“How did we get to talking of threats.” Han Yueqi’s laughing voice came from behind Ye Lingbo: “I know what Lingbo was going to say — she is a young miss and it would not be proper for her to say it, so let me say it for her. Qiaozhen is a newlywed and yet here she is at the Flower Xin Banquet — she must be missing her husband terribly, crying until her eyes are blurred, no wonder she could not tell a cuckoo from a mandarin duck. Is that not so, everyone?”

Her standing among the capital’s young matrons was unrivaled. Secretary Shen currently served as the Minister of Rites — a position of substantial authority — and Young Master Shen had passed the imperial examination with honors as one of the top three scholars, a man of great promise with the Emperor’s own regard. Her own family was of refined and distinguished lineage; her husband’s family held weight and power; she had a daughter to her name. The moment she appeared at the Flower Xin Banquet, even Lu Wenyin’s position as principal guest would have to yield to her.

And so, regardless of whether her quip was particularly funny, everyone had to laugh in unison. The younger matrons stepped aside and made their bows; Madam He herself came forward to receive her in person: “Young Madam Shen, what an honor your presence bestows upon us.”

“You are too kind.” Han Yueqi only smiled warmly and took her hand, saying: “Madam He is too formal — it is I who should apologize to the Elder Matriarch. I ought to have arrived this morning, but there were matters at home that I could not leave. It was only at midday, when I heard that this year’s Flower Xin Banquet was especially lively — and that Qinglan was here — that I could no longer bear to stay away, and abandoned my household affairs to come and find Qinglan.”

Having said this, she took Lingbo’s hand and smiled at Ye Qinglan. Ye Qinglan looked at her with mild helplessness: “With the household so busy, what did you need to rush over here for?”

“I had a message through Biwei’s maid saying things were very lively at the banquet, so I came.” She smiled and turned to look at Lu Wenyin: “Madam Chen certainly has leisure — you arrived early this morning. I hear you have been very warm and close with my Qinglan?”

“Jealous, jealous!” a matron immediately laughed: “Everyone knows Madam Shen and First Young Miss Ye are the closest of all — Madam Chen would have to take second place.”

“Quite so.” Han Yueqi smiled at Lu Wenyin, with layers of meaning in her words: “I don’t mind what games you play with others — but if you play them with my Qinglan and Lingbo, I will come, even if my house is on fire. And if you set my back courtyard burning, I will not forgive you.”

It was said in jest, and the room laughed in response, the atmosphere warming at once. Lu Wenyin had no choice but to stand down, smiling along with Yang Qiaozhen and the rest, without further comment.

For Han Yueqi’s arrival, the Elder Matriarch herself came forward to receive her. Han Yueqi was all propriety and deference — “I dare not accept such ceremony,” “Elder Matriarch, you will make me feel ashamed” — but all the while with a smile, she told and retold the story of Lu Wenyin and Yang Qiaozhen mistaking Ye Qinglan’s embroidered cuckoo bird for a mandarin duck and then mocking her for it, until even the Elder Matriarch found herself obliged to correct Lu Wenyin: “As a matron, how can one mock an unmarried young miss like that? If guests are treated this way, will anyone dare come to our home again?” As for Yang Qiaozhen’s mother-in-law, Madam Xue, she personally apologized to Ye Qinglan herself.

But high standing came with its own burdens. From the moment she appeared at the Flower Xin Banquet, there was not a pause — those who knew her naturally came to pay their respects, those who did not know her hurried over to cultivate a connection, and the young misses all came forward to declare their admiration: “Elder Sister Han is the paragon of all the inner-chamber ladies.” A full hour of bustle passed before she at last found a moment to be alone with the Ye sisters.

By then it was already afternoon. The sky was beginning to darken, and the snow had stopped. A thin layer of white lay on the ground. Han Yueqi’s household stewardess held an umbrella, maids clustered around, and she walked with Qinglan and Lingbo admiring the plum blossoms in a secluded corner of the garden.

Only now could a few genuine words be spoken.

“Lingbo, come here.” She was in truth the same age as Qinglan, still with a young girl’s love of good stories. She could not help asking at once: “What on earth has happened in the Yang family — why was Yang Qiaozhen so frightened of you saying it?”

“It is nothing extraordinary. Their ‘Young Master Xue’ has been gambling outside, ran up some debts, and Madam Xue concealed it from Lord Xue — mother-in-law and daughter-in-law put their money together quietly to settle it. The mother-in-law now blames the daughter-in-law, because it was her cousin who took him gambling in the first place — she suspects it was a setup. The two of them were quarreling over this when they came, and their sedan chairs even left home at separate times,” Ye Lingbo said, with perfect composure.

