Chapter 1

Xun Yang froze for a moment, then his expression darkened.

“I’m not joking.”

“Neither am I.”

I raised my eyes and met his gaze without flinching.

For an instant he looked angry, as though this was not how I ought to behave.

But there was no ought about it.

I had known from the start that our marriage would not last.

Plant the wrong seed, and it will never bloom into the flower you hoped for.

Three years earlier, Xun Yang had used me as an excuse to defy his family.

It was an impeccable excuse. No one could find fault with it.

Except that I was innocent of the whole affair.

At the time, I had been back in the marquis’s household for barely a year.

My parents had kept their promises.

They did not compare me with the girl who had taken my place.

I could farm; she could manage a household. Both were skills. Had we grown up in each other’s circumstances, we would have learned each other’s trades. Neither made us worth more or less.

They did not take things from one of us to give to the other.

Do what you can with what you have. Buying goodwill with someone else’s belongings is a shabby thing to do.

Nor were they to exchange our betrotheds as they pleased.

When children cannot get along, it is often their elders who have behaved badly. If our parents wanted us to be good sisters, they ought to interfere less.

My parents and brother did well.

For that year, Gu Zhiyao and I lived peacefully together. There was no scheming, no plotting against each other. We were not close, but we treated each other courteously.

My adoptive parents had already died.

Gu Zhiyao had nowhere to go. My parents asked my opinion: they wanted to keep her as the family’s eldest daughter.

I nodded, and called her my elder sister of my own accord.

The babies had been exchanged by mistake during a flood. Neither family had done it deliberately.

Besides, my adoptive parents had been good to me.

They were poor, but they had loved me generously.

I could not deny that love simply because of the difference in our circumstances. For their sake, I was willing to care for their child too.

I accepted Gu Zhiyao as my sister willingly.

For a year, everyone was happy.

Then her betrothed appeared: Xun Yang, heir to the Duke of Jing.

Somehow he had learned about the exchanged daughters. Without warning, he broke his promise and demanded to marry me instead.

From that day, everything changed.

My parents, my brother, and Gu Zhiyao seemed suddenly to see my true colors: behind my open, honorable manner, I was a petty schemer.

My parents were angry with me.

My brother refused to speak to me.

Gu Zhiyao spent her days in tears.

Back then, my hopes were very simple. I would not confess to something I had not done. And I had a mouth; surely I could explain.

I went to my parents and told them exactly what I thought.

“Apart from those few banquets, I’ve never met Xun Yang in private.”

“His change of heart has nothing to do with me.”

“We should ask him what is going on.”

“However grand his family may be, he cannot exchange the marquis’s daughters whenever he pleases.”

“If his family has something in mind, they can say it plainly. I refuse to be used as their pawn.”

My parents seemed moved.

My brother relaxed a little.

Gu Zhiyao’s eyes shone.

They did believe me, a little.

After a year, they had some idea of my character. This was beneath me.

What happened next taught me something.

Some things obey no reason. For some people, merely existing is a crime.

Xun Yang came to the house himself with his answer: the duke’s family had chosen me.

“What does it matter that she grew up in the country? Go back a few generations, and so did all of us.”

“As for manners and propriety, I’m sure the marquis’s own daughter is no fool. She can learn.”

“If your family wishes to keep an adopted daughter, that is your affair. Our family places greater value on blood.”

Then he lowered his head and smiled at me.

“The betrothal was always between us. We would never accept an impostor.”

He was looking straight at me, but watching Gu Zhiyao from the corner of his eye.

Watching her face drain of color and her eyes redden.

A strange satisfaction came over his face, as though he had finally taken revenge.

Unease stirred in me. He hated Gu Zhiyao.

Why?

Hadn’t they grown up together?