Not long after returning to the ancestral lands to settle, people from various tribes swarmed in for the summer festival. The largest market on the grasslands was held at the Ashina clan’s ancestral grounds.

The handmaidens relayed a piece of gossip to Xie Yuzhang: “Yuan Ling came to Mobei to search for someone.”

The person Yuan Yu was searching for was a woman who had belonged to a small tribe — and that had already been more than ten years ago. With the constant shifts and changes among the grassland tribes, who could say whether such a small tribe still existed.

Yuan Yu seized the opportunity of this grand market to ask many people to make inquiries on his behalf.

In such a place, the occasional romantic rumor of this sort gave the handmaidens endless delight to gossip about.

“Goodness, who would have imagined that someone like Yuan Ling was once a man who abandoned a woman’s heart,” they said. “He promised to marry her, and then left.”

“Ah, men are all like this — even when they do marry, they still bring one beautiful concubine after another into the household.”

Yuan Yu had no idea that the old affair he had let slip while drunk had made the handmaidens so indignant. For several days they gave him no smiles, leaving him utterly baffled.

Xie Yuzhang could only press her hand to her forehead.

In this lifetime, Yuan Yu had not died a sudden death, and that allowed Xie Yuzhang to relax her nerves considerably. Yet what she never could have anticipated was that Nanny Xia would begin to fall ill.

At first, it was the exhaustion of the long migration that had worn her out. They had assumed she would gradually recover, but Nanny Xia’s strength simply never returned.

After arriving at the ancestral lands, everyone’s domains were laid out anew. Xie Yuzhang received land at the foot of the mountains for her people to cultivate, and beekeepers were set to raising bees and harvesting honey. The craftspeople had all set up their tools — carpenters crafting wooden wares, potters firing earthenware and porcelain. The first few kiln-loads came out rather rough, and the artisans themselves were unsatisfied, yet everything sold out during the summer festival, exchanged for all manner of goods.

Among the items the nomads brought for bartering, there was also meteoric iron. When Xie Yuzhang learned of it, her hand moved instinctively to the dagger at her waist.

“Put out the word,” she said. “No matter how little, Princess Zhao will accept any star-iron that can be found.”

But meteoric iron was something one encountered only by chance — entirely a matter of luck. Unlike cattle and sheep, which could be found everywhere and priced in terms of “this item is worth so many sheep,” meteoric iron had no such easy measure.

There was also the matter of training the guard. Though Wang Zhong and Li Yong were there to oversee it, Xie Yuzhang kept a close watch as well, often riding out to inspect them so they would not grow lax.

Amid all this busyness, by the time she noticed something was amiss with Nanny Xia, the old woman had already begun to tire easily, her strength clearly no longer equal to the demands placed upon her.

Xie Yuzhang relieved her of all duties and bade her rest and recuperate.

She summoned Bao Zhongjin to consult him. Bao Zhongjin said with a sigh: “Nanny has reached an advanced age. Two long and grueling journeys within half a year have taken too great a toll. No matter when… this is to be expected. It remains to be seen whether she can endure through this coming winter.”

It was already the ninth month. The wheat the farmers had hastily planted on the mountain slopes had already yielded one harvest. The output could not compare to that of the Central Plains, yet set against the wild fields where the nomads scattered seeds and then left them entirely untended, the lands that Princess Zhao’s people cultivated with such careful and thorough farming still produced far more. Ashina was greatly pleased — the people of Mobei truly were not skilled at farming.

At this time of year, had they been in Yunjing, the weather would have been pleasantly cool — the very season when people most loved to go out and enjoy the autumn air. But in Mobei, the cold had already set in; one might almost say winter had already arrived.

Xie Yuzhang refused to believe it: “Impossible! Go and take Nanny’s pulse again! You must have misdiagnosed her!”

This princess, who had always been clear-headed and decisive, had suddenly become unreasonably stubborn — how strange.

Bao Zhongjin had no choice but to take Nanny Xia’s pulse again and observe her condition for several more days, yet he still held to his original diagnosis.

Xie Yuzhang flew into a great rage, stubbornly insisting it was a misdiagnosis, summoning physician after physician to take Nanny Xia’s pulse in turn. She also comforted Nanny Xia, saying: “You’ve simply tired yourself out from the journey, that’s all.”

But Nanny Xia showed no distress herself. She only sighed: “I had hoped to come and care for Your Highness, yet instead I have become a burden to you.”

Xie Yuzhang would hear none of it, and coaxed her in a wheedling tone: “What nonsense you’re talking, Nanny — get well quickly. There’s so much waiting for you. Without Nanny, Baohua cannot manage alone.”

Nanny Xia’s eyes softened with tenderness: “Your Highness can.”

