Chapter 10

“Oh?”

I feigned surprise. “You’ve had such an extraordinary encounter, Your Highness? You’ve seen an animal that could speak?”

His gaze remained fixed on the pond.

“Sometimes,” he said, “an animal with enough understanding can tell you what it’s thinking without speaking.”

“I used to keep a little fox. Clever, and wonderfully perceptive. Its bright, liquid eyes always looked so alert.”

“It knew how to show me what it wanted and what it didn’t. When it liked something, it would hold it in its mouth and refuse to let go. When it didn’t, it wouldn’t spare it a glance.”

“I often brought it here to play in the water. Whenever it wanted to come, it would search the whole courtyard for me, then tug at my robe and run this way.”

“It knew when I was troubled too. It would lie quietly at my feet, making no fuss.”

“A fox, after all,” I said.

He smiled quietly. “Yes.”

“I raised it well. Everyone adored it. Its coat was smooth as satin; everyone who saw it praised how lively and beautiful it was.”

I asked, “But I’ve been at the Eastern Palace for days and haven’t seen a fox. You say you used to keep it. Did it run away?”

Zhong Rui glanced at me and shook his head. “No.”

“I killed it,” he said.

A breeze swept across the water.

Under the late-night moon, it felt especially cold against my skin.

I stared at him.

“Why, Your Highness?”

Zhong Rui looked at me too.

An inscrutable, chilly light shone in his eyes.

“Have you heard the saying that a man’s only crime may be the jade he carries?”

I watched him silently.

“I’d raised it too well. Its beauty alone was beyond compare.”

“But later, I learned it possessed something even more beautiful than its appearance.”

He sighed deeply. “Even for its looks alone, I couldn’t bear anyone coveting the slightest part of it.”

“And if there was something lovelier still?”

“That was my little fox. No one else had the right to so much as look at it.”

“Whatever it possessed was mine.”

“But it was too clever. One day, it would want to leave these courtyard walls and return to the world outside.”

“How could it survive without me? When I first found it, all it knew was how to steal food in the streets.”

“Rather than let that day come—let it leave me, or fall into someone else’s hands—better to keep all of it for myself.”

“So I killed it and kept its most beautiful part.”

“Now that treasure stays beside me every day. I never have to fear it leaving.”

By then, he’d walked me to the guest courtyard gate.

All the way there, the night wind had chilled me to the marrow.

Zhong Rui stopped outside the gate. “That’s the end of the story. Get some rest.”

I lowered my eyes a little. “A story like that frightens me, Your Highness. Aren’t you afraid I’ll flee tonight and never return to teach the crown princess?”

He remained unruffled.

“Anyone who has mastered the guqin as you have must possess depth and judgment. I know you came to the Eastern Palace seeking something.”

“Teach Ah Yao well, and afterward, whatever you want, I can give you.”

I met his gaze.

“All right.”

I tilted my head and smiled. “I’ll hold you to that.”