The mountain path was rugged and uneven, with oddly shaped stones jutting up from the ground that knocked Shen Zhuxi off balance at every step.

Li Wu looked back at her and reached out, catching her hand.

Palm against palm, sharing each other’s warmth with easy intimacy. Shen Zhuxi’s temperature soared on the spot. That night they had rescued the large scallion flower, Li Wu had held her hand as well — but then it had been dark as pitch, and she had been crying so hard the world spun; now, what was the situation? Broad daylight, her mind clear as it could be.

This was the second time in her life she had held the hand of a man outside her family. There was chaos and nerves in Shen Zhuxi’s heart, anxiety and unease — yet not the faintest trace of aversion or resistance. Before she could even begin to work out why, her body had already answered with shy, flustered heat.

Li Wu tightened his grip on her retreating hand, held it firmly in his palm, and looked back to give her a glare: “If you get separated from me out here, you’ll be nothing but bear food by nightfall.”

Shen Zhuxi was startled into stillness, and her hand dared not stir again.

The first time Li Wu had held her hand, it had been a dark and stormy night, and Shen Zhuxi had been in such a panic herself that beyond wet and warm, she had felt little else. The second time Li Wu took her hand, with no darkness and no rain, the impact on Shen Zhuxi was even greater than the first.

She had never known that a man’s palm could be so large — just one hand was enough to enclose hers entirely. She had never known that a man’s palm could run so hot, pressing against hers like a warm hearth.

Utterly unlike the soft, boneless hands of the noblewomen she had known, Li Wu’s hand — every line of his palm, every joint of his fingers — gave an impression of stark, vivid clarity, just like the man himself: rough, yet dependable. Leaning on him was like leaning into a mountain.

She gazed, conflicted, at their two joined hands: was it possible that after living together for so long, she had simply ceased to register as a woman in Li Wu’s eyes, and he now thought of her as some genderless fourth little brother?

To settle the disorder in her heartbeat, Shen Zhuxi kept silently repeating in her head: He only sees you as a fourth brother… only as a fourth brother…

“Do you want to know how Diao’er came to be the way he is?” Li Wu said suddenly.

Shen Zhuxi immediately cast aside all her turmoil and burst out: “I do!”

“Diao’er was a foundling, taken in as an adopted son by a lone hunter in Yutou Town.” Li Wu said. “When Diao’er was ten, the hunter accidentally fell into a deep ravine in the mountains and was killed, his body never recovered. After the hunter died, all manner of people claiming to be his relatives appeared at the door — one taking this, another taking that — and stripped the hunter’s household bare. Less than two years after the hunter’s death, Diao’er once again had no home to return to.”

Shen Zhuxi listened, utterly absorbed, her heart clenching tight for Li Kun.

“He found me living in a duck shed, fighting the ducks for scraps… and after that, we were always together. We begged together, ate spoiled food together, shared one tattered cotton blanket. He is kind-hearted and steady in nature — a single kindness someone shows him, he’ll remember for three years; but if someone wrongs him, he’ll have forgotten it within days. “

Li Wu paused for a moment, and a trace of wistfulness crossed his face — but like thin mist after rain, it dispersed almost as soon as it appeared.

He said quietly: “One winter… it was bitterly cold. Frozen bodies of beggars appeared on the streets every day. Worst of all, a plague broke out in Jinzhou, and Yutou Town was not spared. I had fallen ill — at first I only thought it was from the cold and the hunger, but when I coughed up blood, I knew I had caught the plague. I was afraid of infecting Diao’er, afraid of killing the ducks and bringing harm to Fan Sanniang, so I dragged myself out of the city and found a cave outside the walls to wait for death… I never expected that two days later, Diao’er would track me down — he had searched the whole town.”

“If not for Diao’er, I would have died long ago.” Li Wu said, in a voice of controlled and measured calm. “He risked his own life to care for me, foraged to find me food, begged and pleaded with anyone he could find for folk remedies to give me. Some of the beggars I had offended in the past came looking for trouble — they wanted to burn me alive. Diao’er faced all dozen or so of them alone, and had his head split open by an old beggar, over fifty years of age, who struck him with a river stone.”

“In the end, he drove them away. I lay at the edge of the cave, watching him stagger to the riverbank, wash the blood from his face and head with ice-cold water, and then walk back as though nothing had happened, smiling as he told me there were stuffed buns to eat that evening.”

He spoke slower and slower, with longer and longer pauses.

