Su Luoyun replied, unhurried: “Mother, the public matter the Shizi has taken on concerns the safety of the prefectures and counties at the front — it cannot afford the slightest error. The men under his command are all seasoned old hands who do not take the Shizi seriously in the slightest. He must have had good reason for what he did. When I saw those women come to plead at the door, I was afraid you would be caught in the middle, pulled in two directions — so I simply sacrificed my own face and made myself the villain first, to spare you from difficulties when you see them in future…”

The Princess Consort felt this woman was far too glib, and said with a cold laugh, “So you expect me to thank you for your impertinence? If what happened today gets around, everyone will think those of the Beizhen household are cold-hearted and unfeeling. If I let you off easily, you will ruin the entire moral standing of this estate.”

Saying this, the Princess Consort straightened her back and called out loudly, “Bring the family discipline board.”

The Beizhen household maintained separate instruments of punishment for men and women. For male members, whatever was at hand was generally used — the Prince’s leather horse whip being the most common. The proper family discipline board for female members of the household was a short, pitch-black, lacquered wooden paddle that was usually kept enshrined in the ancestral hall, to be brought out only when the women of the family were disobedient.

Han Yao, however, was ordinarily docile — a stern word was enough to bring her into line. And as for the son Han Xiao, the Princess Consort doted on him like a precious treasure.

The family discipline board had gathered dust in the estate for a long while — and yet today it was being brought out for use on the new daughter-in-law.

Nanny Xi stood before Su Luoyun with an air of great authority, raised an eyebrow, and said, “Shizi’s consort, acting on the Princess Consort’s orders, this old servant must give offence. Please extend your hand and receive your punishment.”

Su Luoyun knew there was no avoiding this, and slowly extended her hand.

Even so, braced as she was, when the paddle struck her palm, the searing, blazing pain shot straight to her head.

Because of her blindness, her other senses had grown acutely sharp — especially her hands, which she used constantly for feeling and reading by touch, making the skin uncommonly thin and sensitive. Pain, for her, cut deeper than it would for most.

Nanny Xi had finally seized the chance to settle scores from their time in the capital. She held nothing back, each blow landing harder than the last.

Even so, Su Luoyun bit her lip and made not a sound.

As a daughter-in-law, she could not refuse her mother-in-law’s correction. But to cry out and beg for mercy — that she would never do.

Just as the fourth blow fell, a dark shape suddenly burst through the doorway. Before anyone could make out what it was, Nanny Xi let out a cry and was sent stumbling to the floor by a kick squarely to the chest.

The Princess Consort was startled. She looked up to find Han Linfeng standing beside Su Luoyun, his expression dark, pulling the young woman upright and examining the palm of her hand.

When had he returned? No one had come to announce him.

The Princess Consort’s fury had not yet abated, and now she watched her normally dutiful and deferential son kick a senior nanny of the household flat onto the floor in her own presence. Her palm struck the table as she cried out, “Have you lost your mind? Kicking someone with your foot right in front of your mother!”

“Su Luoyun is delicate in constitution,” Han Linfeng said coldly. “What has she done wrong, to warrant Mother bringing out the family discipline board against her?”

The Princess Consort was very nearly ready to take to her bed from the combined aggravations of this husband and wife, and said coldly, “She showed no respect for her elders — talking back to me in front of guests. Am I, as her mother-in-law, not even entitled to discipline your wife?”

Han Linfeng had already overheard at the gatehouse that the wives of the supply depot men had come to plead for mercy, only to be driven out mercilessly by the Shizi’s consort. He knew his mother’s nature well enough to sense trouble, and without waiting for anyone to announce him, ran all the way back — and still arrived a moment too late. Those fair, tender palms had already been struck until they bled.

Now, hearing his mother’s rebuke, Han Linfeng said coldly, “The disturbance to this household was caused by my own duties — if Mother wishes to blame someone, blame me.”

On the matter of interfering in the Shizi’s official duties, the Princess Consort had never had the moral high ground to begin with. The charge she was now insisting upon was Su Luoyun’s disrespect for her elders.

In her anger, the Princess Consort said coldly, “Very well — it is clear I have no authority over either of you. If that is how things stand, you need not call me Mother any longer. Take your wife and go live on your own.”

“What is all this noise?” Just then, Prince Beizhen walked in.

After the Princess Consort, trembling with agitation, laid out the whole affair, the Prince first frowned and then instructed the estate manager, “From now on, idle outsiders are not to be admitted into the estate. Coming at the crack of dawn and throwing the whole household into an uproar.”

