Chapter 1

“By imperial command!”

The eunuch had barely finished before I felt as though someone had emptied a basin of cold water over me.

It must have been the midsummer sun making my legs so weak.

No.

This was wrong!

My bewildered gaze darted between the eunuch and my father.

I kept waiting for them to correct the decree.

Then it was put back in its brocade box, the eunuch left the Xia residence, and everyone rose in delight.

I clung to my maid Hongyu’s arm, swaying.

I could hardly stand, yet dared not fall.

The mistress of the house was beaming. Before my elder sister, Xia Linlang, had even found her footing, she swept her into an embrace.

“My darling, what good fortune! The Li family has held high office for generations, and young General Li is such a fine man. To think a marriage like this should fall to you!”

It was a splendid match, of course.

Father was merely the head of Wenyuan Academy. Learned as he was, he held no official post.

In a capital where a casually tossed brick could strike a fifth-rank official, that counted for very little.

The Li family had produced famous generals for generations. One generation had nearly brought the house to ruin, but Li Wujin had emerged to restore it.

For the Xias, this was more than marrying above ourselves. It was a flight into the highest branches.

Once her delight subsided, the mistress glanced at me and smiled without warmth.

“A pity some people scheme so hard and have nothing to show for it. Some are simply born to live beneath others.”

Xia Linlang covered her smiling mouth with a handkerchief, unable to hide the triumph in her smiling eyes.

Outsiders praised the mistress as virtuous, but she never concealed her hostility toward me.

My mother, Concubine Bai, had accompanied her into marriage as a dowry concubine. Beautiful and intelligent, she was the mistress’s own younger half sister. When the mistress married, she feared her sister might someday secure a better match and pleaded with her family to send Mother along to the Xia household.

For more than a decade, she had been the wife and Mother the concubine. She kept my mother firmly under her heel with endless talk of propriety and rank.

Later, Mother learned gu sorcery from somewhere and nearly brought her down.

But the poison turned on Mother. She failed at the final step.

Now their feud had passed to the next generation, and the mistress still could not bear to see me marry better than her daughter.

Mother and I both had to stay beneath their feet.

Father never wished to involve himself in the affairs of the inner household. So long as its scandals stayed inside the gates, he turned a blind eye.

If I did not plan for myself, I would inevitably be sent along with my sister as her dowry concubine.

How hateful that my luck should be as bad as Mother’s.

We had both fallen at the very last step.

As soon as night fell, I put on a veiled hat and slipped out.

My little courtyard was so neglected that no one would care if I stayed out all night.

I knocked softly at the Li family’s back gate. The steward saw me and immediately smiled.

“Fourth Miss, the general has been waiting for you.”

He had known I would come.

I stumbled along, desperate to tell him that the decree was wrong, that I was not the one marrying him.

Then I saw Li Wujin seated calmly in the inner room, tending powdered incense, and all my words died.

He only had to lift his eyes to me once. I understood there was no need to ask.

He knew.

And he sat there unmoved, quietly waiting to watch me fall apart.

How could the decree be wrong? How could the eunuch have read it incorrectly?

I was the one who had been wrong.

All those words came down to one question.

“Why?”

The Li Wujin who had once been so tender with me flung his incense spatula at my feet.

He stood and advanced, his expression sharp.

“Xia Tingchan, who gave you the nerve to question me? Do you need me to remind you what you’ve done?”

His merciless words left me stunned.

Had I done something shameful?

Yes, I had approached him with an ulterior motive.

He was the husband my mother had chosen. I wanted to marry him and escape the Xia family. I did not want to be trampled on anymore, or spend my whole life under Xia Linlang’s thumb.

But I truly loved him.

I respected him as a hero. I loved his strength and integrity. I had counted myself fortunate that his heart had room for me.

He had said, “Chan’er, family and status mean nothing to me. I, Li Wujin, am blessed beyond measure to have your affection. All that remains is to ask for a decree and bring you into my family with every honor.”

Those memories had once gone down like sweet wine. Now they burned bitterly in my stomach.

But what of it?

We loved each other. Was that something to be ashamed of?

The confusion in my eyes seemed to kindle his anger.

“How long are you going to keep pretending?

“Your sister has already told me. You have love-gu your mother left you.”

I could scarcely breathe. “You know perfectly well Xia Linlang wishes me harm—”

He cut me off. “You would do anything to marry into a powerful house. If Miss Xia hadn’t warned me, I’d never have known my feelings for you came from a worm!”

Li Wujin glared down at me as though I were a prisoner awaiting judgment.

“And you dare say Miss Xia wishes you harm? You’re just like your birth mother, using filthy tricks to corrupt people’s minds.

“Since you’re so eager for a grand marriage, I thought you should have a taste of being played for a fool, of wanting something you can’t have!”

I backed away, step by step. I had never seen this stranger before.

I had never imagined the wounds I had so carefully shown him would become weapons he used against me.

Once his anger was spent, he saw my ashen face and knew he had gone too far.

But he could not lower his pride. Instead, he asked hoarsely,

“Is there anything else you want to say?”

I knew him too well.

The proud young general was graciously giving me a way out.

But I no longer wanted to soothe him.

When things were good between us, any advance or retreat had been part of our flirtation.

I had even joked to myself that I could hardly give up being a general’s wife for the sake of my dignity.

Now that the choice was before me, I discovered that yielding was not so simple.

Besides, the marriages had been decreed. We had no future left.

At last I understood why Mother had been so unhappy before she died.

Love was a thoroughly pointless thing.

Let that be the end of it.

I bowed. “I misplaced my heart before. Now that I am promised to someone else, I shall trouble you no further, General Li.”

This was not the response he wanted.

“Xia Tingchan,” he ground out, “very good indeed!”

“Get out! Never show your face before me again. If I hear you say one ill word about my betrothed, I’ll cut out your tongue and feed it to the dogs!”

I looked at him coldly, then turned and left without a moment’s hesitation.

At the doorway, I looked back.

His eyes brightened. His lips parted, but no words came.

I spoke slowly.

“My sister was right. I did have a pair of love-gu.

“But I was no good at keeping them. They died long before I ever met you.”