Because of how favored Xie Yuzhang was, matters of Zhaoxia Palace were treated as great affairs throughout the palace. Any instruction from Zhaoxia Palace was carried out at once. Princess Baohua wished to know who the two adopted sons were that Military Governor Li Ming had brought with him, and in less than the time it took a stick of incense to burn, a little eunuch had already come back to report: “They are the seventh and the eleventh. The seventh is called Li Weifeng, and the eleventh is called Li Gu.”

Li Shiyi Lang.

So that Emperor had already come to Yunjing at this point in time? Xie Yuzhang was in a daze — she had had absolutely no idea, no memory of it whatsoever.

A question arose unbidden in her mind — at this point in time, had the two of them… already met?

Seeing Xie Yuzhang’s thoughts drift away again, Lin Fei nudged her with worry: “Your Highness?”

Xie Yuzhang came back to herself and looked at Lin Fei. The dark, glistening eyes that met her held a remote, subdued gaze that Lin Fei found unfamiliar.

“Someone come! Dress and groom me,” Xie Yuzhang said suddenly. “And tell the small kitchen to prepare two cups of chilled perilla drink — they must be iced.”

In her previous life she had not known whether she and he had met during this time. But in this life, now that she knew he was here — how could she not go and see him?

She had to go see him!

“Are you sending it to His Majesty?” Lin Fei asked, watching the palace maids arrange Xie Yuzhang’s hair.

“Yes,” Xie Yuzhang answered, looking at her own reflection in the bronze mirror. “The heat makes everyone sluggish and takes away the appetite. I am sending it to Father to relieve him from the heat.”

This was something she had done frequently in her days as a princess.

Before her mother Empress passed away, she had called Xie Yuzhang to her bedside, pressed her lips close to her ear, and whispered: “Your happiness in this life hinges entirely on the whim of the sovereign. Never forget. Never forget…”

She had always followed her mother’s dying counsel and served the Emperor with the utmost filial devotion. Sending swallow’s nest soup to Zichen Hall in winter, or chilled drinks to Hanliang Hall in summer — these were things she had done more often than any of the four consorts.

Xie Yuzhang gazed at her reflection in the bronze mirror.

Hair as black as ink, skin whiter than snow, cheeks flushed a healthy, dewy pink — the look of someone who had been properly cared for and whose blood and energy were at their fullest. This was herself before she came of age, sheltered in the deep palace, lavished with every tenderness, with no knowledge of life’s sorrows.

Xie Yuzhang closed her eyes.

Before she had been sent to Mobei in marriage, she had never truly understood the meaning behind her mother’s dying words — that without her mother’s protection and her father’s love to shelter her, her happiness for all her life depended on the Emperor’s will.

She had inherited her mother’s gifts. Music, dance, calligraphy, painting — she was exceptionally talented in all of them. Though her book-learning was somewhat weaker, those gifts were more than enough to win the Emperor’s adoration.

“She is truly her mother’s own flesh and blood,” her sentimental and sensitive father the Emperor would say, eyes glistening with tears, stroking her head.

With that adoration, even after losing her mother, she had still become the woman who lived best in all of the imperial palace. Every one of the four consorts greeted her with a smiling face and warm affection. Who among all the palace’s people would have dared show her even the slightest disrespect?

The sound of her dying mother’s counsel faded slowly from her ears.

Yet subsequent events proved how wise her mother had been — her words had been almost prophetic.

The Emperor’s one instant of love and tenderness could indeed bring her every honor and glory.

The Emperor’s one instant of ruthlessness could also plunge her straight into hell.

Xie Yuzhang walked briskly along the long covered corridor, all these tangled thoughts flashing through her mind.

Since she was going to see the Emperor, Lin Fei had not followed but remained behind in Zhaoxia Palace. The palace attendants around her did not know what had come over the princess lately — she seemed to have become an entirely different person. No one dared speak; no matter how quickly the princess walked, they all followed closely in her wake.

But Xie Yuzhang’s footsteps suddenly halted.

The cluster of people behind her all stopped short together.

“Your Highness, those two are the Military Governor of Hexi’s adopted sons,” the eunuch stepped forward promptly to inform Xie Yuzhang. “The sturdier one is Li Weifeng, seventh in order. The leaner one is Li Gu, eleventh.”

Xie Yuzhang fixed her gaze on the two young men standing in the shade of the trees.

