Li Shu had spit a mouthful of clear wine all over the place, drawing the attention of everyone present. Cui Jinzhi at her side hastily reached over and steadied her shoulders, patting her back with one hand while offering a cup of mild tea with the other.
“What happened? Did the wine go down the wrong way?”
His voice was unexpectedly gentle.
But Li Shu was too submerged in shock to spare any attention for Cui Jinzhi’s gentle words.
Shen Xiao had been sprayed full in the face by Li Shu’s wine. He stood to the side of her seat, face expressionless, looking down from above at Li Shu — still coughing and sputtering — and took in the entirety of her disheveled state.
Princess Pingyang. Li Shu.
This was a person Shen Xiao would never forget for the rest of his life.
Three years ago, that most exalted princess in all of Great Ye had been reclining against her cushions, lofty and untouchable, while Shen Xiao knelt on the ground, in the most abject of postures.
In order to obtain an official post, he had cast aside his dignity as a man and become a servant beneath the princess’s skirts.
Shen Xiao had spent twenty years reading by a cold window, a man of principle and backbone — yet from the night before, he had become a flatterer who traded on his looks for favor.
All for the sake of obtaining an official post.
Yet that exalted princess had treated the whole affair as something utterly trivial.
Those sharp inner corners of her eyes carried a coldness that came to her by nature. “Although last night I did promise you — that if you served me well, I would recommend you for an official post. And you did serve me… admirably enough. However…”
Her red lips parted and closed, her voice languid and indifferent, as if addressing a pet toy she had grown bored of. “However, today I simply changed my mind. I have no intention of recommending you for an official post.”
A slight lift of her fingers, signaling to the maidservant to bring forth gold and silver. “Consider this a reward — in recognition of last night’s performance.”
Shen Xiao had been down on his knees, forced to look up at the princess on her raised seat. Through layer upon layer of gauze curtains, the only thing he could clearly recall was those sharp inner corners of her eyes, and those red-painted lips.
Enchanting, yet utterly cold.
Princess Pingyang. Li Shu.
A person he would never forget for the rest of his life.
Shen Xiao’s gaze was piercing cold as it fell upon Li Shu. Li Shu had just recovered from her coughing fit when she found herself plunging straight into the ice cellar of Shen Xiao’s stare. She couldn’t help but shiver.
This top scholar had the look of someone who held his grudges.
She had lived twenty years and dallied with exactly one man in that fashion — and of all people, that man had to go and become Great Ye’s first-ever top imperial scholar. What kind of absurd luck was this? How was she supposed to go on living?
Lost in her own tangled thoughts, Great Ye’s first New Scholars’ Banquet came to its end.
Grand Princess Kangning was fond of amusements, and so after the banquet dispersed, Li Shu and the other noble ladies lingered at Qujiang Pool for a while longer. By the time the pleasure outing concluded, it was already close to dusk. Li Shu had been hungry for ages — so hungry her stomach was pressing against her spine. The food at the imperial banquet might look fine, but it was prepared for the Emperor and the high officials. Every dish had to be tasted repeatedly for poison before serving, and by the time it reached the table it was stone cold. Li Shu had barely touched any of it — and then after being startled by Shen Xiao, she’d lost what little appetite she had left.
So Princess Pingyang’s carriage made a detour, turning onto Zhuque Avenue — the most bustling street in Chang’an.
Xiankelai restaurant on Zhuque Avenue was the finest dining in all of Chang’an.
But the moment her carriage turned onto Zhuque Avenue, she noticed something different about the street today. Several storefronts had long queues of people stretching outside — ordinary commoners, every one of them with worried expressions, some looking positively gaunt.
*
Shen Xiao had changed into an ash-gray robe that had seen better days — eight-tenths worn through — and was now standing in line outside the Abundant Year Grain Shop, a cloth sack in hand, waiting to buy rice.
After the morning’s New Scholars’ Banquet disbanded, the other newly placed scholars either had family members in the capital or connections at court, and had various banquets to attend through the afternoon. Only Shen Xiao, with his commoner’s background, knew no one in the imperial court at all. Though he was the top scholar, not a single person saw fit to invite him to anything — asking the noble families to host a commoner would be laughable.
So he spent the afternoon with nothing to do, and went out with a cloth sack to buy rice.
