The charred remains of the kitchen were swiftly torn down, and a sturdier, taller kitchen was raised in its place on the original site.

On the day the new kitchen was completed, Li Que bought a roast chicken again to celebrate the occasion.

No one mentioned the previous fire again — only Shen Zhuxi still reproached herself from time to time in her heart.

Whenever Li Wu went out early and came home late, Shen Zhuxi would watch his retreating figure with a troubled heart — he had gone off to be a kept man again. Whatever was to be done?

She had thought of speaking to Li Wu directly — urging him to give up that way of making a living — but every time she met his gaze, the words she had prepared lodged in her throat. Her face would flush, and no matter how she tried, she simply could not say:

“You don’t need to sell yourself to support me anymore.”

On this day, Li Wu was gone again before dawn.

Shen Zhuxi finished her morning wash and, without even eating breakfast, sat beneath the sweet osmanthus tree and sighed heavily, at a loss for what to do.

When she had agreed to the fake marriage from the start, she should never have said anything about earning money and keeping house — look what she had driven Li Wu to! If she wanted Li Wu to return to the right path, simply urging him to change his livelihood probably wouldn’t work. There were so many mouths to feed in the household, and the most pressing need was to find ways of increasing income.

When all was said and done, it came down to money.

She could no longer earn money by writing letters on others’ behalf — so were there any other skills she possessed that could be converted into income?

Shen Zhuxi thought and thought, and recalled the letter paper designs she had once worked on together with Fu Xuanmiao.

Even a farmer who could not read a single character would, at some point in their life, have occasion to correspond with someone. Writing a letter required letter paper, and through the choice of paper alone, one could catch a glimpse of a person’s integrity, their taste, their circumstances.

Shen Zhuxi had made decorated letter paper before, and many exquisitely crafted paper designs were imprinted in her memory. She was confident she could replicate them.

Though they could not compare with the original works of great masters of calligraphy and painting, as commercial goods with a certain value attached, they were more than sufficient.

No sooner had Shen Zhuxi thought of something than she set about doing it. She headed out eagerly and went straight to the only stationery shop in town.

When the proprietor of the River Willow Hall saw her, his old face broke into a wide smile.

“Lady Li is here! What will you be replenishing today? Has the half-cartload of xuan paper been used up?”

“I’d like to see what kinds of letter paper you have in the shop,” Shen Zhuxi said.

Thanks to that half-cartload of paper, Shen Zhuxi had already become one of the River Willow Hall’s most valued customers. The proprietor needed no further prompting and immediately brought out every piece of letter paper in the shop, enthusiastically describing the characteristics of each variety.

Shen Zhuxi’s knowledge of fine stationery and scholarly goods left the proprietor at least ten lengths behind — she didn’t even wait for him to finish his introduction before her eye landed on a particular piece of jade-green letter paper.

This time, she had learned her lesson and did not agree to the proprietor’s asking price on the spot.

After some negotiation, Shen Zhuxi brought the price down from five taels of silver per bundle, all the way to one tael per bundle.

The proprietor of River Willow Hall stared at her as though seeing her for the first time.

“Do you have water-smoke ink here?” Shen Zhuxi asked.

“We do, but water-smoke ink is cheap, its color is faint, and it’s difficult to work with. Let me show you this instead…”

“I want the water-smoke ink,” Shen Zhuxi said. “Give me two pieces.”

The proprietor of the River Willow Hall, with some reluctance, wrapped up two ink cakes for her.

Shen Zhuxi took the paper parcel and left the River Willow Hall. When she arrived home, Li Wu had not yet returned. She unwrapped the parcel on the square table in the main room, set out her brush, ink, paper, and inkstone, and carefully began grinding the ink cake.

Water-smoke ink was inexpensive and its color pale and thin. In terms of price, common stone ink was even cheaper; in terms of depth of color, pine resin ink was far richer. Water-smoke ink’s only advantage over common stone ink was that its scent was faint, and once the characters dried, it left almost no odor.

That faint color and the absence of lingering scent after drying were precisely the qualities Shen Zhuxi required.

To create decorated letter paper from scratch, one had to polish the surface, dye it, and trim the edges — she knew the process but not the precise techniques. With water-smoke ink, however, she could take a shortcut that saved time but required effort.

That shortcut was to paint on each sheet by hand, one by one.

Shen Zhuxi cleared the table, selected a simple and elegant design from her memory, and lay over the table, drawing with careful concentration.

