Chapter 4
Her eyes red, my aunt stumbled toward Song Wan.
Then she saw the red rash on Song Wan’s neck and hands and stopped in terror.
“You… What’s wrong with you?”
Song Wan bit her lip and clutched her hand.
“Mother, didn’t you miss me? Are you afraid of me? Why? Because I have an incurable, filthy disease?”
My aunt went still, then violently shook her off.
She was as quick and merciless as if she were shaking away something dirty.
“You… What did you say? What disease have you caught? How could you do something so shameless and disgrace our family?”
Song Wan laughed until tears came.
“You’re disgusted by me?
“You’re my own mother.
“And you’re disgusted by me?
“Mother, don’t you feel the slightest pain for me?”
She reached for my aunt’s hand, but my aunt dodged her. Song Wan stumbled, fell to the floor, and fainted.
Wang Heng hurried to gather her into his arms.
Before he left, he still found time to tell me,
“Song Heyue, expect your letter of repudiation!”
My mother said coldly,
“You brought this on yourself. Now even your husband doesn’t want you. Let’s see where you can go!”
My aunt, distraught, raised her hand to strike me.
“Song Heyue, I raised you for nine years. What did I ever do to deserve this revenge?
“You’re using my own daughter against me!
“You know perfectly well that she’s the wound in my heart!”
I neither moved nor flinched.
“Go on. The moment that hand lands,
“I guarantee that within an hour, every street and alley will know the Marquis of Pingyang’s lost daughter has been found.
“I’ll make sure everyone knows she was in a brothel.”
My aunt’s hand froze in midair. Tears of panic fell, but she could not bring herself to finish the blow.
“You… How can you say such a thing?
“You’re threatening me! How dare you threaten me with something that will disgrace both our families!”
She accused me in despair,
as if I were the one who had hurt her most deeply.
She flung herself into my mother’s arms and sobbed.
“Sister, she hates me so much! She hates me!
“She’s using Ah Wan to take revenge on us!
“She’s going to ruin the children in both our families!”
My mother looked at me. After weighing things up, she softened her tone.
“I know you hate me. But I had my reasons. I had no choice.”
I smiled and cut her off before she could say more.
“Let me be clear. Your reasons have nothing to do with me. I’d be happy even if you died.
“Stop sickening me with this talk.
“I know you want to silence me by invoking all those innocent brothers, sisters, and cousins.
“But let me tell you: the reputation of either family, your other children, my aunt’s other children—
“I have no affection for any of them. Whether they live or die is nothing to me.
“Don’t expect to play on my feelings for them to keep me quiet.”
Under her astonished gaze, I went on.
“If I were you, I’d ask myself just how badly both your families have treated me, that you can’t find a single person whose words or affection might sway me.”
My mother fell silent. Then humiliation turned to anger.
“What will it take to make you shut your mouth and never breathe a word about Ah Wan?”
I gave her a smile that came from the heart.
“Money. If affection can’t seal my lips, you’ll have to seal them with silver.”
After marrying Wang Heng, I had taken charge of the duke’s household finances.
Only then did I learn
that even such a grand and powerful family
did not have the easy abundance of money I had imagined.
Respectability, prestige, all the splendor of an ancient house—
it was built on money.
Without money,
even the noblest family could not keep up appearances.
To me now, money was far more tangible and important than family affection or romantic love.
My mother asked bitterly,
“How much do you want?”
I named my price.
“A hundred thousand taels to keep my mouth shut.
“Another hundred thousand for the medicine to treat Song Wan’s disease.
“Two hundred thousand in all. Between you and my aunt, you can find it.”
She could not believe it.
“You have medicine that can cure Ah Wan?
“Ah Wan is your own cousin. You have a cure, and instead of saving her, you’re using it to extort money from us?
“When did you become so selfish, so obsessed with money?
“How did you become like this?”
I couldn’t be bothered to waste more words on her. I threw them out.
“You have three days.
“If I don’t see the money within three days, you might as well take all the unmarried children in both families and jump into the river!”
Finding they could get nowhere with me, she and my aunt
went to Wang Heng instead.
A married woman must obey her husband. Now Wang Heng and I had a daughter, too.
My mother thought that would bring me to heel.
She was very wrong.
I had bowed my head for long enough.
I was done with the miserable life of a daughter, a wife, a daughter-in-law.
I no longer wanted to watch anyone’s face for signs of displeasure.
I would not endure even the smallest injustice again.
No matter how grand a family a noble daughter married into, her marriage only paved the way for the men of her birth family and her own sons.
She had to swallow an ocean of grievances.
Even her own daughter would be sacrificed to advance the family’s men.
My mother-in-law had raised the subject of concubines more than once.
Wang Heng had repeatedly brought me fertility medicine and pressured me to have another child.
Even though the imperial physician had told them that another pregnancy could kill both me and the baby.
I no longer wanted a life that looked dignified from the outside and was full of humiliation within.
They could all get out! They could all die!