“Eat! Eat, eat up! No, no, there’s plenty more.”

Inside General Yuwen’s residence—

The lady of the house, Madam Dawu, forced a smile as she pushed the braised pork knuckle in front of her toward Hu Yougui, urging him to eat more.

Ever since this person had been snatched back home, the whole family had been badly shaken. And upon hearing that this flower-delicate young master had been frightened into coming back this way, the entire Yuwen household felt terrible about it.

They knew perfectly well what kind of temperament their own daughter had, and even before coming to Yandu they’d repeatedly warned her, over and over, about the stakes involved.

But who could have foreseen that this ancient iron tree that had never once bloomed would, the very moment it finally did bloom, spiral completely out of control and abduct a man right at the foot of the imperial capital?

Thinking of tomorrow’s court session, likely facing a whole crowd of unbending, iron-willed censors, General Yuwen Chongde felt utterly hopeless, unable to say another word.

What to do? Since there was guilt in their hearts, best to treat the man to a good meal first.

Heaven and earth are vast, but eating comes first — once a person’s stomach is full, only then can other matters be discussed. And so, the mistress of the household ordered the kitchen staff, and had a full table of substantial food set before Hu Yougui.

Hu Yougui looked at the apologetic Yuwen couple before him, then glanced at the six bearded men standing against the wall glaring fiercely, and then at the room full of women, every face apologetic. He wasn’t about to stand on ceremony — generally speaking, if food was given, he’d eat it. And so, with impeccable poise, he lowered his head and dug in with gusto.

The way he ate startled the entire Yuwen family, and they all thought — good heavens, did they abduct a bottomless pit instead of a man?

It was strange, too — such a small frame, so delicate and fair-skinned, where was all that food even going?

The six bearded men against the wall found it strange too, and edged over behind Hu Yougui to study him closely, thinking to themselves, this young fellow eats prettily enough, but two or three bites per large steamed bun, and in the blink of an eye, seven or eight had already gone down?

How many days had he gone hungry?

After watching a while longer, the family’s eldest daughter-in-law, Madam Lianghar, exchanged a glance with her mother-in-law, and the two women rose together, forcing dry, awkward smiles as they left the hall.

The Yuwen family had guarded the border town of Boyi Pass for generations, and for the peace of the frontier, the Yuwen family had for generations intermarried with the local native peoples. The moment you heard the surnames Dawu and Lianghar, you knew they came from great local native clans.

The two women, mother and daughter-in-law, walked together into the courtyard, and after searching three circuits finally found her in a corner — Yuwen Xiaoqiao, crouched under her personal guard’s umbrella, poking at the dirt.

For this creature, falling for someone was a matter of an instant, and she hadn’t hesitated at all in abducting him — yet now that she’d actually gotten him back, she’d turned utterly timid, not even daring to go near him, only sneaking glances by craning her neck at the window, still not daring to face Hu Yougui directly to this very moment.

Madam Dawu, born and raised in the border town, wasn’t exactly graceful in her own manners either. Seeing her daughter looking so pathetically hopeless, she hiked up her fine skirts and squatted right down on the ground beside her daughter, saying: “Listen here, daughter, don’t get your hopes up. This isn’t a matter you can just lock down with one key — Mother’s telling you, however you look at it, this just isn’t going to work out!”

Yuwen Xiaoqiao was fully committed in her heart — in twenty-six years, this was the first time she’d truly fallen for someone, and who would have thought her own mother would refuse to support her.

Hearing this, she immediately grew agitated, springing up in anger: “Mother! That’s not what you used to say! Back then you said if I just captured myself a donkey, you’d throw in ten storerooms of dowry and send me off with a big drum…”

Before she could even finish, her mother sprang up and smacked her down to the ground with one slap, muttering: “I said I wouldn’t marry, and you insisted I should. Now I want to marry you off, and suddenly you don’t want to?”

Madam Dawu said bluntly: “Just give up on this, don’t waste your hopes! We’ll give him a good meal, apologize properly, and send him back home nicely — this is a young gentleman of Yandu, not some dimwit from your uncle’s mountain stockade who can’t even walk away from a woman he sees, letting you snatch him up as you please…”

Yuwen Xiaoqiao sprang up again: “Why not, why can’t it work? What’s wrong with him? Any man in the border town would do — every single one of them, put together, all the men in Boyi Pass — go find me one better-looking than him!”

