Xie Yuzhang gave Yuexiang to Li Yong.

By the time the betrothal gifts had been exchanged between the two of them, it was already the sixth month, and the summer festival was imminent — the tribe was bustling with busy and lively preparations. The wedding was therefore postponed for the time being, to be held after the summer festival was over.

Only Yuexiang had a great deal more boldness than Wanxiu. Wanxiu before her wedding had stayed obediently tucked away in the tent, relaying things to Wang Zhong only through Lin Fei as the go-between.

Yuexiang, however, slipped out on her own and went strolling through the summer festival market hand in hand with Li Yong.

When the others noticed and laughed at her, she planted a hand on her hip, tilted her chin up, and said: “What of it? Don’t the girls of Mobei all do this?”

Someone called back: “Yes — and at night they crawl into tents with their sweethearts as well!”

Laughter erupted all around. Yuexiang’s face went crimson, and she set off chasing the one who had spoken.

Xie Yuzhang said: “I wonder if I chose the right matches for them. Wang Zhong and Wanxiu are both quiet and speak little. But with Yuexiang and Li Yong, one is sharper-tongued than the other.”

Lin Fei laughed: “Each person lives their own life in their own way. Are you going to spend a lifetime worrying over them?”

Then she added: “Yuan Ling’s daughter — you ought to meet her.”

Xie Yuzhang perked up at once: “Right, I need to hear the full story of this — tell me everything.”

The spark of gossip-loving curiosity blazed brightly.

At this year’s summer festival, a young woman had come to the royal court in the company of another tribe’s party. She sought out Yuan Yu and, upon meeting him, said without preamble: “My mother’s name was Burileguoli. Are you the Central Plains father of mine?”

Yuan Yu stood dumbstruck for a long moment, then asked: “Where is she?”

“She died three years ago giving birth to my little sister,” the young woman said. “Are you or are you not my birth father?”

As it turned out, at the previous year’s summer festival, Yuan Yu had entrusted others to search for news of the woman he had once wronged and left behind. The one tasked with the search was an itinerant merchant who traveled to trade between various tribes, and who inquired on Yuan Yu’s behalf as he went. After an entire year, the merchant had truly found word of her.

All these years later, Burileguoli’s tribe had long since been absorbed by another, and she herself had long since been married off.

Back in those days, she had given birth to a child out of wedlock. But this was common on the grasslands. Some tribes with small populations simply did not send their daughters to marry outside the tribe at all — instead, when outsiders passed through, the women of the tribe would be sent to share their tents, for the sole purpose of bearing children and increasing the population.

Tribes with too few people were like small, helpless sheep on the grasslands — fated to be absorbed. If lucky, their people were taken in as free subjects; if unlucky, they became slaves.

Burileguoli’s tribe had been among the fortunate ones, absorbed as subjects, and she had later been given in marriage. After her death, this daughter too had been married off by her foster family. This past winter, her husband had died, and by custom his older brother had taken her in. But that older brother had a habit of beating women, and the young woman could not endure it. She fled back to her maternal family seeking refuge.

But the maternal family had received twenty sheep from the husband’s side when she was first married, and were unwilling to return them, so they refused to take her back. Her new husband had followed her and beaten her again on the spot, and was preparing to drag her back home.

It was at this exact moment that the itinerant merchant came inquiring to this very household, and walked into the full chaos of the scene. He first calmed everyone down, then began asking questions.

Once he had a clear picture, he looked the young woman up and down and asked: “How old are you?”

The young woman said: “Eighteen.”

The merchant asked her foster father: “Is she your blood?”

The foster father said: “She is not — her mother brought her along.”

The merchant understood at once, and laughed: “Stop quarreling — what is twenty sheep? Her birth father has come from the Central Plains looking for her. He is a man of wealth. What does twenty sheep amount to?”

The young woman was overcome with excitement, nodding again and again: “Yes, yes — my mother told me my birth father was a man from the Central Plains!”

So the young woman traveled with the merchant to the royal court — her husband came along too. That husband would not release her without getting his twenty sheep back; a woman was a man’s property, just like a sheep.

The foster father had originally wanted to come as well, to seek some compensation from her birth father for the cost of raising her. The merchant gave him a sideways glance: “Then go and return the twenty sheep first!”

The foster father’s neck retracted into his shoulders. He did not follow them after all.

Yuan Yu heard the full account, and without a word first paid that man his twenty sheep. Then he had the man sign a written agreement.

The nomads had no written contracts; such matters were settled by word of mouth. The man could not read at all — to say nothing of written Chinese, he could not even read his own mother tongue.

Yuan Yu put brush to paper and drafted a contract in two scripts, then had the man press his handprint to it.

Yuan Yu was impeccably dressed, clearly a man of considerable means at a glance. The man did not dare to make trouble, and pressed his handprint to the paper like a good and obedient fellow, then took his sheep and left.

Yuan Yu also paid the merchant his agreed-upon fee, and only then brought the young woman back to his tent to question her at great length, after which he sighed: “From now on, you will live here with me.”

