June, the fifteenth year of the Tianbao era.
The blood at Mawei Slope had not yet dried when Emperor Xuanzong's carriage hurried in panic toward Shu. Passing through Hanzhong, the soldiers were exhausted and the emperor looked gaunt. They came upon a tea mountain, so he ordered his men to find water and brew tea.
There he met a woman who grew tea on the mountaintop and drank only dew from the clouds. Her beauty was so ethereal she hardly seemed mortal. She called herself Miss Wuzi. She served him a cup of fragrant tea, its brew clear green and its aroma rich.
Xuanzong took his first sip and burst into tears. He thought of the tea banquets at Daming Palace, and of the woman who had died at Mawei Slope.
He wanted to take her into the palace.
That night, she walked to the edge of White Pine Cliff and leaped off.
In an instant, clouds surged across the sky. A golden phoenix burst through the mist, circled the tea mountain three times, then flew away with a long cry.
From then on, the fragrance of tea never left Mount Wuzi, but no one ever saw the golden phoenix again. Yet every year, in the days before Qingming, people can still hear its cry hidden among the clouds and mist.
Posting begins in October.
Theme: Better to break than to bend
