The man who’d initiated contact with the two of them later gave his name as Second Hu.

Whether Second Hu was actually acquainted with the third young master Bo remained uncertain.

But he was, without question, genuinely interested in the large batch of herbs.

After Shen Qingwu proved herself “simple-minded,” Zhang Xingjian drew him out, and the two talked at length. Second Hu wanted to take the entire batch, though he couldn’t decide on his own and would need two more days to discuss it further.

Zhang Xingjian, for his part, promised that the one delivering the herbs would be the “simple-minded” Shen Qingwu he’d seen—not Zhang Xingjian himself.

Through the lengthy conversation, Shen Qingwu played her simple-minded role without moving a muscle, while Zhang Xingjian picked up on the fact that Second Hu seemed to hold some wariness toward him specifically.

Zhang Xingjian mused to himself: why would the man be wary of him in particular? Did he know he was a court fugitive—or was there some other reason?

Either way, the deal was more or less settled in broad terms. The two parties parted ways; Second Hu showed no sign of hostility, and Zhang Xingjian took his leave along with his “simple-minded” wife.

Once in the carriage, having traveled some distance, Shen Qingwu, leaning against the carriage wall, said flatly: “Someone’s following us.”

Zhang Xingjian had also caught some faint stirring in the wind, though he hadn’t been sure of it. Her words confirmed his suspicion, and, naturally trusting her combat instincts, he asked, “Second Hu?”

Shen Qingwu said, indifferent, “Probably.”

She looked at him. “Why drag things out like this? Just find their den and cut our way in.”

Zhang Xingjian smiled. “Once we find their den, there’ll be plenty of time for you to cut your way through it, my dear—your husband won’t stop you.”

Shen Qingwu raised an eyebrow.

She questioned him: “‘My dear’? ‘Your husband’?”

Clearly, the “wife” Zhang Xingjian spoke of was nothing like the polite address “Madam Shen”; and his “your husband” was, without question, taking advantage of her.

To make things convenient, ever since she’d first confined Zhang Xingjian, Shen Qingwu had taken to calling the two of them husband and wife. Cowed by her strength, Zhang Xingjian had never quite said yes or no to it—only grudgingly played along.

But privately, had he ever, even once, genuinely believed the two of them were truly husband and wife?

Whatever the substance of husband and wife they shared, the bond of true matrimony between them was entirely absent.

The carriage jolted, wheels rattling along the road. Zhang Xingjian looked at Shen Qingwu, clearly turning over this same thought himself.

His smile faded slightly, though his tone remained just as gentle: “Second Hu following us means he still doesn’t trust us. If he really is one of the third young master Bo’s people, they’ve spent years hiding, fearful of the authorities, naturally suspicious of anyone who shows up in front of them.

“Since that’s the case, we’ll simply have to keep up this little performance.”

Shen Qingwu frowned slightly.

It wasn’t that she objected to continuing to pretend to be husband and wife in private—what she took issue with was him calling her “simple-minded.” Indignant, she said, “I’m not actually an idiot. How am I supposed to keep playing an idiot even in private?”

If she hadn’t brought it up, it would have been fine—but the moment she did, Zhang Xingjian was reminded of the grotesque face she’d pulled back at the tea stall.

His eyes flickered, the corner of his mouth twitching upward, holding back a laugh that threatened to break free.

Seeing the murderous look in her eyes, he reined in his smile with effort, saying gently, “Don’t be upset, my dear. You needn’t do anything at all—just watch your husband handle it.”

Shen Qingwu decided to let it go.

That night, the group found a farmhouse to stay in. The court’s secret agents, disguised as servants, unloaded the herbs, then took the farmhouse’s owner with them to check the town market for any new goods worth buying.

They played the roles of well-off traveling merchants with great sincerity. Second Hu quietly followed them around for a while, watching the servants head off toward the market, then crept back to the farmhouse, laboriously climbing a tree and scaling the roof tiles, lying in wait on the cold winter eaves to listen and see whether the unlucky merchant couple had gone to sleep.

Under a bean-sized lamp flame, Zhang Xingjian sat idly at a table, using a handful of stones as chess pieces, playing a game against himself out of boredom.

