Although they had encountered a cold wave on the road, the overall situation was still optimistic.

From the time they departed Yunjing to now, Xie Yuzhang’s dowry procession of over a thousand people had only lost a little over ten. Most were those who had already been frail or ill to begin with — among them four elderly people, and another three from accidents: one slipped and drowned while relieving himself at the water’s edge, one fell in the snow and struck his temple on a sharp stone, and another was accidentally beaten to death in a brawl, with the man who delivered the fatal blow having already fled, also counted among those lost.

Yet even this number brought Yuan Yu considerable satisfaction.

“It is the first time any of them have traveled such a great distance to Mobei,” he said. “It has not been easy at all. And not a single person frozen to death from the cold wave — that is truly cause for happiness.”

Xie Yuzhang said, “Had anyone frozen to death, it would have been my sin.”

Yuan Yu said, “Your Highness is merciful.”

And so, those thousand-odd souls followed Xie Yuzhang, and in grand procession they finally arrived at the true seat of the Khanate — the site where the great khan’s royal court was encamped.

Standing atop the high ground and looking down, one beheld a silvery ribbon winding in nine bends and eighteen turns — the river had frozen solid with ice — and felt tents stretching endlessly, their rooftops pressed one against the next in numbers beyond counting.

Everyone gazed upon this center of the Khanate’s power with hearts stirred by both awe and sorrow.

They had arrived.

Ashina, in high spirits, rode up beside Xie Yuzhang’s carriage, his voice resonant as a great bell: “Baohua, come out! I will show you your new home!”

His tone brooked no refusal.

There were times when a man could be coaxed or even deceived, and times when he could not. Xie Yuzhang could discern when it was right to act coquettish and sulky, and when it was right to comply and obey.

From within the carriage came the princess Zhao’s soft, yielding voice: “Wait, let me bundle up more. Is it windy outside?”

She used the word “bundle,” which brought a smile to Ashina’s face. He said, “There is no wind — do not be afraid. You can burrow into my cloak, and you will not be cold.”

Xie Yuzhang’s words were tender and sweet, yet she did not truly make Ashina wait long. With Lin Fei’s help, she nimbly pulled on a large fur-lined cloak and climbed out of the carriage.

Ashina was tall and powerfully built, and so was his horse. Seeing Xie Yuzhang emerge, he stretched out a large, rough hand toward her: “Come!”

Xie Yuzhang understood his meaning. She gave him a sweet smile and opened her arms toward him. The great khan’s long arm swept around her, and with effortless ease he lifted her and set her before him on the saddle.

He said, “Hold on tight.” With a squeeze of his legs against the horse’s flanks, that remarkably spirited steed broke into a full gallop.

Lin Fei lifted the curtain and called out, “Wang Zhong! Go with them!”

Once Wang Zhong led a company of men to follow, Lin Fei watched that retreating figure vanish into the distance, and pressed her lips together in a thin line.

She let the curtain fall and withdrew into the dim interior of the carriage, her heart feeling as though it were blocked — suffocatingly so.

Though she knew full well that the old khan was Xie Yuzhang’s husband. Though she knew that even if it were delayed three years, Xie Yuzhang would inevitably have to consummate the marriage with him — and indeed, in Xie Yuzhang’s other lifetime, she had already served him long ago. Yet to see with one’s own eyes a red-cheeked young woman keeping close, intimate company with a white-haired old man — it was still so very difficult to bear.

Was this, then, why Xie Yuzhang never brought her along whenever she went to see Ashina?

A flawless jade tarnished by defilement — to witness it made one’s heart ache.

The path from the high ground down to the encampment did not descend in a straight line but wound downward in serpentine curves, bending one way and then the other.

Ashina’s steed galloped for a stretch, and in the blink of an eye carried Xie Yuzhang around to the hillside’s midpoint, where the view was clearer still.

He raised his riding crop and pointed: “Baohua, look — the largest one there in the middle, that is my royal tent!”

Xie Yuzhang was already quite familiar with that grand and ornate felt dwelling, yet she exclaimed with admiration, “How enormous!”