To the people of these small grassland tribes, the royal court of the Khanate was what the capital Yunjing of the Zhao kingdom would be to a country bumpkin. The young woman nodded with great excitement.

Xie Yuzhang summoned Yuan Yu and asked: “Is she truly your daughter?”

Yuan Yu’s old face flushed: “The age lines up, and she looks like me.”

Though given the free and open nature of relations between men and women on the grasslands, the likelihood of his having taken on another man’s child was also quite considerable.

But with his dignity already sacrificed, Yuan Yu abandoned all pretense of shame and said: “I promised her mother I would marry her, and then I failed her. Whether or not she is my blood, she is that woman’s child — and so she is my child.”

Yuan Yu was also well on in years, with no children to his name. Having a daughter to care for him in old age and see him through his final days would not be a bad thing.

Xie Yuzhang summoned the daughter before her and asked: “What is your name?”

The daughter knew she was a noble Central Plains princess, the consort of the great Khan — she was so overcome with nerves she did not know what to do with herself: “Sha — Shasha.”

Xie Yuzhang was very kind and gentle with her, and only gradually did the young woman’s anxiety begin to ease. As Shasha spoke, Xie Yuzhang learned that she had been married at thirteen, had already given birth to four children, two of whom had died in infancy, with two still living — left behind with her husband’s family.

After Shasha took her leave, Xie Yuzhang sat thinking of the children Shasha had left behind with her former husband’s family, and remained unhappy for a long while.

Lin Fei did not understand why. But it was the height of the summer festival — what was there to be so gloomy about? She gathered the handmaidens around Xie Yuzhang and took her out to browse the market.

She herself remained behind to keep watch over the tent.

Ashina had received a pot containing a flower that was said to bloom in clusters of white clouds, and came to present the treasure to Xie Yuzhang with great delight. When he arrived at the great tent, he found it quiet and deserted — only two servants outside the tent door, speaking with an unfamiliar handmaiden.

Ashina reined in his horse and looked at that handmaiden for a long moment, then urged his horse over: “Hey — you!”

Lin Fei looked up.

Slender and graceful, refined and elegant — standing there, she was the very image of a painting of a court beauty.

One such as this — no matter how carefully Xie Yuzhang tried to keep her hidden, she was ultimately impossible to conceal.

“What is your name?” Ashina asked with great interest. “I do not believe I have seen you before.”

“This servant’s surname is Lin,” Lin Fei replied calmly. “This servant is responsible for affairs within the Princess’s inner chambers. I have seen the Khan on a few occasions, but the Khan had not noticed me.”

Ashina considered this, and conceded it was likely so — Xie Yuzhang’s beauty was so radiant and all-consuming that when she was present, one truly would not notice the handmaidens around her.

“You are rather handsome,” he said approvingly. “Come and serve at my side.”

The guards and attendants before the great tent were thrown into a panic. They all knew how much Xie Yuzhang cherished Lin Fei — she never brought Lin Fei to the Khan’s great tent, and her protective intent was obvious to anyone with eyes. If Lin Fei were to be noticed here and taken away by the old Khan, how were they to account for it to the Princess?

But Lin Fei smiled.

“That will not do,” she said with a pleasant smile. “The Khan does not know how jealous our Princess is. She told us long ago that none of us are permitted to serve her husband.”

Ashina thought of Xie Yuzhang’s willful, imperious nature and burst out laughing, letting Lin Fei off the hook.

Lin Fei narrowly escaped danger. When Xie Yuzhang returned and heard of it, she was so frightened her heart nearly stopped.

“What a stroke of fortune that you were quick-witted!” she said, pressing a hand to her chest. “No matter how carefully one guards against something, there is no preventing it.”

From the start she had deliberately kept close to Zhadayali, and even after returning to the ancestral grounds she had pitched her great tent beside Zhadayali’s domain — at a considerable distance from Ashina. On ordinary days it was always she who went to the royal tent, and she never brought Lin Fei along, just as Lin Fei had once been right there in the Zhaoxia Palace yet rarely crossed paths with the Emperor.

Lin Fei looked at her lingering unease and asked out of nowhere: “In my past life — did I ever serve him?”

Xie Yuzhang went rigid in an instant.

Seeing her reaction, Lin Fei understood. She nodded, saying with quiet comprehension: “It would seem I did serve him. If even he was unavoidable, then Xia’erdan and Wuwei must also have been inescapable?”

Xie Yuzhang sat frozen, unable to move. She could only look at Lin Fei, her throat stopped, unable to speak a word.

“So that is why, when we left the capital, you would not allow me to stay in the Duke’s estate no matter what,” Lin Fei said, holding her gaze.

The grasslands were a place that still practiced slavery. The customs and systems here — in the eyes of people from the Central Plains — were barbaric and backward in many ways. A handmaiden brought along as part of a bride’s retinue, for instance, held a role not entirely unlike that of a secondary wife given in marriage alongside the primary one.

