Snow Days

Radishes, cabbages, spinach, and shepherd’s purse. That should be enough for now to get them through the end of winter. Muyang buries each seed deep beneath the frosty soil, in neat furrows he had spent the afternoon getting right.

He straightens up from where he had been bent over the ground, brushing the dirt off his hand. As the cold air touches his bare skin, Muyang shivers and sticks his hands into the blanket that is draped over his shoulders and wrapped partially around him. Part of him wishes he could bury himself in the soil like a seed until winter is over so that he would be warm and cozy at least.

Ever since the leaves started to fall, Muyang has been sluggish, clumsy in his movements as he lumbers around. More than once, Ziyu has caught him dozing off in the kitchen, curled up in front of the fire because it was just so nice and toasty there. They had warm winter blankets, stuffed with down feathers, hand-stitched by the old women of the village who were quite willing to let them go to Muyang and Ziyu in exchange for some work of reinforcing their roofs against the coming snow.

As the temperature continued to drop, Muyang handed over their coin pouch to Ziyu so he could buy some winter clothing for both of them in the market. In the meantime, Muyang stayed behind in the little house on the outskirts of the village that the villagers had let them use when they decided to spend the winter here. When they had first moved into their temporary winter residence, the house had been dusty and dilapidated, fallen into disrepair after the last inhabitant of the house had moved out. It came with a wide, empty space before it, with a perimeter of rotting wooden stakes driven into the ground—the remnants of a garden and a fence. So, Muyang got to work, clearing the ground of stones, checking the quality of the soil, and repairing the fence until it could keep out any foraging animal in search of a winter snack.

However, being out here in the garden now, with the soil frozen under his snake half and a blanket bundled around him, is making him shrivel up from the cold. Muyang knows he would not last a trek down to the heart of the village without the proper clothing so he is depending on Ziyu to procure something for them.

Right on cue, Muyang sees Ziyu returning, walking the overgrown path down to their garden, carrying a hefty bundle in his arms. Against the snow, Ziyu’s white hair and clothes makes him blend in, with only the black accents on his wings and red in his clothes making him stand out. He cuts a quiet, confident figure striding over, head held high and back straight, almost seeming to glide over the ground, untouched by the snow.

Ziyu opens the gate in the fence that Muyang had made, heading straight for him, and Muyang moves towards him at the same time so that they can meet in the middle. Ziyu is always warm and Muyang throws his arms around his childhood friend—and now partner—curling his tail fervently around Ziyu’s legs as he leeches off his body heat greedily.

“You’re so warm.” Muyang sighs, cuddling up to Ziyu the best he can with the bundle still between them.

“Nice to see you too, Muyang,” Ziyu says drily, but he places a hand on Muyang’s waist, tucking the bundle under his other arm as he guides Muyang back to the house while Muyang clutches onto him like a leech.

“Did you manage to get winter clothes?” Muyang asks, peering at the bundle.

Ziyu nods. “They were selling some secondhand from travellers who passed through during spring. I checked and they’re still in fairly good condition.”

When they get back to their borrowed house, Muyang immediately stokes the fire warming the place, chasing the cold out. Ziyu puts the bundle on the table and starts pulling clothes out from it.

“Muyang, come here,” Ziyu calls, his voice carrying easily through the small house.

Muyang slithers over, curious, as Ziyu shakes out an article of clothing and throws it over Muyang’s shoulders. Soft, padded material engulfs Muyang, immediately trapping heat between it and his body, and Muyang sighs in relief and snuggles into it instantly. Ziyu knots the silk ties of the cloak into a bow that hangs across Muyang’s collarbone, holding the cloak in place, and Muyang finally looks down at what he is wearing.

The winter cloak might have once been a brilliant shade of violet, now faded into something closer to pale lavender. Delicate embroidery stitched into plum blossoms decorates the cloak, and white fur runs along its edges. It comes with a wide hood as well and the soft fur tickles Muyang’s face as Ziyu pulls the hood up over his head. Muyang’s head and ears finally feel warm and protected under the hood and he sighs happily, curling and uncurling his tail around Ziyu’s legs.