At this point Li Gu was perhaps eighteen or nineteen at most, still in that phase of youth when boys shoot up in height and become especially lean.

Yet even so much younger, even so much greener, even so much leaner, the figure of Li Gu standing there with his hands clasped behind his back already possessed a sharp, formidable presence that commanded wariness.

For the less formal imperial audiences, the Emperor preferred to have his subjects wear everyday dress. He frequently commented on their clothing as well — anything praised by the Emperor immediately became the new fashion standard of Yunjing City.

Li Gu wore casual clothes that bore no resemblance to current trends, and he wore no treasured blade at his waist, yet the iron-blooded aura forged in battle formation — how could that be hidden?

A man like this, even standing in the middle of a crowd, could never be overlooked.

Xie Yuzhang was at a loss.

She had met Li Ming; she must have also met Li Gu at some point in her previous life. How was it that she had retained no impression of him at all?

She stood there in a daze for a moment, then suddenly laughed at herself.

The way she observed people now, of course, she looked first at presence and spirit. But what had she, before she came of age, looked at?

On a hot summer day in Yunjing City, he was still wearing brocade rather than this year’s fashionable sheer gauze, his pattern and colors falling at least three years behind the city’s current style, with not a single refined or elegant accessory to recommend him — a country bumpkin arrived from the northwest. How would the person she had been before notice someone like that?

She had probably looked right through him as though he were air.

So they really had met this early, and yet…

“Yunjing is truly hot. The clothes I brought are still too thick,” Li Weifeng said to Li Gu. “I see Zhang Wu Lang and the others are all wearing sheer gauze — they look so much cooler. We should get a few sets made too.”

Li Gu paid clothing no attention whatsoever, but he knew all too well that if the two of them suddenly turned up in sheer gauze robes — bought ready-made from a clothing stall, since they had brought neither tailors nor seamstresses on this trip — they would inevitably face yet another round of silent mockery and derision.

Their adoptive father had sent them to make connections with the noble sons of Yunjing City, and they had expected it would not be difficult. But it turned out that these capital young men thought of nothing all day but coursing dogs and baiting roosters, and cared more than anything else whether their clothes looked fashionable and attractive.

Apparently this was a trend started by the Emperor himself. From top to bottom, Yunjing City was obsessed with beautiful clothes, beautiful people, precious food, and refined cuisine — and because they lived beneath the Son of Heaven’s own feet, every one of them had an eye as high as the sky.

In the midst of all this excess and refinement, the two of them fit in nowhere. They were constantly the target of veiled mockery, and had swallowed a belly full of grievances.

Li Gu was about to speak when he noticed Li Weifeng’s eyes suddenly go fixed. He jolted, and turned around.

The young woman who had left such a deep impression on him with that fleeting glimpse beneath the covered walkway of Hanliang Hall several days ago was lifting the hem of her skirt and walking toward them.

Skin fair as snow, features luminous, a waist as slender as a willow bough. Every step she took was like ripples spreading gently over still water — each step a blossoming.

Li Gu held his breath.

It was only when Fuchun deliberately raised his voice and called out, “Greetings to the Princess!” that Li Gu and Li Weifeng suddenly came to themselves — and in that instant, both of them were thoroughly embarrassed. Even at banquets when those capital young wastrels made cutting jabs disguised as wit, neither of them had ever lost their composure like this.

Both of them felt the heat rise to the tips of their ears and the backs of their necks, and they bowed: “Greetings to Your Highness.”

The reddened tips of their ears left Xie Yuzhang stunned — she could barely believe that the young man before her was the same sovereign who had later made the whole world tremble at his name.

But he truly was that person — and alive, in flesh and blood, right before her eyes.

Xie Yuzhang’s gaze settled on his face. In truth she had never actually looked at him this closely before. In her previous life, she had not known who he was; and by the time she did, she could only bow her head in his presence.

A sovereign’s countenance — who dared look upon it directly?

“Who is this?” Xie Yuzhang said, coming to a stop and feigning ignorance.

“This servant reports to Your Highness,” Fuchun said, bowing dutifully — being the nearest eunuch, it fell to him to answer — “these two are the adopted sons of Military Governor Li.”

“This subject, Ningyuan General Li Weifeng,” said Li Weifeng.

“This subject, Huaihua Military Commandant Li Gu,” said Li Gu.

