The news that Princess Anle intended to take refuge at Baochong Nunnery — keeping her hair while entering monastic life to pray for Noble Consort Shu’s blessing — had also reached Zhaoxia Palace.
“Princess Anle, Noble Consort Shu…” Lin Fei murmured. “Cunning…”
“There’s no need,” Xie Yuzhang said.
They had no way of knowing that Princess Anle’s matter had nothing to do with any of this — it had been entirely Noble Consort Shu’s scheme, born of her refusal to let her daughter be married off to Hexi. Both of them assumed it was Noble Consort Shu hedging her bets, adding another layer of insurance to ensure Princess Anle would not be sent to Mobei as a peace bride.
This move of Noble Consort Shu’s weighed even more heavily on Lin Fei’s heart. At night she dreamed the same nightmare over and over — a great wheel rolling toward her, crushing both her and her princess to dust.
She jolted awake in the night, drenched in cold sweat.
Xie Yuzhang had woken too. She reached out and touched the damp strands of hair at Lin Fei’s brow, asking softly, “What is it? A nightmare?”
Lin Fei said apologetically, “I must have disturbed Your Highness. I’ll go back to my own bed.”
She made to rise. But Xie Yuzhang caught her arm, rolled over, and held her close. “Don’t go. Stay with me.”
These past days Xie Yuzhang had seemed so composed — yet here, in the deep stillness of the night, she was still this fragile, still needing to be sheltered.
Lin Fei held Xie Yuzhang and patted her back gently, coaxing her. “I’m not going anywhere. Go back to sleep.”
Lin Fei and Xie Yuzhang burned the same incense. They were so familiar with each other’s scent that, wrapped in that closeness, the two of them gradually drifted back into sleep.
This time, there were no more nightmares.
Time passed quickly. The Mobei Khaganate’s envoy delegation had been in the capital for half a month.
The month of July arrived. One day, before the midday meal, a familiar palace attendant from Hanliang Hall came with a summons: the Emperor wished to see Princess Baohua.
Lin Fei slipped a gratuity envelope to the attendant and asked, “Do you know what His Majesty wishes to speak with the Princess about?”
The attendant, unlike his usual smiling self, pushed the envelope straight back. “That, this servant truly does not know.”
This attendant had come to Zhaoxia Palace countless times before. His uncharacteristic manner made Lin Fei’s heart clench.
The attendant had taken no small number of gratuity envelopes from Zhaoxia Palace over the years. He hesitated, then lowered his voice: “After morning court, His Majesty received the Khaganate’s envoys again.”
“Understood. Thank you, Eunuch.” Xie Yuzhang inclined her head, signaling Lin Fei not to press further.
Lin Fei’s heart was heavy, though she kept her face calm, directing the palace maids to fetch a wide-sleeved over-robe of sheer silver-red fabric scattered with golden butterflies dancing among flowers.
Xie Yuzhang raised her arms, and the palace attendants helped her into the robe.
The attendant snuck a glance — Princess Baohua Xie Yuzhang carried herself with an air of magnificence, her beautiful face glowing with luminous radiance, her beauty beyond compare. Yet the attendant lowered his head and did not offer his customary smiling praise.
Xie Yuzhang cast a sidelong look at him.
The Emperor disliked the Lin family and therefore disliked Lin Fei as well. Lin Fei had never accompanied Xie Yuzhang on visits to the Emperor, and this time was no different. She could only wait in Zhaoxia Palace, consumed with anxiety.
The last time she had felt this gnawing unease in her chest was when she first heard that her grandfather had died by throwing himself against the pillars of the Golden Hall, that her father had already been thrown into prison — and armed soldiers had surrounded the Lin household, yet no one had come to formally announce their crimes. That terrible stretch of waiting.
Fear and helplessness, in equal measure.
Lin Fei forced herself to be calm. She ordered the palace maids to open the latticed windows facing the inner courtyard, and sat there, gazing out at the lush garden.
Lin Fei had been raised from childhood to be a distinguished young lady of a great family. When she sat with that composed gravity, spine perfectly straight, not even a corner of her robe trembling, the palace maids around her found themselves instinctively lowering their voices and lightening their steps.
That heavy, oppressive silence held until Xie Yuzhang returned. Seeing Xie Yuzhang’s expression calm and her steps even carrying a lightness to them, the palace maids’ faces broke into smiles.
Only Lin Fei tilted her head to study Xie Yuzhang’s face, and her eyes held no joy. She rose slightly to bow, her body turning to follow Xie Yuzhang’s movement.
Xie Yuzhang stepped inside, gathered her skirts, and sat down in the seat of honor beside her.
A wave of her hand, and the palace maids receded like the tide. Xie Yuzhang and Lin Fei sat side by side gazing into the courtyard, neither speaking. In the distant corridor, the palace maids looked over across the courtyard at each other in bewilderment.
After a long while, Lin Fei spoke, her voice rough: “Your Highness?”
Yet Xie Yuzhang felt an inexplicable calm wash through her.
“Imperial Father told me that I am to be sent to Mobei as a peace bride,” she said.
More than this long-predicted fate, Lin Fei was heartbroken by Xie Yuzhang’s calm. Shouldn’t her naive princess be shattered, weeping with grief? Where had her pain gone? Why was she suppressing it like this?
“Your Highness…” Lin Fei gently reached out and covered Xie Yuzhang’s hand with her own. “If you want to cry, cry.”
Don’t hold it in. Don’t bottle it up. Suppressed emotion is the most harmful thing of all.
But Xie Yuzhang said, “I’ve already cried.”
Of course. To have her future announced to her directly by the Emperor who had always cherished her — how could she not have wept? Lin Fei felt a pang of sadness.
Just as she was gathering herself to say something comforting, she heard Xie Yuzhang continue, “As his daughter, going to serve the nation, marrying far away to Mobei, never again able to fulfil my filial duties at my Imperial Father’s side — how could I not shed a few tears? Rest assured, I have already wept before Imperial Father.”
Lin Fei looked up in stunned disbelief, as though she no longer recognized Xie Yuzhang.
Xie Yuzhang had been reborn back into her girlhood for half a month now. Throughout those two weeks, she had often been mired in depression, in darkness, in fear.
She had known her future fate. She had known the blade hanging above her head. But now that the blade had finally fallen, she found herself not nearly as terrified of what lay ahead as she had imagined.
In this moment, Xie Yuzhang understood with deep clarity that human fear stems more from the unknown than from anything else.
Everything she was about to face, she had already lived through once before. The moment this thought came to her, her heart settled into a strange, tranquil peace.
“What is there to be sad about?” she smiled gently, taking Lin Fei’s hand. “For things already settled, things already happened — don’t dwell on them anymore. Think about what comes next.”
For things already settled, things already happened — don’t dwell on them anymore. Think about what comes next.
How many times had it been, in the moments when she could barely hold on, that Lin Fei had held her hand just like this, gathered her close, and whispered those exact words in her ear?