she didn’t exist because she adopted me.”

Xu Erxiao also took out Liu Sanniang’s wooden tablet and placed it to one side.

“My ma is the same.”

“She’s my mother, but she’s more than just somebody’s mother. She had a place, an old name, knew how to sing, and left me osmanthus candy.”

“You use one word, ‘mother,’ to cover everyone up. How’s that any different from covering everyone in the town with one word, ‘Gu’?”

The white spirit tablet at the end of the corridor shook.

Cracks appeared in the words “Shared Name of the Gu Family Mothers.”

Wang Cheng’an immediately spread out a fresh sheet of paper.

“Correction to the kinship register.”

“Mother and child, father and child, siblings, adoptive relations, spouses, and members of the same clan are all relationships between people.” “A relationship is not a name.” “Do not use ‘mother’ to replace the woman herself, and do not let ‘child’ swallow the mother’s old name.” “Record kinship, but keep each person in a separate register.”

As he wrote, the floor of the ancestral shrine suddenly split apart.

A beam of white light burst up from below and tore the paper in Wang Cheng’an’s hands in half.

At the end of the corridor, the white spirit tablet slowly turned around.

A snow-white register was embedded in the back of the tablet.

Unlike the black Southern Register, this book had not a single smudge. Its pages were so clean they were almost blinding. The first page bore only one line:

“Kin share a name, and thus will not be scattered.”

White Reed’s expression changed.

“This is the kinship section of the main register.”

The white register turned its pages on its own.

Every page depicted a family tree.

The Gu family formed the roots. The branches bore no personal names, only “eldest daughter,” “second son,” “mother,” “father,” “wife,” and “husband.”

Everyone was nothing but a position within a relationship.

The white register turned to its final page, revealing two blank spaces.

“Gu family eldest daughter.”

“Lu family adopted son.”

Beneath the two spaces were the names White Reed and Lu Yuan.

“Please return to your kinship positions.”

The ancestral shrine’s portraits spoke in unison.

“Once you return to your places, Gu Lanzhi can appear.”

White Reed looked deeper into the corridor.

Sure enough, the shadow of a woman had appeared there.

It was not a false face made by a lamp, nor was it a portrait.

With her back to them, the woman stood before a half-open door. Flames blazed outside it, and fire had already caught the hem of her clothes, but she held a boy in her arms.

She turned to look at White Reed.

“Seven-niang.”

White Reed took half a step forward.

The woman then looked at Lu Yuan.

“Little Yuan.”

Lu Yuan tightened his grip on the wooden horse.

Wang Cheng’an cried out in alarm, “Don’t let your names be recorded!”

The two blank spaces in the white register began pulling them outward.

The red cord around White Reed’s wrist drew taut, and a fine line grew from the wooden horse in Lu Yuan’s hand. Each line connected to one of the positions, “eldest daughter” and “adopted son.”

If they answered even once, their names would fall into the spaces.

Gu Lanzhi’s shadow spoke softly from behind the door:

“I can’t hold on much longer.”

“Write your names down, and I’ll be able to come out.”

Flames climbed up her cotton-padded jacket.

Tears welled in White Reed’s eyes.

“Are you really her?”

The woman did not answer the question.

She only repeated:

“Seven-niang, take your younger brother and go.”

The words were exactly the same as in White Reed’s memory.

But Lu Yuan stared at the boy in her arms.

The boy was not holding a wooden horse.

“That isn’t me she’s holding.”

White Reed suddenly understood.

The child in the woman’s arms was younger than Lu Yuan had been back then, and a silver longevity lock hung around his neck.

There was no plum blossom on its face.

There was a willow leaf.

Xu Erxiao saw the lock, and his expression changed abruptly.

“A willow-leaf lock.”

“Someone mentioned it in my mother’s old list.”

He hurriedly pulled out the Liu family gully relocation list. Beside a burned-away gap, a line of tiny characters could just barely be made out:

“Young son of the Liu family, entrusted to Orchid Branch Ward for care.”

The child in the woman’s arms in the fire was not Lu Yuan at all.

This old memory belonged to another child.

The white register had simply pieced together all the memories of “adopting children” and pinned them on Gu Lanzhi.

White Reed wiped away her tears.

“You’re not her.”

The face of the woman in the fire did not change.

“I am every woman who ever saved a child.”

“Then you shouldn’t be using only her name.”

White Reed raised a hand and untied the red cord.

She did not cut it. Instead, she tied one end to Gu Lanzhi’s picture of the snowy mountains and the other to her own wooden tablet.

“Gu Lanzhi is Gu Lanzhi.”

“If the woman who saved the Liu family’s youngest child was also Gu Lanzhi, then verify it before recording it.”

“If she wasn’t, find the real person.”

Lu Yuan also pulled the fine line away from the white register.

“My adoptive relationship with Gu Lanzhi can be recorded separately.”

“You can’t use me to fill every position for an ‘adopted son.’”

Xu Erxiao slapped the Liu family gully list down in front of the white register.

“And there’s this child.”

“I’ll find out who he was later.”

The three pieces of evidence lit up at the same time.

The enormous Gu family tree inside the white register gave a crack.

Its roots did not break.

But the positions on its branches, “eldest daughter,” “adopted son,” “mother,” and the rest, began to detach and turn into separate sheets of white paper.

Each sheet was left blank:

“Name pending investigation.”

“Relationship known.”

“Evidence to be supplemented.”

