Chapter 2

It was late spring. The morning breeze had lost its chill, and the sunlight was warm.

Yet I felt none of that warmth. I stood rigid, staring at Father’s body and his unclosed eyes, then at Xu Qing’s careless, mocking smile. My heart felt submerged in ice water, the cold piercing to the bone.

Mother came up behind me and rested her hands on my shoulders. “Yang, what’s wrong?”

As though she had sensed something, she sniffed the heavy smell of blood in the air. Her voice began to tremble. “Husband? Husband?”

I did not know when my sister had come out behind me. She stared blankly at Father’s body a short distance away, gave a wail of grief and collapsed.

I shielded them both, biting my lip hard to hold back my tears.

“What’s wrong, little beauty? Nothing to say? You had such a sharp tongue in front of the princess yesterday.”

Xu Qing was smiling, but murder filled his eyes. “I wasn’t going to kill you. But you and your father didn’t know what was good for you. How dare you go babbling to the princess and ruin my reputation?”

“Luckily she pitied me. She wasn’t taken in by your filthy lies.”

At the mention of the princess, his eyes softened and the corners of his mouth rose. He looked like a man newly in love. Then his gaze returned to me, and disgust and hatred replaced it all.

“I suppose I should thank you. If you hadn’t been so aggressive yesterday, she wouldn’t feel even sorrier for me. But I don’t want to thank you. I want to kill you.”

He smiled, watching me with interest. “I’ll give you a quarter of an hour. Make it out of these woods, and I’ll let you go. If you don’t, I’ll—”

I grabbed Mother and my sister and ran.

Xu Qing had let the horse loose at some point. Mother could not see. All I could do was hold her tightly by the arm and cling to my sister’s hand.

But few people ever came through these woods. Thorns and mud covered the ground. My sister and I managed, but Mother fell again and again. At last, she could not get up.

“Go! Hurry, go! Leave me!”

She pushed frantically at us, her sightless eyes staring into nothing. “Yang, Lan, don’t worry about me! I’ll only slow you down. Run! Get as far away as you can!”

For the first time in half a month, my sister broke into sobs. “Mother!”

My heart felt as though it were splitting open. But Xu Qing’s footsteps were already approaching. Mother shoved my sister into my arms and screamed, “Go!”

I could only pull my sister up and run. When I looked back, Xu Qing had reached Mother.

Father’s blood still stained his sword, its blade flashing white in the sunlight. He smiled at me, then drove it straight through her body.

Rage nearly tore me apart. Blood spilled from Mother’s mouth, and bloody tears ran from her eyes. Yet she made no sound. She clamped both arms around Xu Qing’s legs.

He struggled twice but could not pull free. Enraged, he raised his sword again.

I could not bear to watch. Holding in my overwhelming hatred and fury, I ran with my sister toward the sliver of daylight at the edge of the woods.

I remembered that Father had stopped not far from the main road. It must be somewhere between seven and nine in the morning, when travelers would be passing. If we could reach the road, we might have a chance!

But fate mocked us. We emerged from the woods to find no busy road, only a cliff.

I stood at its edge and looked down. Jagged rocks jutted from the face, and the river roared below. We had reached a dead end.

My sister gripped my hand, her face ashen. “I’ve brought this on you and our parents. It’s all my fault…”

“Sister.”

I cut her off, my heart hammering with fear and panic. “Listen to me. This isn’t your fault. Xu Qing is vicious and shameless, and he treats human lives as nothing. Princess Pingyao ignores the law and uses her power to crush the weak. They’re to blame. You aren’t.”

“Xu Qing can’t bear the smallest slight. I insulted him in front of the princess. He must hate me with every fiber of his being. He won’t stop until he kills me.”

I pushed my sister toward a concealed path beside the cliff, overgrown with thorns. “I’ll hold him off. Go. Get far away, and never come back to Yangzhou.”

Tears streamed down her face. “No! This all started because of me. Mother and Father are dead. I won’t let you die for me too! You go. I’ll stop him. Yang—”

“Sister!”

Fighting back tears, I spoke urgently. “This is our best chance. You go first, and I’ll find a way to escape. Otherwise neither of us will get away!”

