Three thousand troops stood ready to march. With a single command from Li Wu, they set out and departed from Yangzhou.

Considering Shen Zhuxi’s tendency toward seasickness, Li Wu, worried it would worsen her discomfort during the pregnancy, decided to travel the entire route back to Xiangyang by land.

Three thousand infantry moving together would severely slow the pace of the central column where Shen Zhuxi’s carriage traveled. So Li Wu divided them into detachments of five hundred, sending each on separate routes, and only gathering them once at the prefecture seat of each province they passed through.

By the time Shen Zhuxi’s carriage entered the territory of Shouzhou, six days had passed since their departure from Yangzhou.

Shen Zhuxi’s monthly cycle had still not come.

Though no physician had yet taken her pulse, it hardly seemed to matter anymore whether one did or not.

The last time she had passed through Shouzhou was during the southward flight from famine more than a year ago. Times had changed, and Shouzhou had transformed greatly since then. The common people she saw along the way no longer wore the gaunt and hollow look of before. They were not as prosperous and at ease as the people of Jiangnan, but color had returned to their faces, and the old panic and numbness had faded from their eyes.

With the fall of the false Liao dynasty and the restoration of Great Yan, everything was moving in a better direction.

Perhaps the day Li Wu resigned from office and withdrew from public life was not so far away after all.

Perhaps they really would open a roast duck shop, set up side by side with Sui Rui’s chicken restaurant.

With nothing to do in the carriage, Shen Zhuxi let her mind wander from the Li Family Duck Shop all the way to how she would break the happy news of her pregnancy to her several sisters — and then the carriage gradually came to a stop.

Li Wu, who had stepped out of the carriage half an hour earlier, rode his horse around to the window and knocked it open.

“Come on out. There happens to be a Guan Yu temple here — we’ll camp here for the night.”

Shen Zhuxi looked at the sky, still clearly bright, and said: “The sun is still up and you want to stop already?”

“There’s a fallen tree up ahead, wedged right between the sides of a mountain pass.” Li Wu said with a furrowed brow. “Must have been knocked down by those thunderclaps last night.”

Those thunderclaps last night were still vivid in Shen Zhuxi’s memory.

She had worried it would bring a violent storm, but fortunately those had only been dry summer thunderclaps — tremendous in sound but without a drop of rain.

After Li Wu helped her down from the carriage, Diniang hopped out behind her and began looking around with wide-eyed curiosity.

Camping in the wilderness was nothing new for Shen Zhuxi. Familiarity had made it easier with time, and she was now perfectly capable of sleeping soundly in a derelict temple — compared to that desperate flight from Shouzhou to Jiangnan all that time ago, the current conditions were vastly improved. At the very least, when camping in a ruined temple, there were people to sweep out the dust and cobwebs, and thick bedding to sleep under.

What more could she possibly complain about?

Li Wu guided Shen Zhuxi for a slow walk outside the Guan Yu temple, his solicitous and careful manner making Shen Zhuxi laugh despite herself, giving her the strange impression that she had already entered the final stage before delivery.

Once the temple had been cleaned and prepared, Li Wu led her into a transformed Guan Yu temple.

The temple appeared to have been abandoned for many years. The pigments on Guan Yu’s statue had long since flaked and peeled, and even the figure itself was no longer entirely intact. The cobwebs beneath the eaves had been largely cleared away, though the empty bird’s nest in the path of the Green Dragon Crescent Blade was left untouched, kept in place for the swallows that would return the following year.

Shen Zhuxi stayed well back from the fire kindled in the center of the hall and settled onto a bamboo mat at Guan Yu’s feet. Li Wu left three hundred soldiers to guard the Guan Yu temple and led the remaining two hundred out to clear the fallen tree blocking the mountain pass.

The tree wedged in the pass was at least a hundred years old — five men joining hands could barely encircle its trunk. Li Wu walked along it for a moment, then suddenly stepped on a rocky outcrop jutting from the cliff face and leaped up onto the tilted trunk.

He climbed along the trunk all the way up to where it had fractured.

The fracture was smooth and clean, with none of the splintering or scorching that a lightning strike would naturally produce.

“General!” one of the soldiers below suddenly called out in surprise. “A rope has been found here!”

Li Wu jumped down from the trunk and went to where the rope had been discovered.

A sturdy hemp rope was looped around a branch near the crown of the tree. Li Wu untied it, and with several soldiers made his way around to the other side of the fallen tree, then followed the rope and began pulling it back in.

Buried beneath the yellow sand, the rope revealed itself section by section as dust billowed all around. The rope, pulled tighter and tighter, stretched toward a large boulder at the far end of the mountain pass.