Xie Yuzhang felt a chill in her heart.

She said to Lin Fei: “I am afraid.”

Lin Fei said: “Afraid of what?”

Xie Yuzhang said in a daze: “In my past life, Nanny did not say it that way. In my past life, she could never stop worrying about me no matter what.”

Lin Fei had long been asking about that “dream.” Xie Yuzhang had spoken of it so often that she sometimes used the words “past life” without even realizing it. Lin Fei had noticed long ago — she simply never said so aloud.

Xie Yuzhang said: “At this time, it was I who was recovering, and Nanny who was caring for me.”

The difficult labor had nearly taken Xie Yuzhang’s life, and it had also proven Governess Xu wrong and Nanny Xia right. One could even say it was Nanny Xia who had brought Xie Yuzhang’s life back from the edge.

Without Nanny Xia, even if Bao Zhongjin had wished to help, without being granted permission, how could he have dared to force his way into the birthing chamber — how could he have dared to lay hands on the princess?

Governess Xu… likely did not have the courage to make such a decision.

The Nanny Xia who had once been the Head Palace Matron, trusted by the Empress and commanding authority throughout the inner palace — she was truly a different kind of person altogether.

Nanny Xia weakened little by little. This was the way of an elderly person whose lamp was running out of oil. Among those who had passed away on the road from Yunjing to Mobei, half had been elderly people just like Nanny Xia.

Even though the ancestral lands were considerably warmer than other places, even though Xie Yuzhang had people attending to her with the greatest care, Nanny Xia still could not endure through that winter.

Before she passed, she had summoned her remaining strength to speak to Xie Yuzhang of things to come.

“Your Highness need not bear children yourself — have others bear them for you, and then take them to raise at your knee,” she said.

Xie Yuzhang said: “I never intended to leave children behind here.”

Nanny Xia said: “Wang Zhong has no wife yet. Lin Fei would do well.”

Xie Yuzhang said: “Not A’Fei.”

Nanny Xia said: “Then Wanxiu.”

Xie Yuzhang said: “Very well.”

Nanny Xia sighed: “My body has not truly been well for many years. I only thought I could not let Your Highness come to Mobei all alone, so I forced myself to make the journey. I had thought Your Highness still needed me — yet seeing that Your Highness has fully found her footing on her own, I find I can no longer summon that last breath to hold on…”

Xie Yuzhang’s eyes filled with tears.

So in her past life, her own weakness had made it impossible for Nanny Xia to leave her — and Nanny Xia had forced herself to hold on for one more year?

She was supposed to have passed a year later than this.

On a night of howling wind and driving snow, Nanny Xia suddenly rallied in her final moments.

“Zhuzhu, Zhuzhu… come to Nanny,” she called.

Xie Yuzhang had been keeping watch at her side all along. Hearing her voice, she hurried over and took her hands.

Nanny Xia’s clouded, aged eyes grew bright and clear. She gazed at her and said with great warmth: “Zhuzhu is so clever — Zhuzhu can do it…”

At the last, she said: “I will go and tell the Madam…”

With those words, she closed her eyes with a smile and passed away in peace.

A sound of heartbroken weeping suddenly erupted inside the tent.

The handmaidens urged and consoled her again and again, yet none could stop Princess Baohua Xie Yuzhang. She wept with shattering grief, as though she had lost her very own mother.

Nanny Xia was buried at the ancestral lands. For many days afterward, Xie Yuzhang remained sunk in sorrow.

Ashina tried all manner of things to cheer her, gifting her with many slaves, cattle, and horses. Yet the beautiful Princess Zhao stubbornly refused to smile. Ashina asked her: “What would make you happy?”

Xie Yuzhang said: “When someone important is gone, how can one be happy?”

Ashina said: “The soul returns to the Eternal Heaven — that is the destiny of all people.”

Xie Yuzhang said: “I am only fifteen. Do not speak to me of destiny.”

Ashina said: “Everyone has a day when they must return. She was even older than I am — and I too will have that day, let alone her.”

Xie Yuzhang buried her face in his chest and wept softly: “If you die, what will I do? Someone will surely bully me.”

Ashina knew well enough — Xie Yuzhang was so young and beautiful that after his death, she would naturally pass to one of his sons. In all likelihood, it would be that boy Wuwei.

But Ashina had no desire to think about what would come after his death.

He held Xie Yuzhang in silence for a long while, then unfastened the golden blade at his waist and gave it to her: “This is the one I have used for years — everyone knows it. If anyone dares bully you, cut him down.”

Xie Yuzhang clutched the golden blade and wept: “Then you are not allowed to die either. I have not grown up yet.”

