Lost in the Snow

Luoyang West Alley is where Wen Xin lives. There are only two words on the door panel: ask questions. Lu Zhiyuan, thirty-seven years old, had not used that sword in seven years. People who come to him don't ask for money, they only ask for something you are willing to give. Some people were given a hair, some were given a tooth, and some knelt down and kowtowed three times. Three days before the winter solstice, a dumb girl kicked open his door. She used charcoal strips to write on the door panel: Chen Ya died. A male body was fished out of a dry well in Liujia Village. All one hundred and thirty-seven people in the village said they had never seen it. That night, one hundred and thirty-seven people had the same dream. That well was connected to a fire seven years ago. The Yuxue Building burned all night, and one hundred and twenty one people could not come out. Ten volumes. Ten cases. Each roll burns away a layer of ash. The broken sword is buried in the snow. The sword does not come out of its sheath. There was a scratch on the sheath that hadn't been smoothed away in seven years.