Ziyu holds onto the edges of Muyang’s hood as he considers him and Muyang looks up at Ziyu, suddenly nostalgic for the times that he had to look down at Ziyu. He can’t read anything on Ziyu’s face, his expression as smooth as the surface of an unbothered lake, but Muyang is not entirely surprised when Ziyu leans in to give him a kiss on the nose. Ziyu has been kissing him a lot, all over, ever since they got together and Muyang has been learning to anticipate them. Still, warmth spreads out from the tip of Muyang’s nose where Ziyu had kissed him, dusting his cheeks, and Ziyu smiles at him before letting go of his hood.

Muyang tugs on the hood, his fingers clutching the edges where Ziyu had been holding, his heart suddenly startled in his chest. Ziyu has gone back to the bundle on the table, pulling out more pieces of clothing from it. The next item he pulls out is another cloak in a solid black colour, the colour of it faded from multiple times in the wash. This one is trimmed with black fur and has no hood, no embroidery on the cloak, and it looks imposing as Ziyu drapes it over his own shoulders. He looks down at himself, giving himself a once over, considering how it looks on him.

“Hey, we should swap,” Muyang points out, looking down at the plum blossom embroidery on his own cloak. It is pretty, much livelier than plain black, and he thinks it would look nice on Ziyu. He does like pretty things after all. “I think this purple one suits you better.”

Ziyu raises a perfectly shaped eyebrow at him. “Why?”

“It’s pretty,” Muyang explains, pulling up the part of the cloak with the embroidery for Ziyu to see. “I think it would look good on you.”

Ziyu looks at him, barely looking at the embroidery that Muyang shows him. “Keep it. It’s the one with the hood and you need it more than I do.”

The hood is pretty snug and Ziyu is right—Muyang is already reluctant to part with the cloak and the warmth it brings to his head. The black cloak does look good on Ziyu too, as most things do, making him look more substantial than the little ghost Muyang remembers growing up with. It gives him presence, something that Muyang feels always grows when Ziyu is acting out a scene from a popular opera show. A pang of familiar guilt stabs Muyang, something that dogs him whenever he thinks of Ziyu and opera.

Hands touch Muyang’s shoulders and Muyang suddenly finds Ziyu standing close to him, his eyes concerned but touched with a hint of amusement as he tugs Muyang into his arms, sharing his body heat with him.

“Did you freeze again?” Ziyu asks as he hugs Muyang against him, rubbing his hands down Muyang’s arms, businesslike, having done this countless times before when Muyang started spacing out in the cold. “I thought the cloak would help keep you warm enough to function.”

“It’s not the cloak. I like it well enough. It’s warm. I’m never going to take it off,” Muyang responds, his nose suddenly buried in Ziyu’s shoulder. He takes a deep breath and he smells sandalwood, the soft, woody scent chasing away the frosty chill that Muyang had been breathing in while he had been out in the garden. Ziyu smells like home, even this far away from Zhuhe Town.

“Good to hear that because I can’t keep being your heater today.” Ziyu plants a kiss on the top of Muyang’s head, resting his nose in his hair. “I have work to do in the village so the cloak will have to do.”

Muyang nods but Ziyu is the one who is not letting go of him, his arms locked tight around Muyang’s waist.

“There are thicker clothes in the bundle as well,” continues Ziyu, “but I didn’t find anything that can cover your snake half. Not many yuan-ti like you pass by this village, let alone sell off their winter clothing.”

“I should have brought something from home,” Muyang says wistfully, thinking about the winter clothes he has back in his family home.

“The long sock?” Ziyu raises an eyebrow, probably recalling all the times he has seen Muyang slither out of his house during winter with a fuzzy tube-like piece of clothing covering up his snake half.

“It’s my lifesaver during winter! You see how cold you get when half of you is constantly in the snow.” Muyang says defensively.

“Well, maybe one of the grannies in the village can be persuaded to make you a long sock for the winter.”

“If I faint in front of them do you think they would take pity on me?” Muyang muses.

“I think they might adopt you on the spot,” Ziyu affirms.

“Perfect.”

—

Ever since Muyang started working at the village’s medical hall, the warm, winter clothes Ziyu had procured for Muyang has started to smell like the herbs he helps the local doctor brew. Muyang doesn’t mind it himself—he thinks it smells kind of nice in a familiar sort of way—but he has seen Ziyu’s eyebrows raise high on his forehead and then furrow when Muyang comes back after a day of work. Muyang tries to air the cloak out in the cold at least, not needing it while he is crouched over the stove and fanning the flames as the different herbal concoctions brew.