Seeing her sister-in-law spring up again, Madam Lianghar reached out and pressed down on her shoulder, and the two women, sister and sister-in-law, squatted back down together. All three women resumed poking at the dirt together.

Madam Lianghar sighed: “Little sister, your sister-in-law here has at least been through this before — in this regard, you really don’t understand as well as I do! Look at that fellow’s skin, so delicate it’ll bruise at the slightest touch — when you’re looking for a man, you need someone practical, don’t you? Can a person stay young and handsome forever?

Let’s not even compare with anyone else — take your own brother, when he was young he was the number one handsome man in all of Boyi Pass, but look at him now, more than ten years later — still handsome? He can’t even finish a bowl of chicken soup properly, half of it ends up in his beard. Still good-looking? Whenever I look at him I just… I just… you know?”

Seeing her mother-in-law suddenly glare up at her, Madam Lianghar didn’t dare say anything more disparaging about her own husband.

Whether Yuwen Xiaoqiao had lost her mind or not, she herself couldn’t say — but ever since seeing him today, the whole sky seemed full of clouds to her, her heart practically ready to burst.

She simply wasn’t going to listen to her parents’ advice, and muttered resentfully: “My brother? Hah! My brother is hideously ugly, how could he even compare to him? If I’d married someone like my brother, I’d get a pain in my liver every morning the moment I opened my eyes and saw that face! And look at my brother’s belly, hmph, it’s bigger than you were when you were eight months pregnant — and you call that a handsome man?”

Hearing her sister-in-law badmouth her own husband, Madam Lianghar naturally wasn’t pleased — this whole family had blunt, straightforward temperaments, so Madam Lianghar retorted sharply: “I’ve never seen a handsome man, maybe, but back when I captured your brother, during those two years he worked at my family’s place, my five brothers together couldn’t get as much real work done in a day as he could alone — put together, their arms didn’t have as much strength as his did! Back then, plenty of women wanted to fight me for him — if I hadn’t been fierce enough, your brother would have been swindled away by one of my younger sisters long ago!”

Having said this, she stood up somewhat indignantly, pointing toward the house and shouting in a low voice: “And this one — the moment he came in, he couldn’t even manage a proper word, ate so much of our family’s food, and didn’t even crack a smile for us! Just look at him — willowy waist, thin little neck, couldn’t even lift an axe. Clearly raised pampered and spoiled at home — you expect him to do work for this family? Not doing work would be one thing — we’ve got plenty of hands to help around here — but hey! He sure can eat, hasn’t he? Since he walked through that door he’s already eaten more than twenty of our big steamed buns! Plus half a pot of soup, and out of the eight dishes that came with the buns, he just picked out all the meat! You tell me, aside from a pretty face, what does he have that’s better than your brother?”

Madam Dawu added resentfully: “And there’s also a whole braised pork knuckle — that was supposed to be saved for your father’s evening drink.”

According to the customs of Boyi Pass, if a grown woman took a fancy to a man, she would gather her clan and abduct him. If the man consented, he would stay at the woman’s family home and do hard labor for two years, only then could he take the woman away with him.

Although the native noble clans of Dawu and Lianghar had received imperial recognition for generations, and studied the classics from within the pass, even having clan members who sat for the imperial examinations, every generation of the Yuwen family’s young generals, when it came to marriage, still followed the custom and had to work for the bride’s family.

As for whether the work was done well or not, that all depended on whether the bride’s family was satisfied with it.

With mother and sister-in-law both opposed, Yuwen Xiaoqiao remained determined all the same — once she’d fallen for someone, she found even a pile of dung fragrant. And so she stood up, adopting the hardened tone of the military: “No way. This isn’t Boyi Pass anymore — we’ve relocated to Yandu, so we’ll follow the local customs here. This is the Yuwen General’s residence, not some native stockade back in Boyi Pass. Anyway, he doesn’t have to do labor for our family — I couldn’t bear to make him!”

