chapter 1
When word reached me that Gu Huaichuan had been punished under family law, I was watching a play.
It was a new production, the most fashionable show in the capital.
The story followed Murong Jiu, the female thief known as the Golden Swallow, and Wen Shubai, a constable of the Six Gates, as they joined forces to solve a case.
It was a grand jewel theft. The culprit stole pearls from the phoenix coronets of new brides, always striking on the wedding night at the very moment the couple exchanged nuptial wine. A candle would flicker out and flare back to life, and in that instant every pearl on the bride’s crown would vanish.
At first, the court blamed Murong Jiu, because one of her famous golden-swallow darts had been left at every scene. Wen Shubai later discovered that although the darts were indeed hers, the footprints outside belonged unmistakably to a man. Someone was framing her.
Thus Wen Shubai and Murong Jiu joined hands and swore to find the real culprit.
The audience’s favorite scene was the sham wedding they arranged to lure him out.
One was a young hero; the other, a master thief.
One walked the righteous path; the other wandered between light and shadow.
They should have gone their separate ways, yet affection proved impossible to suppress. Sheltered by the pretense of their trap, they could call each other husband and wife with words that were half feigned and half sincere.
Love was most moving when it defied the impossible: the White Snake and Xu Xian, the Weaver Girl and the Cowherd, even a cat and a mouse.
That was why the story of Murong Jiu and Wen Shubai had taken the capital by storm. I had sent servants to queue for days before securing a private room on the theater’s second floor.
My maid reported Gu Huaichuan’s punishment just as the play reached its finest scene.
The true and false Golden Swallows clashed. Murong Jiu, still dressed in scarlet bridal robes, flitted like a butterfly among flowers. Her veil flew back to reveal a face of breathtaking beauty.
Wen Shubai guarded her flank. With a casual sweep of his sword, he sent a bamboo leaf slicing through the air to intercept the false Swallow’s hidden weapon.
“Take care, my wife,” he said with a smile.
Murong Jiu smiled too, three parts sincere and seven parts false. “Many thanks, my dearest husband.”
The Golden Swallow was played by the celebrated Lady Bai Shisan. With limpid eyes, a feigned pout, and that teasing line—my dearest husband—she made my very bones melt.
The mystery twisted and turned; the romance cut straight to the heart.
It truly was an excellent play.
If only Wen Shubai had not been modeled on my betrothed, Gu Huaichuan.
Everyone knew the theater’s recent plays drew from several cases newly solved by Gu Huaichuan, Vice Minister of the Court of Judicial Review.
Major cases arose every year. There was nothing novel in that.
But add romance, a hero, and a beauty, and a case became legend.
In streets and alleys, over tea and after meals, everyone said that when Gu Huaichuan met Su Wanwan, theirs was a meeting of golden wind and jade dew, worth more than countless mortal encounters.
What a pity that such a beauty was a thief. Admiring Su Wanwan’s skill and quick mind, Gu Huaichuan petitioned the throne after their cases were closed. Imperial grace offset her crimes with her merits, and she was no longer a wanted fugitive.
It was the perfect ending to a storybook romance. All that remained was a wedding feast stretching across three streets, after which the hero would claim his beauty and the immortal pair would spend their lives defending the weak.
What the common folk did not know was that Gu Huaichuan already had a fiancée.
She could not wield so much as a kitchen knife, let alone a sword. She was a proper young lady raised behind secluded walls.
These days, I had all but become the laughingstock of the capital’s noble circles.
My father had once raged that he would shut down the theater.
My mother talked him out of it. If the theater closed without explanation, people would only become more curious. Then truly everyone would know.
The tale of the constable and the thief grew so popular that even my closest friends wrote to ask what was going on. How had Gu Huaichuan turned an official investigation into a grand romance? Did he remember that he was engaged?
I raised my brush time and again, unable to answer.
At last I wrote, It was merely an act demanded by the occasion.
It preserved a shred of dignity for me.
Gu Huaichuan had been punished.
Everyone in the Gu household refused to speak of why.
They said nothing.
And in doing so, said everything.
He had just rendered distinguished service. He was upright, refined, and unfailingly courteous. He neither visited brothels nor gambled, and he had never defied his elders. Yet he had still received thirty strokes of a rattan cane, leaving him unable to go out for nearly a week.
There could be only one reason.
Su Wanwan.