“Proprietor, are you truly only taking two sets? My flower notepaper never had trouble selling in Yutou Town — let alone in a great city like Xiangyang.”

In a refined, rustic bookshop in Xiangyang, Shen Zhuxi was doing her best to persuade the proprietor to take more of her flower notepaper.

But despite all her efforts, the proprietor remained firm.

He shook his head without hesitation and said, “Madam Li, times are different now. People can barely afford rice these days. The only ones who’d spend good money on flower notepaper are a handful of young ladies and gentlemen in the city, and even they are not particularly flush right now. Two sets — that’ll probably take me half a month to sell, if you ask me.”

Shen Zhuxi had no choice but to leave the bookshop with her remaining three sets of notepaper.

With this autumn’s poor harvest, life had grown increasingly difficult for ordinary people. Even the markets had far fewer buyers and sellers than before. Near the city gates, faces had started to appear — gaunt and sallow, speaking with accents from elsewhere.

Li Wu was working under the Xiangzhou Prefect, so even when hardship came to the city’s doorstep, he would be among the very last in Xiangzhou to go hungry. For now, beyond feeling the effects of soaring prices, Shen Zhuxi had not yet been impacted in other ways.

Many ordinary households could no longer make ends meet, yet Li Wu still regularly brought home roasted chicken, roasted duck, roasted suckling pig, and all manner of fine pastries from the Xiangzhou Prefect’s residence.

Just looking at those lavishly wasteful pastries, Shen Zhuxi knew that Fan Wei gave not the slightest thought to the hardships of the people.

She had no right to condemn Fan Wei.

When soldiers at the frontier went without pay, the palace had still been full of song and dance, spending ten thousand coins on a single day’s food.

Shen Zhuxi walked along Dongsheng Road, its pedestrians now sparse and its shops quiet and deserted, and looked upon this once-bustling main street of Xiangyang with a heart full of unease and worry.

Ordinary families had already cut their meals down to one a day, and even that was a drop in the bucket. The truly bitter winter had not yet arrived — when the cold season came, how much further would the price of rice climb?

“Madam, please buy some pomegranates… have a kind heart, buy some pomegranates, let me take a handful of rice home to my family…”

A feeble voice drew her attention, and Shen Zhuxi could not help but slow her steps and stop.

An old woman sat before two baskets of pomegranates, her face creased with deep lines, patchy yellow and grey, her hair a wild tangle. The hands resting on the shoulder pole of her carrying baskets were parched and bony, wrinkled like the claws of an old hen. She looked up at Shen Zhuxi with an expression of desperate pleading.

The pomegranates in the bamboo baskets were a mix of red and white, varying in size. At the palace, these would be the kind of thing Shen Zhuxi would not have given a second glance.

But now, she walked over to them, and asked, looking at the pomegranates in the bamboo baskets, “Old woman, what are you asking for these pomegranates?”

“One tael of silver and you can have them all — and I’ll even carry them to your home for you!”

Shen Zhuxi could hardly eat this many pomegranates herself. But when she looked into the old woman’s eyes, blazing now with fierce hope, the words of refusal would simply not come out.

Besides, one tael of silver — it truly was far too little.

“Then please carry them home for me — thank you very much,” Shen Zhuxi said, taking a piece of silver from her purse that amounted to roughly two taels and held it out. “The extra is for your trouble in carrying them.”

“Dear young lady, thank you… thank you so much… you have such a kind heart…” The old woman trembled with feeling, her hands shaking as she held the silver, tears welling in her eyes. “My grandchild hasn’t eaten for several days now — today, finally, we can… thank you, thank you…”

Just as the old woman looked as though she was about to kneel down and bow her head to the ground, Shen Zhuxi quickly caught hold of her arm.

What she felt was not only the thickness of the patches on the old woman’s clothing, but the weight of a whole lifetime of poverty. She was not worthy of the old woman’s gratitude. She had once been one of those who fed on the blood and sweat of the common people—

A bow like this from the old woman — she was overcome with shame. She did not deserve it.

“Old woman, please get up — if you keep doing that, I’ll be too embarrassed to buy your pomegranates,” Shen Zhuxi said.