Shen Qingwu sat against the peeling wall, hugging her saber, watching him with a cold eye.

The strikingly handsome young man held a fistful of stones, his brows and eyes dark as ink. Sitting in this crudely furnished farmhouse, he might as well have been sitting in a splendid palace—only the occasional rise and fall of his wrist, revealing the shackles beneath his sleeve, gave away his true situation.

In the lamplight, he truly was lovely to watch as he played, entertaining himself alone, every inch the elegant gentleman of a decadent age.

Shen Qingwu found herself watching, entranced.

But… she had studied chess under Bo Rong for several years.

Whatever her skill level, her attitude toward learning had always been earnest. Bo Rong had never expected her to master strategy from the chessboard—he’d only hoped the game might help settle her, rein in her impulsive, fiery temper.

Shen Qingwu knew her own chess skill was mediocre—Bo Rong had never praised her talent at reading or chess the way he’d praised her gift for martial arts.

But now, watching him coldly, she couldn’t shake the feeling… that Zhang Xingjian’s chess seemed even worse than her own?

She sat there watching him, propping his chin up carelessly, his mind clearly elsewhere entirely. He would place one stone, then pause for a long while; place another, and immediately forget where the last one had gone. The whole game descended into chaos under his hand, so much so that Shen Qingwu, watching in confusion, couldn’t even tell whether he was playing black or white.

Watching him play, it seemed even he himself had gotten lost.

The handsome young man drifted back from wherever his mind had wandered, his long fingers gripping a handful of stones, unable to find anywhere to place them.

Shen Qingwu leaned comfortably against the corner of the table, watching him. After Zhang Xingjian sat there blankly for some time, he calmly scooped a stone he’d already placed back into his palm.

Shen Qingwu: “…”

Wasn’t there some saying about a placed stone being final, about a gentleman’s word being his bond?

Having taken back one stone, he still seemed unsatisfied, and took back several more in a row. Only once he felt he could finally make sense of the board did he resume playing, satisfied. And yet his next moves were just as poor—drift off for a while, wander back, and the board would fall into chaos all over again.

Shen Qingwu silently recalled a memory of Zhang Xingjian from when she’d once spied on him back at the Zhang residence in the Eastern Capital: playing chess with Chang Lin, his skill hadn’t even matched Chang Lin’s.

Shen Qingwu even suspected she could beat him herself at this rate.

She’d always heard that those skilled at chess were people of exceptional strategic mind. A man as deeply calculating as Zhang Xingjian surely shouldn’t be bad at chess—and yet he genuinely was, which could only mean… that Zhang Yuelu’s mind wandered constantly while playing, that he wasn’t putting any thought into it at all.

He was lazy.

Probably far lazier than most people would ever guess.

Having glimpsed this hidden side of him, the corner of Shen Qingwu’s mouth curved up faintly.

This adorable, indolent, careless, perfunctory-about-everything moon… unable even to play a decent game of chess—hardly seemed like Bo Rong’s brother at all.

This would be the kind of poor student even Bo Rong wouldn’t know what to say to—she herself was surely not the worst student he’d ever taught.

In her mind, Shen Qingwu imagined Bo Rong and Zhang Xingjian playing a match, picturing how utterly speechless Bo Rong would be; then she imagined herself facing off against Zhang Xingjian, picturing how thoroughly she’d crush him.

Her eyes, dark and glistening, rested on the table, the curve of her lips growing more pronounced.

Zhang Xingjian, a fistful of stones in hand, had drifted off again—this time toward her. He watched her lying there so obediently, so still, her eyes bright and clear, watching him without blinking. Though she wasn’t smiling, the curve of her lips was deeper than usual.

She lay there so quietly.

Something in his chest gave a small lurch.

He asked, “Why aren’t you saying anything? Why aren’t you moving?”

Shen Qingwu said, “Didn’t you tell me not to move, to play the idiot properly?”

Zhang Xingjian couldn’t hold back his laughter at that.

His heart melted into something soft; he wanted, wanted… He fought to control every inappropriate impulse rising in him, his heart pounding fit to leap from his chest, color flooding up his neck and cheeks. He sat frozen, the handful of chess stones still in his grip, not daring to set them down.