Because this was the first sheet of decorated paper, she was especially precise, fearing that a single careless moment would ruin it.

Each one of these, after all, was worth Li Wu’s — well, never mind. Best not to think about it.

It was only after great effort that Shen Zhuxi completed the sheet without a single mistake. Without waiting for it to dry, she eagerly picked up the two corners, and carried the freshly finished decorated paper out into the sunlight in the courtyard.

Golden light, like scattered coins, filtered through the jade-green letter paper, casting the layered patterns of its grain into relief like mountains stacked upon mountains. The water-smoke ink’s pale and thin color traced the outlines of blue-green peaks — deep in some places, faint in others, like drifting cloud and mist. Glancing at it, one might almost be looking at a lively and vivid landscape of mountains and sky.

Shen Zhuxi was quite pleased with herself, but she worried this was merely her own opinion. She thought it over and decided to bring the decorated paper to show Zhou Sao.

Zhou Sao’s courtyard was not far from the Li family’s. By the time Shen Zhuxi’s piece of decorated paper had dried completely, Zhou Sao’s small courtyard had already come into view.

She quickened her step and, standing at the bamboo gate, called out Zhou Sao’s name in a soft voice.

She had barely called out the first time when Zhou Sao’s bright and lively voice rang out from within the courtyard, and almost before she had finished calling, the bamboo gate swung open.

Zhou Sao was holding a half-dry garment. The moment she saw Shen Zhuxi, she broke into a smile.

The small courtyard had a row of dark-colored garments drying on a line, and on the innermost drying pole, a long bed sheet was draped. In the center of the courtyard sat a small stool, a washbasin, and a scrubbing board piled with several men’s garments. The clear fragrance of cleansing powder drifted through the air.

“Zhou Sao, are you busy? If so, I can come another time…”

Before Shen Zhuxi could finish, Zhou Sao laughed and pulled her into the courtyard.

“It’s only household chores — what’s there to be busy about? What’s brought you here? Is there something I can help you with?”

“I wanted to ask you to look at this,” Shen Zhuxi said, bringing out her decorated paper with a shy smile. “In your opinion, how much do you think it’s worth?”

At this, Zhou Sao looked at the decorated paper.

“Let me put down this garment first, so I don’t soil your paper,” Zhou Sao said. She quickly draped the garment she was holding over an empty bamboo pole, then walked back, wiped her hands repeatedly against her sides, and only then accepted the paper from Shen Zhuxi, holding it up carefully to the light for a long, thorough look.

“This paper is really lovely. Did you buy it at the River Willow Hall?” Zhou Sao’s eyes lit up with admiration. “A single sheet like this must be more expensive than a whole bundle of plain paper, surely?”

The cheapest paper at the River Willow Hall — what Li Wu called “backside paper” — cost six hundred copper coins per bundle.

If a single sheet of this decorated paper could sell for six hundred coins, Shen Zhuxi would be very satisfied. She could paint at least ten sheets like this in a day; at six hundred coins per sheet, ten sheets would amount to five taels of silver — far more profitable than writing letters for others.

It was just a pity she couldn’t reveal her identity. If people knew that each piece of decorated paper had been crafted personally by the Princess of Yue, even a thousand taels per sheet wouldn’t be enough to meet the demand.

“I don’t know whether it can be worth the price of a bundle of plain paper,” Shen Zhuxi said shyly. “This is a piece of decorated paper I painted myself.”

“You painted this?” Zhou Sao exclaimed, her admiring gaze falling upon the paper with even greater wonder. “Not only is your needlework outstanding, but your painting skill is this accomplished too!”

Before she had sent the Dragon Boat Festival sachets, Li Wu had emphasized repeatedly that if anyone found out he had embroidered them, he would silence them permanently. Shen Zhuxi could only laugh awkwardly and avoid the topic entirely.

“I want to sell this to the River Willow Hall. If that’s possible, I could use it to help with household expenses.”

“You want to go out and do business?” Zhou Sao hesitated before speaking. “Does Li Wu know about this?”

“He knows,” Shen Zhuxi said with a nod.

“And he didn’t try to stop you?”

Shen Zhuxi relayed Li Wu’s attitude honestly, and Zhou Sao’s expression grew complicated. She shook her head and said, “Since your husband doesn’t have any objections, I won’t say anything further. This decorated paper is truly beautiful — the River Willow Hall will take it. Just make sure you keep your wits about you, and be careful not to let him drive the price down.”