“Yes yes, alright. Let me carry these pomegranates to your home right away. If you’d lead me there, miss.”

“Old woman, are you sure you can manage the load? Shall I find someone to help you?”

The old woman broke into a warm, unaffected smile. The lines carved deep by years of hardship seemed to shine with another kind of radiance.

“Thank you, miss, but there’s no need. I’ve been helping out on the family farm since I was a small child — I’ve got strength in these arms. When I was young, never mind one basket of pomegranates — I could carry a full basket of mud and dirt without blinking.”

Shen Zhuxi couldn’t help but smile. She watched the old woman hoist the carrying pole onto her shoulder with practiced ease, and even reached out to steady it for her as she got it balanced.

The old woman carried the pomegranates and followed Shen Zhuxi’s steps forward.

“You have such a good heart, young lady. People like you are rare these days,” the old woman said with feeling. “This year not only was the grain harvest poor, my pomegranates didn’t grow well either — you’ve paid one tael of silver and that’s honestly more than they’re worth. When the harvest is good next year, I’ll bring you the biggest, reddest ones to give to you.”

“Don’t worry about it — I’m not a picky eater. I can’t really tell the difference,” Shen Zhuxi said to put her at ease.

She was getting on in years after all, and likely hadn’t been eating well on top of that. By the time they were halfway there, the old woman’s steps had grown heavier, and sweat had begun to bead on her forehead in increasing drops.

“Old woman, I’m tired from walking — let’s rest by the side of the road for a moment. I’ll go buy us a bun to eat.”

The old woman wiped the sweat from her forehead and smiled. “Don’t worry about me, young lady. I’ll just wait here for you.”

Shen Zhuxi turned and crossed the street toward a small pastry stand.

There was no one in front of the stand — the lone vendor sat listlessly at the stall, dozing. His chest and both arms were dusted with a thin layer of flour.

“Two buns, please,” Shen Zhuxi said.

“A hundred coins,” the vendor said, opening one eye to look at her.

…The prices had gone up again.

Who could have imagined that just a few months ago, white-flour buns were two coins apiece?

Shen Zhuxi fished out a hundred coins and handed them over.

The vendor pocketed the money before slowly getting to his feet, picked out two white-flour buns, wrapped them in a lotus leaf, and handed them to her.

Shen Zhuxi took the buns and pinched off a small piece for herself to eat, then turned back to where the old woman waited, put on an expression of distaste, and pressed the buns into her hands.

“Old woman, help me eat these — I just had a bite and they’ve gone down the wrong way.”

“That won’t do!” The old woman immediately tried to return them. “If you can’t eat them now, young lady, you can take them home for tomorrow, or bring them back for your family — giving them to me would be a waste…”

“Bringing them home would be even more of a waste — my family doesn’t like buns either,” Shen Zhuxi pushed the old woman’s hands back.

“Then… thank you, young lady. I’ll take them home to eat.” The old woman accepted the buns with great care.

Shen Zhuxi smiled. “Please don’t mention it — I—”

“Look at you, putting on airs! Some people — the few measly coins in their household couldn’t keep a dog fed.”

An unkind, sarcastic voice interrupted her.

Shen Zhuxi looked up. A young woman in a plum-purple embroidered satin straight-lapel jacket and a silver-rose gauze skirt cast a contemptuous look her way, then loosened her grip on the white-flour bun in her right hand. The bun rolled and fell at the feet of a yellow lion dog at her side.

The dog stepped forward, sniffed it, and turned away uninterested. Not far off, a beggar in tattered clothing shot out a hand, snatched the bun, and vanished in an instant.

“…Hmph. Putting on a show of kindness with something not even a dog would eat — how hypocritical.” The woman hugged her lion dog and said, with words aimed clearly at Shen Zhuxi and the old woman without naming them directly.

Shen Zhuxi herself felt no anger toward this. She didn’t know this person at all — being insulted by a stranger was no different from being barked at by a stray dog on the street. If the remarks had been aimed only at her, she would probably have walked away without a word — she had heard more than enough gossip in the palace, and one more exchange like this meant nothing to her.