Shen Xiao had his ancestral home in Wuxing, but he had no relatives of note in Chang’an. Three months earlier, he had come to sit the examination and had rented a small rundown room in Yanshou Ward to stay in. He was poor by nature, had no servant to speak of, and was entirely on his own. Though he had just won the top scholar title these past few days, no official post had yet been conferred upon him, and so no salary either. He remained, in short, completely penniless.
So he stood perfectly still among a crowd of ordinary commoners, waiting in line. Save for being a bit taller, a bit better-looking, and carrying a rather more aloof air, there was nothing about him to suggest he was the newly minted top imperial scholar.
A commotion broke out near the front of the line.
“Shopkeeper — why is there no rice left?!”
The shop boy at the Abundant Year Grain Shop rolled his eyes skyward with an expression of unmistakable indifference. “Who says there’s no rice? Here it is.” He scooped up a handful from the bin by the door and let it cascade noisily back down through his fingers.
But the customers were furious. “That’s years-old grain! Look at all the sand and rat droppings mixed in. Don’t try to pass off old grain as new — we want new rice!”
The protest spread like sparks through the queue. “We want new rice!” the waiting customers shouted.
The shop boy crossed his arms, fed up. “New rice? There is none. It hasn’t rained since last winter — the canal is still blocked, the southern grain can’t get through. You want new rice? Dream on.”
“Rubbish — the Abundant Year Grain Shop has stockpiles. How can you have no new rice? You’re clearly hoarding it, holding back on purpose!”
Shen Xiao listened without expression.
His deep, still eyes watched the confrontation in silence.
Guanzhong was in a drought.
But the drought had only begun last winter — it hadn’t been going on for years. To claim the Abundant Year Grain Shop had no new rice was something Shen Xiao simply didn’t believe.
Merchants holding back grain and selling at inflated prices — that was all this was.
Shen Xiao tilted his head and glanced at the sky. He read widely and studied all manner of things, including a little celestial observation — enough to see that this weather was likely to keep drying for some time yet. The merchants could see it too. The longer the drought dragged on, the higher the price of grain would rise — and so their plan was to sit and wait.
Once the old grain currently on the market was exhausted in a month or two — once ordinary people had truly run out of food to eat — that was when grain prices would peak. That would be the moment to release the new rice, selling it at five times the price, or even ten times. A beautiful profit.
Having worked this out, Shen Xiao let his gaze fall from the cloudless sky. He was about to turn back when something made him stop.
Across from the Abundant Year Grain Shop stood Xiankelai — Chang’an’s most expensive restaurant.
While countless commoners stood here worrying about a single bowl of rice, the carriages of princes and nobility continued flowing in and out of Xiankelai’s entrance without pause. At this moment, a carriage had just pulled up to the door. The restaurant’s boy rushed forward so eagerly he was practically prostrating himself.
In a Chang’an where high officials were everywhere and nobles were more common than dogs, what had the boy seen to make him so fawningly attentive?
The person inside that carriage was not of low standing.
The carriage curtain shifted, and the figure of a woman in magnificent robes emerged.
Princess Pingyang. Li Shu.
The most favored princess in the Emperor’s court — truly not of low standing.
Shen Xiao’s gaze turned instantly ice-cold.
Li Shu was genuinely pressing her stomach to her back with hunger at this point. She was desperate to tumble through Xiankelai’s doors and eat her fill. She had just lifted the curtain and was about to put her foot out of the carriage when she felt a chill, frigid gaze settle upon her.
Li Shu looked up.
What manner of absurd fate was this — to encounter this man twice in a single day, and each time his gaze was cold enough to have been tempered in ice.
Cold as if it wanted to kill.
Li Shu’s foot slipped, missing the step entirely. She tumbled straight out of the carriage.
Fortunately, Hong Luo was quick-eyed and quick-handed, catching her in time before she planted her face on the ground.
Across the wide boulevard of Zhuque Avenue, a grimacing Li Shu and an expressionless Shen Xiao faced each other.
Shen Xiao was blessed with a handsome face. The eight-tenths-worn robe that would have looked shabby on anyone else looked merely austere and lofty on him. He was tall and lean, broad in the shoulder and long in the leg, and stood out in the crowd the way a crane stands out among chickens.