“That night, we shared half a stuffed bun that had already gone sour and rotten. Diao’er broke it open and gave me the larger half… he was always like that — not only toward me. He was always like that… willing to go hungry himself, willing to take the injury himself, willing to sacrifice himself… to shield those weaker than him.” Li Wu said. “I am not his equal in that.”

“That evening he was still smiling and talking with me, asking if I was cold, saying he felt warm and wanting to take off his clothes to add to my blanket. But the next day… he was different.”

“When I woke up, he was right beside me. Humming an unknown little tune, playing with a handful of pebbles on the ground. When he saw me wake, he scooped up the pebbles in his hands…” Li Wu suddenly stopped.

He couldn’t go on. His expression had locked shut, his gaze blank and fixed straight ahead.

Her heart seized with a sudden, sharp ache — fiercer than any she had felt when grieving for Li Kun.

“Li Wu…” She did not know what to say, but thankfully Li Wu did not leave her feeling helpless in that moment.

He did not look at her, but his grip on her hand tightened — as though drawing warmth and courage from her touch. Not pausing to consider whether it was proper, Shen Zhuxi gripped his hand just as tightly in return.

“He scooped up the pebbles in his hands… brought them up to my face, smiling so wide the corners of his mouth stretched all the way to his ears… I asked him what he was doing, and he cupped the pebbles together in his palms, held them out to me, and said…”

He drew a slow breath, and said: “Said… ‘Honored guest, come eat the freshly steamed buns.'”

Shen Zhuxi’s tears had risen to the very edge of her eyes, on the verge of spilling over at any moment.

What could she say to comfort Li Wu? How could she convey the grief she truly felt alongside him?

It was at moments like these that Shen Zhuxi resented her own tongue for lacking Li Que’s gift for words.

Li Wu raised a finger and wiped away the tear at the corner of her eye. He looked steadily into her grief-filled, shining eyes and said: “…This one tear is enough.”

He always seemed to see through to her heart with the greatest of ease.

“The hard days are past. Only good days lie ahead.” Li Wu said. “…That is why the four of us are together now.”

He tightened his hold on her hand and walked on.

Shen Zhuxi found in herself no more desire to pull away.

“If only the four of us could always stay together just like this…” Shen Zhuxi said, unable to stop herself.

She knew how naive those words were.

The four of them were worlds apart in station, and the day of parting would inevitably come. When it did, whether they wished it or not, they would be separated. Li Wu would still have his two brothers to live alongside, while she would have no one to return to but the lonely depths of the palace, learning to endure the endless, hollow passage of time alone.

Though the moment of parting had not yet arrived, Shen Zhuxi already felt the urge to weep.

“I don’t want things to always stay like this.” Li Wu’s unexpected answer cut across her grief.

“Why not?”

“Figure it out yourself.”

“…I can’t.”

“Try harder.”

“Can’t you just tell me?” Shen Zhuxi said, exasperated.

“No.” Li Wu gave her a sidelong glance and said, “You have to figure it out yourself. What someone else tells you — it doesn’t take hold.”

“…Stingy.” Shen Zhuxi muttered.

Li Wu was about to reply when a sound of snapping wood behind them made his expression shift instantly.

On pure reflex, he pulled her behind him and spun to face the direction of the noise, drawing the short knife at his waist in the same swift motion.

From the lush, thick forest, a pair of bright eyes appeared first, then black and gold striped fur, and several deep, vivid claw marks across the tiger’s back, the blood dried and crusted over.

A mother tiger leaner and smaller than the one before, ribs already clearly visible along its sunken belly, stepped out from the trees.

It flared its nostrils, and its head turned in a slow, small arc, as though tracing a scent in the air. Then its gaze locked onto Shen Zhuxi, and without any warning, it let out a roar of unmistakable fury.

“Run!” Li Wu gave her a forceful shove.

Caught off guard, Shen Zhuxi had no time to think — she ran at his word.

No sound of Li Wu’s footsteps followed behind her.

By the time she came to her senses, the dense forest surrounded her on all sides. Li Wu was nowhere in sight. An enraged tiger roar reached her — and Shen Zhuxi held her breath, straining to listen, but could not catch a single sound from Li Wu.

Flee, or turn back?

Shen Zhuxi was cold to her fingertips, her entire body shaking — yet she set her teeth, forced herself to turn, and ran back the way she had come.

Li Wu was no Li Kun. She could not simply leave him!

