Chapter 3

As soon as the marquis’s household heard, they rushed to arrange the wedding.

The old madam had wanted a quiet affair. It was only a second marriage, after all.

She had not expected Mother to prepare my dowry herself: a full hundred loads and eight great chests, nearly a third more than my elder sister had received.

After that, they dared not neglect a single formality and hurried to make up everything they had omitted.

Even so, on the wedding day I could feel the faint disregard that ran through the household.

Madam Xu even pretended to be a frank, well-meaning woman offering comfort.

“Don’t be upset, Sister-in-law. The ceremonies for a second wife can never equal those for a first. Surely you wouldn’t compete with your own sister?”

I gave her a faint smile. She might have had a hand in my sister’s death. If she was so eager to put herself forward now, she would make an excellent example later.

The moon was high. Shen Yixuan had yet to appear in the bridal chamber when someone began kicking the door.

Ruyue, my personal maid, went to answer it, furious.

“What fine manners this family has! Are you going to behave like common louts and make a scene in the bridal chamber—oh!”

The door opened. Yu squeezed through, her hair in two bunches, dirt from head to foot. Without a moment’s hesitation, she tried to fling earthworms and loaches at me.

“I don’t care what kind of horrible aunt you are! You’re marrying into this house today, and I’m warning you—don’t you dare start scheming against Jin and me!”

My sister had married far from home. I hardly knew the children.

Clearly someone had been filling their heads with the idea that I meant to hurt them.

Yu wiped mud from her face, lifted her chin, and waited stubbornly for me to shriek like some delicate young lady.

Instead, I rose, wet my red bridal veil, and walked toward her.

She was only a child. I could see her fear as she drew her head back, though she still glared at me defiantly.

“I’m the marquis’s eldest legitimate daughter! You’re only a second wife. What do you dare do to me?”

Before she could finish, I wiped the mud from her face with my veil, tipped up her plump little chin, and gave her cheek a firm pinch.

“Well, would you look at that. No wonder my sister was always scolding me for making that face. Now that I can see it properly, it really is rather irritating.”

Ruyue covered her mouth and laughed.

“Miss Yu has exactly the same temper you had as a child, Madam. There’s no mistaking the family resemblance.”

Yu looked bewildered.

While she was still staring, Jin came in, nodding his head with the gravity of a grown man. Seeing Yu make trouble, he dropped to his knees and performed a solemn bow.

“My respects, Mother. It’s all Jin’s fault. I failed to stop my sister. Please don’t punish her.”

The teasing warmth vanished. The instant Yu saw her little brother kneeling and knocking his head to the floor, she panicked. She thrust herself in front of him, fists waving.

“Who do you think you are, making my brother bow to you like that—”

Only after all this commotion did Marquis Shen Yixuan stroll into the room. He glanced at Yu and waved a hand in distaste.

“Yu! Where did you learn your manners? Insulting a new bride like this. You’ll copy the Precepts for Women three times!”

Jin immediately turned and knelt to Shen Yixuan.

“Father, it’s all my fault—”

Shen Yixuan frowned and waved him away before he could finish. “Useless boy. Get out!”

The way he treated them sent a chill through me.

“It’s our wedding day, and you’re threatening and scolding my sister’s children. If word gets out, people will call me an unkind stepmother—and they’ll say you’ve forgotten your first wife now that you have a new one. Am I right, Brother-in-law?”

I drew out that last word, deliberately provoking him with the reminder.

He waved his hand. The servants understood at once and hurried the children away.

We were alone.

As the door closed, he handed me the wedding wine with an expressionless face. There was the suggestion of a smile in his eyes.

“Brother-in-law? What are you trying to remind me of?”

I meant to settle everything between us then and there. But he drank his wine, rose, and went out.

At the door, he left me one remark. “Think about what happened tonight.”

What a bastard.

A man of his age, still putting on these airs!

I could just imagine him secretly congratulating himself as he left: Ah, I really know how to keep a wife in line.

Shameless.

As though anyone wanted an old man like him.

I cursed him silently.

Everyone outside was part of my dowry retinue. They knew my temper. His departure did not trouble us; it gave me time to have them unpack and take stock of my possessions that night.

“Ruyue, what do you think of those children?”

“Miss Yu has a fierce temper, just like you as a child, Madam.

“Young Master Jin is the younger one, but he has better manners. Still, judging by what we just saw, the marquis is rather cold toward him.

“I’m afraid Miss Yu will be the one who needs more of your attention.”

I shook my head inwardly. Yu was a good child. Jin, on the other hand…

He reminded me far too much of an irritating little female cousin of mine. First she urged someone else into trouble, then rushed forward to play the sensible, well-behaved child and win the adults’ approval.

He had already learned every trick of a scheming household woman.

But he was the eldest legitimate son of this house. Another two years, and he might have been ruined beyond repair.

From Shen Yixuan’s treatment of him, I doubted anyone had bothered to bring him up properly at all.

That thought made me dislike Shen Yixuan a little more. A man who could not even raise his children. What use was he?