The portraits on both sides of the corridor, all bearing Gu Lanzhi’s face, also began to change.

The first became a young woman with a high brow ridge.

The second became an old woman with a round face.

The third remained Gu Lanzhi.

The fourth had only a blurred outline.

They no longer shared the same face.

A sigh came from deep within the ancestral shrine.

This time, the sound did not come from any of the portraits.

It came from beneath the white spirit tablet.

Lu Yuan and Zhou Heng pushed the tablet open together.

There was a narrow door beneath it.

Inside the door was an old wooden chest, unlocked.

Written on the chest were the words:

“Personal effects of Gu Lanzhi.”

White Reed crouched down.

“Can we open it?”

Wang Cheng’an checked all around the chest lid.

“There’s no transfer seal or return-to-place seal.”

Song Qinghe shone her lamp over it.

“There’s only one thing inside.”

White Reed slowly lifted the lid.

There was no family tree, no kinship register, and no old paper that could prove blood ties in the wooden chest.

There was only one letter that had never been sent.

On the front of the envelope were the words:

“For the two children.”

It was exactly like the letter beneath the stele beyond the bridge.

Lu Yuan took out the letter he had been keeping.

When they placed the two letters together, the six-petaled plum-blossom seal on the wax was finally whole.

One letter read, “For the two children.”

On the back of the other was a line of writing that had not appeared before:

“Only if you find both letters may you read them.”

White Reed and Lu Yuan exchanged a glance.

This time, no one stopped them.

They opened the letters together.

The first began:

“If you’ve finally made it here, then I wasn’t able to finish crossing the bridge.”

The second continued:

“It also means you didn’t follow the order they arranged for you to recognize each other.”

Farther down, Gu Lanzhi’s handwriting was clear and calm:

“Seven-niang isn’t your real name.” “Little Yuan isn’t your original name either.” “I gave you these two names only so you could find each other when you were fleeing for your lives.” “If you grow up safely one day, you can stop using them.” “Or you can keep using them.” “Don’t go back to any register that would swallow you up just to be my daughter or my son.”

White Reed’s tears fell onto the edge of the letter.

Lu Yuan continued reading.

“The Gu family of White River Town is not your ancestral clan.” “I’m not related to the Gu family by blood either.” “Gu is a surname I borrowed from an old pharmacy sign.” “Orchid Branch is a name I chose for myself.”

Wang Cheng’an quietly read the next line:

“I once had the surname Shen.”

Everyone was stunned.

At the bottom of the letter, she had written the true place she came from:

“Shen Lanzhi, younger sister of Shen Bonian.” “Later changed her name to Gu Lanzhi and managed Orchid Branch Ward.” “Adopted children without household registration and refused to enter them in the Gu family kinship register.” “If you investigate my past, ask at Yongji Grain Depot.” “If you investigate the two children’s original names, don’t ask me.” “I never knew them.”

The ancestral shrine fell silent.

Shen Bonian’s younger sister.

Shen Qiushuang’s aunt.

Gu Lanzhi had no blood ties to the Gu family. White Reed might not be the Gu family’s eldest daughter, and Lu Yuan was not the so-called Gu family adopted son.

The entire family tree the white register had arranged for them had lost its roots in the face of this letter.

It was a long time before Xu Erxiao finally said, “After all that, she didn’t even know either of your original names?”

White Reed smiled through her tears.

“She didn’t know, so she didn’t make anything up.”

Lu Yuan laid the two letters flat.

The final passage slowly appeared:

“Seven-niang came from the willow-leaf lock.” “Little Yuan came from the nameless stone.” “Neither object is a name.” “If you want to keep investigating, go to White River Town’s old birthing room.” “There are records of the two of you being brought there.”

Beneath the letter was another line of hidden writing that had only just emerged as it was soaked by tears:

“But beware of the midwife at the birthing room.”

“She has lived far too long.”

Suddenly, the sound of a cane striking stone slabs came from outside the ancestral shrine.

Once.

Then again.

It came closer and closer.

The portraits, whose faces had just become distinct again, all turned toward the main doors.

An old woman’s voice sounded from outside:

“Lanzhi still gave you the letter she shouldn’t have left behind.”

The ancestral shrine’s main doors opened on their own.

An old woman with silver hair stood in the snow.

Her back was hunched, a cane in her left hand, and a bamboo basket full of red cords in her right. A wooden baby tablet was tied to every cord.

The old woman raised her cloudy eyes and looked first at White Reed, then at Lu Yuan.

“One willow-leaf lock.”

“One nameless stone.”

“You two really are both still alive.”

Lu Yuan stood in front of the others with his saber held crosswise.

“Who are you?”

The old woman grinned, revealing a toothless mouth.

“I brought every child in White River Town into this world.”

She picked out two red cords from the basket.

A willow leaf was drawn on the first wooden tablet.

The second bore no writing, only a grain of black stone embedded in it.

“You’re not siblings.”

“You’re not of the same clan.”

“You weren’t even brought here on the same day.”

She held the two wooden tablets high.

“But you have the same birth mother.”

The color drained from White Reed’s face.

But Lu Yuan did not look at the two wooden tablets.

He looked at the snow behind the old woman.

There were still no footprints there.

“You say you delivered us.”

“Then first prove that you’re alive.”

The old woman’s smile slowly stiffened.

But the hundreds of red cords in her bamboo basket drew taut at that very moment.

A tiny cry, like a foal’s, sounded from every wooden baby tablet.