Shen Zhuxi pulled away from Li Wu’s side with the speed of a thunderbolt.

Her movement was so abrupt that she slipped on the roof tiles, nearly tumbling down along with the shard that fell to the ground below. It was Li Wu who yanked her back just in time.

Li Wu’s expression darkened. “I’ll go down first,” he said.

Shaken by what had just happened, Shen Zhuxi couldn’t bring herself to meet his eyes. Her gaze drifted off as she gave a scattered nod.

The knocking at the courtyard gate continued. Li Que, apparently assuming they were asleep, was hammering louder than usual, as if afraid they wouldn’t know who had come. Between knocks, he called out: “Big Brother, Sister-in-law, it’s——”

“I know who the hell you are! Get over here so I can give you a thrashing!” Li Wu bellowed furiously.

The voice outside went silent.

Li Kun and Li Que, weighed down with bundles large and small, exchanged a glance. Li Que’s expression turned grave. “We’re in trouble… we’ve definitely ruined Big Brother’s moment.”

“His moment? Was Big Brother eating offal?” Li Kun sniffed.

“Not necessarily offal — he might have been eating tofu,” Li Que said, handing his things to Li Kun. “Here’s what we do — you wait here while I go stay at an inn for the night, and tomorrow I’ll——”

Before he could finish, the courtyard gate was flung open from the inside.

Li Kun and Li Que were each grabbed by an ear and hauled simultaneously through the gate.

“I thought you’d both ended up rotting in some ditch!” Li Wu cursed. “You can’t come when you’re supposed to, but when you shouldn’t come, you show up faster than anyone — what’s the meaning of this? Are you deliberately trying to make my life difficult?”

“Big Brother! Big Brother!” Li Diao whimpered, “Why are you hitting me?”

Li Que bared his teeth in pain as well, but being the quick-witted one, he didn’t plead with Li Wu — instead, he stretched his hand toward Shen Zhuxi in a bid for rescue. “Sister-in-law, save me!”

Shen Zhuxi couldn’t bear to watch. “Let them go,” she said, “and let them speak properly!”

Li Wu released the two reddened ears and snapped, “Talk! If you can’t give me a proper explanation, I’ll break both pairs of those snail-slow legs of yours tonight!”

“Big Brother — we were late for a reason,” Li Que said, rubbing his ear. “Neither Second Brother nor I have had a full meal in a long time. How about Big Brother gives us a bowl of porridge so we can eat and explain at the same time?”

“Yes, let them eat something first,” Shen Zhuxi added. “I can see they’ve both lost weight.”

Li Que had never been stout, but now he was positively gaunt, the pockmarks on his face standing out all the more against the pronounced bones of his face. As for Li Kun, the shoulders that had once been two men wide were now half as broad, and the endearing double chin beneath his jaw was entirely gone — when he wasn’t speaking, there was a new maturity to his whole bearing.

Li Wu let out a heavy grunt and strode off toward the kitchen. The moment Li Kun saw him head that way, he knew exactly what was coming — he dropped his bundles where he stood and scrambled after him.

Li Que gave Shen Zhuxi a conspiratorial wink and flashed her a familiar grin.

Shen Zhuxi bit her lip to hold back tears and smiled back.

With both brothers finally back, there was no chance Li Wu was going to fob them off with a single bowl of porridge.

In the brightly candlelit main hall, the small square table was laid out with an almost overwhelming spread of food. Pride of place at the very center went to Li Kun’s most beloved dish — pork offal.

Li Kun needed no encouragement, but even Li Que ate bowl after bowl, wolfing everything down in a manner that made plain how long it had been since either of them had eaten their fill.

Shen Zhuxi watched with a pang in her heart. She picked up her chopsticks and made a token gesture of eating, but couldn’t get a single bite down.

When only scraps remained on the table and Li Kun had begun pouring the last of the various soups together to mop up with a steamed bun, Li Que set down his chopsticks.

Both Shen Zhuxi and Li Wu watched him without blinking.

“After we separated from Big Brother and Sister-in-law,” Li Que began, “we took a different route toward Shouzhou.”

Li Wu interrupted him. “Why did you leave without a word?”

