Chapter 1

Heavy snow was on the way. The wind outside was bitter, but the room was warm as spring.

I shut the window tight, sealing out the bone-deep cold.

Just then, a rustle came from the washroom.

The heir emerged.

I hurried forward to attend him.

Before I could get close, a hand lifted the pale aqua curtain from within. A tall, broad figure in a white sleeping robe appeared behind it.

His gaze settled on me.

I hesitated for only a moment, yet he was already standing before me, his expression dark as he stared down at me.

The look in his eyes made my heart tremble.

“My lord…”

But he was forceful and paid no heed to my pleas. I knew he was in a foul mood.

He had returned to Hanshan Courtyard that evening with a stormy face and had not spoken a word.

The entire courtyard had fallen deathly silent.

He was always like this when angry.

At such times, I dreaded being called near to serve him.

For then, he showed no tenderness at all.

But whom was he angry with? Who had provoked him?

I did not dare ask.

After all, I was only a bedchamber maid too lowly to be acknowledged in public.

A bedchamber maid had no right to ask such questions.

As my thoughts grew hazy, I wondered how I had ever come to this.

I had once been the senior maid of the legitimate daughter of the Prince of Zhenbei.

My plan had been to save some money, and when I came of age and was released from service, perhaps my prospects would be better than they had been before I entered the residence.

So I served my young mistress with all my heart. Never had I imagined that calamity would come so suddenly.

At the prince’s Mid-Autumn family banquet that year, the heir, who was supposed to be patrolling the northern frontier, unexpectedly returned to the capital.

As lanterns were being lit, he strode into the crowded banquet hall in silver-white armor, surrounded by an entourage.

His arrival was so unexpected that it caused quite a stir.

When he returned to the banquet after changing, the old dowager immediately pulled him into the seat beside her.

One moment she called him her precious grandson, the next her dear Ju’er.

He answered all her solicitous questions with a smile, patient and gentle all the while.

I still remembered the bamboo-patterned robe he wore after changing. He looked every inch the refined young gentleman, utterly unlike the martial officer who had entered the hall before.

My mistress, one of the younger generation, sat at another table with the prince’s concubine-born daughters and the young ladies of the collateral branches. They all deferred to her. I stood nearby as one of her four senior maids.

For some reason, she singled me out that day.

“Qiyu, take this plate of chestnut cakes to my brother.”

When I set the cakes before the heir, he was entertaining the old dowager. Whatever amusing tale he told about the northern frontier had her laughing merrily.

I said with due respect, “My lord, the young mistress asked me to bring you these.”

He merely glanced at the delicately arranged chestnut cakes and gave an indifferent hum of acknowledgment.

I curtsied in silence and turned to leave.

“Wait.” His eyes returned to the cakes, then suddenly shifted to me. “This maid looks rather familiar.”

Because of that single remark, my mistress sent me to Hanshan Courtyard that very night.

I could still remember her reclining on a fur-draped couch before I left, her phoenix eyes, so like her brother’s, narrowed at me. “Who would have thought my brother would take a fancy to you?”

My eyes were swollen red from crying, but I said nothing more. I could only lower them in resignation and hide the turmoil within.

My mistress had already sent word to Hanshan Courtyard that she meant to give me to him. No answer had come.

But no answer was answer enough.

No matter how I struggled, it would be useless.

I was no more than duckweed adrift, born to a humble fate.

Nothing was mine to choose.

“Put away that miserable face. Don’t spoil my brother’s pleasure,” my mistress said coldly. “What is so bad about serving him? It is a blessing you must have earned over several lifetimes.”

In that moment, her expression looked so much like the heir’s.

The same cold disdain. The same merciless pride.

They were brother and sister indeed.

The path from Nongyu Lodge to Hanshan Courtyard was long and winding. The covered corridors twisted endlessly, as though there would never be an end in sight.

Just like my fate.

Two thickset matrons followed behind me, half escorting and half forcing me onward. Only after I had crossed the gates of Hanshan Courtyard did they bow and take their leave.

That night, I became the heir’s bedchamber maid in truth.

There were no red wedding candles, and no bridal robes.

The phoenix coronet, embroidered cape, matchmaker, and betrothal gifts I had once dreamed of vanished like smoke. In this lifetime, they would remain forever beyond my reach.