Having said this, she walked a few steps to beneath the window, and stealthily climbed up onto the windowsill, and with her heart full of adoration, pressed herself against it to peek in again, and after watching a while, she sighed admiringly: “Look at you all, look how good-looking he is even while eating!”

Hu Yougui had finally eaten his fill and comfortably so, no longer quite so angry. He picked up a cup of strong tea, took a sip to cut through the greasiness, and stood up to stretch his stomach.

Seeing that the Yuwen family didn’t seem to want to give him a hard time, he cautiously tried heading outside, and the moment he stepped out he saw the whole courtyard full of Yuwen Xiaoqiao’s female guards, busy carrying boxes and arranging them.

Hmm, so this must be that “ten storerooms of dowry” they’d been chattering about on the road?

Was this meant to tempt and entice him?

Hmph! Useless! His heart was set like stone, he would never yield. He still had no shoes on, and the mud on both his feet had already dried.

Yuwen Xiaoqiao watched him for a while from the side, seeing him stand there beneath the eaves, his sleeves fluttering in the wind, looking every bit like a banished immortal, her heart raced with longing, and she pressed even harder scratching at the lacquer on the pillar beneath the eaves.

While scratching at the pillar, she mustered her courage, and asked shyly and awkwardly: “Little young master, are — are you full? If it’s not enough, I’ll have them make more for you…”

Once a person had eaten their fill, their mood always improved somewhat, and much of the anger inside Hu Yougui had dissipated — yet he still had no interest in dealing with Yuwen Xiaoqiao, and simply stood quietly watching the path leading to the main hall, waiting for his own elder brother to bring troops to rescue him.

Yuwen Chongde, watching his daughter tread so carefully while the man wouldn’t even bother acknowledging her, felt a pang of sympathy.

He’d had six sons before finally getting this one daughter, and later when she’d wanted to go to the battlefield, he hadn’t objected either. All because his family had never been like ordinary families — ever since the Yuwen army had been established, its purpose had been to watch over the steppes, stabilize the border, and defend against foreign enemies.

In short, different circumstances called for a different way of doing things.

Take his wife’s family, for example — her father ran one stockade, her mother ran another, and her mother’s stockade was quite large besides, governing several tens of thousands of people and several tens of thousands of mu of mountain forest land.

His mother-in-law doted on her daughter, and had said that in the future Xiaoqiao could inherit the stockade, and the clan elders there had agreed to it as well. So that she’d be capable of managing it later, Yuwen Chongde had raised his daughter as though she were a son.

He never in his wildest dreams imagined that Emperor Wu would transfer the Yuwen family from Boyi Pass to Yandu. It wasn’t just his daughter — during this whole period, his entire family had found nothing to like about Yandu. The people here, even their speech, seemed to twist and turn with hidden meanings.

But he was, after all, the third-rank Great General Pacifying the Distant Lands, and when the sovereign reassigned troops and commanders, he had no choice but to return. But who could have predicted that his daughter would fall so deep the moment she arrived in the capital?

Feeling utterly weary at heart, Yuwen Chongde walked to the hall’s entrance, and after glancing at his lovesick daughter, sighed deeply and said: “Young man, have you eaten your fill? If not, my household has plenty of meat!”

Toward a loyal and dedicated family that had faithfully guarded the border under whatever dynasty or reign, protecting the common people no matter what, Hu Yougui couldn’t afford to be discourteous.

Hearing the general address him, Hu Yougui turned and bowed in courtesy: “Many thanks, Great General. I’ve eaten my fill.”

Oh? He’d finally spoken. Not so pretentious after all, it seemed.

Looking again at the courtyard full of trunks and boxes, General Yuwen said with some worry: “Young man, I’m sorry about all this — which household are you from?”

Once he knew where the young man came from, it would be easier to send him home properly.

The moment Yuwen Xiaoqiao heard this, she grew anxious, springing up and rushing to her father’s side, pushing him back toward the house: “Father, go inside! Just leave this matter be, all right?”

Yuwen Chongde glared at his daughter, thinking to himself, well, sooner or later they’d have to pay the price for this anyway — better to suffer a mild loss now with this soft-spoken young man than risk grabbing an imperial prince next time and having the whole family executed.

