That Li Xuandu had come personally to call upon her father was something Pu Zhu had known long before. Thinking of the Emperor’s grand display of gifts to her earlier that day, she had already guessed the purpose behind his visit.

Her heart was a little nervous, yet also anticipatory and excited. When she heard once more from a maidservant that Prince Qin had left, she restrained her impulse to run out immediately to find her parents, and waited patiently in her room.

Sure enough, in just a few moments her mother came. Then her father followed her in.

Her parents’ expressions both looked quite grave. They exchanged a glance. Her father seemed about to speak, but her mother stopped him: “Let me say it!”

Her father closed his mouth. Pu Zhu then heard her mother say: “Zhuzhu, there is something Mother wishes to discuss with you…”

“Zhuzhu, don’t be frightened — Father is here!” her father interjected.

Pu Zhu feigned ignorance: “Please go ahead, Mother.”

Meng Shi weighed her words, then said: “Among the families that came to propose a match, your father and I did not find any of the young men particularly ideal. Now there is one more person — that is… Prince Qin, who just came in person to propose marriage, saying he has feelings for you and wishes to take you as his wife. You should know who Prince Qin is — he is the very Prince Qin who escorted you to Guo’an Temple to view the peonies the other day. Mother and Father want to ask your thoughts, and whether you are willing…”

So he really had come to propose marriage!

She had been waiting for this day for nearly six full years. Having finally waited until he came at last, how could she possibly be unwilling?

“Mother, Father — your daughter is willing!”

The moment Meng Shi finished speaking, Pu Zhu said so immediately, without the slightest hesitation.

Their daughter had agreed so quickly? Both Pu Yuanqiao and Meng Shi were taken aback and looked at each other again. The father in particular felt a small twinge of displeasure rising within him, and could not help asking his daughter: “Zhuzhu, there’s no rush to answer — think it over carefully. Don’t be afraid…”

Pu Zhu quickly said: “Father, your daughter isn’t afraid! Your daughter made up her mind long ago! Your daughter has liked Prince Qin for a very long time!”

Pu Yuanqiao felt a sudden ache in his jaw, and a quiet irritation began to stir within him.

His daughter was young and naive — could it be that Li Xuandu had at some point been meeting with his daughter in secret behind his back and winning her over? Otherwise, how could a girl kept in the inner chambers say, as she herself put it, that she had liked someone “for a very long time”?

The more Pu Yuanqiao thought about it, the more displeased he felt. Yet afraid of frightening his daughter, he forcibly suppressed his feelings and put on a gentle father’s smile: “Zhuzhu, can you tell Father — when exactly did you start to like Prince Qin?”

Pu Zhu blinked. “Father, have you forgotten? It was the year I was almost eight! That day you were setting out on your mission to the Western Regions, and I chased after you to the edge of the city, where I met Prince Qin. It was Father who asked him to escort me home. It was that very time — that was when I fell for Prince Qin! He was so handsome. The moment I laid eyes on him, I made a vow to myself: when I grew up, I would surely marry him!”

Pu Yuanqiao and Meng Shi stared in astonishment, and for the third time exchanged a look. When they recovered themselves, Pu Yuanqiao was at a loss for words, while Meng Shi could not help laughing and saying: “What a destined match this truly is! Zhuzhu, you little rogue! If that’s the case, then how wonderful — Prince Qin also has feelings for you. If you are willing, then your parents will accept this proposal on your behalf?”

Pu Zhu nodded happily: “Your daughter will follow whatever arrangements Father and Mother make!”

Meng Shi was overjoyed. She turned to see her husband not making a sound, looking as though he was not entirely pleased. Afraid he might say something to dampen their daughter’s spirits, she immediately pulled him out of the room, and back in their own quarters, began to discuss how to reply to the palace. Seeing him looking listless and glum, and finding her own mood dampened by him in turn, she frowned in annoyance: “What’s wrong with you? Prince Qin has feelings for your daughter, and your daughter’s heart is already set on him — isn’t this a match made in heaven, better than you could ever wish for? What is there wrong with Prince Qin? To receive such a son-in-law, and you pull this face — what does it mean?”

Pu Yuanqiao did not know himself why he felt the way he did. He knew he should be happy for his daughter, yet there was a faintly sour feeling in his heart. Seeing his wife scold him, he smiled wryly and nodded: “I am glad. What is there for me not to be glad about? You manage the wedding arrangements — I won’t interfere!”

Meng Shi watched the retreating figure of her husband walking away with his hands clasped behind his back, muttered once under her breath, and let him go. She called the steward and others in to begin discussing the great matters ahead.