A beauty in tears — like a pear blossom touched by rain — filling the heart with tenderness.

Ashina laughed and sighed at his little wife, who always said such foolish things. Yet these foolish things were what he loved to hear most.

Xie Yuzhang brought the golden blade to show Lin Fei.

“I want to kill someone again,” she said.

Lin Fei said helplessly: “Keep a cool head — don’t act on impulse. He is nothing like Ma Jianye. You cannot simply kill him at will. We must lay our groundwork first. And besides, you have only just received the Khan’s golden blade. If you then kill his son, how could others not grow suspicious?”

“Very well, then I will not rush,” Xie Yuzhang said. “I will not rush at all. I still have a great deal of time.”

But Xia’erdan — he must die.

Lin Fei was entirely opposed to this matter.

Even if Xia’erdan’s influence was limited, he was still a prince — Ashina’s own son.

In this lifetime, Xie Yuzhang had been on her guard against him from the start. Even if Ashina were to die one day, she would never fall into Xia’erdan’s hands again. She truly could not understand why Xie Yuzhang was so determined to kill him.

This was because when Xie Yuzhang had told her of her past life, she had spoken of Xia’erdan with great reluctance to elaborate. She had only said, “He treated me very badly and caused me much suffering,” and left it at that.

Yet in the year since, Xie Yuzhang had encountered Xia’erdan many times. Every time she saw him, she was reminded of how he had treated Lin Fei. And all that suffering had been borne by Lin Fei in her place. Each time Xie Yuzhang saw him, her resolve to kill Xia’erdan grew by one measure.

From then on, Xie Yuzhang wore the golden blade Ashina had bestowed upon her at her waist every single day. Within the same waistband, the dark lacquered dagger was tucked alongside it as well.

Since arriving on the grasslands, Xie Yuzhang had no longer worn the wide-sleeved, broad-collared robes she had once worn in Yunjing. She had made many garments in the Mobei style, and also modified Central Plains clothing — wide sleeves were replaced with arrow sleeves, two-paneled designs with four-paneled ones — maintaining a distinctly beautiful and distinctive style of dress while also adapting to life in Mobei, making it entirely suitable for riding and archery.

By the time of Xie Yuzhang’s second Central Plains New Year since coming to Mobei as a bride, her people had already fully adapted to life here. The princess had distributed cattle and sheep among them, and now every household kept cattle and sheep just as the Mobei people did. Those who knew how to farm could still farm — the princess had enclosed a large stretch of land in the mountain foothills, well away from the pastureland. Her soldiers had originally been garrison troops who farmed their own fields, so they already knew how to cultivate the land. During planting season they went to the fields, and during quieter times they trained.

The crops planted upon returning to the ancestral lands had yielded an excellent harvest.

Many nomads, seeing them bring in such great quantities of grain, came to learn from them — how to fertilize the soil, how to weed and control pests.

That year’s New Year was one of abundance and plenty. Though from the previous year onward they were expected to wait and celebrate the New Year in the third month along with the Khanate, during the Central Plains New Year they still slaughtered meat, fried dough pastries, and made meatball soup, celebrating the occasion all the same.

They also sent these Central Plains foods as gifts to the nomadic families they had grown close with. Many nomadic households were delighted to receive these gifts and sent back cheese and sheepskin in return.

Though it was not the Khanate’s New Year, the Zhao people’s high spirits spread to the nomads, and the atmosphere became lively and festive all around.

Ashina, watching it all, took it as an auspicious sign of his kingdom’s flourishing, and was greatly pleased. He publicly praised the Baohua Khatun, commending her for governing her own people so admirably.

The Baohua Khatun wore the golden blade at her waist, her face as radiant as a lotus.

Ashina Khan’s deep affection for her was spoken of all across the grasslands.

The Central Plains New Year passed, and when the weather turned warm in the third month, the Khanate’s own New Year arrived — and that was when the true festivities began.

The great and lesser khans began to gather at the Ashina clan’s ancestral grounds. Throughout this period, there was one banquet after another, and the fragrance of roasting mutton made the mouths of the slaves water endlessly. Yet though they herded and slaughtered and roasted sheep all year long, not once could they eat a single mouthful of meat.

Xia’erdan was attending a banquet inside Wuwei’s great tent. He had drunk a great deal, and stepped out to go around to the back of the tent, undid his trousers, and relieved himself. Halfway through, he suddenly heard a woman’s startled voice cry out: “Who is there?”

Xia’erdan assumed it was some female slave or another. He turned his head — and by the torchlight, he saw Xie Yuzhang, her face flushed with apparent embarrassment, one hand raised to cover her face, yet stealing glances at him through the gaps between her fingers.

Xia’erdan gave a start — and his stream went sideways.