Seeing that the Prince seemed to lay the whole cause at the feet of the outsiders, the Princess Consort felt he was failing to take her side, and glared at him in indignation.

The Prince soothed her: “All right — these are your juniors. Must you quarrel with children who do not know any better? The scolding has been done, the punishment has been given — let that be a lesson to them. Now, the two of you — go and apologise to your mother quickly, then get out of her sight.”

Han Linfeng offered a brief apology to his mother, then pulled Su Luoyun out of the hall.

When the two of them had returned to the inner courtyard, before Han Linfeng could say a word, Su Luoyun spoke first: “Why do you have such a short temper? It was only a few strokes of the paddle — I could have borne it. You came barging in and now I have taken the punishment for nothing.”

She had seen earlier that the Princess Consort was too proud to let this rest — she was going to insist on some form of punishment. Had things been left to run their course, Han Linfeng, with his temper, would never have stood for it, and mother and son would inevitably have clashed.

She did not want Han Linfeng to be made difficult by the Princess Consort, hamstrung at every turn. It was simpler to play the villain herself, say what needed to be said without restraint, drive the women out first, and then accept the Princess Consort’s punishment. That was that.

Besides, the Princess Consort was too proud a woman, and she herself had been bestowed upon the household by imperial decree. No matter how harsh the punishment, the Princess Consort could not beat her to death.

She had not expected Han Linfeng to return at precisely that moment and reduce all her careful planning to rubble with a single kick.

Han Linfeng’s face was taut as he applied medicinal oil to her palm: “You knew full well you were going to be punished — why not keep your head down instead of charging forward? Were you afraid I could not handle it myself?”

Su Luoyun answered without thinking, from the heart: “You have been so good to me and to my brother. I have kept it in my heart. In ordinary days I can do little for you around this estate. When a rare chance came to shoulder something on your behalf, how could I shrink away?”

Such words of gratitude, if spoken by one of Han Linfeng’s advisers or retainers, would have been entirely fitting — Han Linfeng would even have felt that his investment had not been wasted, that the man had finally proved his worth.

But these words of loyalty and devotion — the notion of dying for one’s benefactor — coming from this slight young woman’s lips, sat entirely wrong with Han Linfeng.

The hand applying the oil paused for a moment, then continued as though nothing had happened: “You are my wife — not a retainer. My care for you is as it should be, and it is equally right that you should live under my protection. What is there to keep in your heart with such gratitude?”

But Su Luoyun did not see it that way.

Her eyes were blind from birth — she was already a burden and an encumbrance. On top of that she had caused him to bear the ridicule of the world without a word of protest. If she could not even share some of his load, would she not truly be a useless deadweight?

“Never mind. This is how things should be between us…”

This time Han Linfeng did not stop his hands — but his expression darkened entirely.

Ever since the danger they had faced in Yan County, Su Luoyun seemed to have let her guard down around him completely. She no longer resisted his closeness, and in the end he had made her his in full. Aside from the initial awkwardness of a woman new to such intimacy, in time the two of them had grown seamlessly close. At first Han Linfeng had felt a deep satisfaction — a sense of fulfilment that he had truly and completely claimed this woman as his own.

But gradually he had begun to feel that something was missing between them. He could not quite put his finger on what it was.

Until today, when he finally understood what that missing thing was — this woman had been repaying a debt to him all along.

It was just like the old fairy tale: a celestial maiden who had won the heart of a poor young man felt compelled to repay the kindness and settle the karmic debt before she could leave. That is roughly how those myths go — once the debt is repaid, the fairy dons her celestial robe and floats away, leaving the poor fool behind, clutching a child, riding an ox, pining for what was lost.

Going by that logic, he too had taken in a celestial maiden. Her “celestial robes” were plentiful enough — each and every one stuffed with silver notes and gold ingots. And he was worse off than the poor young man in the story — he had not even managed to get a child out of it yet.

To test whether his suspicion was correct, Han Linfeng’s thoughts turned over quickly, and he abruptly opened his mouth to probe: “We have been married quite some time, and there is still no child between us… to go on like this, with nothing to show for it, is not a solution. Father has been hoping I would take a few proper concubines… What do you think?”

Su Luoyun paused briefly, not having expected the Shizi to raise this subject so suddenly.

The matter of children — Su Luoyun had thought about it long and carefully, even before she had given herself to him.

In her view, now that she was married, giving herself to him was a matter of course.