The nearly round boulder had the rope wound around it, and the other end hung down over the edge of the cliff, as though something was suspended from it below.

The pass fell utterly silent. At some point, even the chirping of insects and birds had ceased. Only the dry and stifling summer wind stirred the grit and gravel beneath their feet.

Between the boulder and the fallen tree that had blocked the path lay at least a hundred zhang of distance, and the rope itself had to be at least a hundred zhang long. That it had appeared here out of nowhere was clearly no work of last night’s thunder.

Li Wu jumped up onto the tree trunk, his watchful eyes sweeping across the surroundings. He saw no sign of any human presence.

“…Back to the Guan Yu temple.” Li Wu made the decision without hesitation.

He would leave the fallen tree uncleared, and whatever hung beneath that boulder, he had no desire to find out. After Li Wu gave the order, the soldiers exchanged uncertain glances with one another but moved quickly nonetheless.

It was at that very moment that the boulder balanced at the cliff’s edge shifted with a creaking groan beneath a strong gust of wind, and from below the cliff came a muffled, terrified whimper.

That whimper, strangely familiar, made Li Wu stop dead in his tracks.

He pricked up his ears and listened hard, his brow deeply furrowed, and caught the sound again — a muffled moan barely louder than a mosquito’s hum.

He recognized the voice. And he would have much preferred not to.

The boulder teetered precariously at the cliff’s edge, and the rope suspending whatever hung from the steep cliffside was already badly frayed. Whether the boulder or the suspended figure would fall first was only a matter of time. Li Wu’s deputy general watched his commander’s expression darken, and ventured cautiously:

“General… do we still go?”

The iron pot hung over the fire gurgled as it came to a boil, and the steam of cooking food gradually spread through the temple.

The sky was dimming. The last light of the setting sun spilled into the hall.

Shen Zhuxi waited for Li Wu until she was dozing off.

One fallen tree blocking the road — wasn’t it supposed to be cleared and done? Was he hauling the tree all the way back to Xiangyang?

“My lady, why don’t you have a bowl of soup first to warm yourself?” Diniang said kindly.

“It’s midsummer — what is there to warm?” Shen Zhuxi said. “Fan me instead.”

Diniang sat beside her and gently sent a cool breeze her way with a folding fan.

“What is taking Li Wu so long?” Shen Zhuxi grumbled, peering toward the entrance of the Guan Yu temple where the soldiers were gathered.

“Perhaps the tree is somewhat far from the temple. The trip there and back must take some time.” Diniang offered by way of comfort.

Shen Zhuxi said nothing, but could not help letting her mind wander to unwelcome possibilities. In a desolate wilderness like this, there was no shortage of bandits. Li Wu was taking so long — could something have happened on the road?

Diniang did not grasp her worry, and went about busily arranging the floor bedding for the night. Then she pulled out a sachet that had fallen from the bedding and looked at it curiously.

“My lady, you’ve been using this sachet for over a month now. Shall I swap it out for a new one?”

Shen Zhuxi shook her head. “Leave it.”

“Is this one from Master Li?” Diniang said with sudden understanding.

“It was White Cousin who gave it to me the last time he came to Xiangyang.” Shen Zhuxi took the faded sachet and looked at it with a wistful expression. “This was my mother’s last piece of embroidery before she left home to be married.”

Diniang immediately realized the awkwardness of her earlier suggestion and smiled quickly: “No wonder my lady treasures it so!”

She did not breathe another word about replacing the sachet.

Shen Zhuxi held the sachet in her hand and sent a silent prayer upward to her mother’s spirit, hoping Li Wu would return safe and sound, and soon.

“Boom—”

The sudden thunderous roar made the sachet slip from Shen Zhuxi’s hand.

A flock of birds burst into the air and swept toward the blood-red setting sun.

“What in his mother’s name — of course it’s you!”

Li Wu looked at Bai Rongling, hanging upside down from a rope over the cliff face, and swore with exasperation.

Bai Rongling hung in midair without daring to move a muscle, directly above a deep valley swathed in thin mist and vivid green. His eyes were stretched wide with terror, his face a portrait of fright, and from beneath the cloth strips binding his mouth came muffled, garbled whimpers. The rope connecting him to the boulder had been severely worn by the rough edge of the cliff and was now more than half frayed, with only a thin remaining strand linking the two.

Three soldiers returned at a jog to report that no ambush had been found in the surrounding area.

The boulder was on the verge of toppling. Li Wu had the greater part of his soldiers work together to brace and stabilize it, while he lay flat at the cliff’s edge, and with the help of several more soldiers, hauled Bai Rongling — hanging below the cliff — back up by force.

