Chapter 3

“Miss, please don’t cry anymore. I had a bite of that black sesame cake you made. It’ll make the pain go away.”

Dongfang Heng brought ointment to visit me.

“Xian’er is delicate, with tiny steps. How could she be like you, lively enough to climb trees…”

“I came all this way to coax you. Please stop being angry, all right? You would have escaped for sure. You’re fine now, aren’t you?”

“In a few days, at the Hundred Flowers Banquet, I’ll have a gift ready for you.”

I looked at him and suddenly laughed.

His grown-up face no longer looked quite so appetizing.

I handed the hairpin to Mother.

“Mother, please return it to Her Majesty the Empress for me. And thank her for the marriage arrangement, but tell her I must decline.”

“If I really married Dongfang Heng, I’d be the one who couldn’t swallow a bite.”

Father and Mother immediately paled. They gathered around me, looking me up and down.

“No wonder Anhe’s been eating one bowl less lately!”

“How can you go without eating? That’s no good. Hurry and call a physician! If you don’t want to marry him, then you won’t.”

I tugged at them. “I’m not going to the Hundred Flowers Banquet. I want to go to Lizhou with Auntie.”

“I crave fried chicken, grilled sausages, and river-snail rice noodles so badly I could die!”

“I’ll sneak a look at how they make them, then come back to open a branch in the capital.”

Mother and the others looked at one another and swallowed.

“We’ve had your luggage packed for ages.”

5

Usually, when Auntie finished visiting her family and left, her eyes were always red from crying.

This time they were red too, but they looked more like she was in a hurry.

She hugged Grandmother, and didn’t even stop to hug Mother.

She was already urging the maids, “Prepare five carriages and drivers. They’ll take turns driving. We travel day and night!”

Grandmother pouted. “A daughter married out is like water poured out!”

“The Hundred Flowers Banquet only comes once a year. Can’t you wait until it’s over?”

Auntie stuck out her lip.

“Not even a Hundred Thousand Flowers Banquet could keep me here. What’s so good about it? A table full of cold soup and wilted vegetables—you can hardly swallow it.”

“Mother, once Anhe brings back some food, you’ll taste it and feel light on your feet!”

“Don’t see us off. Just wash your tongues and get ready to eat.”

My brothers’ eyes were red. One after another, they pressed silver into my hands.

“Little sister, don’t deprive yourself. Come home soon. We’re waiting for you to bring us something delicious!”

The carriage raced along at full speed.

Auntie didn’t seem tired at all.

I wished I could grow a pair of wings and fly there.

On the road, when we spoke of the Crown Prince, Auntie pulled me into her arms.

“When the Empress summoned you to the palace, your parents and three elder brothers went for days without being able to eat.”

“They said they missed you so much that even food had lost its flavor!”

“If the Crown Prince hadn’t treated you well and you hadn’t liked him so much, your father would have brought you home ages ago.”

“Tell your aunt the truth. Has he been treating you badly?”

I looked at her, amused.

“Auntie, why do river-snail noodles smell so bad? Just how bad are we talking?”

“Are they made with field snails or sea snails? Can you eat that dirty stuff? Does it taste sweet or sour?”

“Will they teach me how to make it? Is the shopkeeper old?”

“Where did he learn to make all these strange dishes?”

Auntie slapped her forehead. “…”

“She’ll definitely get along with you. I even invited her to cater a banquet at our residence once.”

To be fair, I had thought about Dongfang Heng on the road. After all, we had shared a table for years.

He often smiled as he watched me eat and served me more food. He had been a very good dining companion.

But whenever I remembered how he had thrown the peach-and-poria cakes I had painstakingly made to a cat,

I no longer wanted to pay him any attention.

It was spring, and the flowers were at their most beautiful. Our carriage passed a sea of blossoms. I happily climbed down and picked a bouquet.

The breeze carried the fragrance of the flowers. A butterfly fluttered over, sniffed at them, then flew high into the sky.

6

Fly on, fly on—

all the way to the Hundred Flowers Banquet in the capital, where flowers bloomed in a riot of color.

At this time of year, unmarried young men and women were always delighted.

The Empress watched the young people, their hearts stirred by spring, and remembered her own youth with Qiao Shuning.

They too had once passed through a passionate springtime, until each married someone else.

Back then, they had even promised to carry their sworn-sister bond into the next generation.

If one had a boy and the other a girl, the children would be betrothed.

But just yesterday, Shuning had arrived in her court robes and returned the jade hairpin, offering all the usual polite excuses.

Then she had knelt and begged the Empress to grant her request.

“Your Majesty, this subject’s wife begs you to withdraw your kind offer of a marriage between our daughter and the Crown Prince. Anhe is truly not worthy of His Highness.”

“She knows she is foolish, with nothing in her heart but food and drink. His Highness is the heir apparent—how could she possibly bear the responsibilities of the future empress?”

The Empress helped her dear friend to her feet and held her hand, feeling deeply ashamed.

How could Anhe be foolish? She was simply innocent and straightforward.

Even the strict governess in the palace had once praised her in these words: