Dongjing’s Lantern Festival lasted a full five days. On the sixteenth night, while the people of Dongjing were still out admiring the lanterns, the Yizhou army stationed near the capital broke camp and set out with their commanding general, returning to Yizhou.

That night, Chancellor Kong personally escorted Shen Qingwu and her party out through the city gates on behalf of the court, giving the Yizhou army every measure of face.

Shen Qingwu found the man tiresome.

Yang Su said that wasn’t tiresome at all.

After Shen Qingwu bid farewell to Chancellor Kong, Yang Su followed her onto her horse, leaning in to murmur in her ear, explaining: “You cost Zhang Sanlang face at the New Year’s moon ceremony—that’s exactly the kind of gesture that wins Chancellor Kong’s favor. And during our many days in Dongjing, we visited Chancellor Kong repeatedly but never once visited Zhang Sanlang—Chancellor Kong will take that as a sign we favor him too.

“A border general’s gesture of goodwill, the sincerity of one of Great Zhou’s two most formidable border armies—of course Chancellor Kong is pleased. Think about it—these past days in Dongjing, Chancellor Kong seemed to pay us little mind, but really, he’s been looking out for us at every turn—otherwise, given everything with you, wouldn’t Dongjing have torn us apart by now?”

Shen Qingwu glanced at him: what exactly had she done? His way of putting it displeased her somewhat.

Yang Su grinned: “You know, the whole business of no one at court knowing you’re a woman, whatever chaos you stirred up at the princess’s banquet… I really do admire you, I have to say.”

What he admired most was Shen Qingwu’s fearless stubbornness.

Under the bright moon, Shen Qingwu had already mounted her horse; Yang Su was still rubbing his chin, muttering to himself: “Given that strange history between you and Zhang Sanlang… Chancellor Kong was probably worried you’d side with Zhang Xingjian. Him personally seeing us off tonight was surely also a way of testing our relationship with Zhang Sanlang. Lucky for us, you came across so coldly—that should be enough to put Chancellor Kong’s mind at ease.”

Yang Su mused further: “Going forward, once we’re back, the court will probably be quite lenient with us regarding military provisions and the like.”

Yang Su: “Well done, General.”

Shen Qingwu, numbly: “Mm.”

But a moment later, Yang Su found himself troubled by something else: “You’ve satisfied Chancellor Kong, sure, but doesn’t that mean you’ve effectively offended Zhang Sanlang? And given that history between you two…”

Shen Qingwu glanced at him: “There’s no history between us whatsoever.”

Her reason was still intact—she hadn’t done anything to Zhang Xingjian; if anything, he should be grateful for her mercy, her restraint, her composure—proof that Bo Rong’s teachings had served her well after all.

Yang Su said, “Well, it’s just… the two of you… it’s hard to say. Would Zhang Sanlang use his position at court to make trouble for the Yizhou army because of you?”

Shen Qingwu, quite seriously: “If he dares try, I’ll kill him.”

But privately, she believed Zhang Xingjian wouldn’t do such a thing—that man’s coldness, more often than not, applied equally to everyone. He wouldn’t act differently because of her, wouldn’t withhold anything because of her either. If he looked out for her at all, it was probably only because she’d once saved his life.

Still… who would ever want to be his savior?

Yang Su laughed awkwardly: “I was only joking, don’t take it too seriously.”

Shen Qingwu: “I was joking too.”

Yang Su thought: …Your jokes sound like they come straight from the heart, not like jokes at all!

Having already given his warning, he mounted his own horse and said no more.

Riding on horseback, the familiar sensation of leaving the capital made Shen Qingwu glance back despite herself.

She saw the bright moon hanging high in the sky, so similar to a certain night long past.

But atop the lantern-lit towers and pavilions of Dongjing, all she saw now were the stationed guards. This time, there was no Zhang Xingjian, no Shen Qingye standing there to see her off. She heard no sound of Shen Qingye’s weeping, felt none of that reluctance, that lingering attachment.

The moon hung so high.

When would the moon ever fall?

Zhang Xingjian stood beneath the city tower, watching indifferently as the guards hung lanterns and checked the flames.

Using “fire prevention” as his pretext, citing the near-fatal incident at last night’s night market as an example, he was inspecting the lanterns along the route out of the city for any risk of fire or toppling lantern stands.

Chang Lin approached silently from behind him and said, “Chancellor Kong personally saw them off—Shen Qingwu has already left the city.”

Zhang Xingjian nodded.

Chang Lin said, “Since you’re already here, why not go up to the tower to watch? That way she’d know it was you looking out for her too.”

…Then maybe she wouldn’t treat him with that attitude every single time.

Zhang Xingjian handled every small, tangled matter of court politics on Shen Qingwu’s behalf, quietly and without a trace—even factoring in Chancellor Kong’s favorable impression of her had been part of his calculation… From Chang Lin’s perspective, the young master treated Shen Qingwu exceptionally well.

Zhang Xingjian said, indifferent: “There’s no need to burden her with meaningless attachments.”

Every moment he spent with Shen Qingwu was carefully calculated, measured with precision—close enough to show goodwill, but never too close… though, in truth, Shen Qingwu was genuinely difficult to please, and in the end, he hadn’t managed to strike quite the right balance after all.

Looking down, Zhang Xingjian’s gaze fell on the lantern shadows scattered across the ground, and he found himself recalling the alley from the night before, tending to her wounds.

He thought of the cold sweat on her brow, her cracked lips, the indifference in her eyes.

Shen Qingwu truly was the least self-caring woman he’d ever met. If he were to help her dress up, style her a little…

Stop.

Zhang Xingjian cut off his own wandering, aimless thoughts.

Chang Lin watched as Zhang Xingjian smiled at the soldiers reporting to him. He walked alongside his master for a while, noting that Zhang Xingjian was clearly distracted, yet somehow never let it interfere with the matter at hand.

Chang Lin admired this ability to be so absent-minded and still competent. Still stuck on their earlier conversation, he said, “Must be nice, being your savior.”

Zhang Xingjian let out a soft, distant laugh, gentle and refined: “Why don’t you ask Shen Qingwu whether she’d rather kill me?”

Chang Lin let out an awkward “uh,” not knowing how to respond.

Zhang Xingjian turned his back, his loose robes stirring in the wind—whatever he wore always seemed to lend him an even more elegant air. Yet what occupied his mind day and night had nothing to do with purity or nobility—

Chang Lin heard Zhang Xingjian instruct him: “Start the investigation with Shen Qingwu’s circle. Look into the household registration and background of every soldier in the Yizhou army. Check for anyone with ties to Dongjing—a Dongjing accent, time spent in Dongjing, or anyone who’s gone missing or disappeared for a stretch of time.”

Chang Lin, startled: “That’s an enormous scope. My lord… could you tell me plainly what exactly we’re investigating?”

He hesitated, stammering: “Aren’t you engaged to Fifth Young Lady Shen? Don’t tell me you’re actually having second thoughts, that you and Shen Qingwu are…”

He was met with a cold, distant glance from Zhang Xingjian.

Chang Lin groaned: “Your behavior is so strange lately, how can I not start imagining things?”

Zhang Xingjian said: “This secret may well touch on a crime of deceiving the emperor—if it comes to light, it could mean the extermination of an entire clan. Are you certain you want to know right now?”

Chang Lin, shocked, went cold all over: “You’re lying to scare me, aren’t you?”

Zhang Xingjian said gently: “Yes. I was lying.”

But given how freely Zhang Xingjian mixed truth and lies in everything he said and did, how could Chang Lin possibly trust him?

Chang Lin hurried to catch up with Zhang Xingjian’s unhurried pace: “Where are we headed now? Still going to see the lanterns?”

Zhang Xingjian: “Home.”

He needed to test his elder sister, Zhang Wenbi. He needed to find out whether she knew anything about whether Zhang Rong was truly dead or alive. This potential crime against the throne hanging over the Zhang family—he needed to figure out how to cover for it, how to turn defeat into victory.

Having become someone’s adopted brother, he naturally owed loyalty to that family.

Wanting to be the moon in the sky, he naturally had to be ruthless and cold-blooded when it counted.

That night, Zhang Xingjian went to test Zhang Wenbi; in the deep hours after midnight, Shen Qingwu and her soldiers made camp in the wilderness to rest.

Shen Qingwu had a dream—a night split by lightning and thunder, in which she advanced step by step, sword in hand, cleaving through the storm-lit sky, breaking apart the churning, layered clouds. She stood atop a mountain peak, and saw the night like frost, the moon like daylight, suspended before her, radiant and vast.

The wilderness around her lay in perfect stillness. Shen Qingwu woke with a start, and reaching for the jade pendant against her chest, could still feel her heart pounding wildly.

She crawled out of her tent, and there, right above her, was the moon.

Dark shrubs and trees swayed in the gentle breeze; in the deep night, only Shen Qingwu stood alone in the open clearing, gazing up at the bright, full moon—a stillness and a grandeur unlike anything in her dream, a sight she knew she’d never forget.

Dust drifted on the night wind, tree shadows swaying and falling across her eyes. The vast, magnificent scene stretched on and on; Shen Qingwu glanced toward those around her, wanting to share the sight of the moon with someone.

Everyone around her was snoring, deep in sleep. She called out to them, but none stirred, none heard her.

Shen Qingwu slowly sat down, hugging her knees, gazing at the moon alone.

She was lonely in that moment—but undeniably happy too.