Across the press of bustling, queuing people, Shen Xiao’s sharp, upswept brows were like a long, narrow blade cleaving straight at Li Shu’s eyelashes.
Li Shu’s heart gave a sudden jolt — those handsome features stole her attention for a brief, involuntary moment.
By the time she came back to herself, Shen Xiao had already retracted his gaze, picked up his rice sack, and walked away.
Clean and decisive. Not so much as a nod in her direction.
Li Shu was speechless.
She was a reigning princess, for heaven’s sake. Even a first- or second-rank official could not simply look right through her. Who would dare turn away without a word?
Shen Xiao was no more than half a step inside the official world. Who did he think he was — that he could ignore her?
But Shen Xiao’s legs were long, and in two or three strides he had disappeared entirely from view, leaving Li Shu fuming impotently.
Hmph. A monk could run but his temple couldn’t. So long as he was serving in the imperial court, there would come a day when they met again. Just you wait.
Li Shu pulled her gaze away, took Hong Luo’s arm, and went into Xiankelai, taking a private room on the third floor.
Sichuan, Shandong, Cantonese, Huaiyang — no matter the cuisine, Xiankelai had the finest chefs in Chang’an for all of them. Li Shu was a regular here, and the kitchen knew her preferences well. The moment she was seated, the shop boy said cheerfully: “My lady, shall I bring out the Sichuan dishes you always enjoy?”
Li Shu favored spice — Sichuan cuisine was her preference.
But she paused a moment, then said: “Not today. Bring out a Huaiyang spread.”
Shen Xiao — from Wuxing. And Wuxing was most famous for its Huaiyang-style cooking.
Steamed crucian carp. Winter melon soup. Crab roe soup dumplings. Jade shrimp with fragrant green tea. Clear-broth fish maw…
Li Shu had a small appetite, yet the table before her was covered with eight Huaiyang dishes. Huaiyang cuisine was clear without being bland, rich without being heavy — exquisitely savory and delicate.
And yet Li Shu only sipped absently at her soup, her mind drifting back to the matter of Shen Xiao.
*
Three years ago, she had followed Cui Jinzhi on his travels to Wuxing in the south of the Yangtze.
In those days, Li Shu’s love for Cui Jinzhi had gone all the way to the bone. Wherever he went, Li Shu followed.
They had stopped their boat in Wuxing to sightsee for a few days when, one morning, Cui Jinzhi returned from a pleasure house with a woman from the entertainment quarters in tow — a woman named Qing Luo. He told Li Shu he wanted to keep her by his side.
He said it as they were eating breakfast. Wuxing’s small soup dumplings were delicious — the sort you ate in one bite; when you pierced the paper-thin wrapper, the slightly scalding broth would rush into your mouth.
Very hot, but also exquisitely savory — impossible to stop eating.
Cui Jinzhi hadn’t even looked up from his dumplings. He told Li Shu he wanted to take Qing Luo as a concubine in the same tone one might use to discuss the weather.
His manner was utterly natural — natural to the point where it seemed like the duty of a prince consort was simply to take concubines.
Li Shu was stunned. It took her a long moment to understand what had been said.
Over the matter of Qing Luo, she and Cui Jinzhi had quarreled until the heavens split and the earth shook. Neither would yield an inch. They were like two roosters with blood in their eyes, each wanting to peck every feather from the other’s body on that killing field, wanting to see what ugly, barren soul was hiding beneath all that colorful plumage.
Li Shu had been sick with rage at the time — half out of her mind with the desire to take a knife to the wretched Qing Luo. But Cui Jinzhi protected Qing Luo like a fortress, and Li Shu could not touch her.
After that, Li Shu’s heart went entirely cold.
If Cui Jinzhi wanted to keep a concubine, then she, Li Shu, would keep a companion of her own.
She had the local magistrate of Wuxing find her the most handsome unmarried men of good character in the city.
The magistrate dug up every eligible man he could find — and produced twenty young men with presentable looks who were willing to serve the princess.
Among all those men who were so willing and subservient, Li Shu chose Shen Xiao at a single glance — tall and thin, dressed in a half-new, half-worn cotton robe. He was there to be a companion, yet his spine was straight as a lance, as though he had come to die for a noble cause.
