Amidst the chirping of spring orioles and the swirling of scattered red petals, several girls aged seventeen or eighteen sat by the stone railings beneath the cool pavilion with its upturned eaves. Some smiled as they plucked flowers, while others gently fanned themselves with silk fans. Only one stood to the side, wringing her fingers and hanging her head low, looking utterly pitiful.
“Jiang Yingyue, have you made up your mind?”
By the railing, a girl dressed in a vermilion skirt embroidered with golden pomegranate patterns plucked a crimson rose and idly tore off its petals. She raised her eyes and asked, “Will you marry Third Young Master Liu from the east of the city, or will you marry my father and become the fill-in wife of an old man?”
“Oh, Ah Shao, how can you speak of your own father like that?” A girl in a pink skirt beside her covered her mouth with a light laugh, her eyes gleaming with amusement. “But to be honest, Master Wang is indeed old enough to be Fifth Miss Jiang’s father. If it were me, I could never bear it.”
“But I’ve heard that Third Young Master Liu from the east of the city isn’t easy to get along with either,” someone chimed in, eager to stir the pot. Covering the lower half of her face with her silk fan, she lowered her voice and said, “Last year alone, he tormented three concubines to death!”
Beneath the pavilion, Jiang Yingyue’s face grew paler and paler. She hung her head so low that she almost seemed to merge with her own shadow. She hadn’t wanted to attend today’s flower-viewing banquet, but she had no choice.
The slightly worn handkerchief in her hand was crumpled into a ball. Her fingers brushed against the embroidered pattern of a river reflecting the moon—delicate and soft, yet it felt like a thin thread tightly wrapped around her fingers, squeezing all the way into her heart.
The handkerchief was embroidered by her mother, the flower-viewing banquet was arranged by her mother, and even the marriage prospects were arranged by her father and her mother.
“Although Master Wang is a bit older, you’ll become the legitimate wife as soon as you marry him. Besides, he only has one daughter. As long as you can bear him a son, you’ll have a comfortable life ahead.”
“But…” Jiang Yingyue remembered whispering her objection at the time, “But the way he looks at me makes me feel uncomfortable.”
It felt as if a greasy hand had secretly grabbed her arm in the dark, slowly creeping up her skin. When she couldn’t help but scream, it would suddenly pull away, leaving behind a look of exaggerated shock and the strange gazes of those around her.
“Just endure it… you’ll get used to it,” her mother had held her hand and sighed, speaking earnestly. “Your mother is of low status, and you’re a child born of a concubine. With such a background, you can either become a concubine in a wealthy household or the legitimate wife of a poor family. Your mother has been poor before, living a life where you have to calculate every penny for food and fuel. I don’t want you to suffer through that again…”
Jiang Yingyue could no longer remember the rest of her mother’s words. Only the flickering candlelight of that night and her mother’s tearful, weary eyes remained deeply etched in her memory. And so, she was led by them to the teahouse for the marriage prospect meeting, and she was dragged by them into blurring the memories of that time.
Until…
“Fifth Miss Jiang,” Wang Shao’s voice abruptly pulled her back to the pavilion where she stood now. “Fifth Miss Jiang surely doesn’t want to be harassed day after day anymore, does she? The other day it was street thugs, but who knows—in a few days, it might be bandits or ruffians.”
“Oh my, that would be too dreadful!” The girl in the pink skirt chuckled softly in agreement. “Whether she could return unscathed from a bandit’s den is one thing, but even if she were fine, with so many people in Lingcheng, just one spit from each would be enough to drown Fifth Miss Jiang.”
“I remember Li Erniang from the tailor shop in the west of the city—she seemed to have run into the mountains to take her own life because of this,” sighed the young woman in a blue dress by the stone table. “Ah, it’s truly too pitiful…”
Jiang Yingyue’s face had turned as pale as paper, her frail figure swaying unsteadily, as if she might collapse to the ground at any moment.
