Chapter 1
The day I returned to Spring Breeze House and raised my scarlet banner again, Madam Sang asked whether I meant to keep my old professional name. I lowered my eyes and said yes. The steward promptly hung up the wooden plaque carved with the two sinuous, seductive characters: Xiangsi—Yearning.
At birth, Mother had looked at the red beans in a winnowing basket and named me Hongdou. After she ran away, a gambling-house owner bought me from Father before his very eyes. A musician here, who had studied a few years, said Hongdou sounded vulgar and renamed me for the poem: *Gather more of these red beans, for they best express yearning.* Madam Sang had clapped in delight. What else could a courtesan rely on but the faint yearning of her patrons?
Gongs and drums thundered outside. The Xiao family’s wedding procession was passing. I stared at the red bridal sedan in silence.
Wei Zi leaned over the rail, flicking her handkerchief. “If you had accepted Second Young Master Xiao, some of today’s glory would have been yours.”
I snatched her handkerchief, wiped my lips, and dropped it. “It isn’t too late. No one takes what I want.”
The Xiao family held banquets for three days. Everyone praised the bride’s beauty and said Second Young Master adored her. Turning my wine cup, I asked a patron, “Is the new Lady Shen prettier than I am?”
He faltered, then smiled ingratiatingly. “Of course not. Miss Xiangsi is unrivaled in Jinling, even in the capital. But Miss Shen is a respectable woman. It would be improper to compare you.”
I laughed coldly and drained my wine. Improper? He meant a whore had no right to compare herself with a legitimate daughter. Men of the pleasure quarter flattered you as the moon in the clouds while despising you as mud underfoot. No one cared more about the line between respectable women and prostitutes.
Seeing me drink cup after cup, he leaned in and proposed we link arms. The door flew open before he could touch me. Wind and snow swept away the room’s perfumed warmth.
Xiao Yunqi stood on the threshold, face dark as water, unmelted snow on his black cloak. At the sight of the living King of Hell, everyone fled with apologetic smiles. No one would offend the mighty Marquis of Dingyuan’s household over a courtesan.
He pinched my chin. “You sent a steward to my residence. Xiangsi, have you finally learned regret?”
My skin crawled. Memories from a year ago flooded back: me sprawled, bloodied, at his feet in this same room, my back striped by his whip, his official boot grinding into my wounds.
“A whore dares look down on the Marquis of Dingyuan’s gates? I’ll ask once more. Will you enter my household?”
Raised in martial arts, Xiao Yunqi had nearly beaten me to death. Dirt, grit, and snowmelt burned in my wounds; all ten carefully tended nails had broken as I clawed the floor. Even Wei Zi, who normally hated me, had begged in a trembling voice, “Give in, Xiangsi.”
Yet the fire in my chest hurt worse than the lashes. Entering a brothel had stripped me of kin, status, and name. If I surrendered my last scraps of freedom and pride, life meant nothing. I might be lowly, but I was not senseless mud. Could a marquis’s son command not only my life but my death?
I spat blood and laughed. “Pleasure still requires consent, Second Young Master. Are you so furious because you’ve fallen in love with me?”
After two years, I knew his pride outweighed heaven. Whatever confused feeling he had died under that taunt. He mounted in rage and snapped, “Throw her outside. Let her linger. Anyone who calls a physician dies with her.”
Now I met his searching gaze and curved my eyes into a smile. Like a docile cat, I rubbed my cheek against his palm. “Yes. I regret it. I am willing to enter the Marquis’s household.”