Shen Zhuxi smiled happily. “I will! Thank you, Zhou Sao, for advising me. If I manage to sell the decorated paper, I’ll treat you to a meal for sure!”

“A meal made by your own hands?” Zhou Sao laughed. “Just don’t set the kitchen on fire again like last time.”

Shen Zhuxi smiled with embarrassment. “Please don’t tease me, Zhou Sao. I made such a fool of myself — even now, just thinking about it makes me blush.”

“You really ought to learn to cook,” Zhou Sao said with a smile. “When your Li Wu comes back after a full day of work and there’s a hot meal waiting for him, won’t he hold you in even more fondness? When you have some free time, come to your sister-in-law’s place, and I’ll teach you a few of my best dishes. You…”

Zhou Sao’s words were cut short by a pounding at the bamboo gate.

“Mother! Open the door, quickly!” Zhou Zhuang’s voice rang out.

Shen Zhuxi and Zhou Sao exchanged a glance. Zhou Sao’s brow creased, and she said, “This troublemaker is back again to leech off me. If you have nothing else, you’d better head off first.”

Shen Zhuxi had no desire to come into contact with Zhou Zhuang either, and took the opportunity to agree.

After Zhou Sao opened the gate, Shen Zhuxi lowered her head, ducked a little, and slipped past Zhou Zhuang in the doorway and out.

Zhou Zhuang watched her retreating figure, muttering: “She’s clearly the ‘beauty to overturn cities and kingdoms’ that man was looking for. So why…”

Zhou Sao’s expression turned cold. “Keep looking, and mind Li Wu doesn’t gouge your eyes out.”

Zhou Zhuang felt a flash of resentment at her constant use of Li Wu’s name to put him in his place, though he showed not a trace of it on his face. He made an uncharacteristic show of warmth, hooking his arm through his mother’s and pulling her affectionately toward the interior.

“Mother, I listen to everything you say. You didn’t want me to have contact with Lady Li, and I haven’t exchanged a single word with her! Mother, I’ve been this obedient — won’t you reward me?”

“There’s no money in this house!” Zhou Sao yanked her arm free. “Go try your luck elsewhere!”

“Mother! You’re my mother! Besides you, where else could I go?” Zhou Zhuang said.

“Look at this house — so bare even the mice don’t deign to live here! Where would I find money to scrape out for you to gamble away?” Zhou Sao said furiously.

“I’m not gambling anymore!” Zhou Zhuang fell to his knees with a thud and clutched her arm, swearing up and down: “Mother, I truly am not gambling anymore! Believe me just this once. If I ever gamble again, then I’m no human being — I’ll descend to the eighteenth level of hell, I’ll come to a bad end, I—”

“Enough!” Zhou Sao cut him off in anger. “Are you cursing yourself or cursing me? If you’ve truly reformed, then show me by living up to your potential! Stop letting me hear rumors about you stealing and cheating everywhere!”

“Mother, I’ll listen to whatever you say! I was far too rotten before, but from this day on, I’ll follow your every word!” Zhou Zhuang said. “I genuinely know I was wrong now. If you don’t believe me, I’ll cut out my own heart and show it to you!”

“Don’t just say it — do it. Whether you’ve truly changed, I’ll have to see from your conduct going forward!” Zhou Sao said as much, yet her expression had already softened. When Zhou Zhuang reached for her hand again, she no longer pulled away.

“Mother, I want a future too — but I may not have one left…” Zhou Zhuang held her hand, and suddenly tears began to flow.

“What do you mean by that?” Zhou Sao frowned.

“I owe a large sum to the gambling house. If I can’t pay it back, they’ll kill me…” Zhou Zhuang said through his sobs. “Mother, I want to start over as a new person. Help me one more time…”

Zhou Sao’s expression shifted, and she yanked her hand free, glaring furiously. “So you really did come back just to cheat money out of me!”

“I didn’t! Mother! I really didn’t — this time it’s real. If you don’t help me, I truly won’t survive — Mother, Mother!” Zhou Zhuang threw his arms around Zhou Sao’s right leg, crying out in anguish.

Zhou Sao’s rage boiled over, and a resounding slap landed on Zhou Zhuang’s face, the force of it sending his outwardly strong but inwardly frail body toppling sideways to the ground.

“I won’t be deceived by you again! If you want to become a new person, I’ll support you — because you are my son regardless. Bones broken still connect to flesh — that is a fact neither of us can change! But if you want to cheat money out of me again, that is impossible! Because I don’t only have you to think about — I also have your father and your older brother!”

