Spring Returns to Me

“Xingyi, could you please not go?”

“You’re not in good health, and Mobei is bitterly cold. This journey…”

Shen Xingyi lowered his head and looked at me quietly.

Those eyes that had always held the warmth of spring were now covered in ice.

“Zhao’er is in a difficult position too. This journey is fraught with danger. How can you be so heartless?”

“Du Yuning, you already have everything you wanted: the position of Marchioness and all the wealth and honor that come with it.”

“What more do you want?”

His voice was as cold as the depths of winter.

I had no answer. I could only let go.

Shen Xingyi did not love me.

I had always known that.

He was supposed to be the bright moon high in the sky, while Princess Pei Yunzhao was the morning star always at his side.

I was nothing more than a despicable liar.

I had taken those few years by scheming. I should have been content.

So I watched Shen Xingyi mount his horse and ride beside Princess Pei Yunzhao’s canopied carriage.

He faced the blinding snow and left without looking back once.

For the rest of my life, I never received any news of him.

The wedding procession was attacked by bandits at the border. The heir and the princess both disappeared without a trace.

But countless rumors sprang up in the capital.

Some said they had been killed by horse bandits.

Others said the heir and his wife had always been at odds. If he hadn’t owed her a debt for saving his life, he would never have married a merchant’s daughter who was beneath his station.

Most people said the heir and the princess had been childhood sweethearts who loved one another. Now he had abandoned his wife and child; the two lovers had merely used the bandits as an excuse to run away together.

I became a laughingstock throughout the capital.

The looks directed at me held not only pity, but a trace of unspoken blame.

After all, if I hadn’t interfered back then,

how could a pair of lovers have ended up like this?

After Shen Xingyi left, the great tree sheltering the Marquis’s residence came crashing down.

The elderly Marquis led a search party to the northern frontier and refused to give up, but no news of Shen Xingyi ever came again.

The Marchioness couldn’t bear the blow. She fell gravely ill and passed away not long afterward.

I dragged my ailing body through the empty residence, standing alone as it weathered the storm.

In the end, my child and I were never meant to share much of a bond.

The baby left me before it could be born, just as Shen Xingyi had.

After all, who could hope for a life conceived through lies and schemes to come to fruition?

In this life, I had gotten everything I had asked for, yet none of it was what I truly wanted.

In the end, I had brought it all upon myself.

If there is another life,

I hope we can both live in peace, without ever meeting again.

06

The door to the guest courtyard suddenly swung open.

Pei Yunzhao had changed into a pale lotus-purple dress. Her hair was still damp, the black strands clinging to her cheeks.

She wore a thick cloak, and water still dripped from its hem.

She didn’t mock me as she usually did.

She stared at me, a hint of confusion in her eyes.

“Why?”

“Du Yuning, you never do anything unless there’s something in it for you. In the past, if Brother Xingyi so much as looked at someone else, you’d rack your brains to get close to him.”

She stepped toward me, watching me intently.

“There was no one else by the pond today. Why didn’t you jump in and save him yourself? Why did you run to get me?”

I pushed a white porcelain bowl to the edge of the table.

“The water is freezing cold in early spring. If Your Highness doesn’t change into dry clothes soon, you may have a fever tomorrow.”

Pei Yunzhao didn’t take the tea.

She circled me suspiciously.

“Don’t try to fool me with that fake benevolence. You’d have to be up to something to act so well-behaved. Tell me, what are you plotting?”

I tucked my hands into my sleeves and calmly met her gaze.

In my previous life, I would have used my gentlest, weakest voice to secretly argue with her.

I would have made her angry, then arranged for the Marchioness or Shen Xingyi to catch us at just the right moment.

“I’m weak, and I can’t swim.” I lowered my eyes, my voice calm. “If I jumped in, I’d only add another person to rescue. It was better to let Your Highness save him.”

“Is that really all?” She frowned.

I lifted my head and looked straight into her eyes.

“Your Highness risked herself to save him today. The Marquis and the Marchioness will surely remember your kindness. I’m only a guest living under their roof, so I won’t go to the main courtyard and intrude.”

Pei Yunzhao was stunned.

Her mouth opened, but all the taunts she had prepared seemed to strike a pile of cotton.

In the end, she picked up the ginger soup and drank it in one gulp.

“At least you know how to behave.” She set the empty bowl down, then hurriedly left.

Over the next half month, Shen Xingyi did indeed fall ill.

Precious medicinal herbs flowed into the main courtyard. Physicians came and went without pause, and the Marchioness worried herself into cold sores at the corners of her mouth.

Before, I would have been the first to rush to his bedside.

I would have competed to prepare his medicine, tested its temperature, and stayed by him without taking a step away, not even bothering to change my clothes.

Even if I could only stand outside his door, I would make sure everyone knew how devoted I was.