Zhang Xingjian said softly, “Wutong…”

Shen Qingwu said, “He’s here.”

She delivered this piece of news without moving a muscle, and Zhang Xingjian understood at once that she meant Second Hu had arrived.

Zhang Xingjian smiled faintly.

While Shen Qingwu looked on in confusion, he swept aside the chaotic mess of stones that had made up his chessboard, utterly indifferent to the game. He went and washed his hands, then brought over a plate of pastries, sitting down beside her.

He picked up a piece of lotus cake between his fingers, eyes crinkling with a smile, and held it up to her lips.

He said, smiling brightly, “Ah.”

Shen Qingwu: “…”

Zhang Xingjian, feigning distress though his eyes remained full of laughter, said, “My dear, this is called a ‘pastry’—it’s edible. Eat up now, your husband needs you to earn our keep, after all.”

Shen Qingwu was confused for a moment, then, seeing him wink, realized he was putting on a show for Second Hu.

Ah. So he was “feeding the idiot,” was he.

Shen Qingwu gritted her teeth, genuinely irritated by his teasing. He waved the pastry in front of her, his jade-white fingers wiggling it back and forth, exactly like dangling a bone in front of a puppy.

Especially since he kept smiling the whole time.

Smiling, her foot.

Shen Qingwu refused to open her mouth, staring at him coldly, while he bent down, repeatedly tapping the pastry against her lips. Unfortunately, Second Hu, out in the cold wind, had no idea just how pleased with himself this young man was:

“Ah, one, two, three, open wide…”

Shen Qingwu suddenly opened her mouth, her tongue pressing forward against the pastry.

The pastry was soft, and at her touch it slipped from Zhang Xingjian’s fingers and fell to the floor. But her tongue had already made contact, her eyes fixed on his infuriating fingers. He froze, tried to pull his fingers back—only to have Shen Qingwu catch them between her teeth.

He shuddered, lowering his eyes.

With his fingers held in her mouth, she bit down lightly a few times—venting, and warning him. She remembered he was a fragile sort of man, and didn’t dare bite hard, worried it would set him off pretending to faint or feign weakness again, so these light nips were nothing that would actually hurt him.

The blood in his chest surged hot outward.

He sat frozen, watching her bite his finger, his dark eyes slowly darkening further, black as midnight.

His family had deep, storied roots in learning.

He wasn’t quite so untouchably aloof as others believed him to be.

Who, in their youth, hadn’t once or twice secretly read some scandalous book behind their elder sister’s back?

At that moment, with Shen Qingwu’s tongue pressed against his finger, his fingertip enveloped in the warm, soft heat of her mouth—that cold, hard woman, yet her lips and tongue were soft and warm—a tingling, numbing warmth spread from his fingertip through his entire body.

Zhang Xingjian gazed at her, deep and still.

She bit down gently on his finger once more, as if to remind him: Second Hu’s still out there, and you’re just going to stay silent like this?

He looked down at her, and slowly, his voice came out somewhat hoarse: “My dear, don’t eat the pastry that fell on the floor. Your husband will… your husband will buy you a new one.”

His voice was gentle, his posture perfectly upright—only the flush spreading across his jade-porcelain neck grew more and more visible, and in his calm, clear eyes, darkness pooled like a river, carefully concealing flashes of blade and steel.

Lying across the table, Shen Qingwu tilted her head up to look at him, noticing something distinctly off.

The two of them locked eyes, each studying the other.

Under his gaze, Shen Qingwu’s heart skipped several beats; she couldn’t help holding her breath, terrified that her own breathing might give something away, that Second Hu outside might notice something amiss.

Zhang Xingjian said softly, “My dear, why have you stopped eating again?”

Shen Qingwu’s eyes were like a vast, misty river, still as midnight.

She gave an exploratory lick to his finger, and watched his expression tighten faintly, his rosy lips pressing together, the watery light in his starlit eyes growing darker still.

Simply… a feast for the eyes.

The atmosphere in the room turned strange.

Shen Qingwu abruptly spat out his finger and leapt to her feet, as though shattering some dazzling dream. Caught off guard, Zhang Xingjian saw her turn to push open the window and leave—he couldn’t help reaching out, catching her hand: “Shen Qingwu…”

She’d already been on the balls of her feet, ready to leap through the window, and was pulled roughly back. She looked down at him, puzzled, not understanding what he meant.