Bai Rongling had no idea how long he had been suspended in that position. Not only had his face gone a violent shade of red, but even the whites of his eyes were shot through with bloodshot streaks.

“What in his mother’s name are you doing in Shouzhou getting strung up like this, when you should be back in Xiangyang eating braised pork?”

Li Wu removed the cloth strips binding Bai Rongling’s wrists, then yanked out the strips from his mouth. Bai Rongling broke into a fit of hoarse, rasping coughs, tears streaming from his eyes.

“Run — run quickly…” he said, his words coming out indistinct.

Li Wu hoisted him up onto his shoulder and said: “Well, I still have to bring you along before I can run, don’t I?”

A thin hemp rope trailed down from Bai Rongling’s waist. Li Wu frowned and pulled at it, following it to find that the other end extended toward the woodland not far away.

Another one?

He drew the dagger at his hip, and was about to cut through the thin rope tied to Bai Rongling’s body, when a voice — utterly calm and unhurried — came from behind the fallen tree.

“If you don’t want him to die, don’t touch that rope.”

Under the combined effort of several strong men, the fallen tree was rolled and tumbled down the mountainside.

A tall, willowy figure dressed in the pale white of moonlight stepped out from among a crowd of fully armed attendants.

“…Vice Administrator.” Li Wu gave a slow, lazy smile, set Bai Rongling down from his shoulder, and said: “It really is you.”

The mountain wind whistled as it swept the robes of both men. The two figures, equal in height, faced each other across the swirling yellow sand. One wore his emotions openly on his face; the other kept his locked behind composure. One had spent years beneath the open sun, his skin burnished like a field of ripened wheat; the other had passed his months sheltered under eaves, his complexion as pale and lustrous as jade bathed in moonlight. One was open, the other closed; one bright, the other shadowed — the only thing they shared was the implacable, unyielding hostility in each other’s eyes.

“Since you already knew it was me, why did you stay?” Fu Xuanmiao said quietly.

“Isn’t it because you’ve got my cousin-in-law in your hands?” Li Wu said with an air of casual indifference.

Fu Xuanmiao gave a faint smile, a flash of contempt crossing his eyes.

“Unexpected… so it seems Lord Li is a man of sentiment and loyalty after all.”

On the horizon, a mass of dark cloud slowly caught the last trailing edge of the sunset, swallowing the magnificent crimson radiance inch by inch.

The light was dying.

Shadow fell, stripping away the cold and hollow civility from Fu Xuanmiao’s face.

He looked at Li Wu with a frigid stare, and from between his even, pale teeth, words came one by one, as cold as ice:

“Only — why… did you have to steal her from me?”

There was no longer any point in evasions.

Li Wu let the easy grin fall from his face and met Fu Xuanmiao’s crushing, glacial gaze without flinching:

“If she were truly the one you loved… then why, when she was at your side, did she not even dare to wear a red dress?”

“What she wears is her own choice. I have never interfered.” Fu Xuanmiao said. “How could I dare interfere with a princess of a nation?”

“You never directly interfered,” Li Wu said. “But your shadow was everywhere around her.”

“The way I conduct myself with my wife is not something for an outsider to comment on so lightly.”

“But she is my wife now.”

“By parental decree and a matchmaker’s word — do you have even one of these?” Fu Xuanmiao looked at him quietly. “…A union without rites.”

The darkness in Li Wu’s eyes dropped a full shade. His gaze, sharp as a blade, cut straight at Fu Xuanmiao’s face.

“…You may insult me, but do not insult my woman.”

“Your woman?” Fu Xuanmiao gave a low, quiet laugh. “…Not for much longer.”

Before Li Wu could respond, Fu Xuanmiao turned his gaze toward Bai Rongling, who stood to the side, face filled with dismay and unable to stay still, and said coldly:

“Young Master Bai, if you still aren’t making your move, are you having second thoughts — considering changing to a different brother-in-law, perhaps?”

“I…”

Bai Rongling looked at Fu Xuanmiao, then at Li Wu standing beside him. His lips trembled, his face awash with fear and confusion.

“Young Master Bai…” Fu Xuanmiao said. The icy threat in his eyes spoke for itself.

He had only spoken his name, yet Bai Rongling trembled from head to toe. A terror stronger than the one he had felt hanging upside down over the cliff seized him by the heart.

“I — don’t force me…”

Bai Rongling took a shaky step backward, stumbled on the rope around his waist, and sat down hard in the sand.

“If you have something against me, come at me — don’t drag in people who have nothing to do with this.” Li Wu said, his face grim.

“If you truly hadn’t wanted him dragged in, he would not have been in the same carriage as me when it left Shouping Village.” Fu Xuanmiao said. “From the moment you and he conspired together to deceive me with an unidentified woman’s corpse, you should have anticipated this moment.”