Shen Zhuxi hadn’t run far when she saw the gaunt tiger and Li Wu locked in a fierce struggle. Unlike Li Kun’s brute force, Li Wu faced the injured tiger with visible difficulty. His short knife was too short, forcing him into close combat, and with strength at a disadvantage, he rapidly began to lose ground. The short knife was knocked from his grasp by a single swipe of the tiger’s paw.

This tiger, though smaller than the last, was clearly far more cunning — the moment it sensed Li Wu falter, it gathered itself and unleashed a tiger roar that seemed to come from the very depths of its lungs.

The deafening roar drove a spike of pain through Shen Zhuxi’s eardrums from where she stood, far back — she could only imagine what it felt like for Li Wu standing right before it.

In an instant, Li Wu’s movements slowed. Two sets of razor-sharp claws pinned him down.

Watching those dripping fangs drive toward Li Wu’s throat, Shen Zhuxi’s mind went completely blank — and without thinking, she charged forward.

“Shen Zhuxi! Have you lost your mind?!”

Only then did Li Wu notice her standing in the trees. The face that had been remarkably calm even while pinned under the tiger’s claws went suddenly, starkly pale.

His voice reached Shen Zhuxi as if through a thick layer of cotton — muffled and distant.

She could hear nothing else, see nothing else. She was so terrified of tigers, yet she snatched up a branch from the ground — as thick as an arm — and gathered every last shred of her strength, bringing it down on the starved tiger’s body—

“Get away from him!” Her voice trembled with fearful, helpless weeping.

But her hand did not stop — one blow after another, raining down on the tiger’s body, its head.

The branch caught the tiger squarely in the eye. It let out a pained, furious roar and released its grip on Li Wu, swinging its gaping jaws toward her.

“Shen Zhuxi!” Li Wu’s expression turned a shade of white.

The short knife was not far away — but there was no time to reach it now. He launched himself toward the now-frozen Shen Zhuxi and in one rolling motion flipped her beneath him, shielding her with his back turned toward the enraged, starving tiger.

Time had never moved so slowly.

For a brief moment, the rapid pounding of Shen Zhuxi’s heart seemed to blend with the heartbeat pressing down against her — merging into one single pulse. Li Wu’s eyes, unwavering, looked down into hers with absolute steadiness and calm.

The attack they had braced for did not come.

From somewhere behind them came a small cry — something between a dog’s bark and a duck’s quack, impossible to tell if it was a mrow or a squawk — and that tiny roar brought the mother tiger’s assault to a halt.

The tiger released them both at once and spun around.

Li Juan came waddling out of the trees on four chubby little paws, swaying side to side with each step.

The two tigers met. The mother tiger lowered her head and gently butted Li Juan’s square little head, then extended her tongue and tenderly lapped at the two round half-circle ears on top.

Li Juan called out to the mother tiger in two mrows, then came trotting toward Shen Zhuxi.

“Li Juan!” Shen Zhuxi stretched out her trembling hands, wanting to gather it into her arms — a low rumbling growl from the mother tiger made her dare only to brush the top of its soft, fluffy head.

“Mrow!”

“Li Juan, who is that? Do you know her?”

“Mrow! Mrow mrow! Mrow!” Li Juan pranced happily in circles before her.

The mother tiger stood right there watching with vigilant eyes, and Shen Zhuxi, that hopeless dolt, managed to carry on a conversation with the tiger cub as though no one else existed. Li Wu truly didn’t know whether to call her thick-skinned or overly sensitive.

Fair enough — a person who was terrified of chickens yet dared to pick up a tree branch and beat a tiger was someone capable of absolutely anything.

“Is that your mother?” Whatever this dolt had somehow gleaned from those mrows and mrowls, she said tearfully, “That’s wonderful — you and your mother are finally reunited…”

Li Wu truly could not hold it in and interrupted the tender scene:

“It’s male.”

“…Then you and your father are reunited.” Shen Zhuxi, entirely ignoring the voice raining on her parade beside her, said to Li Juan once more.

Whether Li Juan understood or not was anyone’s guess — it padded happily away on quick little paws, scampered back to the mother tiger’s side, then turned and called out twice more to Shen Zhuxi before following the larger tiger’s steps deeper into the dense mountain forest.

Until that familiar plump little rump disappeared, swaying from side to side, into the undergrowth, Shen Zhuxi murmured at last:

“Will it come back to visit me?”

“…It will.”

Li Wu laid his hand on her shoulder, and before she could react, pulled her into his arms.

No feather duster. No pretense. Li Wu held her — really held her.

Shen Zhuxi was stunned for a moment.

“What are you doing…”