“Have you put it away?”
What was bad, what was jealous—Anning would never limit herself with such labels. She did as she pleased.
She could tell that the Third Prince wasn’t actually angry; if anything, he seemed pleased by her words. So she immediately pressed her advantage, wrapping her arms tightly around his waist and acting spoiled. “I want it like this! Like this! Like this!”
The Third Prince’s waist was rather sensitive, and her wriggling made him unbearably ticklish. He hurriedly agreed to whatever she wanted just to escape, and the two of them tumbled together onto the small couch, wrestling and laughing.
The dark green little bird thought they wanted to play with it, so it hopped over from the withered branch, spreading its wings and chirping noisily.
“Little Leaf, quiet! No chirping!”
Anning pretended to scold it.
“It takes after its master.” He propped himself up on the couch and casually stroked the bird’s feathers.
“It’s not my master,” Anning said, lying down in front of him with her feet kicked up behind her, swaying. She lowered her voice to a whisper and said deliberately, “It’s Xuanye’s bird.”
The Third Prince paused slightly, glancing sideways at her.
In his eyes, Anning saw her own reflection.
He said, “Call me that from now on.”
Anning was stunned for a moment, then asked in a small voice, “My mother said it’s a great disrespect to call a prince by his given name, but calling you Third Prince feels too distant.” You’re two years older than me, so I’ve always called you Third Brother. Don’t you like it when I call you that?”
“If there’s a Third Brother, then there’s a First Brother,” the Third Prince countered. “If there weren’t only two princes older than you, how many brothers would you have?”
For others to call him by his name directly would indeed be a great disrespect—but she was different.
The “First Brother” he referred to was the First Prince.
“…” His words sounded strange—like he was angry, yet not quite.
Anning was confused. She gave an “oh,” obediently agreed, and dropped the subject.
“Oh, right!” She dashed back into the inner chamber and returned moments later, holding out an exquisite mother-of-pearl treasure box. “Brother Xuanye, I have something to give you!”
“What is it?” The Third Prince’s gaze lingered on her rosy cheeks before falling upon the treasure box, as if he understood. “You want to give me a gift?”
Anning beamed and opened the box. “These are all the treasures I’ve saved up over the years. You can pick one—whatever you want, I’ll give it to you! No regrets!”
Treasures?
The Third Prince raised an eyebrow slightly.
He glanced inside, and his expression froze. He picked up a cloth doll from the top. “This is…”
The doll was sewn in the shape of a little monkey. It had faded from frequent washing, clearly having been played with many times.
Anning quickly took it back and hugged it to her chest, stroking the little monkey’s head affectionately. “My mother sewed this for me with her own hands. It’s been sleeping with me ever since I was born. Don’t crush it.”
The monkey was her zodiac animal. The Third Prince now understood what was in this box. He took out another item—a sachet. “And this?”
“My wet nurse made it for me when I was little. Smell it—it still has the scent of milk cakes inside!”
How rank must that be?
“…” Who would dare smell it?
The Third Prince’s mouth twitched slightly. He looked at the others—there was even a small, well-worn blanket. He remarked with some amazement, “These are all things you used as a child. I suppose you can’t bear to part with them?”
Anning nodded earnestly. “My mother said that if she took them away, I would cry endlessly and refuse to sleep.”
“No wonder.” So she was someone with shallow tear ducts.
These few exchanges had opened the floodgates, and she eagerly began introducing everything to him.
“Look,” she said, picking up a smooth, translucent white stone and holding it up for him to see. “This is a pebble I found by the lake when our family went to the summer resort years ago. Isn’t it especially round? Especially white? Doesn’t it look just like a big pearl?”
The Third Prince examined it closely and noticed the pebble had been polished smooth enough to reflect light. He glanced at her small hands. “That must have taken great effort.”
“Of course it did! I only ever found this one—even my father and mother couldn’t find one!” Anning was very proud of this. Her grandfather had praised her, saying she had sharper eyes than anyone else.
He shook his head and praised her considerately. “Sister Anning is truly remarkable.”
Anning was so pleased she practically preened. These were all worthless trinkets, so she dug deeper into the box and pulled out a jade bi carved in the shape of an auspicious cloud. “This was given to me by my grandfather last year when I recited a poem from memory. I heard it’s very precious.”
The jade bi was nearly transparent, like dark clouds about to shed rain. When touched, it carried a lingering chill. “Cold jade?” The Third Prince was genuinely surprised. “Truly precious. It would be wonderful to hold in summer to cool off.”
Anning winced at the thought of parting with it. She hesitated for a moment, then steeled herself and shoved it into the Third Prince’s arms. “It’s yours!”
This genuinely surprised him. “You…” He could clearly see the reluctance on her face—as if she was afraid she might change her mind.
“Hurry and put it away!” So she wouldn’t have to look at it.
She covered her eyes and lowered her head, pretending to continue rummaging through the treasure box.
“Have you put it away?”
After a moment, his usual calm voice came. “Yes.”
—”What is this?”
“Ah!”
Anning looked closely. “Ah, be gentle!”
It was a strange red maple leaf, as large as two palms, pressed flat and stiff to the touch—so brittle that a little more pressure would crush it to pieces.
But it wasn’t the withered yellow hue of a sun-dried maple leaf. Instead, it was stained with blotches of black ink.
“You wrote on it?”
“You could tell?” Anning muttered, leaning in to look at it with him. “The writing’s already illegible now.”
Was it really that hard to guess? In the few days she’d been practicing calligraphy, similar marks had been all over her rice paper.
The two were sitting close together; Third Prince had to lower his gaze to see her face clearly. “Give this to me.”
“Hm?” Anning immediately sat up straight. “You want this?” She stared at the leaf in disbelief, pointing at it.
“A black leaf for Xuanye—isn’t it a perfect match?” he said with certainty, making no move to return it.
“…” Shameless.
Anning held her breath, but didn’t dare say it out loud.
That meant he’d taken two things from her now—she was heartbroken… This was the biggest maple leaf she’d ever picked.
The next moment, her eyes were covered by his hand.
She flailed and grabbed at his hand. “What are you doing?”
“No cursing at me.” The hand covered her eyes again.
“…I wasn’t.” Her mouth was covered now too, and she protested with muffled whines.
“Not even with your eyes.”
He could be quite intimidating when his face was expressionless, but Anning wasn’t afraid of him anymore. She opened her mouth and bit his hand.
Sure enough, she earned a sharp hiss of pain.
That night, as she prepared for bed, Anning was still feeling quite pleased with herself. Third Prince had been bitten by her, and he hadn’t gotten angry—he’d only pinched her cheek hard.
She went to the bronze mirror and examined herself from both sides, confirming there were no marks left, then hummed a tune as she waited for Talu to comb her hair.
“Miss, if you’re not going to admire these items, this servant will put them away for you.”
“Mhm mhm, yes, yes.” Anning pinched her own cheek, then paused as it registered. “What items?”
She trotted over to look. In Talu’s hands was a precious piece of cold jade shaped like an auspicious cloud.
Anning was stunned, hardly believing her eyes. “Where did you find this?”
Talu pointed to the small couch. “There—it was on the couch, pressed firmly beneath the soft pillow. This servant almost missed it; I thought you’d forgotten to put it back in the treasure box.”
Author’s Note:
Here we go.