It was on the night of his appointed attendance that Li Shu learned why Shen Xiao alone had stood so straight.
He had not come to be a companion at all. He had only wanted to see the princess — to petition her to recommend him for an official post.
Three years ago, Great Ye had no imperial examination. The only path to officialdom was to be recommended by someone of influence. But the influential families only recommended sons of noble clans — they would never share their advantages with a commoner. Shen Xiao had great ability, great ambition, great hunger for position — and no family name at all. If he wanted to climb, he had no choice but to rely on the recognition of the powerful. And so his eye had fallen on Princess Pingyang.
He had no wish to be a companion. For a man, such a role was a humiliation beyond measure. But short of mixing himself in among the candidates for companion, he had no other way to get before the princess.
That evening, Li Shu had poured herself drink after drink of wine, telling herself: Cui Jinzhi had found a new love, and so had she — tonight was the night she would put Cui Jinzhi entirely behind her.
But that dark-browed, dark-eyed young man knelt before her with a spine still straight as ever, both hands cradling a bundle of papers, and said: “Shen Xiao has no wish to be the princess’s companion. I only ask that the princess look over Shen Xiao’s writings. If they meet with your approval, I beg you to… recommend Shen Xiao for an official post.”
Li Shu was rather heavily drunk. She reached out and took the bundle of papers — then flung them aside. Pages scattered and drifted all across the floor.
The companion stared at her in shock. Li Shu noticed that he had a pair of extraordinarily dark, deep eyes.
Just like Cui Jinzhi.
She looked at him through her wine haze and said with a smile: “You want an official post? All right — get into this bed and serve me well.”
“If you serve me well tonight, I’ll find you a post tomorrow.”
Shen Xiao’s face went through a rapid succession of red and white — serve? He was a full-grown man, a man of talent and ability. How could he debase himself to trade on his appearance like some hollow flatterer?
Seeing that Shen Xiao wasn’t moving, Li Shu immediately lost interest. “Since you’re unwilling, go on then. I don’t force anyone.” She called out: “Hong Luo — send someone else in to attend me.”
The princess lay against the bed, slightly drunk, the red canopy all around her, beautiful as a rare jewel.
Shen Xiao raised his eyes and looked at her. He clenched his teeth and stood. “I… am willing to serve the princess.”
What of it — servant beneath skirts, flatterer trading on his face? This was his one and only chance to be recommended for a post. His one and only chance to stop rotting at the bottom. No matter the price, he would seize this chance.
One night of pleasure.
But the next morning, when Li Shu sobered from her wine, she had cast aside her promise of a post as if it had never been spoken — because Li Shu, who had clawed her way from a lowly concubine’s daughter to the most favored princess in the empire, had done so through two things above all else: intelligence, and caution.
She could not do something like selling official posts in exchange for personal favors. That was placing her own neck into someone else’s noose.
Last night had been nothing but drunken rambling.
So Li Shu had looked at Shen Xiao with languid indifference and said: “Although last night I did promise you — that if you served me well, I would recommend you for an official post. And you did serve me… admirably enough. However…”
Her red lips parted and closed, her voice languid and indifferent, as if addressing a pet toy she had grown bored of. “However, today I simply changed my mind. I have no intention of recommending you for an official post.”
A slight lift of her fingers, signaling to the maidservant to bring forth gold and silver. “Consider this a reward — in recognition of last night’s performance.”
Shen Xiao stood there, stunned.
Those dark eyes — eyes black with longing for power and position, eyes ready to sacrifice everything to claw his way up — went cold, swiftly and completely.
For someone of Shen Xiao’s background, it was not the absence of any hope that was most devastating. What destroyed a man of his kind was when someone opened the road upward before him — when he had stripped away every shred of dignity and self-respect and thrown himself into climbing — only to have that person turn to him with total indifference and say: I was only toying with you. Then kick him back down into the abyss from which he had come.
Coming back to herself from that memory, Li Shu truly wanted to slap herself for the person she had been three years ago. How could she have been such a wretch?
Now Shen Xiao had risen to become the top imperial scholar and stepped across the threshold of officialdom. From this point on, they would likely be at each other’s throats… The gentle winds of the third month of spring were blowing, and yet Li Shu was seized by a sudden chill, as though she could already see the wretchedness that lay ahead of her.