“We greet Your Highness the Princess!” both said together.

Having just made a fool of himself, each of them was determined not to be embarrassed again, and they announced themselves with rigid, unsmiling voices, loud and blunt, without a trace of the refined elegance of Yunjing’s young men. Laughter escaped from Xie Yuzhang’s palace maids, who covered their mouths to suppress it.

The faces of the two young men flushed even deeper — not knowing why they were being laughed at, they felt utterly humiliated before Xie Yuzhang.

Little did they know that Xie Yuzhang’s own heart was more ashamed than either of them.

She remembered now. Li Weifeng — the Huaihua Grand General who would hold the northern frontier for Li Gu. Under his watch, Da Yue and Wumeng would both keep to their borders without daring to encroach.

An Emperor and a Grand General — how had her palace maids dared to laugh at such men?

They were no different from herself in this moment — equally ignorant.

Xie Yuzhang lowered her eyes, then raised them again and smiled. “So you are the two General Lis. The two of you have guarded the frontier and served your country — you have worked hard.”

She finished speaking, then bent her knees slightly in a half-bow.

When had the beloved pearl of Yunjing City, Princess Baohua Xie Yuzhang, ever bowed to anyone other than the Emperor and the four consorts? The palace attendants exchanged glances and, wise as they were, suppressed their laughter entirely.

Li Gu and Li Weifeng felt the small knot of embarrassment and resentment in their chests dissolve entirely. They returned the bow at once: “We dare not accept the princess’s praise.”

Xie Yuzhang let her gaze sweep across the two of them and asked: “Are the two generals waiting for Lord Li?”

Li Weifeng, being the elder, answered: “Indeed.”

Xie Yuzhang smiled. “His Majesty is receiving Lord Li in the imperial garden. He may be admiring the view or fishing — who knows how long it will take.”

She turned her head and reproached the eunuch standing nearby: “Why have you not offered the two generals a —”

The soft, unhurried voice came to an abrupt stop when she saw the round, cheerful, flattering smile on Fuchun’s face.

Fuchun — the first chief eunuch superintendent of the Da Mu dynasty? The most trusted and relied-upon eunuch beside the new Emperor?

He… had already attached himself to Li Gu at this point in time?

“— seat?” Xie Yuzhang heard herself complete the sentence.

She was, after all, no longer the true thirteen-year-old Xie Yuzhang.

She was the Xie Yuzhang who had been married off to the Mobei Khanate, who had struggled and clawed for survival over ten brutal years, who had come back at last, and who had then lived in silent endurance under the humiliations and oppression of Yunjing City’s newly powerful.

This person — this person she now was — was she to live through the fate of her previous life all over again?

“Yes, this servant will go at once,” Fuchun said, hunching his back, and disappeared in a trot.

But Li Gu felt a faint sense of puzzlement.

He had noticed: just now, at the very moment this princess — who had entranced both him and his elder brother — finished those words, something in her bearing had shifted, subtly and unmistakably.

He could not tell if it was his imagination, but for one instant, he thought he had glimpsed a flame-like flash of brightness in the girl’s dark eyes. When he looked again, she had already lowered her gaze, concealing everything within.

“The two generals may wait here. This princess must go pay her respects to her father.” The princess smiled.

Li Gu followed Li Weifeng in a cupped-hands bow and heard his elder brother say: “We thank Your Highness for the seats.”

The eldest spoke first when seniority mattered — there was no need for Li Gu to open his mouth.

But the princess, unexpectedly, looked at him once more, gave a small nod, and walked past the two of them.

A long time passed. Beside him, his elder brother suddenly let out a long, slow breath.

That single breath carried longing, admiration, and wistfulness all at once.

Li Weifeng said nothing, but Li Gu felt every shift of emotion in him as though it were his own — for as he watched Princess Baohua’s figure slowly disappear into the distance, he was feeling exactly the same.

The most beautiful woman they had likely ever seen in all their years of living — near as a cloud overhead, yet far as the edge of the sky.

Utterly beyond reach.

Fuchun returned leading attendants carrying drum stools, and the two of them were given seats.

After a long silence, Li Weifeng said, with no particular context: “It would be good if we were the Lord’s own sons…”

Li Gu said nothing.

If they had been the legitimate sons of a military governor who controlled his own territory, perhaps there might have been a chance…

But they were not.