Winter is a time of cold, Master Xuan, the local doctor and owner of the small medical hall in the village, had told Muyang. Not only does the body have to be protected externally from the cold with warm clothes, but it is just as important to warm the body from within. In addition to that, winter brings with it stillness and dampness, a combination of which is particularly hard on the elders of the village. So, to help them through the winter, Master Xuan has Muyang brew tonics that can help to nourish warmth in the body as well as make poultices that can be applied to the joints to help the ache that comes with the cold.

In the short time he has been in the village and even before that, Muyang has learnt so much. He is still in the Ranhui Province, which his own hometown is a part of, but Ziyu and him have travelled as far north as they could and seen so much they would not have been able to if they had just remained in Zhuhe Town. He has seen how the colour “yellow” is produced from canola flowers, much like how his town produces a particular shade of red. He has encountered bandits on the roads he travelled with Ziyu, which had prompted them to improve their basic self-defence skills. He has learnt that coughs can originate from cold, heat, or dryness and that there different remedies to treat each one effectively.

“Muyang,” Master Xuan calls for Muyang and Muyang raises his head from where he had been watching over the fire, careful not to let the precious tonics brew over, to look over at the old man.

From where he is, it is hard to see Master Xuan’s face under his impressive eyebrows, which have grown so long at the sides that he could probably twist them into braids. Master Xuan is perched on a stool behind the counter, which elevates his height just right for his shoulders and chest to stick out from behind the countertop. He is measuring dried herbs out, wrapping them with paper and tacking the prescription slip onto them with a spot of glue.

“Madam Lin who lives by the grocery store is down with a severe case of rheumatism. Would you deliver the medicine to her?” Master Xuan asks.

“Of course,” Muyang responds, tossing a piece of firewood into the stove before him. “The tonics here will take another fifteen minutes or so before they’re done, and the one on the far right will take another half hour. Will you watch the fire for me?”

Master Xuan nods severely, his impressive eyebrows swaying in the wind, giving him the air of a very wise immortal. He hands Muyang a wrapped package as Muyang comes over to the counter, stooping so that he can be on the same level as the diminutive man. Muyang retrieves his winter cloak from where it is hanging just by the window, slithering back to the front of the stove to leech off the heat from the fire before he braces himself for the trek outdoors.

It is cold the moment Muyang slithers out from the medical hall, the bracing wind clearing away the smell of herbs from Muyang’s nose in an instant. Muyang sneezes as he feels the tip of his nose grow cold and he pulls the cloak’s hood up over his head to protect himself from the wind. Prepared, he slithers in the direction of the market street, leaving behind a great trail in the snow and dirt.

The villagers call out friendly hellos as Muyang makes his way through the village and he responds cheerfully in kind. Ever since Ziyu and him moved into their temporary residence on the edge of the village, the villagers have treated them as one of their own. They had met with the village head and some of the elders when they had asked for a place to stay for the winter, and then met the rest when they were invited to the village-wide feast to welcome the start of winter. It was then that Muyang had met Master Xuan and asked for work at his medical hall while Ziyu got besieged by various requests by the grannies of town to do all sorts of odd jobs for them.

In the time that they have been in the village, Muyang has seen Ziyu do everything from carrying water from the well to chasing lost sheep back into their pens after they decided to do a bout of wandering. The only thing Ziyu has been excluded from is cooking, which has Muyang breathing a sigh of relief because the medical hall does not have enough herbs to treat the indigestion that Ziyu’s cooking tends to cause. Muyang would know—he has suffered enough during the times Ziyu decided to try his hand at cooking.

Muyang hurries along to the grocery store, medicine bundle safely tucked away in his sleeve and his hands safely tucked away in the folds of his clothes. He knows Madam Lin—she had given Ziyu and him apples to share once—and it is easy enough to navigate his way to her home to deliver the medicine with instructions on how to brew the herbs and apply the poultices to her joints. He helps her wrap the first of the poultices around her swollen hands, securing it with a bandage, and she insists on shoving a packet of candied hawthorn sticks at him before he leaves. With one package exchanged for another, Muyang leaves Madam Lin’s house, making his way back to the medical hall and thinking wistfully of the boiling clay pots on the stove and how warm they are.

