Yang Jingyuan pushed open the door to the western wing and threw Ji Yingying onto the couch.
The impact against the couch nearly made Ji Yingying’s heart jump out of her mouth. What kind of grudge was this? Throwing her like a sack of grain. She grimaced while rubbing her bruised shoulder, using one hand to prop herself up into a sitting position.
Yang Jingyuan stood with his arms crossed, looking up at the ceiling.
On the misty night, it took Ji Yingying a moment to see his face. When he tilted his head up, his jawline was sharp and distinct; he had lost much weight since leaving. He wore a dusty gray short jacket with a black scarf around his neck. His hair was carelessly tied back with a cloth strip. Even before, when Young Master Yang Three didn’t use the fine gold wire headpiece to contain his hair, he had used brocade ribbons to tie it. He must have suffered greatly in Santai. Surely he hadn’t pawned all the fine clothes made for him? These clothes weren’t even as good as those worn by the Yang family’s doorkeepers. Her heart, like a castle built of sand, collapsed in an instant. Her words of reproach dissolved into fine grains of sand, scattering into nothingness.
“Third Young Master.”
Her voice was soft, slightly nasal, filled with lingering affection.
Lingering. Yang Jingyuan remembered the soft sash wrapped around Concubine Liu’s neck. The main room had a decorated ceiling with colorful paintings. That night, Concubine Liu had been dragged from her bedroom and thrown into this wing room where the servants lived. There was no ceiling here, the beams exposed, and one spot showed where the sash had scraped away the dust…
He looked around; the round stool was still lying on the ground, and no one had bothered to right it. He reached out and set it upright on the floor.
Yang Jingyuan bent down, grabbed Ji Yingying’s arms, and lifted her, making her stand on the stool.
Ji Yingying instinctively grabbed his shoulders: “Third Young Master, what are you doing?”
“Stand still!” Yang Jingyuan pulled away her hands and stepped back.
Why so fierce? Ji Yingying pouted, enduring his dark expression while standing uncertainly: “What am I standing here for?”
Yang Jingyuan looked up.
Look at what? Ji Yingying followed his gaze upward. Yang Jingyuan’s haunting voice reached her ears: “My concubine mother also wore plain white mourning clothes, stood on this very round stool, and hanged herself.”
…
As if seeing Concubine Liu hanging from the pitch-black beam in her flowing white clothes, Ji Yingying’s legs went weak. She instinctively stepped backward and tumbled off the stool. The round stool fell over again with a dull thud. Ji Yingying lay on the ground, turning her head angrily to look at him: “Is it fun to play such tricks?”
“Tricks? This was a life, my concubine mother’s life!” Yang Jingyuan exploded, “She may not have raised me, but she was still my birth mother! Was she so eager to die? She wouldn’t even see her son one last time before dying?! She was forced to death by Madam! Just because Father secretly left me some property, Madam forced her to die.”
A handkerchief was thrown onto Ji Yingying’s face. She grabbed it and opened it to see the character “Shu” written in blood. The bloodstains had long dried, leaving dark marks on the handkerchief. Ji Yingying trembled and threw the handkerchief aside.
“What’s wrong, you can’t even bear to look at a single blood-written character?”
Yang Jingyuan knelt before her, the ferocity and killing intent in his brow terrifying her. She tried to retreat, but he gripped her chin: “Ji Yingying, were you so eager to become the Yang family’s Third Madam? Who did you bow to in marriage? What did you promise me? When you knelt before Madam offering tea and calling her mother, did you think of me at all?”
Each word seemed ground out by a millstone, carrying hatred sharp as teeth and pain like a crushed heart.
“You’re hurting me!” The rough fingers gripping her chin sent burning pain through her face. Ji Yingying didn’t care if he would hurt her more, she forcefully jerked her face away.
“Do you know what pain is?” Yang Jingyuan pointed to the door, “Father wasn’t even in his grave for seven days. She brought out the family punishment rod for me. One strike broke the long bench in two and shattered the blue flagstones. She wanted my life, wanted to destroy me completely… I called her mother for eighteen years! For my concubine mother to live happily with Father, to put her at ease, I lived carelessly and idly for eighteen years! I thought, the concubine mother simply didn’t want to live anymore, no one forced her, she just didn’t want to live. I’m not dead yet, I’ve repaid her kindness of raising me for eighteen years. I don’t blame anyone anymore. I left! I went far away. I went to live my own life!”
Tears fell without warning from his eyes. Yang Jingyuan looked at Ji Yingying, his lips trembling, unable to continue speaking.
It was she who had lived in the mountains, waiting for him while living on simple meals. It was she who had sewn his clothes, and made his shoes and socks. It was she who had made that rainy night warm with a bowl of hot, fragrant soup and rice. He thought he still had her by his side.
Master Shu had given him an opportunity. He had to earn his future. Through all sorts of discomfort and difficulties, with her in his heart, he had feared nothing.
Her marriage was like a sharp knife stabbed into his back. At his most defenseless moment, it pierced his weakest spot. The pain left him no chance to breathe, directly taking his life.
“Third Young Master, Third Young Master!” Ji Yingying’s face crumpled with heartache as she cried and embraced him, “Third Young Master, I’m sorry. Please don’t be like this, my heart aches so much!”
She held him with all her strength. She couldn’t think of any other way; it seemed only a tight embrace could ease his pain a little.
“I’m sorry. I was wrong, I was wrong.”
Ji Yingying didn’t try to explain herself; she hated herself for causing Yang Jingyuan such pain. The guilt in her heart was boundless. She had guessed that Madam might have forced Concubine Liu to commit suicide. She had guessed that Yang Jingyuan left home because of the family property. She hadn’t known that Madam had wanted to beat him to death.
“I didn’t know it was like this. I didn’t know she wanted to kill you.”
Her mother wanted to repay the Yang family’s helping hand, and both her mother and Madam hoped she could bring Yang Jingyuan home. Her mother forced her, and Madam said it was to ensure the Yang family’s protection of the Ji family. She hadn’t wanted this either, but she had no choice. She had hoped for his return, hoped he would understand.
Yang Jingyuan removed her hands and forcefully pushed her to the ground. He stood up, his eyes now tearless, as indifferent as if looking at a stranger.
Ji Yingying had seen this look before. When he sat on his horse and threw down the pot of fresh fish porridge, he had been just as cold.
“Third Young Master! Listen to me!” Ji Yingying quickly crawled over, grabbing his trouser leg, “Third Young Master, I didn’t want to marry, I wanted to wait for you. I know you resent me, but you’ll forgive me, won’t you? I never meant to hurt you…”
Her plain white robe spread out on the ground like moonlight falling on his heart, ice-cold. Her hair was loose, and her dark eyes looked just like those of a pitiful puppy.
Yang Jingyuan still remembered her bare feet on the brown wooden floor, cradling them in his palms like pristine snow. He had carefully kept that secret, privately delighting in having touched her feet. His heart twinged; she had bewitched him before, but he would not let her bewitch him again.
“How much did Madam give you, to make you sacrifice yourself in marriage like this? Ah, I almost forgot – when I first met you at Zhulin Temple, you were always talking about earning lots and lots of silver. Don’t worry, the Yang family’s Third Madam won’t want money to spend.”
Ji Yingying’s mouth fell open, her hand slowly loosening: “Please… don’t say such hurtful things…”
Her head slowly lowered until she lay face-down on the reed mat, crying out loud.