Rain fell in that morning quiet and steady, beading on the window lattice and trickling down the clay tiles. Yi Rong sat cross-legged on the floor, chin resting in her palms as she watched it. The scent of wet earth and damp wood filled the house outside the fields were soaked and Fang Zeyu had stayed home to mend a broken rake.
"Rong'er," Ruolan called softly from the kitchen corner, "can you bring me the ginger from the basket?"
Yi Rong rose without a word walking barefoot over the cold floor. Her feet made no sound she had always been light like that, like she was made of something less heavy than flesh. sometimes, Ruolan would watch her move and forget she was a child at all.
She passed the small altar in the corner and paused.
The incense had burned low, leaving only a thin curl of smoke rising from the ash.
The scent something in it pulled at her.
A flash of fire behind her eyes.
The roof collapsing. Screams. Smoke.
Yi Rong's breath caught in her chest her hand trembled.
"Rong'er?" Ruolan's voice broke the moment.
She blinked then hurried on clutching the ginger as though it anchored her.
By afternoon the rain had turned to mist. The village lanes were puddled and quiet most children stayed inside, but Yi Rong wandered hood pulled low, fingers trailing along the stone walls like she was looking for something or perhaps trying to remember.
She stopped in front of the old shed It belonged to Old Wen, who had been a healer once in his youth, before his hands had grown too shaky.
The shed door was slightly ajar.
Yi Rong hesitated then pushed it open.
Rows of dried plants hung from the beam chrysanthemum, honeysuckle, wormwood. The air was thick with age and scent she stepped inside, eyes scanning the shelves.
Her hand hovered over a wooden box.
"You've a nose for these things," came a voice behind her.
She turned to see Old Wen watching her with mild amusement, a carved pipe tucked into his sleeve.
"Most children can't tell mugwort from pigweed But you..." he tilted his head, "you walk in here like you already know what you're looking for."
Yi Rong didn't answer right away her gaze fell to a jar filled with dried petals.
"Mother said I dream a lot."
Old Wen chuckled, "Dreams are funny things some say they're whispers from a past life."
"Do you believe in past lives, Uncle Wen?"
The old man scratched his cheek,"Hard not to in times like these the land forgets, but people... people carry memories from past life."
He walked slowly to a stool and sat,"I had dreams too, when I was young feverish ones. I once thought they meant I was meant to be someone great." He smiled without bitterness. "Turns out I was just meant to grow old in this village."
Yi Rong stepped closer "But you saved people, didn't you?"
Old Wen looked at her surprised,"Who told you that?"
She shrugged.
No one had But she remembered it somehow. A story half-forgotten, a little boy with coughing fits who lived, because of a bitter root boiled in wine. A woman who had bled for days, stitched and poulticed with trembling fingers.
Old Wen stared at her for a long moment, "Strange girl," he murmured but not unkindly.
He reached behind him and pulled down a small book leather-bound and weathered.
"Here," he said placing it in her hands "that's of no use to me now,can't see half the characters anymore ,you might find something in there your dreams haven't told you yet."
Yi Rong bowed, cradling the book like it was precious.
When she left the shed the rain had stopped the clouds were parting.
That night after dinner, Fang Zeyu sat by the fire with his hands outstretched to the warmth. Yi Rong sat her legs crossed with book open on her lap. She didn't understand all of it, but the diagrams the symbols they felt familiar her eyes moved like they were tracing old roads she'd once walked.
Ruolan came in wiping her wet hands on her dress "Still reading, little scholar?"
Yi Rong nodded absently.
Zeyu glanced at the book, "She's learning quiet well for her age," he muttered kindly under his breath.
"She has an old soul," Ruolan said smiling as she ruffled Yi Rong's hair.
That night Yi Rong dreamed again.
But it wasn't the clinic.
It was a white hall quiet and bright,people in long coats a soft voice speaking words she couldn't understand but she remembered the feel of them Cold. Precise. Important.
A glowing shape on a screen like wings and fire.
She woke with a breath quick her pendant, the one she'd worn since the day she arrived, was warm against her chest she clutched it tightly eyes wide in the dark.
Days passed.
The village prepared for the spring festival, stringing red paper lanterns from the rooftops. Ruolan sewed Yi Rong a new robe from leftover febric green with faint golden thread.
On the morning of the festival, Ruolan braided Yi Rong's hair with a sprig of plum blossom. Fang Zeyu even smiled when she spun in a circle to show them.
"You look like a proper little lady," he said eyes crinkling.
Yi Rong smiled but something tugged in her chest a whisper of something just out of reach.
That evening, drums echoed through the hills as villagers gathered,children lit sparklers, smoke curling into the starlit sky.
Yi Rong stood a little apart from the others, watching the lanterns float one caught the wind and drifted toward the forest edge, its flame flickering softly.
And there just for a moment she thought she saw a shadow watching from between the trees.
Tall.
Still.
Familiar.
Her breath caught.
But when she blinked, it was gone.
She didn't tell anyone.
But that night, she placed her pendant beneath her pillow and whispered a promise to herself.
She would find out who she was. Why she had come back. Why the fire had taken her once, but not completely.
And when the time came, when the dream turned real—
She would be ready.