Yet her union with the Shizi was one that could well see some change within a few years — not because she wished to part from him, but because if the worst came to pass and she were forced to leave the household, would the children not be made to suffer alongside the adults? She knew from her own experience what it was to grow up without a mother. She did not want her own children to endure the same.

And so she had been quietly and carefully preventing pregnancy, not having conceived at all. It was not that she never wanted children — only that she wanted to wait a little longer. What she was waiting for, she could not quite say, even to herself. There was simply an unease she could not name.

But now the Shizi had suddenly said — because there had been no child for so long, the Prince hoped he would take some proper concubines.

Su Luoyun felt as though a heavy stone, long expected, had finally dropped into still water — within the realm of what she had foreseen, and yet impossible to disguise the sudden, winding blow of it.

Still, what Han Linfeng said was not unreasonable. He had no idea she had been preventing pregnancy, and after so long a marriage with nothing to show, the elders of the household would naturally be anxious.

Han Linfeng was of an age where he ought to have heirs. She could not hold up the expansion of the Beizhen household’s line simply because she did not wish to have children.

She kept her composure as best she could and forced a faint smile: “You are the Shizi — it is only right that you have people around you to attend to your needs. I have this trouble with my eyes and cannot assess a woman’s looks, so if the Prince is willing to arrange things, I would save myself the trouble… Whatever he selects, I will accept.”

She did her best to sound gracious and compliant. As the wife of a great household, even in the happiest of marriages, a woman would still be expected to help her husband take concubines — she had seen this often enough in the noble households of the capital.

As long as the women he took in were not disreputable creatures from the pleasure quarters like Hong Yun, a wife had no grounds for objection.

Han Linfeng had anticipated her reaction. Though he had expected this composed, unruffled manner, seeing it with his own eyes still kindled a suppressed frustration deep within him — she held him in high regard, was grateful and devoted, yet the one thing she did not do was see him as a man she cherished, one whose attention she could not bear to share with another woman.

“Oh…” Su Luoyun felt the pressure of the hand applying the oil suddenly increase, kneading her palm until it ached sharply, and she let out an involuntary cry.

Even without being able to see, she sensed at once that something was off about Han Linfeng. She could not help turning her head and “looking” toward him with searching uncertainty.

Her eyes were the most beautiful he had ever seen — bright as still water touched by light, catching and scattering reflections.

Those eyes were reflecting his image now — yet did he live anywhere in her heart?

Beyond being her benefactor — the master of her household — what else was he to her?

Su Luoyun waited a long while and heard nothing from him, so she slowly withdrew her hand: “My hand is all right. No need for more oil.”

Han Linfeng knew that Su Luoyun had just suffered a grievance on his account. If he were now to carry on like a nursing infant crying that he was not loved enough, that would truly be beyond foolish.

So he drew a quiet breath and said to Su Luoyun, “I have not practised boxing in a long while. I am going to the training ground for a while… Do not eat anything with a strong fishy flavour at midday — take care of your hand… And from now on, you are not to stand up for me in matters like this.”

With that, he rose and went directly to the training ground.

Su Luoyun heard the door open and close, and knew he had gone.

Of course. With concubines about to enter the household — and not just one — he naturally needed to keep himself in fine physical condition. Otherwise, how would he manage so many demands under the covers?

She drew a long breath, then rose and sat down at the writing desk. Ignoring the red swelling of her palm, she began to grind ink and practise calligraphy.

Xiangcao watched from the side — the text her mistress was copying was the Sutra for Calming the Mind. Was there some inner demon she was trying to vanquish?

Only that the characters, which ordinarily flowed upright and smooth, seemed today to have lost all order. Her mistress made several mistakes one after another, and at last threw down the brush. She waved her fan in irritation and asked Xiangcao, “Bring me a ladle of cold water. Why is this room so stifling…”

Xiangcao looked around the room. The charcoal brazier had long since gone cold and had not yet been replaced. In the depths of a freezing winter, how could it possibly be stifling?

Had her mistress developed an inner fever?

The Shizi’s consort was not the only one burning inside the estate that day.

At the training ground, the Shizi seemed to be working out some inward fury — he punched a sandbag clean to pieces.

The Princess Consort was burning too. Still fuming, she heard from a young maidservant that the Shizi had just been training and had burst a sandbag, and she hurled a teacup down in anger: “So kicking Nanny Xi to the ground was not enough to vent his temper — he is taking it out on me now!”