In the corner of his eye, Muyang catches a flash of red and he turns his head instinctively at that bit of colour against the stark white snow. He sees sleek wings with white and black feathers, and a head of snowy white hair, all intimately familiar to Muyang. Ziyu’s side profile is elegant, his features beautiful as always, as he exits through the seamstress’s shop. Ziyu spots Muyang as he passes through the doorway and Muyang beams at him, slithering over to him immediately. There is something different about him today and Muyang spots it immediately.

“That cloak looks gorgeous on you,” Muyang says happily, going a full circle around Ziyu and coiling the end of his tail around Ziyu’s legs as he does. “Is it new?”

That morning, when they had parted to do their respective jobs in the village, Ziyu had been wearing the all-black cloak he had gotten with Muyang’s. However, now he has that draped over an arm and another cloak over his shoulders. This one is red in colour, a colour Muyang knows and loves well, but it is brighter than the red that his town produces, catching the rays of the sun and reflecting them. There are embroidered camellia flowers decorating the cloak, dark red thread shaping the petals and yellow thread forming the stamens. When Muyang reaches out to touch the cloak, it is suitably plush for the weather, and he takes a step back to admire how it drapes around Ziyu’s frame.

Ziyu looks mildly embarrassed as he explains, “Madam Ruhui gifted this to me. She said that she and a bunch of her friends got together to make this cloak for me. They thought the black one looked too plain.”

“I told you!” Muyang crows, tightening his tail around Ziyu’s legs. “You look wonderful in pretty much everything, but beautiful people still look the best in beautiful clothes.”

Ziyu raises an eyebrow at him. “How does it feel to share the same thinking as the grannies of this village? They told me the same thing.”

“Triumphant. I’m right after all, and so are they.” Muyang leans in, drawn to the familiar warmth radiating off Ziyu’s body. “I hoped you thanked Madam Ruhui for such a beautiful gift.”

“I did,” Ziyu says, with a hint of a smile on his face. “She wouldn’t let me reject it after all the effort she and her friends went through to make it. When I put money on the counter to pay for it, she threw the coins back at me. She has quite the throwing arm—I barely made it out unscathed.”

Muyang laughs, linking his arm with Ziyu and slipping his hand into his. “Perhaps we can invite her over for a meal someday. I think my spinach is almost ready for harvesting and we have that leg of cured venison you got in return for shepherding sheep the other day.”

“Good idea,” Ziyu says, smiling properly now, and Muyang can once again understand why the grannies wanted to gift Ziyu something so beautiful to match him.

Muyang has no capability to produce a cloak of any quality so he settles for leaning in to give Ziyu a quick kiss on the lips. He shoves the packet of candied hawthorn he is holding into Ziyu’s hand as he moves away after the kiss and Ziyu blinks at him, looking down at the packet in his hand.

“A snack for you,” Muyang tells him. “I’ll be running back to Master Xuan’s medical hall for now but I’ll see you back at home later. Can you pick up some ingredients for me before you head home?”

Ziyu blinks again, his hand closing around the packet. “Sure, just let me know what you need.”

Muyang rattles off one or two things he knows their kitchen is running low on, and Ziyu nods, holding the packet of candied hawthorn in one hand and Muyang’s hand in the other. Once Muyang is done, he makes to let go of Ziyu’s hand only to realise that Ziyu still has his fingers gripped in his. He looks up at Ziyu quizzically, only to find Ziyu looking at him, his face smooth and unreadable again.

Ziyu squeezes Muyang’s hand and finally lets go, a trace of his warmth lingering on Muyang’s skin. He smiles at Muyang, the curve of his lips soft and affectionate as he says, “I’ll see you back at home then.”

Muyang nods slowly, wondering why something tightens in his chest when Ziyu says that, when Muyang had just said the same thing to him. It had been a perfectly ordinary sentence and yet, the way Ziyu had said it back to Muyang makes him feel like there is so much more to it.

“I’ll see you back at home.”

They are far away from Zhuhe Town and once spring comes, the both of them will move on from the village, resuming their travels through the Autumn Palace once more. The house that the villagers let them use is only a temporary residence and, yet, this is home for the both of them now. It is not like Muyang is a stranger to staying with Ziyu when the both of them live in the same house back in Zhuhe Town but he supposes this is the first time they have had a home all to themselves.

Muyang idly rubs his hand, the one that Ziyu had held, as he slithers back to the medical hall. Even if it is only for the winter, even if the slow-paced life that they have now is only temporary, it is not a bad experience, living like this with Ziyu.