“Impressive, is it not? The largest felt dwelling on the entire grasslands.” Ashina said proudly.

Xie Yuzhang feigned an air of innocence and asked, “And where will I be staying?”

Ashina gazed into the distance, and truly could not say with certainty, so he turned and called out, “Chiguxie, where has Baohua’s felt tent been arranged?”

Chiguxie could be said to be Ashina’s personal chief steward — to draw a comparison, he was the equivalent of what Fuchun, the great eunuch, would one day be to Li Gu.

He spurred his horse forward and pointed to a spot: “There — it has been placed over there.”

Ashina squinted for a look, then let out a sound of displeasure and said angrily, “Why is it so far from my great tent?”

Chiguxie did not dare say that it was the spot the khan himself had marked out with his riding crop before their departure. With sharp perception, he bowed and nodded: “This servant will arrange it at once and find the Khan Consort a new location!”

“Go, go, go — be quick about it!” Ashina gave him a kick and then said sheepishly to Xie Yuzhang, “Look at these people — they cannot manage even the simplest thing.”

In truth, there was no cause to blame Chiguxie. When word had returned that the Zhao dynasty’s princess of legitimate birth was to be wed, Chiguxie had gone to seek instructions on where this Zhao princess should be placed.

Ashina, at his age, had taken women in numbers no fewer than the inner palace and six chambers of the Da Zhao Emperor. And they were all daughters of chieftains or noble families from every tribe — women who could each be called a “princess” in their own right on the grasslands. Among them, some already had hair as white as Ashina’s.

These women’s felt tents encircled Ashina’s great tent, and when Chiguxie came to ask, Ashina had ridden his horse up to the hillside’s midpoint and gestured vaguely with his riding crop from afar, pointing out a spot for the Zhao princess.

It was simply that at the time, he had not anticipated liking this tender and charming little princess so very much — so much that he would want to keep her close by his side.

Yet Xie Yuzhang said, “I want to be placed next to Zadayali!”

“Zadayali?” Ashina hesitated. “But that is too far from me.”

“I do not know any of the others — I only want to be next to Zadayali!” Xie Yuzhang tugged at Ashina’s cloak and acted coyishly. “When I turn seventeen, I will move to be beside you.”

Chiguxie did not move immediately, but cast a sideways glance and waited for the khan to speak.

Ashina took one look at his expression and knew he was surely suppressing laughter inside. As for the personal guards beside him — were they not all straining to hold back smiles too?

Ashina very much wanted to assert his commanding authority, but when he met Xie Yuzhang’s dewy eyes and those pouting red lips, a soft-headed foolishness came over him like a spell.

“You wretch, why are you still standing there? Did you not hear what Baohua said?” He gave Chiguxie a mock lash of his riding crop, laughing and scolding all at once. “Go — see whether there is still room near Zadayali. If there is none, clear out a space for Baohua and have them move!”

Moving house on the grasslands was far simpler than in the cities of Da Zhao. After all, the dwellings of Central Plains people, even those built of mud-brick, could not be dismantled and carried away. The felt tents of the grasslands could be taken apart and reassembled; a few experienced hands could accomplish it in half a day.

Having received his orders, Chiguxie gave a shout and rode ahead to go down first.

He was, in truth, a slave — though naturally, as someone Ashina had found indispensable, he had long since shed his slave status many years ago. Yet he was unlike a warrior; his way of surviving was to manage matters for his master and keep his master pleased.

As he rode his horse at full speed back toward the encampment, he thought to himself: this Zhao princess, young as she was, had considerable feminine cunning. He would have to put in great effort to serve this one well in the future.

Chiguxie had taken a few people and gone on ahead; but in truth, scouts had already ridden back to deliver word long before any of them.

By the time Ashina rode back in high spirits with Xie Yuzhang in his arms, a host of princes, consorts, and nobles had already come out to receive them.

“Baohua, come — let me introduce you to everyone.” Ashina reined in his horse and, before the assembled crowd, lifted back Xie Yuzhang’s hood.