When Han Yao heard that her mother had punished her sister-in-law, she muttered quietly, “Elder brother never speaks a harsh word to sister-in-law — he tends to her with such care. Mother goes and brings out the family discipline board. How could someone as fragile as sister-in-law endure that? It would be strange if elder brother were not worried sick…”

The Princess Consort felt that the younger generation of the household had entirely lost their heads. Even her normally obedient daughter had started to answer back, and she glared at her in rising irritation: “Oh? And you feel for her too, do you?”

Han Yao twisted her handkerchief and said softly, “If I marry someday and my mother-in-law brought out the family discipline board at the first disagreement, would Mother not feel for me?”

In her own view, the mistress of the Junguо Duke’s household was even stricter than her mother. If she were to marry into that family and find herself alone in a strange place, looked down upon by her in-laws, would she not be in exactly the same position as her sister-in-law?

And so seeing Su Luoyun’s predicament, Han Yao could not help but feel a sympathetic pang of sorrow for herself as much as for the other.

The Princess Consort was so annoyed she nearly laughed: “You are becoming increasingly impertinent. Why wait for a future mother-in-law? I should be applying the family discipline board to you right now. Someone — bring me the board!”

It was just the hour for dinner, and Prince Beizhen happened to step in at that very moment, catching the Princess Consort in full cry for the family discipline board. He raised his voice: “What has gotten into everyone today? The Beizhen family discipline board has been gathering dust for years — today it seems to have been consecrated and put to constant use. At this rate, it will be worn to splinters.”

Han Yao quickly ducked behind her father, whispering, “Father, I know I was wrong — please talk some sense into Mother.”

And so the Prince smoothed things over as peacemaker, and the family discipline board was allowed to go back to gathering dust.

It was the middle of the month — the day the whole household gathered for dinner together — and it was for this reason that Han Linfeng had hurried back.

When the lamps were lit, Su Luoyun and Han Linfeng took their seats, and the subdued family banquet began.

The Princess Consort had that very day come into conflict with the young couple, losing Nanny Xi as her chief ally in the process, and was in no mood for conversation.

Han Linfeng and Su Luoyun had just been discussing the matter of bringing new people into the household, and both were displeased — they had nothing to say to each other.

Han Yao had barely escaped a beating from her mother not long ago, and drank her soup without daring to make a sound.

Of everyone at the table, only the Prince seemed reasonably at ease. But the dinner table was so hushed it was like a gathering of ghosts on the night of a restless spirit’s return — so silent one could hear the north wind circling outside the window.

Prince Beizhen felt his very heartbeat slowing to a halt. Unable to bear it any longer, he cleared his throat and asked Han Linfeng about affairs at the supply depot.

Han Linfeng selected what could appropriately be said and gave the Prince an account of the losses at the supply depot.

“The men have been siphoning off and selling grain for far longer than just a few days — the accumulated shortage is considerable, and the accounts do not tally at all. Once the spoiled and rotted grain is removed from the total reserves on hand, nearly half is gone. Fortunately I discovered it early and have already reported the matter to my superiors, requesting that the court dispatch additional provisions. Otherwise the deficit would have been laid entirely at my feet, and if an urgent transport were required and I could not produce the grain, I would have been using my own head to cover for that gang of scoundrels…”

Hearing this, the Princess Consort finally grasped the gravity of the supply depot affair — it was entangled with the authorities, a capital crime punishable by death.

Thinking of how she had nearly agreed to intercede that very day, she felt her cheeks tighten with embarrassment, and she could not bring herself to meet Su Luoyun’s eyes.

She was not, however, grateful to her daughter-in-law. She simply felt stung by Han Linfeng’s words, as though a slap had landed on her own face, and the meal sat rather heavily with her.

After a few bites, Su Luoyun finally spoke. She turned to the Prince: “By the way, Father — the Shizi mentioned your intentions to me, and it is I who have been thoughtless. Do you think there might be a suitable young wom—” Mmph—

Han Linfeng had only been testing the waters that afternoon, and in his sour mood at the time had simply wanted to vent. He had entirely forgotten to explain himself to her afterwards.

He had not expected this wretched girl to bring the matter up at the dinner table before his father, with such impatient urgency.

The weather was warming up — no need for anyone to warm the bed — so she was eager to have him driven from the room tonight, was she?

He had no time to kick her under the table. Before she could say anything more outrageous, he quickly stretched out his large hand and clamped it firmly over her mouth, then pressed her head against his chest and said in a low voice, “What are you babbling about? Sit still and eat.”

Su Luoyun, caught completely off guard, found her mouth smothered. She was struggling to pry his hand away, but he would not release her — entirely unconcerned that they were in front of his parents.

