Chapter 8

Chapter 8

From the next day on, I began to learn how to feign obedience.

When the palace maids combed my hair, I no longer threw the comb. When the eunuchs made me learn the palace rules, I stood properly with my eyes downcast. When Yan Zhichuan needed matches at night, I delivered them to him box by box, as quiet as if I had truly been bought by the warmth of the Royal Palace.

Only I knew that every time I walked a path, I was mentally counting the doors, locks, and guards between the Greenhouse and the Furnace Room.

Yan Zhichuan likely saw through it, but he didn’t expose me.

There were a few times when I brought him fire and happened to catch him during a severe bout of illness. Even though the floor heaters in the hall were burning intensely, there wasn’t a hint of color in his hands. When the imperial physician pricked his wrist with silver needles, tiny beads of ice quickly formed on the tips. He coughed until his body bowed; his palms couldn’t contain it, and blood seeped through his fingers, freezing into a thin layer of frost the moment it hit the ground.

“Your Highness, please light the fire quickly,” the physician pleaded, trembling on his knees. “If you delay any longer, the Cold Marrow will invade your heart.”

Yan Zhichuan didn’t even look at the box of matches. He simply reached out toward me. “Give it to me.”

I handed the box over, but I pressed my hand down on his before he could strike a match.

He looked up.

“Whose box is this?” I asked.

On the lid was written “Ah Man.” The characters were crooked and shaky, clearly written by a child who was just learning to write.

Yan Zhichuan was silent for a moment. “The youngest son of a family from the textile mill on the east side of the city.”

“How old?”

“Nine.”

“What did he see before he died?”

This time, Yan Zhichuan looked at me for a long while before whispering, “He saw his mother making him a new pair of padded cotton shoes.”

My palm tightened, nearly crushing the lid.

“Do you remember every box you burn?”

“I remember.”

“Then do you not have nightmares at night?”

His lips twitched as if he wanted to smile, but in the end, he couldn’t.

“Yi Jiangxue, I rarely sleep.”

I looked at the dark shadows under his eyes and suddenly remembered what Bai Linye had said. My mother told me not to let the Royal Palace know that I could hear the fire speak. But Yan Zhichuan didn’t seem to need to hear it at all. To him, every box of fire wasn’t just ordinary matches; it was a face, a name, a sentence left unfinished before death.

Living like this might not be any easier than dying.

But just as a flicker of pity stirred within me, I remembered those small hands wrapped in white bandages back in the Greenhouse, and I immediately suppressed my heart again.

In the evening, Mo Yaoshuang sent word that the Midwinter Night Banquet would be held in three days, and the Crown Prince would select this year’s “Lampwick Maiden” at the feast.

The palace suddenly became a hive of activity. The sewing rooms worked through the night to tailor clothes, the imperial chefs began preparing wine, and even the snow under the corridors was swept clean. The palace maids gathered around me, their gazes half-envious and half-pitying.

“Maybe it’ll be you.”

“Being chosen is a blessing.”

“Once you enter the Furnace Core, the whole city will remember your kindness next year.”

They spoke lightly, as if discussing which vase a flower should be placed in.

At night, I went to the side storehouse to secretly search for Ming Yinxing’s box of matches. As I reached the final shelf, footsteps suddenly sounded behind me. I spun around to find Yan Zhichuan standing at the door, his face whiter than paper.

“Stop looking,” he said. “The box with the name ‘Ming Yinxing’ isn’t here.”

“Where is it?”

“In front of the Furnace Core.”

My heart sank.

He looked at me, his voice incredibly raspy. “Yi Jiangxue, on the day of the Midwinter Night Banquet, no matter what you hear or see, do not trust Mo Yaoshuang.”

I sneered. “Then who should I trust? Trust someone who relies on the dead to stay warm every night?”

Yan Zhichuan didn’t answer. He simply stepped closer and placed a tiny copper key into my palm.

“Your mother didn’t have time to open the final door back then.”

His hand was cold-as cold as a piece of breathing ice.

“You try it for her.”