Chapter 4

I could not remember how I fled back to my room. I did not sleep for almost the entire night.

Near dawn, I finally drifted off, only to dream of my mother-in-law chewing meat and turning to look at me.

The next day, shouts and sobbing woke me.

Lady He’s voice was shrill enough to carry across several courtyards.

“Snowball! Snowball, where are you?”

I rose and washed. As my maid pinned flowers into my hair, she said quietly, “Lady He’s cat is missing. She’s been searching the whole estate since early this morning.”

I knew the cat.

Wen Rong had paid a fortune for it from a merchant out of the Western Regions. It was snow-white, with a pair of blue eyes.

Lady He and I had both adored it.

But after Lady He wept and pleaded, the cat was sent to her room the very next day.

She had gloated for a long time, named it Snowball, and carried it wherever she went, cherishing it like a treasure.

“Let her search,” I said coolly.

The search lasted all day.

Lady He and her maids turned the Wen estate upside down. They even reached into every crevice in the rockery, yet found nothing.

Even I found it strange.

The cat had always been tame and obedient. It had never wandered off in all this time.

Could a servant have stolen it to sell?

At dusk, I suddenly heard a scream.

“Ah—”

It was Lady He, her voice so full of horror that it sounded almost inhuman.

I frowned and walked toward the garden where the sound had come from.

The setting sun stained every flower and tree in the garden blood-red.

Behind the rockery was a small bamboo grove that few people visited.

Lady He sat crumpled on the ground there, her face white as paper and her whole body shaking.

I followed her gaze and saw a filthy heap on the ground.

Looking closely, I made out what seemed to be a clump of white fur. The hairs had clotted together and turned black, leaving its shape impossible to discern.

Then I realized what it was.

“Snowball…” Lady He’s voice shook, and tears spilled down her face.

The missing cat lay on a bed of dead bamboo leaves, its belly hollowed out.

All that remained was an empty pelt soaked in blood and dried to a deep brown.

Both eyes had been gouged from the cat’s head. Two black holes stared straight at Lady He.

“Snowball! My Snowball!”

Lady He finally came back to herself and began to wail.

“Who? Who did this?!”

The maids gathered around, covering their mouths, every face ashen.

I took a step back and remembered my mother-in-law crouched over the stove, gnawing bones the night before.

A thought surfaced that chilled me to the marrow.

Had my mother-in-law eaten Snowball?