She looked at the hand holding hers.

Shen Qingwu assumed his martial skill was simply too poor to have caught the disturbance outside. Masking her wildly pounding heart with impatience, she glared at him: “Second Hu’s leaving. I need to go after him. Why are you holding onto me?”

Zhang Xingjian went still for a breath’s length, then let go of her hand with a smile.

He recovered his composure, mild and warm once more: “No particular reason. I only meant that it’s cold outside—put your cloak on before you go, Lady Knight.”

Shen Qingwu said, “Don’t dawdle.”

His voice, as he bent down, still carried a trace of unspent hoarseness, though it came wrapped in gentle, faint laughter: “All right. I won’t dawdle.”

He took the gray-black cloak he’d recently had made for her and draped it over her shoulders, then tied the sash for her. Their breaths mingled in the quiet stillness between them. Shen Qingwu was desperate to escape this atmosphere she could barely stand, while Zhang Xingjian likewise fought to suppress every uncontrolled, flickering spark rising within him.

As he finished tying her sash, his fingers, withdrawing, brushed lightly against her warm cheek.

He looked down at her. “General Shen, be careful. If you sense anything wrong, trust your instincts and get out. We’re in no hurry—I’ll wait here for you to come back.”

Shen Qingwu said nothing, turned, and leapt out the window.

The window shut again with a snap. Zhang Xingjian stood there for a long moment before finally sitting back down. He looked down at the faint tooth marks on his index finger, sat in silence for a long while, and closed his eyes.

He let out a soft, rueful laugh, and covered his face with his hand.

Beauty leads a man’s judgment astray.

Zhang Yuelu, you need to keep your composure—

Shen Qingwu followed Second Hu without a sound, trailing him through winding turns up a mountain path. Second Hu’s martial skill wasn’t much to speak of, and she followed him with ease. Away from the strange atmosphere back in the room, she found her calm again. Moving silently through the night, she made not the faintest sound, like a cat.

She watched Second Hu climb the mountain, where several men came out to meet him.

She heard them say: “Old Three’s been waiting for you a while now. Is that him?”

“Who’s that woman? Surely not really his wife?”

“These government types, truly a bunch of bastards.”

“Let’s try again.”

Shen Qingwu wanted to get closer, but one of the men, after every couple of steps, glanced warily backward, making it impossible for her to approach further.

Still, she pressed on, following them a good distance further.

The mountain path grew rugged, the trees thinning the higher they climbed, leaving fewer and fewer places for her to hide.

The cold deepened further; the first snowflake of the winter drifted lazily down onto the tip of her nose. Shen Qingwu tilted her head back, looking up at the heavy, dark clouds above.

With the sky so cold and moonless, there was no telling how long this snow might fall. Shen Qingwu knew that continuing to follow them further would yield nothing, and withdrew in good time.

The thought of “withdrawing” turned over in her mind, and her calm heart, like a still pond struck by a thrown stone, quickened its pace.

Tonight, beyond tracking Second Hu, she had another purpose of her own—one she had to keep hidden from Zhang Xingjian—

The young Miao woman sat in a rented room, sighing over how she might sell her “Heart-Bound Gu,” worrying over when she might finally escape this increasingly chaotic world and return to her own peaceful nest.

There came two soft knocks at the wooden door.

The Miao girl jumped like a startled bird. “Who’s there?”

A woman’s voice, clear and crisp: “Me.”

The Miao girl couldn’t place whose voice it belonged to, but at least she could tell it wasn’t one of the soldiers out rounding up women for the selection. Nervously, she opened the door a crack, and upon making out the tall, slender figure of the woman outside, relaxed completely.

She opened the door. “It’s snowing?”

The girl’s eyes brightened. “I’ve never seen snow before.”

A thin dusting of snow lay on Shen Qingwu’s cloak; she stood silently at the wooden door, like a shadowy phantom. Only the Miao girl’s lively, delighted voice stirred her, softening her from that cold, statue-like stillness.

Shen Qingwu drew a small box from inside her robe and held it out. “One ingot of gold. I want your ‘Heart-Bound Gu.'”

