The midday palace banquet was held in honor of Princess Yongning, Xie Yuzhang. Xie Yuzhang sat at the head of the table; above her, and only above her, sat the Emperor.

During the banquet, Princess Yongning offered her congratulations to the Emperor on the birth of his second imperial son: “In the years Your Concubine spent in Mobei, I gradually collected some meteorite iron — not much, only three hundred jin. By fortunate timing, it arrives just right as a gift of congratulation for Your Majesty.”

Meteorite iron was gathered piece by piece from meteorites found scattered across the steppe. With good luck, one might collect two or three jin and forge a single blade from it.

For Xie Yuzhang to have collected three hundred jin, it could not have been luck — it had to be the result of years of putting out word and buying steadily, accumulating the stones a piece or two at a time. The generals with origins in Hexi understood at once what that meant.

Everyone glanced toward the Emperor. He had always kept his emotions hidden, and said only: “The Princess has been thoughtful.”

Such bestowed banquets were ordinarily held to celebrate meritorious subjects returning to court; it was the first time one had been granted for a woman.

And she was no ordinary woman. She had once held the honored rank of princess, and had been tempered by eight years on the steppe. When someone at the banquet asked about affairs in Mobei, Princess Yongning, Xie Yuzhang, spoke with eloquence and substance, clearly possessing a profound understanding of the situation in Mobei.

No wonder she had been able to render such distinguished service. A woman of true valor yields nothing to any man.

Someone raised a cup to toast Xie Yuzhang. The Emperor could not help but frown slightly. And the one offering the toast was none other than the Marquis of Bei Rong, Li Weifeng — a man who dared say anything and dared do anything. He had no fear of the Emperor’s frown.

“I never imagined there would come a day I’d see Your Highness again,” Li Weifeng said with feeling. “This cup must be drunk.”

Xie Yuzhang smiled. “I, for my part, always imagined there would come a day when you, Seventh Brother, would receive a marquisate.”

Li Weifeng was taken aback. “How could you have known that?”

Xie Yuzhang said, “When Lord Li came to the capital back then, the men he kept by his side were always those he held in the highest regard. The old lord was a man of exceptional caliber in his generation — how could his judgment have been poor?”

At the mention of Li Ming, Li Weifeng set aside his playful grin and was silent for a moment before saying, “You’re right.” He tilted his head and drained his cup.

Xie Yuzhang took a small sip.

Chen Liangzhi also raised a cup to Xie Yuzhang: “Your Highness ran tirelessly back and forth, mediating on our behalf, sparing our three armies from a great many casualties. Those men are all someone’s father, someone’s husband, someone’s son. I offer this cup in respect to Your Highness.”

Xie Yuzhang looked carefully at his face and said in sudden recognition: “So it was you.”

The two exchanged a smile and drank lightly together.

The Vice Director of the Chancellery, Yang Changyuan, raised his cup: “Baohua — no, Changning — let us, uncle and niece, drink together.”

Xie Yuzhang’s eyes reddened. “Uncle, there is white at your temples now.”

Yang Changyuan said, “It is nothing. To see you return — what are a few white hairs? Now that you are back, may the days ahead be peaceful and smooth.”

The two of them, uncle and niece, drained their cups together.

Still others wished to toast Xie Yuzhang, but the Emperor rose to his feet: “My capacity for wine is poor; let the assembled ministers enjoy themselves freely.”

With the Emperor present, everyone had felt constrained. The Emperor withdrawing first and leaving his ministers to take their ease was an act of consideration toward them.

Everyone rose to respectfully see him off.

The Emperor offered a few words of encouragement to the newly enfeoffed Princess Yongning — formal pleasantries, nothing of particular note — before taking his leave of the banquet.

As a rule, the banquet might have continued for some time, but Xie Yuzhang knew that with herself — a woman — present, these men would not be at ease. After the Emperor’s departure, she waited a brief moment before also rising to take her leave.

Yang Changyuan said, “Good. Go back and rest well. I’ll come to collect you tomorrow.”

Xie Yuzhang gave a slight bow to the senior officials and departed first.

An attendant was there to guide her out, but after a few steps, she realized this was not the way to the palace gate.

Xie Yuzhang’s footsteps paused slightly. Then she followed along.

When they arrived before the entrance of a warm pavilion and she saw that Fuchun was standing guard at the door, she understood.

Fuchun opened the door and bowed. Xie Yuzhang stepped inside.

The outer room was empty. Xie Yuzhang pushed open the latticed partition and walked into the inner chamber.

The windows of the inner chamber were set with translucent glazed glass, and the light was brighter than in other rooms.