He shook his head helplessly, and could only turn to Hu Yougui and say: “Young man, don’t be alarmed — if you wish to leave, she can’t keep you here…”

Furious, Yuwen Xiaoqiao shoved her own father into the hall and shut the door behind her with a turn of her hand. Turning back around, she found that beautiful young man staring coldly at her, and her heart leapt like a startled deer, her legs going weak beneath her.

She braced herself against the wall and forced an awkward smile: “You — don’t listen to my father!”

Hu Yougui had seen Yuwen Xiaoqiao only a handful of times, yet — the woman before him now, ugh, how to even describe her? He had no idea whose advice she’d taken, but she’d completely transformed herself into some kind of fierce shrew.

The moment she’d turned around, she’d changed into a bright red skirt and piled her hair with a full head of ornaments — perhaps hoping to show off her beauty, only her skin simply couldn’t take the white powder, and her face had broken out in blotchy patches, giving her a paste-smeared appearance.

Hu Yougui, already wary of this creature and holding no favorable impression of her, took a step back.

Seeing him retreat, Yuwen Xiaoqiao walked over trying to ingratiate herself: “You, you, don’t be afraid of me, I, I won’t do anything! You, you can really eat a lot, huh?”

Standing at the edge of the courtyard, Madam Dawu and Madam Lianghar, overhearing this, felt completely relieved, their faces showing mocking satisfaction as they thought — it’s settled!

There’s absolutely no way she’ll get married off now!

Walking up to Hu Yougui, Yuwen Xiaoqiao was actually somewhat taller than him. She’d also had someone style her hair in the fashionable style of Yandu, her hairbun piled up as high as the flying celestial figures painted on the walls of Huguo Temple — except those flying celestials weren’t nearly this unattractive.

Hu Yougui hated more than anything having someone taller than him, so he tried to dodge away, and the two of them ended up — one constantly retreating, the other pressing steadily closer — moving down from the hall’s steps and circling around the boxes in the rain.

Rain had soaked Yuwen Xiaoqiao’s face, and streak by streak, it only made her look worse.

After circling twice, she asked loudly: “Am — am I not good enough?”

What a question to ask — of course she wasn’t good enough. Hu Yougui stopped and nodded: “Mm.”

Like hell she wasn’t!

Yuwen Xiaoqiao, quite popular at the border and much admired by the rugged men there, felt a flash of hurt cross her face at this — yet as a female general, her heart had always been broad, and even a blow like this she could recover from instantly. She forced a smile and pressed on: “What’s not good about me?” Circling the boxes once more: “You think I’m too dark, don’t you?”

Of course Hu Yougui found that off-putting — never mind that he had no wish to marry at all, but even if he did want to look, he certainly wouldn’t choose someone like this.

He was rather sharp-tongued by nature, and naturally spoke coldly to anyone he disliked: “You’re more than just dark!”

Damn it, and you’re taller than me too!

Yuwen Xiaoqiao, however, didn’t take this as harsh at all, and simply laughed and admitted it: “It’s true, I am quite dark! But now that I’m not out on campaign anymore, sooner or later I’ll turn fair! My mother said when I was born I was pale as snow.”

“Pale as snow” was border-town speech, roughly equivalent to fair and tender-skinned.

Hu Yougui, thoroughly exasperated with her, tilted his face up to catch the rain full in his face to calm himself, then turned and said even more sharply: “Is the young general always this reckless and unrestrained at the border, too?”

This beautiful young man’s voice was so pleasant to listen to. What had he said again? She hadn’t quite caught it.

Yuwen Xiaoqiao pressed a hand to her chest, looking left and right in confusion, until her eyes fell on Hu Yougui’s mud-covered foot, and her heart ached: “Doesn’t your foot hurt? That— I’ll find you shoes to wear, right, you see how forgetful I am, shoes… shoes…”

She looked around, and began rummaging through boxes. Hu Yougui watched as silks and fine fabrics went flying everywhere, along with gold and silver vessels — this family was clearly well used to her antics, since as she flung things out, guards scrambled all over the ground catching them.