But the old woman at her side had reddened around the eyes. Her expression was stricken, her clouded gaze darting about, and the hand holding the lotus-wrapped bun retreated behind her back, while her other thin, bony hand rubbed anxiously at the fabric of her skirt.

Shen Zhuxi could not let it stand. “We have no quarrel with you, and what we do is none of your concern. What need is there for such cutting remarks?”

“Did I call you out by name?” the woman said mockingly. “The bun was mine — I chose to feed it to my dog, and what business is that of yours?”

Scattered passersby slowed their steps. Shopkeepers on either side of the street began to prick up their ears.

Shen Zhuxi composed her expression and said in a cool, clear voice, “Your bun is none of my concern. I only hope that you and everyone in your family are able to go their whole lives without eating a single bun — otherwise, you might want to think carefully about the words you spoke today. Buns are things not even your dog will eat —”

Even emperors were not immune to a sudden craving for a bun now and then, let alone ordinary people.

The woman’s expression shifted to outrage at her words. “You—”

Shen Zhuxi looked past her as if she were not there, and said gently to the old woman, “Old woman, I’ve rested enough — shall we go?”

“Yes… let’s go.” The old woman came back to herself and hurried to hoist her carrying pole.

The woman stood and glared at Shen Zhuxi’s retreating back, then lowered her voice and spat out the words, “Vile seductress!”

With no audience left and nothing more to gain, the woman clutched her dog and stormed off in a huff.

Not far down the street, Li Wu and Li Que stood at the entrance of the Xiangyang Inn and had witnessed the entire exchange. Li Que looked entirely at ease; Li Wu’s expression was unreadable.

Li Que smiled and said, “Elder Brother, I thought for sure you wouldn’t be able to hold yourself back from stepping in.”

“When women have business between them, why would a man involve himself?” Li Wu said.

Li Que folded his arms, gazed idly at a white cloud drifting past overhead, and counted silently in his mind — one, two, three—

“Do you know whose people that was?” Li Wu asked.

“I do — the youngest daughter of Old Boss Zhang from the rice shop, the only one of his daughters still unmarried,” Li Que said with a smile. “A few days ago, her betrothed said something foolish while drunk.”

“What did he say?”

“That he must have done great deeds in a past life to deserve marrying a woman as beautiful and accomplished as Madam Li in this one; and that he must have done terrible wrongs in a past life to have been betrothed by family arrangement to an illiterate shrew from the Zhang family.”

The corner of Li Wu’s mouth curved. “…That’s not wrong.”

“Those words got passed around by a few people with nothing better to do. Zhang’s fourth daughter naturally heard it too — what do you expect when a barrel of vinegar gets knocked over?”

“Let’s go,” Li Wu said, stepping down from the inn’s stone steps. “Come home and I’ll treat you to pomegranates.”

Li Wu and Li Que returned to the courtyard to find that the old woman had already unloaded the pomegranates and gone. Shen Zhuxi was directing the servants to carry the two baskets of pomegranates into the kitchen.

“Shen Zhuxi, what did you drag home this time?” Li Wu walked over.

“Pomegranates I bought. Do you like pomegranates?” Shen Zhuxi said. “There are so many, we couldn’t finish them just by eating them ourselves. I want to ask Jiu Niang for a recipe for brewing fruit wine and make pomegranate wine to put away.”

“Now that’s thinking ahead,” Li Wu said, leaning against a porch column. “Did you sell your flower notepaper?”

“Only two sets. The proprietor said times are hard now, and this kind of expensive notepaper doesn’t sell well.”

“Sold two sets, so you’re unhappy?” Li Wu said in a casually observant tone.

Shen Zhuxi looked up. “When was I unhappy?”

“Right now,” Li Wu said. “How come you’re not smiling that silly smile of yours? Did something happen on the way?”

“Nothing.” Shen Zhuxi lowered her head again and went back to sorting through the pomegranates. “I don’t have a silly smile. I never did.”

Li Wu watched her without speaking.

After a long moment, she suddenly raised her head. Their eyes met.

“Li Wu,” she said, “I want to discuss something with you.”

“What is it?”

“Can I set up a gruel distribution in the city?”