Han Yueqi could not help laughing.

“You girl, how do you come by all this information?” She had half a mind to praise Lingbo for it, but catching Qinglan’s frown, she changed course and adopted a reproving tone instead: “You — this sort of thing is fine to say in private, but how could you bring it up at the Flower Xin Banquet? You harm the enemy by a thousand, but lose eight hundred yourself. You are an unmarried young miss — how can you speak of these inner household secrets? Will that not only confirm that you are scheming and calculating?”

“Yang Qiaozhen has taken a habit of bullying our family — if I don’t give her something heavy to feel, she will never know to be afraid,” Lingbo said.

“She is a petty person — you are a young miss of a great family. Why lower yourself to her level?” Qinglan said, correcting her: “Even if it was on my account, it was not worth it. This year’s Flower Xin Banquet is your affair and A’Cuo’s — you should take care of yourself. There is no need to worry about me.”

Lingbo always heeded her sister when they were out in company, and did not argue. But Han Yueqi understood her feelings and did not press the point — only smiled at her quietly, with a private sigh.

When it was time to go back inside, Qinglan walked ahead, and Han Yueqi lingered behind. Lingbo came to help her up the steps, but Han Yueqi turned toward Lingbo with a smile.

“You truly mean to retie the red thread?” Han Yueqi asked her.

Retying the red thread referred to a play — the story of how a sharp-witted and resourceful maid named Red Thread helped her young mistress reconcile with a young scholar whose engagement had been severed by a misunderstanding, ending with the young mistress as the wife of a first-class scholar.

Lingbo smiled too: “A rare and fitting match is hard to come by. Of course it must be made whole again.”

Such a pair, perfectly suited in talent and beauty — who could not feel the loss of it? Han Yueqi herself lamented it, and so she offered no dissuasion, only sighing: “It is a pity that Madam Meng is no longer with us this year. You are young misses — there are many things you cannot say, many things you cannot do. At every turn your hands are tied. Even if you have the means to check them, you invite the accusation of being overbearing and relentless. I know you are proud and strong-willed, but at a time like this, you can only let a matron speak for you — however great your skill, you must put it away…”

Lingbo said nothing. Han Yueqi knew she was compliant on the surface but still set on her own course, and so she stopped walking entirely to make her point.

Qinglan was Lingbo’s blood sister, true, but Han Yueqi had grown up alongside Qinglan and long since thought of Lingbo and Yanyan as her own younger sisters — otherwise, she would not worry herself like this over her.

“I know you mean well for Qinglan, but the world moves like water, and hearts change with it. Cui Jingyu may not be the same Cui Jingyu as before. Why hold on so tightly?”

Ye Lingbo did not answer. Where they stood, on the steps, there was a white plum tree in full bloom. One could not tell whether the white massing on its branches was snow or blossoms, only catch the quiet drifting fragrance. Her face was lit by the snow’s reflection; even in full formal dress, she was at best a pleasant-looking girl, thoroughly unremarkable in the flower-filled assembly of the Flower Xin Banquet.

Fortunately, she no longer cared about this particular banquet.

“Of course I know that time has passed and things have changed. He is a marquis now. Perhaps this play is not ‘retying the red thread’ at all — perhaps it is ‘water splashed before the horse,’ but one must still try.” She stood beneath the tree and said quietly: “My mother used to say: ‘The phoenix alights only on the parasol tree — there is always one thing that subdues another.’ If even Elder Sister Qinglan and Cui Jingyu end in sorrow and ruin at the last, then what in this world is worth believing in?”

A single sentence, and Han Yueqi too could only sigh, all arguments gone.

Lingbo then lifted her skirts and walked on, making her way up the steps — until she heard Han Yueqi ask from behind her: “And what of you yourself? Where is your place to land?”

The phoenix-like Ye Qinglan had Cui Jingyu to be her parasol tree — even if it ended in sorrow at the last, it would not be a life unworthy of the Flower Xin Banquet. But Ye Lingbo? This was not her first Flower Xin Banquet. The capital’s young ladies were like blossoms, its young men like trees — which tree was there for her to alight on?

Lingbo did not turn around. She only laughed.

“It is a fine place, but there is nowhere here for me to land. I will leave it to fate.”