The next day, news spread throughout the capital, and all the great noble families were in a stir. Word went about that the Pu family’s daughter had celebrated her birthday and received a lavish gift from the palace — and the reason turned out to be that the palace had its eye on the Pu family’s daughter, and the Emperor was going to decree a marriage to the Emperor’s fourth son, Prince Qin. When the Princess Consort of Prince Duan’s residence, the Marchioness of the marquis’s household, and the wife of the Grand Physician’s residence heard the news, though each was disappointed in her own way, without exception they all privately breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

To speak truthfully — if their own son or grandson had lost out to someone else, any one of those three families would have felt as though their dignity had been slighted, and harbored some resentment. But now it turned out the Pu family’s daughter had caught the Emperor’s eye, who wished to marry her to Prince Qin. However outstanding one’s own son or grandson might be, they could not be spoken of in the same breath as Prince Qin. With this outcome to the marriage, none of their families had lost any face — everyone was satisfied.

In the blink of an eye, the Pu family became the most envied household in the entire capital. After Pu Zhu’s birthday, officials from the Imperial Clan Court and representatives from the palace began coming and going at the Pu residence one after another to discuss arrangements for the grand wedding.

The betrothal proceeded smoothly, and everyone said Prince Qin and the Pu family’s daughter were a perfectly matched pair of jade — yet regarding the wedding date, a small private disagreement arose between the two parties.

Pu Yuanqiao, who had said he would not interfere, in the end still put in a word. He proposed that his daughter was still young, and that he hoped the wedding date could be set two years hence — after she had turned sixteen and come of age, she would then be wed.

The instructions the Clan Court had received from the Emperor were that the sooner the wedding, the better. They had not anticipated that Pu Yuanqiao would say this.

Though one party to this marriage was the imperial family and the other a minister, since it had from the outset been conducted as a proposal rather than a direct imperial decree, the imperial family, however imperious, could not entirely disregard the wishes of the bride’s family.

The Clan Court official could not very well dismiss the request on the spot. After all, this was only human nature, and so he said he would go back to report and have the Pu family wait for the palace’s reply.

They waited several days with no word. Then one evening, Pu Zhu, having bathed, sat in her room fingering the ancient qin. Suddenly she heard from beyond the window the sound of wings fluttering — as if Jin-Eye Slave had returned.

Jin-Eye Slave had a highly perceptive nature, and she never kept it tethered. These past two days, it had flown off somewhere unknown, and she had been a little concerned. Hearing those wingbeats, she quickly got up, pushed open the window, and looked outside. Sure enough, Jin-Eye Slave had returned, now settled in the hawk perch in the courtyard that had been built for it. By the light of the corridor lanterns, Pu Zhu could see what appeared to be a small bamboo tube fastened to its talon.

Back in those earlier years when she and Li Xuandu had been exchanging letters, it was always this sort of small bamboo tube they had used to carry messages — she knew it at a glance. Her heart stirred, and she immediately ran out of the room, untied the tube from Jin-Eye Slave’s talon, and carried it back inside. After dismissing her maidservants, she opened the tube herself. Sure enough, out rolled a tightly wound slip of paper.

“I long for you greatly. Do you long for me?”

No signature. Just this single sentence on the slip.

Pu Zhu recognized the handwriting at a glance, and her heart began to race.

Of course she longed for him. Especially after his proposal — it was as though three autumns passed with each day apart from him.

She clutched the letter and ran to the window, looked out at the night beyond, then returned to her desk, picked up her brush, and added a line to the slip — asking him where he was. She then rolled it up again, put it back in the small tube, came outside, and refastened it to Jin-Eye Slave’s talon, gently stroking its head.

Jin-Eye Slave beat its wings and soared into the air. In a moment, its silhouette had vanished into the night.

Pu Zhu waited.

In just a moment, Jin-Eye Slave flew back. She opened the tube and took out the letter. She saw a few words added to the slip.

Just as she had guessed — he was outside her home right now, the two of them separated by only a few walls.

She added another line to the slip, sent Jin-Eye Slave out once more, and then slipped quietly out of her room and made her way to the rear garden — to that secluded corner of the courtyard where, during the Lantern Festival when she was small, he had carried her on his back and climbed the wall to send her home.

She told him, in her note, to wait for her there.

The moonlight was like water. At last it illuminated a slender shadow parting the flowers and brushing past the willows as she walked toward him.

Li Xuandu watched her come, his emotions in conflict.

His father the Emperor’s wish was for the wedding to be held as soon as possible.

To speak truthfully, deep in his own heart, that was his silent wish as well.

Before he had known her true feelings, his days had passed, one after another, just as they always had.