Madam Dawu, seeing her daughter wasting things, hurried over to stop her: “Daughter, don’t waste things like this! There’s no shoes here, I packed your dowry boxes myself — how could there possibly be shoes in there?”

Right, she really didn’t have any shoes.

Yuwen Xiaoqiao straightened up awkwardly, and said to Hu Yougui with some embarrassment: “That— it’s raining hard out here, why don’t you sit inside? I’ll have them find you a pair of shoes right away, all right?”

Feeling quite uncomfortable, she reached out, grabbed a brand-new silk skirt, and scrubbed roughly at her own cheeks with it. After a few strokes, Hu Yougui finally got a clear look at this female general.

Truth be told, she wasn’t actually unattractive — she had features different from the women of Yandu, that open, clear-browed look, with sword-straight eyebrows and starry eyes.

Seeing this beautiful young man staring at her, Yuwen Xiaoqiao dropped the silk skirt, gave an embarrassed chuckle, and looked up: “I, I know I’m not like them. But, I, actually I’m better than any woman in Yandu — I have my own salary, I won’t spend your money, I, I can support you too, that works too! If you agree, I’ll, I’ll do all the labor for these two years myself! Really, as long as you agree, from now on, I won’t let you suffer one bit of hardship — chopping wood, farming the fields, all of that, I can do it all!”

The feeling of silk sticking to his skin was unpleasant, and Hu Yougui tugged at his collar and said: “A marriage between two families requires that they be of matching social standing…”

Before he could even finish, she immediately assured him: “I won’t look down on you! Really!” Yuwen Xiaoqiao smiled with utter sincerity: “Even if you had nothing at all, I still wouldn’t mind.”

This one had truly gotten it into her head, and wouldn’t listen to reason at all. Hu Yougui muttered irritably in the rain: “It’s me who looks down on you. Marriage requires mutual consent at the very least, and someone like you, you haven’t got a shred of virtue, grace, manners, or accomplishment…”

His words weren’t kind, and the six bearded men eavesdropping at the window couldn’t stand to hear it any longer — hearing this fellow speak so cuttingly, they all wanted to climb out and grab the boy and give him a beating.

But their father, keeping a level head, held them all back.

Yuwen Chongde glanced outside and said to his sons: “Hey, what are you going out there for? Isn’t it embarrassing enough already? You lot think your own ugly mutts smell sweet — just look at that young man’s clothes, that bearing, that face — and compare that to your sister? Ask around all of Yandu — how many girls past twenty are still unmarried in this whole city?

That man’s not wrong, you know — running a household means worrying about the family’s livelihood too. Your mother, back in her day, wasn’t so different from your sister, but at least she could weave a straw raincoat or something. What can your sister do? She’s only good with a whip.”

One of the bearded brothers muttered: “This young man from Yandu isn’t much of a decent sort either — why’s he got to speak so cuttingly?”

The second brother chimed in: “Exactly, sister was carefree enough as it was — she’d be better off back at the border stockade.”

After saying this, they sighed together, and Yuwen Chongde said wistfully: “Back to the border town? Who wouldn’t want that.”

Outside, in the rain, one cold and indifferent, the other burning with feeling, neither spoke, standing there a long while, soaked through and chilled to the bone.

Yuwen Xiaoqiao finally said with a bitter laugh: “What you’re talking about, I know it. It’s the sort of thing Yandu women learn from childhood.”

Hu Yougui turned his face away.

Yet she continued earnestly persuading him: “But I’m afraid I can’t learn it, and I don’t want to either — that’s not the kind of thing I should be learning. You saw me try dressing up like them, and you still didn’t like it, did you? So then — how about we change the terms instead? Really, every household’s different — as long as you agree to marry me, in two years I’ll give you the best life in all of Daliang, I swear it! I won’t let you suffer even the smallest hardship.”

Hu Yougui had no interest in dealing with her, and lowered his head to tug at his own sleeve, thinking, and you still say you won’t let me suffer? The very first time we met you whipped me with that — a toad hoping to feast on swan meat…

Just as the two stood there at a standstill, someone came running into the courtyard from outside carrying a calling card.