In the spring of the twenty-third year of the Tianlong era, Shen Qingwu and Yang Su and the other soldiers made their way back to Yizhou. They’d completed their mission successfully, gotten along well with the court and its officials in the capital, and secured no small number of promises and gifts of grain in return… Bo Rong held a banquet in their honor, and throughout the second month, the mood among the Yizhou army was light and easy.

Shen Qingwu didn’t attend the evening banquet; the soldiers, well aware of their general’s solitary nature, didn’t seek her out.

Someone knocked at her tent flap. Shen Qingwu was still seated on the ground, sorting through her clothes. Bo Rong stepped inside, and seeing the tent scattered with her belongings, furrowed his brow helplessly.

Shen Qingwu paid him little mind either.

Bo Rong coughed once, laughing softly: “I saw the sword you sent me. A fine blade. You don’t earn much in monthly pay—that must have cost you a fair bit.”

Shen Qingwu said nothing.

Bo Rong stood at the entrance for a while, considering whether to lecture her, but thinking she’d only just returned, worried that scolding her now might only provoke rebellion. After a moment’s thought, he stepped carefully around the weapons and clothes scattered on the ground and found a clear spot to sit.

Shen Qingwu turned her face slightly, glancing at him.

He sat there, refined and cultured, his robe sleeves slightly creased, his posture relaxed yet graceful… she found herself certain, once again: Zhang Xingjian was exactly the same way.

Whatever Zhang Xingjian did seemed effortlessly pleasing to look at; so did Bo Rong.

Bo Rong lightly pinched the bridge of his nose, a trace of worry on his face, the corner of his mouth curved in a faint smile.

Shen Qingwu’s expression remained blank: look, even that was the same.

She really hadn’t been wrong.

It was only that Zhang Xingjian was younger, more delicately handsome, more refined; Bo Rong was simply older. It was only that Bo Rong lacked Zhang Xingjian’s deep scheming, his complete absence of desire or attachment…

As Shen Qingwu’s thoughts wandered, she heard Bo Rong cough again.

She rolled her eyes.

Bo Rong hesitated: “Yang Su tells me that in Dongjing, you and some young man from the Zhang family… someone named Zhang Xingjian… got rather close?”

Shen Qingwu: “…?”

She said, “Yang Su’s slandering me.”

Bo Rong smiled slightly at how seriously she took this.

Bo Rong said, thoughtfully: “Perhaps it’s best not to associate too much with the young men of the Zhang family, because…”

Still searching for the right excuse, he was cut off by Shen Qingwu’s light, breezy: “Mm-hm.”

Bo Rong froze.

He hadn’t expected Shen Qingwu—always so difficult to reason with, never one to heed advice—to actually listen to him, just this once. He’d braced himself to argue at length, certain he’d never manage to hold her back…

Shen Qingwu said, “I never planned to see him again anyway.”

—She feared that if she saw him again, she might lose control entirely, might end up locking Zhang Xingjian away somewhere, and that would put Bo Rong in an impossible position.

Remembering something, Shen Qingwu told Bo Rong: “Zhang Xingjian asked me about the jade pendant you gave me. Do you know him?”

Something flickered across Bo Rong’s eyes.

He said, “A’Wu, what did you tell him?”

He began to feel a headache coming on, wondering what to do.

He regretted, now, that when he’d sent A’Wu to Dongjing in his place, he hadn’t known she was the Shen family’s runaway Second Young Lady, much less that Shen Qingwu had known someone from the Zhang family years ago.

Shen Qingwu considered for a moment: “Nothing important.”

She glanced at him: “Don’t worry. I didn’t tell him your name.”

Bo Rong: “…”

He suspected Shen Qingwu had drawn certain conclusions of her own, though she hadn’t voiced them.

Sitting with her back to him, Shen Qingwu toyed with a dagger: “I won’t tell him anything about you, but he’s clever—you should start being careful around him now. And I won’t ask you what your relationship with him is either. Bo Rong is Bo Rong to me; I don’t care who you are, or what history you have.

“You’ve never asked about my past, and I won’t ask about yours. I’ve always believed in being fair.”

Bo Rong was silent for a moment.

He said, gently: “Good girl.”

Shen Qingwu turned her head, a sly, eager look crossing her face: “So can I command troops on my own now? A force of ten thousand or more?”

Bo Rong smiled at her, perfectly steady: “No.”

Shen Qingwu immediately turned her face away, ignoring him entirely.

Bo Rong: “…”

He laughed as he stepped out of the tent, shaking his head repeatedly over this spirited young woman.

At the same time, a certain unease settled over him—Dongjing knew nothing of his affairs, Zhang Wenbi knew nothing of his affairs, but he had no idea how much longer he could keep it that way.

That third son of the Zhang family, the one he’d never met, the one raised by the second daughter… what kind of child was he, really? Would that child be able to protect his family when the coming storm finally broke?