The Miao girl froze.

She took the box in a daze, opened it, and was startled to find it really was gold. She tested it cautiously against her teeth; Shen Qingwu let her test it as she pleased.

The girl said, “You really have gold?”

Shen Qingwu said, “Just withdrawn.”

She had gone, quite deliberately, and pounded on the door of a money house, exchanging every coin of her salary for this single piece of gold.

She wanted that “Heart-Bound Gu,” and nothing else.

Whatever she wanted, she would have, no matter what.

Shen Qingwu said, “Where are your pills?”

The Miao girl came back to herself and happily went to fetch her wooden box. Shen Qingwu stood at the doorway, checking the box for the pills, her expression serious, her brow cool and clear.

The Miao girl grew a little uneasy. “Just remember—the mother gu is for you to take, the child gu is for the other person. Don’t get them mixed up. And, and… if it doesn’t work, you can’t blame me for that either…”

Shen Qingwu’s gaze flashed like lightning. “Doesn’t work?”

The girl said hastily, “I’m no swindler! I only mean—even the finest gu has its limits. It can make someone unable to bear being apart from you, hearts aching as if breaking, dying of longing when separated… but if that person truly, truly doesn’t like you, forcing them to stay by your side won’t do any good.”

The Miao girl muttered, “My father always said, a melon forced off the vine before its time is never sweet.”

Shen Qingwu gave a cold smile.

She said, indifferent, “Whether it’s sweet or not depends on me. Not on him.”

She gave the box a light shake, signaling she’d received the goods—the deal was done. But the Miao girl seemed to still want to chat: “Hey, mind if I ask—this ‘Heart-Bound Gu’ you’re buying, it’s not for that young man who was traveling with you the other day, is it?”

Shen Qingwu glanced at her: none of your business.

The girl said, “No offense meant, I only mean—my ‘Heart-Bound Gu’ is precious stuff, and if it’s used on the wrong person, you’d have to come find us to undo it. That’d be a real headache… so you really do need to be certain, choose your target carefully, before you use it. If you’re planning to use it on that young man from the other day, honestly, I think that’d be a huge waste—you don’t need it at all with him.”

This remark left Shen Qingwu puzzled.

Shen Qingwu said, “Why wouldn’t I need it?”

The Miao girl stared at her, startled.

She said, “Surely you can tell that young man’s smitten with you?”

Shen Qingwu: “…”

She was utterly lost.

Shen Qingwu said, coldly: “Don’t you dare lie to me.”

She began to wonder whether this “Heart-Bound Gu” was even real to begin with—whether it had any effect at all, which was why the Miao girl kept spinning these tales. Had she been cheated?

Shen Qingwu reached for her saber, while the Miao girl, oblivious to the danger she was courting, kept prattling on with feeling:

“That young man’s eyes never left you, not once, the whole time. Even when you ignored him, he kept watching you. And his eyes kept smiling the whole time… he must be one of those refined, cultured types you people talk about, right? Even holding himself back, he just smiles the moment he sees you.

“The way he talks to you, so gentle, so patient…”

The girl puffed out her cheeks. “How infuriating! Such a handsome man—if his whole heart weren’t so clearly set on you, I’d have snatched him up and taken him home to the Miao lands myself. And here you are wanting to waste a ‘Heart-Bound Gu’ on him… you should give it to someone else instead.”

The girl said, eager: “I’ve heard you people keep three wives and four concubines and all that…”

Shen Qingwu looked at the Miao girl in silence, and the girl trailed off, falling quiet.

Shen Qingwu said, “If the ‘Heart-Bound Gu’ doesn’t work, I’ll hunt you down across a thousand li.”

The girl drew a sharp breath, and in the next instant Shen Qingwu’s figure blurred and vanished into the darkness, leaving no trace to follow—

Shen Qingwu walked through the wind and snow, the wooden box tucked against her chest.

Her warm cloak billowed in the wind, her cheeks numbed cold and senseless, the jade pendant against her chest burning hot, the newly acquired box alternating between cold and warm against her skin.

Every inch of her radiating “stay away,” Shen Qingwu trudged unevenly through the thin, fresh snow, hazy as though caught in some cold, drifting dream.

