chapter 2
Gu Huaichuan and I had become engaged three years earlier.
We were close in age and equal in family standing. At the time, one of my distant uncles happened to work closely with his father in government. With that uncle acting as matchmaker, our elders arranged the marriage as a matter of course.
He had just entered official service, while I had made my name in the capital with a performance on the seven-stringed zither at the Grand Princess’s Flower Ornament Banquet.
A talented man and an accomplished beauty—everyone in both clans praised the match.
I asked a cousin to introduce us and met Gu Huaichuan several times.
He was a dignified gentleman, as mild and polished as jade, and proper in every respect.
Seeing none of the dissolute habits common among aristocratic sons, I set my mind at ease and waited to marry him.
Temperament mattered most when two people meant to share a life.
Besides, Gu Huaichuan was handsome, well born, and impeccable in bearing.
Before gossip about him and Su Wanwan filled the streets, I had been very fond of him.
I had imagined we would support each other through hardship and grow old together.
What girl did not dream of love?
The moment I heard Gu Huaichuan had been punished, however, I knew trouble had come.
The Gu family kept strict discipline. They had never even placed a bedchamber maid beside him, and would never tolerate a scandal before his wedding. His elders were habitually discreet, yet now their most promising younger son had become common gossip, leaving their family open to criticism both public and private. Old Master Gu must have been furious.
Privately, I was grateful that the old master had vented some of my anger for me.
Yet from Gu Huaichuan’s perspective, what had he done wrong?
He had merely solved several cases.
He had used a stratagem to draw out a culprit. The thief preyed on brides, so someone had to play one. If not Su Wanwan, it would have been a female constable or some other woman hired for the role.
It would always have been someone.
His later meetings with Su Wanwan concerned official work. No law decreed that an engaged man could never speak to another woman. He could hardly abandon his duties over rules of propriety, leave cases unsolved, submit his resignation, and retire to the countryside.
He could not.
He had neither written the play nor ordered its story spread through the capital.
Even if his martial skill were unrivaled and his power boundless, he could not govern other people’s hands and mouths.
What had he done wrong?
Yet the cane had still fallen.
If his feelings for Su Wanwan had once weighed only five parts in ten, his family’s opposition would now send the balance crashing toward her.
I sighed inwardly.
Every stroke had landed between Gu Huaichuan and me.
I asked him to meet me at a teahouse.
It was bitterly ironic. In three years of betrothal, we had never once met alone.
We usually saw each other only at banquets, where men and women sat apart. Now and then we crossed paths before taking our seats and exchanged a distant nod.
Knowing he was there had always made me feel secure.
I had never imagined our first private conversation would concern his romance with another woman.
Gu Huaichuan was punctual. He arrived just as I finished pouring two cups of tea.
His lips were pale and faintly blue; his wounds had likely not healed.
I invited him to taste my tea.
I had learned the art from Master Lu and omitted no step, from roasting and grinding the leaves to sieving them and boiling the water.
Sure enough, after one sip he said, “Excellent tea.”
I smiled. “Excellent tea ought to accompany an excellent play. Several new ones have become popular in the capital. Have you seen them, Young Master Gu?”
His expression slowly darkened.
“If you have something to say, Miss Qiao, please speak plainly.”
I looked directly at him and enunciated every word. “Young Master Gu, do you wish to marry Su Wanwan? Forgive my bluntness, but a woman of the martial world is not a suitable wife for you.”
His face hardened completely.
Gu Huaichuan was three years older than I, born to a distinguished clan and famous for his talent from a young age.
He understood everything I meant better than anyone. I had no need to elaborate.
Among the capital’s powerful families, equal standing was the first condition of marriage. Tales of a noble daughter falling for a farmhand, or an heir marrying a courtesan, were vanishingly rare.
Families like ours belonged not merely to ourselves but to sprawling clans bound by intricate ties. Life could never be as simple as two people taking a liking to each other.
Su Wanwan was a daughter of the wandering world, free and unrestrained, quick to repay both kindness and enmity. She would never abase herself as a concubine.
She would demand to be the principal wife, but how could the Gu clan accept a female thief as mistress of the household?
If they chose each other, the road ahead would be desperately hard.
I was different.
I was the Qiao clan’s legitimate-born daughter, raised with all the resources of the family. Well read, discerning, and versed in propriety, I was held up as a model among the capital’s noblewomen.
I had spent years learning to brew a flawless cup of tea. I knew how to manage a great household and cultivate alliances among its women. I could distinguish every precious incense on the market, paint mountains and rivers with a sweep of ink, and coax moving music from a zither.
I was precisely the kind of woman our circle prized.
Gu Huaichuan and I truly suited each other.
He remained silent. I lowered my gaze to the ripples in my cup.
Su Wanwan would never accept concubinage.
I would never surrender the place of principal wife.
I waited for his answer.
After half an incense stick had burned, his expression suddenly softened. Whatever thought had come to him stirred a tender smile at his lips.
In that instant, I knew I had lost him.
We had met only a handful of times and always observed every rule. Nothing in that rigid, decorous courtship could have made him smile so.
I let out a long breath. “It appears you have made your choice.”
Gu Huaichuan rose and bowed.
“My apologies. I have grievously wronged you, Miss Qiao.”
One mild apology, and a woman’s fate changed forever.
I laughed coldly in my heart, rose, and spoke with deliberate calm.
“If the engagement is to end, you wronged me first. Therefore the Qiao family will be the one to withdraw from the Gu family. Please have your elders discuss the particulars with mine.”
He nodded and accepted my condition.
I took my maid’s arm and walked out. As I passed him, I asked one final question, each word distinct.
“Young Master Gu, do you truly love Su Wanwan—or do you love the thrill of defying the whole world and smashing society’s chains?”