Li Gu was dressed in everyday clothes, standing in that light. His shoulders seemed broader than before; his waist, though, had scarcely changed.

Hearing her enter, he turned, his gaze settling on her.

From the imperial audience to the bestowed banquet, all of it had been arranged in advance. Only now, at last, could the two of them meet alone.

Xie Yuzhang’s steps stilled. She gazed quietly at the man before her.

The man, in turn, regarded her in silence.

Who was he? Xie Yuzhang stared for a moment, then it struck her — it was the Emperor, of course.

The Emperor had arranged a private meeting with her here. What was it he was hoping for?

Xie Yuzhang threw herself into the Emperor’s arms.

In that instant, it was as though the composed, principled, meritorious princess who had understood the greater good had vanished entirely. What Li Gu received into his arms — soft and warm — was a fragile, boneless young woman.

He paused for a moment, then held her tightly.

“Yuzhang, don’t cry.”

Her name — he did not know how many times he had silently repeated it in his heart. Today, at last, he could say it aloud.

But she gripped his robe tight, buried her face against his chest, and sobbed: “Let me cry just this once — just this last time!”

The last time…

Then how many times had she cried before? Who had made her cry, and was there ever anyone beside her to offer comfort?

Back then, he had already been so close to her — just that little bit further and he could have brought her home. If he had taken her back to the Central Plains then, all the suffering that followed would have been hers to bear no longer.

And yet…

Using beauty to serve others — those four words surfaced in his mind, and Li Gu felt as though a blade twisted in his heart. He despised himself for his powerlessness then.

He had sent Li Yong as her secret envoy; he had pulled Li Yong aside and asked many questions. The matter between her and Ashina Wuwei — Li Yong, a rough soldier, knew little of it, only that “the Khan dotes on Her Highness.”

She had no children, which was a tremendous mercy. She could leave the steppe without a single tie, without anything left behind to worry over.

“Don’t cry.” He pressed his lips to her raven-dark hair. “You’re back now. I will never let you suffer injustice again.”

Xie Yuzhang wept openly.

These tears were not entirely feigned. She had labored for eight years and finally changed the course of her life in this world. Everything she had endured along the way was, truly, worth crying over.

She cried until the wine rose up through her, until her head swam. Her legs gave way beneath her, and Li Gu caught her around the waist and steadied her.

But Xie Yuzhang twisted herself free and pushed him away.

The warmth left Li Gu’s arms all at once. That soft, boneless hand withdrew from his.

When Xie Yuzhang turned back around, she had already dried her tears with her handkerchief. Only the corners of her eyes and the tip of her nose were still flushed, and her lips, swollen from weeping, were a vivid, lustrous red.

Li Gu’s gaze had only just fixed on those lips when Xie Yuzhang dipped into a bow. “Yongning has been improper; I beg Your Majesty’s pardon.”

The fragile young woman who had just wept out every hardship and pain was gathered back inside herself. Now she was once again the Xie Yuzhang of the great hall — poised, composed, acquitting herself with perfect propriety.

Li Gu pressed his thin lips together, took her arm to help her up, and said quietly, “There is no need.”

Then: “Sit and speak.”

This warm pavilion overlooked the water. In summer, the latticed partitions were removed and a breeze came through; in winter, the floor heating was lit, and sunlight filtered through the glazed windows and spread warmth within.

The inner chamber held a large sitting platform. Xie Yuzhang and Li Gu both settled onto it, seated facing each other.

Li Gu lifted the teapot from the table and poured a cup for her. “Ease your throat.”

Xie Yuzhang had cried herself somewhat hoarse. She took the cup and sipped. The tea had been brewed in advance; it had none of the flavor of ginger, scallion, or jujube, only a faint, mild saltiness.

Holding her cup, Xie Yuzhang remarked, “I hear that in Yunjing now, no one makes tea porridge anymore — it is all brewed this way.”

She sighed. “I have been gone too long. Whatever is fashionable now — I know none of it.”

Li Gu said, “Give it a little time to get used to, and you will soon know all of it.”

Xie Yuzhang made a sound of acknowledgment, and the room fell into a brief silence.

After a moment, Xie Yuzhang turned her cup slowly in her hands and spoke to Li Gu in an unhurried voice: “That year in Mobei, I received word that it was you who had pacified the north and ascended the throne in Yunjing. I knew then that the Central Plains was a place I could return to. From that moment on, everything I did on the steppe had ‘returning’ as its final purpose.”

Li Gu gazed at her.

Brows like kingfisher feathers, skin like white snow.

