Chapter 2

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Chapter 2

After writing the divorce letter, he crumpled it into a ball and threw it at Qinghe’s feet. She bent to pick it up, slowly smoothed it flat, then folded it and tucked it into her sleeve. Gritting his teeth, the Xiao clan head ordered the genealogy amended. Xiao Chengli’s name was crossed out on the spot.

The Shen grand elder nodded and ordered that Qinghe be entered into the senior branch of the Shen clan.

“Gu Qinghe, of the Gu family, is respectful, virtuous, and observant of propriety. From this day forward, she is entered as Shen Zhaoning’s daughter and the Shen clan’s legitimate eldest daughter. She shall bear the name Shen Qinghe.”

Qinghe bowed before the ancestral tablets of both families, her back still straight. Just before she stepped out of the ancestral hall, Xiao Chengli suddenly turned around.

“Gu Qinghe, do you think clinging to my mother will change your fate?”

He pointed at Qinghe, malice curling at the corners of his mouth.

“A cast-off wife who can’t bear children—let’s see who would marry you once you’re away from me!”

No one answered him. The great doors of the ancestral hall closed behind him, shutting out even the last shred of his dignity. Before the ink on the amended genealogy had dried, Xiao Chengli had ceased to be the heir to the Xiao marquisate.

The divorce letter in Qinghe’s hand was no longer a mark of rejection. It was proof that she had escaped that marriage. Both matters had been settled together; no one could exploit an ambiguous status to force her back.

3

As Xiao Chengli left with Cui’er, he tried to go to the rear courtyard to collect his belongings. I ordered the steward to stop him and allow him to take only the personal effects he had brought to the manor himself. I told him the Marquis of Dingyuan’s residence had been bestowed on me by His Majesty; not one brick or tile belonged to him.

He glared at the gatekeeper, but in the end he did not dare make a scene before the Emperor. Not a single chest of Qinghe’s dowry was missing; it was all carried back to the main courtyard. The household accounts were entrusted to her, and the storeroom keys and seals were placed in her hands one after another.

He had been struck from the Xiao genealogy, and there would be no room kept for him in the manor. The servants moved his old trunks outside the gate. They would not even let him take the carriage he always used. As for Xiao Chengli’s old clothes, I ordered them sent straight to the kitchen.

Among them was the brocade robe he had loved most as a boy. I did not keep it. It was no longer a keepsake; it only reminded me how badly I had spoiled him. Once the hall was empty except for Qinghe and me, the shoulders she had stubbornly kept straight finally sagged.

“Mother…”

She had only to say the word for her eyes to redden. I went to her and drew her down beside me.

“Mother, you opened the ancestral hall for my sake and cast out your son. It isn’t worth it. The physician said long ago that it would be very difficult for me to bear a child in this life.”

Seeing her take all the blame upon herself made my heart ache.

“Qinghe, have you forgotten what happened before?”

“In the first year after you married into the family, Xiao Chengli grew greedy for merit and led his men deep into the Qilian Mountains. They were trapped by heavy snow for five days and nights.”

“Who carried charcoal and wound medicine, trudged through snow up to her knees, and searched for him all night in the dark?”

Qinghe stiffened slightly and lowered her eyes without a word.

“You did. By the time you found him, the skin on your toes had peeled from frostbite. That was when you developed the cold condition in your womb.”

“He knelt before me then and swore to Heaven that he would never take a concubine in this life, and that even if he had no heir, he would respect you until old age.”

The more I spoke, the more I felt she had sacrificed herself for a man unworthy of her.

“Now he steps on the military merit you won with your life to climb higher, then turns around and blames you for being unable to bear children?”

“You never wronged him. He is the one who wronged you.”

For seven years, Xiao Chengli had deliberately made everyone forget what Qinghe had sacrificed. But that snowstorm, that night, and the damage to her body were all real.

“Now that you are a daughter of the Shen family, you need not follow the Xiao family’s rules, nor prove your worth by whether or not you can bear a child.”

I wiped away her tears with a handkerchief.

“Qinghe, just be yourself. Live your life well.”

She looked at me for a long while, then finally asked what had weighed on her heart.

“Why are you treating me this way?”

I smiled and held her hand between my palms.

“Because I have no daughter in this life.”

“I have only one son, Xiao Chengli. When I was young, I always hoped for a daughter, but it was not to be.”

“The year you married into our family, I thought how wonderful it would be if you were my own daughter.”

“Later, I came to see that blood ties are not so important after all.”

Qinghe rose and knelt solemnly before me.

“I understand.”

This time, I accepted her bow without hesitation before helping her up. When she had saved Xiao Chengli, she had not known it would leave her with difficulty conceiving. She had only known that her husband was trapped in the mountains.

Later, Xiao Chengli turned her sacrifice into her failing. Once the truth of that sacrifice was made clear, she finally understood: being childless was not a crime dropped from the heavens, nor a debt she owed anyone.

4

Qinghe did not fall apart. The very next day, she changed back into the clothes of an unmarried young lady.

The long-standing gloom between her brows had faded, and she seemed poised and brisk once more. I set a thick ledger before her.

“Dry your tears, and then there’s work to do.”

She opened to the first page and found it filled with notes on the social ties of the capital’s noblewomen.

“In five days, the Grand Princess’s residence will hold an autumn chrysanthemum-viewing banquet in the West Garden. She oversees most of the charitable work in the capital and is always willing to support talented women.”

“Do you want me to take over the Shen family’s outside social affairs?”