Zhou Sao finished speaking and strode into the inner room. Zhou Zhuang scrambled up from the ground and stumbled after her, only to find Zhou Sao had barricaded herself inside. He shoved at the door with all his might, but Zhou Sao pressed herself against the wood, and there was no forcing his way in.

Zhou Zhuang cried and called out at the door for some time, and only when it was clear that obtaining money from Zhou Sao was truly impossible did he stumble away from the house in a daze.

The hope of getting money from his mother had been shattered. Tears were useless now. He wiped his sleeve across his eyes, then walked numbly forward — one moment despondent and defeated, the next cursing in an unbroken stream.

By the time he came back to himself, he realized he had been walking toward the gambling house.

“I can’t go to the gambling house… I can’t…”

He gave a frightened jolt and turned around immediately.

But it was already too late.

Several tall, powerfully built men had encircled him — all familiar faces from the gambling house, men who answered to Hu Yishou.

“Brothers, what is this… You’re not inside the gambling house, so you must be here on some errand. If you’re tired, come to my place for some tea — I’ve also got a freshly born piglet I can offer you in respect…”

Fear churned in Zhou Zhuang’s heart, but his smile grew ever more ingratiating, and he would have gladly dropped to his knees and licked their shoes if it would make them pretend they hadn’t seen him.

It was not to be. One of the burly men grabbed him by the collar without ceremony, a cold smile on his face:

“Zhou Zhuang — three days are up. Come with us.”

Zhou Zhuang’s face turned white as paper. “Please… let me go…”

…

A bestial howl of anguish rang through the mountains and woods, startling a flock of birds into the air.

Zhou Sao shook out the wet garment in her hands with force. The heavy slapping sound and the harrowing cry rang out at the same moment. She looked up suspiciously toward the distant sky, where a line of unknown birds rose up and swept across the blue.

Zhou Sao listened intently, but the mountains fell silent again.

“Summer’s almost here — even the wolf cubs are getting restless…” she muttered to herself.

She hung up the garment, smoothed every wrinkle with care, and went straight into the kitchen to prepare the family’s meal.

Her worthless husband and son might not come home for dinner, but preparing two meals a day was her duty as a wife and mother.

She had a meat dish and a vegetable dish neatly ready, and was just about to take the steamed buns off the stove when a hoarse voice came from outside the bamboo gate:

“Mother…”

She set down the earthenware plate and walked out to the courtyard to open the gate for him.

The Zhou Zhuang outside the gate had red eyes shot through with bloodshot veins, and his face was drained of every last bit of color. The clothes that had been perfectly fine earlier were now crumpled and wrinkled, smeared with dirt and scattered with two dead leaves.

“What has happened to you?”

She was still his mother, after all — it would be a lie to say she felt nothing. Seeing him so haggard, Zhou Sao forgot the earlier unpleasantness and couldn’t help but ask with concern.

“Mother, they cut off my finger…” Zhou Zhuang said, his voice trembling.

“What?!”

Zhou Zhuang raised his right hand. On that hand, only four blood-soaked fingers remained. The index finger was nowhere to be found.

“Who did this—”

The fury and shock on Zhou Sao’s face suddenly froze.

Zhou Zhuang’s blood-stained right hand seized her by the shoulder and pulled her closer to him. His uninjured left hand drew out the dagger he had plunged into his own mother’s body, and drove it in again — once more, with savage force.

He wept as he said, “Mother, it was you who brought this upon your son.”

“You—” A rattling sound rose from Zhou Sao’s throat.

Zhou Zhuang shoved her into the courtyard with one hand and shut the gate behind him.

“Mother, Master Hu said that if I can’t scrape together the money by tonight, he’ll have all my hands and feet chopped off. Mother… your son is still young. Your son doesn’t want to become a cripple…”

Zhou Zhuang knelt beside Zhou Sao where she had fallen, weeping uncontrollably. “Mother, you drove me to this… you drove me to this…”

“You…”

Zhou Zhuang drove in the third blow.

Zhou Sao’s pupils slowly drifted upward, gazing at the brilliant blue of the sky, and went still. The hand that had been clutching Zhou Zhuang’s arm fell away, revealing a palm creased with hardship, like the furrowed surface of yellow earth.

Her mouth remained open, as though there were words still left unsaid.

But there would never be another chance to say them.