The glazed glass fitted into the windows had been polished as smooth as could be managed, but the glass itself was uneven in its density, and refracted the incoming sunlight into several fine ribbons of color that fell across one side of her face. They made the texture of her skin radiant, her red lips vivid and full, lending her beauty an even more dazzling quality.

Xie Yuzhang lifted her eyes. “I did many things on the steppe, some of which I did not like, some of which came at the cost of lives. But I had no choice.”

Li Gu nodded. “Most people in this world are not free to act as they wish. Even I am not. How much less so you.”

Xie Yuzhang said, “There is one matter I do not wish to conceal from Your Majesty — it is something Your Majesty ought to know.”

Li Gu said, “Then speak.”

Xie Yuzhang looked at him and told him calmly: “Ashina Wuwei — my husband — I killed him with my own hands.”

Li Gu stared at Xie Yuzhang, his gaze sharp and penetrating.

That Ashina Wuwei died at the precise moment he had — to call it an accident was something neither Jiang Jingye nor Li Gu believed. Both had known there must have been something behind it, and that Xie Yuzhang was almost certainly involved.

But Li Gu had not expected that Ashina Wuwei had been killed directly by Xie Yuzhang’s own hand, and even less had he expected that Xie Yuzhang would tell him so openly and without hesitation.

Killing one’s husband was by no means a reputation to be sought. Would not any ordinary woman try her best to conceal such a truth?

Li Gu said, “Why tell me? You need not have said anything.”

Xie Yuzhang replied, “Because Your Majesty enfeoffed me as a princess.”

Li Gu said, “Did you truly want to become a Daoist nun?”

Xie Yuzhang said, “Of course not. My thinking was to propose it first; Your Majesty would certainly refuse. I have at least rendered some service, so Your Majesty would need to reward me one way or another — in all likelihood with a court title. I would pretend to decline for a moment, then accept it. That way I would have a standing in Da Mu going forward. How convenient.”

What a fine little scheme. Li Gu could not suppress a laugh.

Sunlight fell across the man’s brow and eyes; the smile made him look years younger, like the young man he had once been. And in truth, he was still only twenty-eight.

Yet people always forgot how young the Emperor still was, and felt only his authority.

Xie Yuzhang was momentarily struck still.

Li Gu asked, “What is it?”

Xie Yuzhang let out a long breath. “Your Majesty has never smiled at me before. Not once.”

Li Gu’s smile faded. After a brief silence, he said, “Before, there was never an occasion.”

Xie Yuzhang said, “I truly did not expect that Your Majesty would still remember what was said that day, that you would make me a princess again.”

Li Gu said, “What I have said — I remember it all, and every word of it stands.”

“I know, and that is precisely why I felt I had all the more reason to let Your Majesty know of this.” Xie Yuzhang set down her cup, placed both hands on her lap, and let her gaze settle on the low table. “Because I know that Your Majesty’s care for me owes a great deal to the fact that Your Majesty still takes me to be the Baohua of eight years ago. But I am no longer her.”

Her hands tightened into fists.

“That Baohua — please, Your Majesty, forget her. Let her be considered to have died on the steppe.” She spoke with her eyes lowered. “I am a woman who killed her own husband. If the world were to know, I would be despised by all.”

Li Gu asked, “Why did you suddenly kill him?”

Xie Yuzhang’s head dropped lower still, and she said in a strained voice, “…He had heard that General Jiang was fond of women, and wanted to give me to General Jiang.”

Li Gu was momentarily stunned, and then outrage surged through him.

Even with the low table between them, Xie Yuzhang could feel the force of Li Gu’s fury. She said, “General Jiang knew nothing of this; Your Majesty must not lay blame on him.”

Li Gu forced down his anger. “That foul habit of his — it is time it was corrected!”

In the years when Hexi and Mobei had faced each other across the frontier, the generals on both sides had known each other well. Jiang Jingye was a formidable warrior who had made a name for himself on the border. It was no surprise that Ashina Wuwei knew of his notorious inability to restrain himself in that regard.

When Li Gu’s fury had run its first course, he saw that Xie Yuzhang still had her eyes cast down, her gaze resting only on the low table. His anger surged anew.

“Yuzhang. Look at me.”

Xie Yuzhang lifted her eyes.

“I do not recognize Ashina Wuwei as your husband. Such a worthless man was unworthy of that name.” He kept his fury contained and told her in a low, firm voice: “The word ‘husband-killing’ is not to be spoken again. Whatever you did on the steppe, the fact that you are here today proves that what you did was right.”

“Yuzhang, you are Princess Yongning now. You are a subject who has rendered distinguished service to Da Mu. In Yunjing, you stand with your head held high, and no one has the right to humiliate you.”