Summer deepened in Qinghe, bringing longer days and the scent of ripening fields. The cicadas buzzed from sunrise to dusk and the dust clung to Yi Rong's feet as she walked the worn paths between the fields and the forest's edge. Life had found a flow which was not hurried but steady.
Each morning, Father left before dawn, his woven hat tilted low against the first light. Yi Rong would sometimes wake to the sound of his quiet footsteps outside and lie still under her quilt, listening as he filled the water bucket or adjusted the hoe strapped to his back. There were no grand speeches in their home. No declarations of love or promises. Just presence. And effort.
Mother continued to hum as she worked. Her hands moved swiftly over beans or cloth, and Yi Rong had begun to memorize the quiet songs under her breath. They weren't lullabies just fragments of tunes from her own childhood, passed on by her mother before her. Sometimes when Yi Rong sat near the stove in the evenings, she would hum along not quite in tune but close.
Yi Rong had taken to helping more with the washing. Her hands were smaller than Mother's but quicker now. She scrubbed gently and rinsed twice then again. The water was always cold but she bore it without complaint.
It was during one of these quiet afternoons that she ran into Lianhua again. The girl arrived barefoot, a reed basket swinging on her hip and a smear of ash on her nose.
"Trade you two cucumbers for a jar of plum paste," Lianhua grinned already dropping the vegetables into Yi Rong's basket before she could answer.
"You bartered without permission," Yi Rong said, trying to sound stern.
Lianhua shrugged, "It's how I make friends."
The two girls sat near the well, peeling cucumbers and dipping them in salt. They chewed in comfortable silence for a while, the sun dappling their legs through the leaves.
"Do you ever think," Lianhua said suddenly, "about what you'll be when you're older?"
Yi Rong looked up, "Sometimes."
"I want to see the sea," Lianhua continued,"My uncle once told me about it how it goes on forever and the air tastes like salt. I'd like to sell baskets to travelers and sleep near the shore."
Yi Rong smiled resting her chin on her knees, "That sounds nice."
"What about you?" Lianhua asked,"You're always scribbling on scraps and muttering about herbs and roots. Are you going to be a healer like Old Wen?"
"I don't know," Yi Rong said honestly"I just want… to help."
Lianhua didn't press. She simply nodded and tossed her cucumber peel to a nearby hen.
By now, more of the villagers had begun to notice Yi Rong's quiet competence. She was the one they turned to when someone had a splinter too deep for a sewing needle, or when a baby wouldn't stop coughing. Old Wen continued to let her use his name as cover, though he rarely said much. He didn't need to.
One day, a boy limped into their yard with a dog bite on his leg. Father was still at the fields, and Mother had gone to borrow rice. Yi Rong had been mixing dried yarrow and plantain when she saw him.
The boy winced but held still as she cleaned the wound. He didn't speak much but his eyes followed every movement of her hands.
"Will I be able to walk?" he asked finally.
"You'll walk soon," Yi Rong replied binding the leg firmly"But no running until it's healed."
He nodded solemnly, like it was a bargain he intended to keep.
When her Father came home that evening, he saw the dried herbs soak in a pot on the stove and raised an eyebrow.
"Heard from the carpenter's wife that you patched up Ming's boy," he said, sitting down to remove his straw sandals.
Yi Rong hesitated,"I did."
Father grunted,"Well, better than leaving it to fester the boy's mother said he didn't even cry."
Yi Rong glanced over his "He was brave."
Father didn't say anything more but later that night he set a small pouch of dried jujube fruits beside her bowl of congee.
"Picked them from the southern grove," he said "For your remedies."
Yi Rong smiled into her bowl.
Days continued like that small, steady, threaded with learning. She practiced blending powders in secret and measuring with a careful hand. Sometimes, when no one was looking, she'd test her stitches on old fabric, remembering muscle memory from a life she no longer spoke of. It was all quiet. All purposeful.
But not everything stayed still.
Rumors began drifting from travelers: border unrest, towns farther south tightening their gates, new taxes being whispered about in places far above their heads. Most villagers ignored it. Qinghe was too small, too far.
But Yi Rong listened.
She didn't know yet why it made her chest tighten, only that it did.
That night, after the dishes had been cleared and the fire was dying low, she stepped outside.
The stars were out, dimmed slightly by the rising mist. Fireflies flickered over the fields like silent dancers.
She was a daughter one who now knew the weight of her father's silence and the warmth in her mother's quiet songs. A girl who listened when her family needed things they didn't know how to ask for and who gave without ever expecting praise in return.
She was a friend someone who could sit in the sun and share salted cucumbers, who could listen to another's dreams without judgment and who had learned to speak gently with the wounded and the weary.
And perhaps, in the distant future, when the rice grew tall and the fireflies danced over fields warmed by seasons of care perhaps then, she would become something more. Something she had not yet imagined.
But there was no rush.
For now, she would keep moving forward steadily and quietly.
One breath at a time.
One heartbeat at a time.
One step after another into the life she was still choosing, every single day.