The journey ahead would take a full day inside the automobile—she meant to travel as comfortably as possible. Braiding her hair would make things far easier. Su Fuying had finished one plait and was starting the second when she realized she was short of a hair tie. She searched the tabletop but found none.
Song Bo noticed her hesitation and stepped over. “What is it?”
“I seem to have misplaced one—though it was here only a moment ago.”
Song Bo glanced around and spotted it lying near the bedside. Su Fuying reached to take it—only for Song Bo to gently hold the end of her braid.
“Let me. I believe I can manage this.”
“My sisters wore their hair in long braids when we were small. This… I know better than I knew how to dry your hair.”
Su Fuying watched him in the mirror, a soft smile playing about her lips.
After they dined in the hotel restaurant, Su Fuying returned to her room and tried to lose herself in her books. Song Bo did not come back immediately—doubtless attending to official business with Yu Sui. She paid it no mind, yet as she read, it seemed every corner of the room still held his presence. She could scarcely focus.
Outside, the gale and downpour finally began to die away. Su Fuying set her books aside, reviewed her planned route, made a small adjustment, and began packing.
The rain kept easing, yet Song Bo had not returned. She walked over to the coat rack and took his still-damp suit. She hung it properly and dried it carefully with the hairdryer.
A knock came at the door—too faint to hear clearly over the hum of the dryer. She switched it off. “Who is it?”
“Me.”
At the sound of Song Bo’s voice her shoulders relaxed. “Come in.”
She turned the dryer back on, working carefully at the last damp cuff, ready to fold it away and depart. When Song Bo stepped inside, he found her drying his clothing.
The dryer fell still in her hand—he reached out and pressed it gently down, his tone quiet and firm. “Why leave the door unlocked?”
“You were not here. If I locked it, I should have had to rise and open it for you.”
The reply came naturally, almost before she knew it—as though they had been husband and wife for years.
The suit was dry at last. She folded it neatly and placed it back inside the paper bag Yu Sui had brought. Outside, the rain had dwindled to a drizzle. Night was nearly upon them.
“General—when shall we leave?”
Song Bo glanced toward the window. The downpour had broken; visibility was returning. “Are you ready?”
Su Fuying nodded. “I saw the rain slackening and packed while I waited.”
Song Bo stood, lifted her suitcase, and took the paper bag. Yu Sui’s voice called out from beyond the door at just that moment. “General, Miss Su—we are ready.”
Su Fuying slung her satchel and followed Song Bo out. Two automobiles waited at the entrance. Tong Da would lead the way in the first; Shi Chang followed behind in the second. Su Fuying and Song Bo rode together in this rear car, with Yu Sui in the front passenger seat.
The first half of the journey passed along the planned route. But when they stopped to rest, Su Fuying proposed a change. Traveling alone, she would have had no reason to avoid the Northern Faction’s territory. But Song Bo rode with her. Warlords and central forces clashed across the region; local commanders held fiefdoms and answered to no one. To pass through their lands with Song Bo beside her was to invite danger. He had brought no guard—doubtless to keep his movements secret. And directly ahead lay the domain of Tu Guangyu—a man renowned for cunning and treachery. Su Fuying would not risk it. Not merely for the examinations—for their lives.
She sipped water and looked across at him. “Not far ahead lies General Tu’s jurisdiction. Let us take the long way round.”
Song Bo had already seen her original route the night before. It was well-paved, direct, and swift. But it passed through Tu’s checkpoint—where scrutiny was severe. To travel that way was to announce his presence to the very man he had come to avoid. Still—he had not come unprepared.
He capped his canteen. “We shall travel via Xincheng—the New City.”
Xincheng had been rebuilt after the war. Though nominally under Northern administration, it stood at the junction of three factions—Northern, Western, and Southern. Every major warlord had stationed troops there, as a show of commitment to post-war restoration. Loyalties were tangled there, and far more complex. But Song Bo also had men there. It was farther than Su Fuying’s chosen road—but if all went well, it would prove both faster and safer.
Song Bo stood and gave Yu Sui the order to depart. Su Fuying felt a sudden, quiet foolishness—as if she had presumed too much.
“Come,” Song Bo said, extending his hand.
She took it and rose. As he helped her into the car, he spoke so quietly she scarcely heard. “Travel with me. You need not weigh a single danger. I shall bear every burden, and solve every problem.”
Su Fuying stood still, his words echoing in her mind. No one—ever—had spoken to her like that. Her mother had died giving birth to Su Qingwan, barely a year after she was born. Her father had always let them fend for themselves; every difficulty had been hers to solve. In her past life, when the Qin family had imprisoned her, he had stood aside and let her suffer. He had never acted as a father ought. And yet men praised Su Hanhai—called him constant, devoted. In truth, he had never remarried because he was poor. He possessed no great talent, only a knack for empty courtesy. His position was a post given him by others—so he might bear the brunt of their anger. The entire Su household stood balanced on a knife’s edge.
Song Bo had already wired ahead to Xincheng. Their passage through the checkpoint was smooth and unhindered. The city had been rebuilt—yet the soot-stained walls, the chipped and pitted stone, still spoke of invasion. For the first time Su Fuying saw the face of war—not fresh ruin, but ruin nonetheless. She could scarcely imagine the power of the bombs that had leveled homes. She thought of the newspapers—of aircraft circling endlessly overhead, silent and unseen until their cargo fell. She had read that the enemy possessed weapons far beyond anything Huaxia could match. Against them, her country was helpless.
She looked at Song Bo, who was gazing out the window at the same devastation. What had he been thinking, when he rode alone into enemy territory? Had he gone prepared to die?
Only now, in this quiet moment, did Su Fuying truly grasp the peril and helplessness of these war-torn years. Haishi endured because foreign concessions held the city divided—but those concessions were themselves a kind of invasion. Guns and aircraft could be turned upon Haishi, upon every city in the land, at any moment. If not for Song Bo—and the aircraft designs he had seized—who could say whether Haishi itself would still stand?