Chapter 13

Three days later, Ye Cangfeng and I were married before a multitude of guests.

They watched eagerly, hoping I’d celebrate with a long-awaited bout.

I knocked some sense into them with a punch apiece.

During our bows to Heaven and Earth, my bridal crown slipped a little, and I raised a hand to straighten it.

The moment I lifted my hand, everyone on both sides dropped to their knees with a thud.

“I thought she was going to hit me!” Young Master Shen said tearfully.

Beside him, Young Master Chu sighed deeply. “The war is over, Brother.”

In the bridal chamber, the wedding candles burned silently, like a dream we dared not disturb.

Ye Cangfeng stood before me in his wedding robes, his eyes seeming to hold a thousand unspoken things.

Suddenly, he said, “The first time we met, I really hated you.”

“Even after you beat up Bighead and the others for me, I still didn’t like you all that much. Back then, I thought you were someone who could be bought with a few pastries.”

He suddenly gave a small, self-mocking laugh.

“I was separated from my mother as a child, and my father was always away. That’s how I developed this suspicious, cold disposition.”

“When I was bullied, Mother told me to endure it. Father thought I was useless.”

“Only you didn’t care in the slightest what sort of person I was.”

He gently lifted my red veil. His smile was mountain mist, snow at the eaves, slowly melting into water before my eyes.

“When you stood against my father for me that day, the first thing that came to mind was you eating pastries, your eyes narrowed with happiness.”

“I was afraid you’d anger him and get thrown out, and then you wouldn’t have your favorite pastries anymore.”

“So I decided I’d go with you.”

“But I discovered that you didn’t actually need me. Wu Zheng would do perfectly well without Ye Cangfeng. But without you, Ye Cangfeng couldn’t go on living.”

I gripped his hand.

“That’s not true. I know they’re all using me—using my defiance, using my sharp edges. But only you want to be my scabbard, a place to shelter that edge.”

My parents named me Wu Zheng, hoping I’d never have to contend for anything in my life.

But I’d failed their hopes. I’d had no choice but to fight.

Ye Cangfeng’s parents had named him “the sheltered blade,” yet his edge still showed.

He must have suffered so much too.

I lifted my face and smiled at him.

“It’s all right. I’ll protect you.”

Meeting him was like a sharp sword at last finding the right scabbard.

However wild and untamable I might be toward this world, when I turned back, there would still be somewhere soft for my weary soul to rest.

The End