Everyone in the capital said that a first-rank maid from the Prime Minister’s Residence was worth more than the daughter of a fifth-rank official.
As the personal maid to the prime minister’s daughter, I had followed the Fourth Young Lady since childhood, learning to read and write at her side.
I understood literature and ink, knew music, and was versed in arithmetic.
When I was nineteen, the merchant Wen Family of Qingzhou, eager to attach themselves to power, came specifically to ask for my hand-a mere maidservant’s-in marriage.
The Fourth Young Lady showed me grace, acknowledged me as her sworn younger sister, and married me off in splendor.
I had thought the inner courtyard of a merchant household would be simple. I never imagined its waters would run as deep as those of the Prime Minister’s Residence.
The Second Branch eyed the account books with envy, while the concubines banded together to put me in my place.
On the day I served tea to my elders, Concubine Zhou “accidentally” knocked over the teacup, and scalding water splashed across the hem of my newly tailored Su embroidery skirt.
I lightly brushed my fingers over the ruined twining lotus pattern on the fabric, then suddenly smiled.
Since some people insisted on throwing themselves onto the edge of a blade-
Then I would show them exactly what the methods of the Prime Minister’s Residence looked like.