Her mind flickered between the dark, downcast look in Zhang Xingjian’s eyes, and the Miao girl’s envious words: he’s smitten with you.

It was absurd, really.

Her hand tightened around the saber at her hip; several times she nearly turned back to kill the Miao girl for deceiving her. She held her temper in check, because she, too, was lost in confusion—

She didn’t believe it.

Her entire long leave of absence had been for him—she meant to win the moon, and then discard it, to make the moon feel, just once, the same bitter dissatisfaction she herself had always known.

That dissatisfaction of hers had never once faded, not to this day. Facing Zhang Xingjian, she still felt that same urgent, desperate hunger to possess him.

She had never once believed she’d actually won Zhang Yuelu.

And yet the Miao girl had said she had.

Did that mean her leave was over, then?

Should she be leaving now?

…But was what the Miao girl said even true?—

Meanwhile, at that disreputable inn on the border of Yizhou, Shen Qingye crept carefully down the stairs.

The inn, packed full of guests, turned as one to look at her.

Shen Qingye’s hand, gripping the railing, had gone white; her eyes lowered, her body faintly rigid. She couldn’t understand why these people wouldn’t simply leave—she’d told her lie about being Qiu Jun’s wife a thousand, ten thousand times over, and still they sat here.

They were probably waiting to see the assassins from “Qin Yueye” come to collect her in person, before they’d finally give up.

But where on earth would Shen Qingye ever find real assassins from “Qin Yueye”?

These martial-world people watched her as though enjoying a joke, waiting maliciously to expose her lie; the inn’s waiter kept insisting that “Qin Yueye’s” assassins would come…

Day after day, night after night, Shen Qingye couldn’t leave this inn, weighed down with worry, growing more afraid by the hour.

How could anyone from “Qin Yueye” possibly come?

At this point, she both hoped someone would come save her, and feared that someone from “Qin Yueye” truly would arrive.

Pale-faced, Shen Qingye descended the stairs; among the martial-world guests below, someone sneered: “Miss Shen, come for dinner? Why don’t you tell us more about you and Qiu Jun… did he really die?”

Shen Qingye forced a smile.

She gathered her courage and lifted her gaze to the room full of guests.

And in that very instant, every lamp in the room went out at once.

The inn plunged into total darkness.

Chaos erupted below at once; Shen Qingye heard the clash of weapons, heard someone slam a hand on a table and shout: “Who’s there?!”

All around, silence and darkness.

Shen Qingye stood frozen in the blackness, terrified of whoever was below, quietly backing away, wanting to retreat to her own room.

As she stepped back, she collided with someone behind her.

Shen Qingye froze.

Amid the chaos and terror below, Shen Qingye heard a man’s voice from behind her, cold as frost and snow, cutting through the entire inn’s confusion—

“Qiu Jun.”

Everyone in the darkness heard that answer. Shen Qingye spun around at once, meaning to face whoever stood behind her, to explain her situation to him. But a gust of wind swept past her in that same instant, and in the next, cries of agony and the clash of weapons erupted from among the guests below.

Wind rattled the shuttered windows, howling.

Shen Qingye, frail since childhood, caught the unmistakable scent of blood. She knew how weak her body was, and knew that whatever happened, she could not afford to faint now.

Hair falling loose across her cheeks, her face white as snow, she sank slowly to the floor against the railing, forcing herself to hold back the onset of her heart condition. The fragile young woman sat on the stairs, covering her ears, trying to shut out the sounds of violence.

Qiu Jun, Qiu Jun…

Someone from “Qin Yueye” had truly come.

And the one who had come was the very husband from her lie, the owner of the jade pendant—the cold-wind, scattered-autumn-leaves lord himself—

“Bang—”

The wooden door swung open. Zhang Xingjian, lantern in hand, stepped outside and saw Shen Qingwu walking back through the wind and snow, her face cold.

He found himself pinned in place by the icy look in her eyes.

She looked at him, walking toward him, step by step.

She meant to test it—was it time for her journey home to begin? Could Zhang Yuelu really fall for someone so easily? What was there about her, so flawed as she was, for him to like?

He was meant to hang in the sky, cold and passionless—how could he ever love anyone? How could he possibly deserve to?