Prince Beizhen had been brought into the conversation by his daughter-in-law, and was rather at a loss. Then he watched his son clamp his hand over Su Luoyun’s mouth and refuse to let her speak — he raised an eyebrow at his son.

What sort of nonsense was this? Why was he stopping her from speaking?

The Princess Consort had no idea what was going on either, and stared at the young couple making a spectacle of themselves in front of their elders. This was flirting and carrying on right in front of her parents?

At the thought, she set down her chopsticks with a heavy clatter: “More and more improper by the day. I am done eating.”

And with that, the Princess Consort rose and left the table.

After dinner, however, when the Princess Consort went to look in on the ailing Nanny Xi — the woman who had taken a kick to the chest and was now pale and listless — Nanny Xi took the chance to plant a seed in the Princess Consort’s ear.

“Princess Consort, now you have seen the nature of that young woman for yourself. If she is allowed to go on unchecked and rule the roost, sooner or later she will be sitting on your head. Would it not be better to arrange a few proper concubines to enter the household soon — at least then there would be some decent company around the Shizi…”

Prompted by Nanny Xi, something stirred in the Princess Consort. Indeed — why had she not thought of this herself? This common-born young woman, who showed not the slightest deference, had been pulling both the Shizi and Han Yao toward her own freewheeling ways. It was high time some proper concubines were brought in to divide Su Luoyun’s hold on favour.

As Han Yao had put it, Han Linfeng now regarded this blind woman as the very apple of his eye — but that was only the novelty of a new marriage. Once younger, more beautiful women entered the household, there would naturally be a comparison to be made.

This Su Luoyun had grown too comfortable and too confident — and that was precisely why she had become so unruly.

For some reason, the Princess Consort’s anger flared hotter still. Without meaning to, she found herself thinking back to her own younger years — newly married, barely settled, when the late Emperor had bestowed a pair of beautiful concubines upon the household.

Han Linfeng’s birth mother had been one of them.

Since they were gifts from the Emperor, the Prince had of course been obliged to receive them in full. At the time, the Prince’s parents — her late parents-in-law — were still living. She had naturally been expected to play the virtuous wife and not give in to jealousy; after her husband spent the night elsewhere, she was still required to send over nourishing tonics.

The sweet, tender warmth of their early marriage had felt as though sand had been poured into it. Their quarrels grew more frequent with each passing month.

She, the true Princess Consort, had been reduced to an ornament. In three years of marriage, the time she and the Prince spent together could be counted on one hand. Added to that her constitution was cold, and for years she bore no children — in the end, under pressure from her mother-in-law, she had been obliged to adopt the most obedient of the concubines’ sons as her own.

Had she not later sought out a remedy for bearing children, she might have gone her entire life without a child of her own.

Now in middle age, what remained between husband and wife was only mutual respect — respect that had long since chilled to ice.

The depth of that old resentment was boundless. This was also why she had always longed to return to the capital and been so insistent on marrying her daughter off there — it was in the capital that she had spent the best years of her girlhood. Once she had married into the Prince’s household, that kind of happiness had never returned.

Now, with Nanny Xi’s suggestion stirring up those old buried grievances, the Princess Consort found herself thinking it was not a bad idea at all.

That new bride was far too arrogant and presumptuous. Did she really think that a great noble household was so easy a place to settle into? It was time to let the new bride learn how things truly worked here.

Meanwhile, back with Su Luoyun — after having her mouth covered at the dinner table, she said no more. But when the two of them returned to their rooms, it was Han Linfeng who spoke first, his expression tight: “In such a hurry, are you? If your eyes were healed, I suppose you would go out personally to seek and select candidates.”

When he had stopped her mouth like that, Su Luoyun had naturally understood that he had earlier been using the Prince as a pretence to test her.

She paid no attention to the man’s cold remarks and instead said with forced lightness, “If you yourself wanted to take a concubine, why use Father as a cover? I would not stand in your way. Besides — a Shizi of your bearing and appearance will have women falling helplessly under your spell wherever you go. Why would you need me to select one?”

Han Linfeng drew a long breath toward the ceiling — every ounce of today’s aggravation was of his own making. He had punched a sandbag to pieces and still had to come back and clean up the mess his own loose tongue had caused.

He had sharp eyes. When they returned to the room, he had noticed Xiangcao hastily trying to conceal two freshly sewn garments. If he was not mistaken, while he had been at the training ground, two more items had been added to the chest of golden “celestial robes.”