Chapter 3
Fifth Madam was persuaded. She kept Yaer and me.
Not out of kindness. I told her that in five days, a stewardess from Qinghe Prefecture would come to buy servants. If Fifth Madam waited by the city gate, she could get ahead of the other brokers. Qinghe was rich in great households and richer still in officials. One connection there would be worth far more than a single sale.
I had not invented the story.
Three months earlier, when Mother was sold to the brothel, I heard the madam sigh that Mother had a lovely face. Had she never borne children, she might have become a maid in a great Qinghe household. Even as a married woman, if she could wait three months for Qinghe’s buyers, she might still be taken as a rough servant.
Mother herself had once been a prostitute, and the madam pitied her enough to offer that advice. Father did not listen to a word. He sold her straight into the pleasure quarters.
Neither of them realized that I had heard everything.
Rich households paid generously. Any girl selected from the broker’s yard would fetch at least as much as a brothel or traveling troupe offered. And if my sister and I were not chosen, Fifth Madam could still take us to the human-meat market without losing money.
Once she saw it that way, her interest sharpened.
We no longer had to survive on thin gruel. We received bowls of millet rice and whole garments. While Fifth Madam calculated her profit, I quietly calculated our escape.
Five days later, the stewardess from Qinghe arrived.
Girls of every age lined the courtyard for her inspection. She wore embroidered silk and enough jeweled hairpins to crown her whole head.
“My masters prize beauty,” she said. “They sent me for young, tender girls. Even if they do no work, a pretty vase is pleasant to look at, isn’t it? But these girls of yours are either too clumsy or too old. How could my masters want them?”
Her dangling ornaments chimed as she shook her head. Then her gaze landed on Yaer and me, and her eyes lit up.
“Oh! Those two are pretty. What a shame…”
“What is a shame?” Fifth Madam asked, bowing as she offered tea.
The woman sighed with theatrical regret. “Fine shells, but no allure.”
I was eight that year. Precocious though I was, I knew nothing of desire and could only watch her prepare to leave empty-handed.
As she went, I heard her gossiping with Fifth Madam.
“…Pretty enough, yes, but my master wants a Guanyin girl. I doubt she would do… Besides, what pleasure is there in two sisters who look alike?”
Great households often kept private shrines, and buying a girl to attend the gods did not sound strange to me. I believed this was the moment that would decide our fate. If we could not board the carriage to Qinghe, we might end up as meat on a platter.
I lowered my eyes. My decision was made.
In the next instant, I snatched a hairpin from the girl beside me and drove it toward Yaer.
Fifth Madam lunged with a cry, but she was too late.
Blood ran down my little sister’s tender face. Under everyone’s horrified stare, I pulled my mouth into a smile.
“Madam, does this Guanyin girl please you?”
The woman stared for a moment. Then she crouched and wiped Yaer’s cheek with a silk handkerchief. Blood still welled from the puncture between her brows. Against her delicate features, the mark truly did make her resemble the white porcelain Guanyin in a side shrine.
The woman smiled. “Now she has something of the proper spirit.”
Fifth Madam understood at once and ordered a contract drawn up.
While they pressed their seals to the paper, I pulled Yaer aside. “Be good and go with Nanny. Qinghe is full of rich people. You will have food there.”
Yaer’s mouth crumpled. Belatedly, she began to cry, her two yellow-ribboned braids trembling.
“Where is Qinghe, Sister? Who am I going with? Are you coming too?”
I stroked her cheek and did not know how to answer.
The girl beside us whispered, “You sisters look alike. If that woman wants your sister, she must want you too. Why not mark yourself with the pin?”
She meant well, but I knew it would not work. Once, at a temple fair, Mother had found two identical rabbit lanterns. She would never have bought both. She had to choose one.
Rarity gave a thing value. The same rule applied now.
“Qinghe is far away, and the carriage is too small for everyone. You go first. I will follow.”
“When will you come?”
I swallowed the sob in my throat, wiped her tears, and promised with all the solemnity I had. “On your next birthday.”
Children think simply. The moment I promised, Yaer brightened. “You have to remember!”
The contract was signed within moments. The woman took Yaer by the hand and climbed into the carriage without looking back. The rest of us were herded indoors like dogs strung together on a rope.
Fifth Madam gave a scornful laugh. “You plan well for such a little girl, and your heart is hard enough. But Qinghe may be rich; that doesn’t mean a girl sold there goes to enjoy herself. Aren’t you afraid your sister will hate you one day?”
I was eight. I could not understand what lay beneath her words. I thought she meant only the hardships of serving in a great house.
“A full belly and warm clothes are blessings enough. Everything else is horseshit.”
The girl beside me shrank so far into herself that her eyes nearly disappeared into her waistband, terrified that Fifth Madam would answer with the whip.
But Fifth Madam said nothing. She merely looked at me for a long moment, then closed the door.