Chapter 1

Chapter 1

I bring death to my husbands.

I’ve already buried two of them.

My first husband was a military officer. He died on the battlefield.

We had one son together.

My second husband was a scholar. Later, he placed as Tanhua in the imperial examinations, only to drown by accident while overseeing flood control.

We had a son too.

I still live in the General’s Mansion.

My second husband was dirt poor, so even after we married, we lived in my first husband’s estate.

My first in-laws were open-minded people.

They didn’t blame me for bringing death to their only son. Instead, they thanked me for giving birth to his posthumous child.

After that, they treated me like their own daughter and doted on me dearly.

My Tanhua Husband was even introduced to me by my father-in-law.

In this dynasty, it was perfectly normal for widows to remarry.

One of our ancestors had even issued a law forbidding people from forcing widows to remain chaste.

Because my Tanhua Husband was poor, and because I couldn’t bear to part with my eldest son, Jindan, all of us lived in the General’s Mansion.

My in-laws wanted us to stay too.

With more people around, the place felt livelier.

Old people love a lively home.

I had a wonderful relationship with both of my husbands.

We were close, loving, and stood by each other through hardship.

They were both very considerate, and I went from an ignorant, sheltered young girl into a young married woman with a charm all her own.

Losing my general husband had already devastated me enough.

Then my Tanhua Husband died too.

That forced me to give up any thoughts of remarrying again.

Even if I dared to marry, who would dare take me?

Besides, I had two sons now: Jindan and Mudan.

Mudan was the child I had with my Tanhua Husband.

Jindan is three years old now, and Mudan is one.

As for me, I have nothing but beauty, yet I spend every night alone in an empty room. It is terribly lonely.

If I had never experienced the pleasures between a man and a woman, perhaps it would have been fine.

But both of my husbands had opened the door to a whole new world for me.

My body had been awakened, and my heart had tasted the sweetness of that affair as well.

Now, all at once, I had to live without it.

I was truly, desperately, unbearably starved.

So I decided to pray to the gods and Buddha, hoping I might meet another man who could bring me happiness.

My body was like a flower. Without the watering of love and passion, I felt as though half of me would wither away.

The other half lived for my children, for my duty as a mother.

I went to Fahua Temple to burn incense and planned to stay there for three days.

The two children were close, and my in-laws were taking care of them both.

I knelt in prayer for the entire morning. I had only two wishes: first, that my family would be healthy.

Second, that I would be granted a happy marriage.

In the afternoon, I slept the whole day away.

That night, Buddha answered my prayers.

After washing up, I gazed at myself in the mirror and indulged in a brief moment of self-pity. Then I put out the lamp and went to bed.

But as I slept and drifted, even in this pure and peaceful Buddhist sanctuary, desire still gnawed at me.

Mainly, it was my body having feelings of its own. I couldn’t control it either.

I thought back to the intimate moments I had shared in bed with my two husbands, the tenderness, the closeness, the way we had blended together like fish and water, and it only made it harder to sleep.

All I could do was clamp the quilt tightly between my legs to ease it a little.

Sigh.

Who could understand the loneliness of a young woman in her springtime, left alone in her chamber?