“Listen. Follow the river north. Beyond Yangzhou’s borders is Huaining. Stay off the main road and take a detour into the city. Beyond Huaining is Qiongzhou. That’s Prince Xian’s territory…”

There was no time to explain more. I could only give her a few hurried instructions. Her eyes brimming, my sister reluctantly turned and left.

I put the entrance to the path back as it had been, then slipped into the woods. As I had expected, I ran into Xu Qing.

Pretending to panic, I let him drive me to the cliff’s edge. He noticed nothing amiss. His eyes burned with the excitement of cornering his prey.

“You haven’t disappointed me. It’s been more than a quarter of an hour already. But I don’t feel like letting you go. What should I do?”

I glared at him. “Stop putting on an act! If you’re going to kill me, get it over with!”

His eyes sharpened, but he smiled. “I’ve changed my mind. I won’t kill you. I’m going to torture you.”

“Let’s see if that tongue of yours stays so sharp!”

Xu Qing must truly have hated me. His blows were vicious, but every one avoided a vital spot.

He toyed with me like a cat with a mouse. When pain twisted my face and left me on the ground struggling to breathe, he laughed with pleasure.

“Where’s that clever tongue now? Didn’t you think you were better than me?”

Standing over me, he regarded me as though I were a worthless insect. He smiled contemptuously. “Why don’t you knock your head against the ground for me a few times? Then perhaps I’ll go a little easier on you and give you a quick death.”

I slowly pushed myself upright, spat out a mouthful of blood and sneered. “You want me to bow to you? Dream on.”

Then I flung a handful of dust into his eyes, turned and jumped.

As I plummeted, I saw the disbelief and fury on his face. For a moment, I felt triumphant.

I never expected to survive.

Freezing river water flooded my mouth and nose. Cold spread through every part of me. I could no longer feel pain.

I thought of my parents’ terrible deaths, of my sister somewhere out there, of Xu Qing’s hateful face. Summoning my last strength, I struggled upward.

But I was too exhausted. Darkness crept over the light around me. A wave broke over my head, and I lost consciousness.

“Yang, get up! Uncle Qi and Auntie Qi will be here soon. Why are you still in bed?”

“Yang? Yang? Why won’t she answer? Has the child caught a chill in the night?”

“Little Yang, if you don’t get up, I won’t save you a single piece of the osmanthus cake Brother Qi brought.”

In the shifting half-light, Father and Mother were already far away. My sister stood a little way off, beckoning, her smile tender and indulgent.

Frantic, I tried to call to my parents, but no sound came. I wanted to get up and run after my sister, but my whole body was weak and aching. I could not summon any strength.

Tears sprang to my eyes. The anguish was unbearable.

At last, just as my sister’s figure began to blur, I cried out, “Sister!”

But it was not my sister who answered. A figure in green hurried out, calling, “My lady! The girl is awake!”

Footsteps came from every direction. My vision went black, and I fainted again.

When I next woke, it was dark. Several maids and older servants were keeping watch beside me. Their faces brightened with delight.

“My lady, she’s awake!”

The woman they addressed looked to be in her forties, her hair piled high, her clothes sumptuous. Her bearing marked her out at once as someone of consequence.

Now she was watching me with anxious joy, as though holding back some powerful emotion. Tears glimmered in her eyes. “Child, how do you feel? Does anything still hurt?”

My rescuer was Lady Li, wife of the Duke of Ying. We were no longer in Yangzhou, but in Ningzhou, a hundred li away.

She had come to Ningzhou to visit relatives and found me washed up on the riverbank.

I had been unconscious for half a month. During that time, she had summoned more than half the city’s doctors and ordered them to save me.

After I woke, she could not have been more attentive or considerate.

Often, too, she watched me with a look of yearning, grief and reluctance to let go.

The matron caring for me explained why: I looked like her younger daughter, who had died young.

When she learned that my parents were dead and my only sister was missing, the duchess wanted to take me back to the capital and adopt me.

And at last I remembered why the Duke of Ying’s title sounded so familiar.

Princess Pingyao’s fiancé was He Yan, heir to the Duke of Ying.

I knew this would be my only chance for revenge.