Chapter 6

Chapter 6

For three full days and nights, my mind churned back and forth between clarity and delirium.

By the time my fever finally broke, it was already the early hours of the fourth day.

Dawn had yet to come, and the room was pitch-black.

In that silent night, a low, vast melody from a flute drifted in, thread by thread, seeping softly into the darkness. It was like a frail, sickly swallow dancing again and again in the dawn.

So fresh, so free, yet so lonely and unrestrained.

I struggled out of bed, only to feel as if both my feet were being licked by flames. By the moonlight, I looked down at my hands and saw two deep scars stretched across my palms like centipedes.

The bronze mirror beneath the window reflected a small face, white as a corpse.

All at once, the flute fell silent.

I lifted my head and looked out through a finger-wide crack in the window.

The man stood in the courtyard, a flute in hand. In the first pale light of dawn, tiny glimmers clung to his sleeves and hair, as though he were a painting stained in rich black ink.

His noble elegance only made my filth and lowliness all the more stark.

Our eyes met, and I couldn’t help but shrink back, my pupils tightening.

“Han…”

The word had barely left my mouth before I felt it was wrong.

Not knowing what attitude I should take with him, I changed the subject instead. “These hands of mine… will I never be able to hold a sword again?”

After a brief pause, Han Mo nodded lightly. “I invited a renowned physician to tend to you. He stitched your wounds.

“But as for how well you’ll recover, that remains to be seen.”

When he finished, silence fell between us.

Seeing how distant he was, I was instantly overcome with shame. “You saved me. If there is anything you want, once my body recovers…”

“No need.”

At that, he refused without the slightest hesitation. “I have no intention of forcing anything from you.

“From now on, you may settle here.

“Unless I send word, I will not come.”

With that, he ignored the awkward look on my face.

Then he stepped across the silver-white moonlight and swept his sleeves away.

During my days at Han Manor, Han Mo truly kept his word.

He never came to that small courtyard again.

My wounds healed very slowly. According to the physician, it was mainly because the tendons and channels in my hands and feet had been severed. Since they had been stitched in time, I had already recovered far better than expected.

In the days that followed, whenever I caught the scent of blood and sweat on myself-

I would recall fragments of memory.

I would remember the person sitting at my bedside deep in the night, his cool fingers brushing over my flushed cheeks, bringing with them an ambiguous dampness. Or how he would check my pupils from time to time, then patiently feed me thin porridge and plain water.

And the way I repaid him-

Was with venomous, naked insults.

Every time I remembered a little more, I would spend the entire day tossing and turning in sleepless regret.