But now, having finally discovered that her longing for him was as fierce as his own — he found he could no longer contain himself.

Two years… it was truly too long.

He could hardly stop himself from sweeping the girl before him into his arms and carrying her away right now. Her being a little younger did not matter — he would wait for her, cherish her. He need not do anything at all. As long as he could see her when he woke each morning, hold her in his arms each night as he slept — he would be utterly content.

But the wishes of her family were something he could not entirely dismiss.

She stopped in front of him, a few paces away, hands clasped behind her back, and said in a low, teasing voice: “Who is this bold young man, daring to scale the wall and trespass into my home?”

Li Xuandu let her mock him without a word, suppressing the urge that had risen within him to sweep her away and hide her from the world.

Pu Zhu, seeing him silent, looked at his face in the moonlight — he stood in stillness, gazing at her — and her heart softened all at once.

She longed for him too. From the very first day she had come to this world, she had longed for him every moment, and had spent all her cunning and coaxing and wits to finally make him her own.

How could she bear to tease him any longer?

She asked him softly: “Prince Qin, dear brother — do you want to marry me sooner?” Seeing him still say nothing, she bit her lip and said: “Prince Qin, dear brother — I also want to marry you sooner. But my father — he cannot bear to let me go so early. Why don’t you wait for me one more year? When this time next year comes, I will marry you. Is that all right?”

“All right.”

He finally spoke.

Pu Zhu let out a breath.

After he said that word, he fell silent again.

And so the two of them stood facing each other in the courtyard. All around was quiet — only the murmuring of summer insects drifting from some hidden corner of the undergrowth.

The moon had climbed to the center of the sky, sleepy-eyed, gazing down at the two young figures on the ground below.

After a while, Pu Zhu said: “Well then — it’s settled between us… It’s getting late. You should head back and rest early.”

“You go in first. Once you are gone, I will leave.” He answered her softly.

Pu Zhu gave a quiet sound of assent, turned, and followed the path back the way she had come, slowly walking toward her own quarters. After she had gone some distance, she looked back and saw him still standing there in the same spot, watching her go. She paused, turned around, and ran swiftly back to him, stopping before him.

“Prince Qin, dear brother — don’t you want to kiss me? I’ll let you.”

“Last time I was the one who kissed you — you owe me one back!”

In the moonlight, the girl pouted her lips, reproaching him for his lack of romantic sensitivity.

Li Xuandu’s heart and soul were instantly set adrift. He could endure it no longer. He gathered her soft, small body into his arms and did what he had been wanting to do all evening, yet had been holding himself back from.

He lifted her up, her feet leaving the ground. She was compelled to stretch out both arms and wrap them around his neck, lest she fall from his embrace.

He lowered his head. At first his lips brushed against hers lightly, tentatively — with care and tenderness.

The young girl’s lips were fragrant and soft. Very soon he tasted a trace of faint sweetness. It was the sweetness that had been snatched away from him that day behind the old scholar tree, the taste that had barely been there before it fled.

Li Xuandu felt the blood in his entire body surge with heat. He could not control himself. He tightened the arms holding her, and the kiss changed from the first tentative sip to something ardent — until at last he held her lips fully within his, kissing her deep.

After a long while, only when Pu Zhu could barely breathe did he finally release her, pressing her head gently against his chest.

Pu Zhu closed her eyes, pressed her face into his embrace, and listened to the sound of his heartbeat. She and he stood quietly in each other’s arms beneath the moon.

After a long moment, he lowered his head again, took her soft earlobe between his lips, and lingered there a little longer — kissing her still — until at last she heard him say in a low, suppressed voice close to her ear: “Go back to your room. I will wait for you — wait until one year from now, when I come to marry you.”

Pu Zhu made a soft sound of assent, her voice tender and gentle beyond measure.

He seemed to let out a sigh, and continued holding her a while longer. Then at last he made up his mind and slowly loosened the arms that had been wrapped around her.

It was on the strength of this kiss that Prince Qin endured the longest, most agonizing year of his entire life.

One year later, when she had completed her coming-of-age ceremony, Prince Qin at last realized his long-awaited wish and celebrated the grand wedding, welcoming home his royal consort.

In this wedding, one party was the Emperor’s deeply trusted fourth son — who had ridden out beyond the passes at sixteen, his literary and martial talents renowned, having pacified the north across ten thousand li, a feat of merit beyond compare. The other was the daughter of a distinguished minister — of celestial beauty and rare grace, the finest jewel of the inner chambers, sought by countless suitors.

Truly, a match made by Heaven itself — a perfect union of kindred souls.