Xie Yuzhang had been seated sideways before Ashina on the galloping steed, her face turned into the shelter of his chest against the wind, with her hood pulled up as well. When Ashina pulled the hood back, Xie Yuzhang lifted her head and turned to face forward.

The clamorous crowd fell silent for a moment.

Xie Yuzhang’s gaze found a powerfully built man among them, and she was thankful that Ashina was at her back just then, unable to see her face.

She truly could not, in that instant upon seeing him, maintain a false expression.

Ashina Wuwei — the man she had once compelled herself to love with all her heart.

Human emotions are like flowing water: even the swiftest blade brought down upon them cannot sever them cleanly, cannot drain them to nothing.

Those years she had spent in Wuwei’s arms could not be called happy ones, yet they were genuinely the best and most settled years she had ever lived. The man’s broad shoulders and warm chest, and those gentle promises he had made — they had beguiled her, led her to believe that the rest of her life might continue on just so.

But it could not.

Xie Yuzhang looked at Wuwei.

Wuwei stood in stunned amazement at her beauty, gazing at her, transfixed.

He had inherited all of Ashina’s finest qualities — tall in stature, imposing in appearance — though at present his beard was longer, and he lacked the neat, close-cropped stubble that Xie Yuzhang would one day trim for him, which had suited him so well. Yet his present vitality and bearing were far better than what Xie Yuzhang remembered.

He had a father whose name shook the grasslands. He was a prince whose mother’s lineage was powerful. He himself was an outstanding warrior.

Within the Mobei Khanate, he was the most acclaimed and promising candidate for succession among all the princes, and had been installed as the Crown Prince of the Khanate.

He was not yet the broken man who would be sent fleeing like a rat before Jiang Jingye’s forces.

Xie Yuzhang finally mastered her emotions, and she turned toward Wuwei and slowly let a smile bloom across her face.

The crowd, drawn back by her smile, stirred and broke into varied exclamations of admiration.

This was precisely the effect old Ashina had wanted. He gestured proudly toward Wuwei with his riding crop and called out loudly, “Wuwei — this is Da Zhao’s most noble Princess Baohua, the Khan Consort I have newly wed. Tell me, is she not beautiful?”

“Extraordinarily beautiful!” Wuwei declared loudly and sincerely. “Her eyes are like the stars in the sky, and like the shimmering, rippling lake waters of our ancestral homeland. I cannot find better words to praise Khan Consort Baohua!”

The customs of the grasslands were vastly different from those of the Central Plains. People here were passionate and unguarded about matters of the heart between men and women. A son could speak this way before a crowd, praising openly his own father’s woman for her beauty, and those standing nearby who heard it all nodded along, feeling the words were apt and well said.

Only the men of Wang Zhong’s company who had accompanied them wore blank expressions. It was simply that — after a journey’s worth of such candid praise — they had grown numb to it. Accustomed to it.

“Who is that?” Xie Yuzhang asked. “He looks so much like you!”

“My own flesh and blood will of course look like me.” Ashina laughed heartily, gesturing with his crop. “This is Wuwei, my Crown Prince. And this is Dangdang, Zhanshilu, Tuqitang…”

Ashina had more than thirty sons, and with a sweep of her eyes across the assembled crowd before her, Xie Yuzhang had already counted more than a dozen. But of those Ashina named and introduced, there were only a handful of the more important princes.

These would be the very ones who, after Ashina’s passing, would contest power and territory against Wuwei and fracture the Khanate into four scattered pieces.

Sons like Xia’erdan, born of slave women, stood lost in the crowd without even their names being spoken by Ashina.

That Xia’erdan was later able to rise to prominence was due to two things: first, because he attached himself to his elder brother Wuwei, displayed unwavering loyalty to him, and was thus given important responsibilities; second, because he was genuinely brave and skilled in battle, and held value as a warrior in his own right.

And so one must have value, Xie Yuzhang reflected.

With value — even born of a slave woman — one could rise above one’s origins.

Without value — even as Da Zhao’s most noble princess of legitimate birth — one could only be offered up as a gift, a wilting flower adorning a turbulent age.