“I left a note by the campfire — didn’t Big Brother see it?” Li Que asked, taken aback.

“That note was addressed to the campfire. I’m asking why you left without telling me.” Li Wu said.

Li Que was quiet for a moment. “I knew the food was running out,” he said. “Rather than dying together, splitting up gave us a better chance — perhaps one of us might find a way through.”

“Who said being together means dying together?” Li Wu’s brow furrowed. “Have you never heard the story of the old man and his ten sons breaking sugarcane?”

Both Shen Zhuxi and Li Que looked completely blank.

“Ignorant!” Li Wu said. “There was once an old landowner who, on his deathbed, called his ten sons before him and said — here are ten stalks of sugarcane——”

“It’s ten chopsticks,” Shen Zhuxi couldn’t help interjecting.

“Chopsticks, sugarcane, doesn’t matter — the point is the same,” Li Wu said. “One stalk of sugarcane you can snap — but who can snap ten stalks at once?”

Li Kun gulped down a mouthful of broth with a loud slurp and declared, “Me! I can snap them!”

Li Wu rapped him with a chopstick.

“Eat your food!”

Li Kun lowered his head and sipped quietly at the broth left in his bowl, his dark eyes round and aggrieved as they darted up at Li Wu.

“Your heart was in the right place — you thought you were lightening my burden. But what if some self-proclaimed True Dragon Emperor, or Primal Dragon Emperor, or Jade Emperor had come along and snapped me in two while I was alone? Your sister-in-law’s arms and legs are slender — do you think she could have held her own?” Li Wu said.

“I was not thinking carefully enough.” Li Que bowed his head and admitted his fault readily, without wasting breath debating whether a True Dragon Emperor, Primal Dragon Emperor, or Jade Emperor would ever appear in the middle of nowhere.

“Do it again, and I’ll break your dog legs,” Li Wu said.

“What fine verse!” Li Que said reflexively.

“That was not a poem!” Li Wu swung a kick at him, and Li Que yelped.

Watching the two of them go back and forth, Shen Zhuxi couldn’t help laughing.

“Look at that — the moment you two show up, your sister-in-law can’t stop grinning,” Li Wu said with a pointed air. “Shen Zhuxi, how come you never smile like that when you see me? Are they more important, or am I?”

“You are, you are,” Shen Zhuxi said. Like Li Que, she had developed a conditioned response — the moment she heard that particular tone, the answer rose to her lips naturally.

Li Wu accepted this satisfactory reply and turned back to Li Que. “Go on. You said you went to Shouzhou — so why did it take so long?”

“The road from Luzhou to Shouzhou had its share of difficulties, but we managed to work through them. What we didn’t expect was that the real trouble would come after we left Luzhou.” Li Que said. “For safety, we traveled with a group of refugees. We didn’t expect to run into Daliang soldiers — they pressed us into conscription.”

Daliang!

Shen Zhuxi’s expression changed.

Daliang was the regime founded by the usurper who had stolen the throne.

“How did Daliang soldiers end up in Shouzhou?” Shen Zhuxi blurted out. “Only the capital region has fallen — the other prefectures haven’t been taken!”

“Sister-in-law,” Li Que glanced at her, a trace of sympathy in his eyes, “there are very few local officials left who still consider themselves servants of Yan. Everyone fears being purged by whichever side prevails, so they’ve all adopted a policy of turning a blind eye. As long as Daliang troops don’t pillage the towns they pass through, the local authorities pretend not to notice.”

“How is that any different from outright betrayal!” Shen Zhuxi trembled with fury.

“There is a small difference,” Li Que said. “His Majesty the Primal Dragon Emperor is currently in Xuzhou. Every checkpoint along the way goes out of its way to assist individuals and groups making their way to join the imperial forces. The officials don’t want to offend the True Dragon Emperor, but they equally can’t afford to antagonize the Primal Dragon Emperor.”

“His Majesty is in Xuzhou?” Shen Zhuxi shot to her feet, her voice rising in shock.