So when she had appeared in the procession accompanying the bride, and Xie Yuzhang had shared such a great secret with her, yet had steadfastly refused to let her ask about her own fate — Lin Fei had dimly sensed that the truth might be worse than she imagined.

So in this lifetime, before Xia’erdan had done anything at all, Xie Yuzhang had struck first and ensured his death.

“What are you afraid of?” Lin Fei took Xie Yuzhang’s hands in hers. In the middle of summer, they were cold. Lin Fei sighed quietly: “Do not be afraid. This lifetime is different.”

“Yes, it is different,” Xie Yuzhang said, her tears falling. “We have worked so hard. If it were to end the same way after all of this, dying would be better.”

Lin Fei said with mild reproach: “What kind of talk is that? Even an ant knows to cling to life. ‘Better to live badly than die well’ — have you never heard that saying?”

Xie Yuzhang laughed through her tears: “I am only saying it. This lifetime will certainly be different. Let us get through these next few years, and then when we return to Yunjing, with Li Gu there, things will be much easier.”

One truly should not tempt fate by speaking too soon — barely had she said those words when, the very next day, a merchant from the Central Plains who had come for the summer festival requested an audience.

Xie Yuzhang received the merchant in her great tent.

The merchant bowed and said: “I was entrusted by an old acquaintance from Hexi to come and pay my respects to Your Highness.”

Xie Yuzhang asked: “Which number among his brothers is this acquaintance?”

The merchant said: “The eleventh.”

Xie Yuzhang asked: “Is the acquaintance well?”

The merchant said: “He is well.”

Xie Yuzhang asked: “Is there a letter?”

The merchant said: “There is none.”

“Is there a verbal message?”

“Also none.”

“…”

“The gentleman instructed this humble one to see Your Highness with his own eyes.”

“Oh.” Xie Yuzhang propped her chin on her hand. “Then look.”

The merchant raised his head and looked openly.

“Well?” Xie Yuzhang asked.

The merchant smiled: “Your Highness is faring very well.”

Princess Baohua’s gaze was bright and clear, the furrow between her brows at ease. Only a woman living comfortably and contentedly could carry such a vivid and lively complexion.

Moreover, word that the old Khan doted on Baohua Khatun so deeply had reached even the Central Plains merchant caravans.

Li Shiyi Lang — you worried too much.

“The gentleman instructed this humble one to say: should Your Highness have any needs, they may be conveyed through me,” the merchant said.

“I have no needs at present,” Xie Yuzhang said.

Her people here were clearing wasteland and cultivating fields, raising cattle and sheep, and had established a sugar-making workshop. Though the raw material was beet rather than sugarcane, it produced snow-white sugar all the same. In Mobei’s Khanate, she was entirely self-sufficient.

And there was still Ashina, that great patron, who was forever sending her this and that. Were it not for the great expense of maintaining cavalry, she could have lived even more lavishly.

“What connection are you to him?” Xie Yuzhang asked. She studied the merchant, feeling she might have seen him before somewhere, though she could not quite place him.

But if he was Li Gu’s man, and had followed him from so early on, he would certainly hold a decent position in the new dynasty by virtue of his merit in aiding its founding. She was not yet familiar with those new dynastic subjects.

The merchant replied: “This humble one travels between Mobei and Hexi trading goods all year round, and once had the fortune of saving the gentleman’s life. I follow wherever he leads.”

Xie Yuzhang asked: “Has there been any progress on the matter of the trading post? Is Li Ming willing to yield?”

A look of difficulty crossed the merchant’s face.

Xie Yuzhang said: “Very well, I understand.”

She said to the merchant: “Go back and tell him I am well, that all matters here I am able to manage myself, and he need not worry about me.”

She paused, then added: “Tell him — I hope he rises to great power, and fills his household with wives and concubines. From Mobei, he and I look toward one another across the distance, each faring well in their own place, and that is enough for both of us.”

The merchant sighed inwardly, and bowed deeply: “I will convey your words faithfully.”

The great market should have been an occasion for good cheer, yet Xie Yuzhang was in low spirits again.

Ashina said with a headache: “What is it this time?”

Xie Yuzhang said: “I met several merchants from the Central Plains. The matter of the trading post has made no progress at all — Li Ming refuses to yield. As a princess sent to forge an alliance, if I cannot achieve even this, I am truly useless.”

Ashina had not expected her to be downcast over this of all things, and was genuinely surprised.

“Oh come now, who truly counted on you for that,” he said with an amused laugh, slapping his knee. “I knew from the start that matter could not succeed.”

“Even without a formal trading post, so long as the trade routes stay open, that is enough. It is just that the tax money goes into the pockets of that short Li fellow instead. I bring up the trading post with your father from time to time — it’s only ever to annoy that short Li fellow,” he said with a great laugh. “Foolish child, do not let it trouble your heart.”

So all of this was men playing power games and testing each other’s strength.

And a princess sent to forge an alliance — what was she, in the end?

Xie Yuzhang forced out a smile: “Then… that is good.”