“If you ladies truly feel pity, a slight gesture of leniency would be enough to fulfill your noble compassion.”
Suddenly, a somewhat familiar voice came from across the way. Everyone looked up to see a tall, slender figure standing in the winding corridor, the hem of her bamboo-green skirt fluttering slightly in the breeze. Gu Ning slowly walked into the pavilion.
“Gu Ning?” Wang Shao crushed the rose in her hand. “What are you doing here?”
“As you can see,” Gu Ning pointed to the medicine chest in her hand, “I’m here to examine Magistrate Wang.”
“Impossible. Our Wang household has long hired a physician,” Wang Shao looked her up and down with disdain. “How could a wild doctor like you, who appeared out of nowhere, possibly examine my father?”
Unless…
“Fine, Gu Ning, you shameless thing! How dare you seduce my father? I’ll beat your face to a pulp!”
Wang Shao slapped the railing and stood up, rushing forward in two or three steps. Gu Ning flicked her wrist, and several silver acupuncture needles were already in her palm. In the blink of an eye, just as Wang Shao raised her hand high to strike, a hand suddenly grabbed Wang Shao’s wrist.
Wang Shao struggled with all her might, but the hand gripping her wrist didn’t budge an inch. Turning her head, she saw it was Jiang Yingyue!
“Let go of me!”
“Miss Wang,” Jiang Yingyue shook her head stubbornly, “you mustn’t hit people recklessly.”
“Are you already acting like a stepmother before you’ve even married my father? Hah, who cares about you!” But the hand gripping her wrist tightened even more, and Wang Shao grimaced in pain, unable to believe it. “How dare you pinch me?!”
“I didn’t…” Jiang Yingyue withdrew her hand, aggrieved. She just didn’t want Wang Shao to take her anger out on innocent people again.
“You say you didn’t pinch me, then what is this?!” Wang Shao pushed up her sleeve, revealing shocking blue and purple bruises on her snow-white wrist.
Jiang Yingyue said nothing, only hanging her head as if frightened by Wang Shao, looking delicate, fragile, and utterly pitiful.
Damn green tea bitch!
Wang Shao’s fury burned hotter, and she raised her hand high again. Several of the young ladies nearby, who had been startled, snapped back to reality and hurriedly grabbed her arm. “Ah… you mustn’t, you mustn’t!”
“Today, anyone who stops me from hitting her is my enemy!”
“A-Shao, you really mustn’t!” Wang Shao’s clique of friends held her even tighter. “If Jiang Yingyue truly gets angry, we might all get our faces beaten to a pulp!”
For a moment, the pavilion was in chaos, with everyone scrambling and shouting. Only Jiang Yingyue stood there, twisting her fingers, looking aggrieved and bewildered.
Gu Ning couldn’t help but chuckle softly. She finally understood why the young shop assistant had said it was Miss Wang who should be worried. Lin Daiyu uprooting a willow tree—Jiang Yingyue possessed great strength without even realizing it.
“Fifth Miss Jiang,” Gu Ning stepped forward with a smile, “actually, today I came not only at the invitation of the prefectural magistrate to examine Magistrate Wang but also for you, Fifth Miss Jiang.”
Jiang Yingyue blinked somewhat helplessly. “…Me?”
Gu Ning smiled lightly. “I’d like to discuss a business deal with Fifth Miss Jiang.”
…
In the private room of the Zhenxiu Pavilion, Hong Yao paced anxiously, unable to stop herself from muttering, “Why hasn’t she come after all this time? Could something have happened? I shouldn’t have listened to the young lady and let her go to that prince’s mansion alone…”
“Someone from the prince’s mansion sent a message… General… General Zhenyuan…”
Suddenly, intermittent, drunken voices drifted in from the neighboring room. Hearing the familiar title, Hong Yao couldn’t help but stop in her tracks, holding her breath and focusing intently.
“…This time… this time he’s really finished.”