“Anticipated what moment?” Li Wu’s gaze swept over Fu Xuanmiao’s attendants standing behind him, and over the arrows and blade-glints now emerging from the woodland where they had been concealed, and gave a cold laugh. “The Vice Administrator seems to have come in quite a hurry — do you really think fewer than a hundred men will be enough to take my life?”

The two hundred-odd soldiers Li Wu had brought were gathered around him, eyes alert, scanning the ring of Fu Xuanmiao’s men that had closed in around them.

Fu Xuanmiao had not brought many men, but every one of them wore an expression of calm confidence, as though the outcome were already decided.

In terms of numbers, the advantage lay with Li Wu. Not to mention, three hundred more soldiers remained with Shen Zhuxi, and the remaining two thousand and five hundred were still on their way.

The composure on Fu Xuanmiao’s face — and on the faces of his men — had no basis in reality.

Li Wu was not about to let his guard down. While buying time, he kept scanning the surrounding terrain, searching for any clue or telltale sign.

“To take your life, more men are unnecessary.” Fu Xuanmiao said.

“You—”

Li Wu’s words stopped short. He turned his head slowly and looked at Bai Rongling, whose face was a mask of horror.

“No — it wasn’t me…”

Bai Rongling drew a blood-streaked dagger, retreating in a stumbling scramble as Li Wu looked on in disbelief.

A great gush of dark blood splashed across the ground.

“General!” Li Wu’s personal guard cried out.

Li Wu lurched, clutching his lower back, and went down on one knee.

Fu Xuanmiao watched him without blinking, not a flicker of expression on his face.

Ever since learning that Li Wu was Li Zhuzong, he had spent the entire journey to Yangzhou imagining many forms of punishment. He had even decided that he would summon the finest physicians and the best medicines, prolonging his suffering to the furthest possible extreme… only then would the hatred consuming his heart be satisfied.

But he had not imagined that upon reaching Yangzhou, what awaited him would be so enormous a “surprise.”

It was Li Wu who had shown him that at the height of hatred, even cruelty becomes a burden.

Simply knowing that they still breathed the same air was enough to make his every internal organ clench and curl, his ten fingers prickle as though pierced by needles.

That was not pain. It was hatred — pure, fierce hatred, the kind that could drive a man to madness.

All he wanted now was to take Li Wu’s life before his very eyes.

“I did what you told me to — so will you spare the Bai Family?!”

Bai Rongling’s trembling hands gripped the blood-slicked dagger, his clothes spotted all over with dark red stains. He cried out, his voice thick with tears.

“Of course.” Fu Xuanmiao’s voice was gentle, his immaculate robes entirely unblemished, his clean hands resting quietly within the wide sleeves. “If you are still alive.”

Boom—!

The entire cliff face shattered with a thunderous roar. The ground dropped away beneath the feet of Li Wu and his men, trapped at the cliff’s edge. Before anyone could make sense of what was happening, they tumbled with the collapsing rock face down into the bottomless gorge below.

Countless fragments of stone plunged into the abyss. Cries of terror rang out, from near and then far, from sound and then silence.

The thin rope buried in the yellow sand snapped taut.

When the dust finally settled, what had been a cliff was there no longer. The two hundred-odd men who had been gathered at the cliff’s edge — Li Wu among them — had all vanished into the depths of the valley below.

Fu Xuanmiao looked at Bai Rongling, who had been hauled back up to the broken edge, his face white as a sheet and trembling ceaselessly, and said quietly:

“White Cousin, wipe your face, change your clothes, then we’ll be on our way.”

He paused. His voice grew softer still:

“When you see the Princess shortly, I’ll need you to put on a charming performance and keep her in good spirits.”

Bai Rongling’s legs shook and his fear overwhelmed him. As a guard dragged him roughly to his feet, a stream of blood flowed from his hands.

Fu Xuanmiao’s gaze fell on the back of his hand.

“When — when we fell… a rock cut me…”

Bai Rongling clutched his injured hand tight, his face ghastly pale, his teeth chattering, looking utterly shell-shocked.

“…Dress his wound.” Fu Xuanmiao said.

A mounted scout who had been posted in the outer perimeter suddenly burst from the woodland, his face awash with alarm, holding up a carrier pigeon.

“Trouble!”

The scout urgently dismounted, stumbling in his haste, and not even pausing to wipe his face, rushed to kneel before Fu Xuanmiao and held up the gray carrier pigeon with both hands, his voice trembling:

“Jian — Jianzhou is in crisis. Li Que has seized the Chancellor’s residence and taken the Chancellor hostage…”

“Rebellion…”