The tense Hu Yougui finally let out a breath of relief.

Before long, Yuwen Chongde came hurrying out with a group of his bearded sons, and Chen Dasheng arrived with his own sworn brothers, all dressed in the uniforms of personal guards, cutting quite an impressive figure as they entered.

These rascals, hearts full of mischief, all burst out laughing the moment they saw Hu Yougui.

Chen Dasheng was even carrying a pair of tall wooden clogs. Seeing his own sworn brother standing there in the rain sure enough, he tossed the shoes over with a grin: “Sorry, brother, I’m late.”

“No matter, the food here’s not bad at all.”

Hu Yougui took the clogs, sat down on a trunk, and put them on before standing up, since he was finally taller than this fierce shrew, the corner of his mouth curled up.

This was the best smile Hu Yougui had worn since he’d first walked through that door, and Yuwen Xiaoqiao found herself staring, entranced, all over again.

She swallowed hard, pressed a hand to her chest, and drew a long breath.

Guan Si’er, finding the whole thing highly entertaining, came over holding an umbrella, laughing as he begged forgiveness: “Brother, sorry about this, what a mess you’ve had to deal with!”

Hu Yougui elbowed him hard and cursed: “You did this on purpose, didn’t you?”

“Now that’s wronging me terribly — I had two whole piles of people knocked out over on my end…”

Yuwen Xiaoqiao wasn’t a fool, and in an instant she understood everything. Hu Yougui had assumed she’d be furious, yet this fellow’s mind worked quite differently from others.

Once she realized who Hu Yougui really was, she smiled sweetly and said: “You! So you’re actually an official of the imperial court, too.”

Hu Yougui gave a proud, cold laugh, cupped his hands and bowed to her: “Is that all? This lowly official is Hu Yougui of the Long Blade Guard. General Yuwen, this isn’t actually the first time we’ve met — that day in the military camp, a whipping — however many years have passed, this lowly official still hasn’t forgotten it.”

This hit her like a bolt from the blue. Yuwen Xiaoqiao had simply gone soft the moment she saw someone precious — out on the field, she was a master of troop deployment and long-range surprise raids.

Now recalling who he was, she stood stunned for a good while before stammering: “It’s — it’s really you?”

Hu Yougui, secretly delighted inside, tilted his head and laughed softly: “Who else would it be but this thief you caught?”

Yuwen Xiaoqiao’s eyes lit up brightly, and she exclaimed loudly to Hu Yougui: “Why didn’t you say so sooner! So that’s it — that day, you really did come to steal me?”

The moment she said this, Hu Yougui’s feet tangled beneath him and he stumbled, and it was only thanks to Guan Si’er, holding the umbrella beside him, catching him in time. Guan Si’er immediately started snickering.

As luck would have it, Chen Dasheng had just finished his negotiations with Yuwen Chongde inside, saying only that today’s matter involved confidential scout business, and hoped General Yuwen wouldn’t let word leak out.

Yuwen Chongde naturally agreed, and saw this group off as though sending off a plague god.

Once the group had ridden off and disappeared from sight, Yuwen Chongde turned to his daughter standing at the gate and said: “Daughter, just give up on this. That family and ours simply aren’t the same kind of people — never mind matching social standing, here in Yandu we can’t even reach that high. Even as a mere marquis, he still outranks your own father.”

This time, Yuwen Xiaoqiao said nothing at all, and went back inside the house as though she’d finally learned her lesson.

Another night passed, the wind died down and the rain stopped, and everyone assumed the whole matter had been resolved.

But the next day was the grand court assembly, and before dawn the Long Blade Guards were already walking to the yamen gates in full armor.

Hu Yougui, having slept poorly the night before, was yawning and half-asleep as he took hold of his own white horse’s reins, just about to swing himself up onto it, when suddenly he felt himself go light as a swallow?

Before he could even register what was happening, he found himself already seated on the horse?

Dazed, he lowered his head, only to see a face bright as a blooming flower — Yuwen Xiaoqiao, hands raised, baring a full mouth of white teeth, smiling sweetly at him: “Gui! You want to ride the horse? I’ll help you!”