5

Lin sat alone in the café across from the old courthouse library, his tea gone cold. He had been staring at the same note in his notebook for over an hour. “Find me beneath the fifth mirror.” He had scrawled it five times, circling it each time, hoping that repetition might turn cryptic poetry into something practical. But it remained elusive. The kind of phrase meant to haunt more than guide.

He rubbed the side of his temple, the beginning of a tension headache forming behind his left eye. Sleep had been elusive again. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her face—not the spectral version in the mirror, but the younger Lian Mei from the photograph, half-smiling beside the man with the ruined face. He had questions, too many to contain, and nowhere to place them. The letters had yielded only more mysteries, the record only more hunger. He needed context. He needed truth.

He found Gu Yan’s contact through an online archive forum. A user named ‘Archivist_Moth’ had posted an annotated scan of a forbidden Qing dynasty opera banned for invoking “unnatural ritual motifs.” The formatting had been meticulous. He recognized the handwriting style—it matched one of the letters from the opera house.

He messaged her without much hope.

She replied in five minutes: “Meet me tomorrow. Come alone.”

And now here he was, watching the door of a narrow basement shop nestled between a stationery wholesaler and a noodle stall. The sign above the door read simply: 顾记旧书 — “Gu’s Old Books.”

He opened the door. A bell rang.

The shop was small and dim, crowded with narrow shelves stacked with yellowed paper and cloth-bound volumes in faded inks. The smell of paper rot and sandalwood clung to the air. A soft fan clicked rhythmically from a high corner. The light inside was golden, old. As if filtered through time itself.

“Lin Xie,” a voice said from behind a sliding screen.

He turned.

She stepped out into view. A woman in her early thirties, short black hair cut just above her jawline, glasses perched on her nose, a plain linen blouse paired with wide trousers. She held a small teacup in one hand and a half-smile on her lips. Not warm. Not unfriendly. Measured.

“You’re Gu Yan?”

She nodded. “I read your message. The handwriting you sent—it’s real. But it’s dangerous.”

“I didn’t ask if it was safe.”

“No,” she said, “you didn’t. Which means you’re already too close.”

Lin pulled out the photo. Lian Mei and the faceless man. He slid it across a lacquered table near the window.

Gu Yan looked at it for a long time.

“She’s not supposed to exist anymore.”

“Her name was Lian Mei. She sang at the Zhongsheng Opera House. She was murdered in 1890. I saw her.”

“You saw her?”

“In a mirror. Then again. And again. She spoke to me. I have her letters. She said I carry his shadow. I need to know who he was.”

Gu Yan exhaled slowly, setting down her tea. She pulled a leather-bound journal from behind the counter and opened it.

“There were rumors of a woman who vanished during the final imperial season of Zhongsheng’s operations. She was both courtesan and soprano—unusual, even for that time. She had powerful patrons and made enemies easily. Her death was covered up by a fabricated elopement story. But some in the underground said she never left. That her voice remained. That it cursed the stage.”

Lin nodded. “I think she made a pact. I think it’s unfinished.”

Gu Yan hesitated. “You’re not wrong. But she didn’t start it.”

“What do you mean?”

“She was the vessel. Not the conjurer. The blood pact began with someone else—a noblewoman known only by title: Lady Gao Zhen. Patron of the arts. Friend to ministers. Obsessed with power through esoteric rites.”

Lin frowned. “She’s in one of the letters. Lian Mei hated her.”

“She’s the one who tied Lian Mei to that stage. The story goes deeper than ghosts. It’s a cycle. And you—if you’re remembering anything, even fragments—you’re not outside it. You’re part of it.”

“Then help me,” Lin said. “Tell me how to finish it.”

Gu Yan’s smile widened, slightly amused. “You want to end it? You’re assuming that’s possible. You’re assuming she wants it to end.”

“She asked for help.”

“Or maybe she asked for permission.”

That chilled him.

Gu Yan rose and walked into the back. She returned with a thick folder bound in twine. “Opera death records. Qing to Republic era. Many were lost or burned. These weren’t. I think you’ll want the last few entries.”

He opened the folder carefully. Near the bottom—an unsigned death certificate. October 11, 1890. No cause listed. No burial. Name redacted.

Attached to it: a copy of a script. A single aria circled in red ink. It read:

Let my voice not fade, though my throat is cut.

Lin sat back, pulse quickening. “That’s the melody. The one from the record. I heard it.”

Gu Yan lowered her gaze. “Then I think she’s chosen you.”

He didn’t speak. Couldn’t.

She watched him for a long moment. Then she said, more softly, “Lin Xie… do you really want to be remembered by a ghost?”

Lin thought of the letters. The photograph. The mirror.

“I think I already am.”

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