“Yes,” Li Que said. “Second Brother and I barely managed to escape, and came straight to Huzhou. The new capital of Great Yan hasn’t been determined yet, so His Majesty may not stay in Xuzhou for long. I know Sister-in-law’s position is not ordinary — what do you intend to do?”

Shen Zhuxi looked toward Li Wu, a pleading look in her eyes before she could stop it.

“The famine has already passed, and I was planning to go back to Yutou County to check on things regardless. Going by way of Xuzhou first won’t be too far out of our way,” Li Wu said.

Shen Zhuxi could have thrown her arms around him and kissed him right then — the way she kissed Li Juan — but that was clearly out of the question. Besides, it brought to mind that unfinished kiss from just moments ago.

She suddenly became self-conscious and said softly, “…Thank you.”

“When do we set off?” Li Que asked.

“Now that you’re here, you’re not leaving empty-handed,” Li Wu said. “We still haven’t touched the banknotes we took from that man surnamed Han. Go to the grain merchant’s tomorrow and use all of the banknotes to buy rice. It’s still spring planting season, so grain prices are still running high. The cheapest rice in the country can be bought here in Huzhou — we’ll sell it along the road back to Jinzhou——”

“Big Brother really does think ahead,” Li Que said. “Tomorrow I’ll go exchange all of it for grain.”

“And we can’t forget the gold buried in Luzhou,” Li Wu added. “We’ll need to make a stop there first.”

“We’ll follow Big Brother’s lead.”

“Now that you’re here, I’m done washing the bowls,” Li Wu said.

Li Que smiled pleasantly. “As is only right.”

With the plans for the road ahead roughly settled, Li Kun ate his fill and went straight to sleep, leaving Li Que to busy himself in the kitchen.

Shen Zhuxi washed up early and got into bed, hoping to fall asleep quickly and spare herself the awkwardness that lay ahead.

The more she tried not to think about it, the more it pressed on her. She tossed and turned on the bed like a flatbread on a griddle, unable to sleep no matter what she tried.

When Li Wu finally pushed open the door and came in, she immediately shut her eyes, went perfectly still, and feigned deep sleep.

Li Wu blew out the lamp, kicked off his shoes, and got into bed with his usual thunderous flair — limbs stretched out to their full extent before he finally went quiet.

He apparently assumed she was asleep. Shen Zhuxi had just let out a breath of relief——

“Stop playing dead.”

Li Wu rolled over, and a pair of dark eyes met hers in the darkness as she instinctively opened them.

“You still haven’t answered my question.”

Wh — what question? Could it be…

“Shen Blockhead. Do you want to truly be my wife?”

In the darkness, her blood ran hot, rushing all at once to her head. She felt dizzy, flustered, and at a complete loss for how to answer.

She only wanted to flee.

She had no desire to be anyone’s wife — least of all Li Wu’s.

A man’s affection was like morning dew in sunlight: beautiful, yes, but nothing more than an illusion. She could not believe Li Wu would be any different. If the dream given by Fu Xuanmiao or any other man shattered, it would shatter — so be it. But if the dream Li Wu gave her were to shatter…

For reasons she couldn’t name, heat rose behind Shen Zhuxi’s eyes.

She squeezed them shut, letting the darkness block out Li Wu’s gaze.

No hope, no disappointment.

Hadn’t her Royal Mother ended up in such a fate precisely because she had believed in the Emperor?

She would not repeat that mistake.

“Shen Zhuxi, I’m talking to you,” Li Wu said, propping himself up on one hand, impatience creeping into his voice.

Shen Zhuxi kept her eyes shut and played dead.

“Shen Zhuxi? Shen Blockhead? You mad woman?”

Pressed into a corner, she dug through her memory for how Li Kun looked when he slept, parted her lips, and forced out a snore:

“Hm——”

The air seemed to freeze.

Shen Zhuxi kept snoring, snoring so hard her throat began to ache.

“…Shen Zhuxi. I’ll give you that one.”

Li Wu flopped back down with a thump.

“I’m not someone to be trifled with either. Just you wait.”

Li Wu lay with his head propped on both hands, head tilted, watching the blockhead snoring with such determination beside him.

One day, he would have this blockhead won over.

He would make her say those words of her own free will —

“I do.”