Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Bitao wasn’t dead.

At dusk on the third day, she came back on her own.

She was dressed in a dusty gray work outfit, her hair soaked through by the rain, and there was a bloody cut across her face.

When I saw her, she was kneeling outside the Pei Mansion, holding an oil-paper bundle in both hands.

“Miss.”

The moment she opened her mouth, her tears fell first.

I walked over. I didn’t let anyone help her up. I only asked, “Who are you?”

Bitao raised her head and looked at me.

That face was still familiar.

Round eyes, thin lips, and two very shallow dimples when she smiled.

But the way she looked at me was different from before.

In the past, she had always been cautious, as if she were afraid I might bump into something, and also afraid I might notice something.

Now she knelt there like someone who had finally reached the end of what she could bear.

“My real name is Liu Fuyi.”

My fingertips tightened.

Liu.

The “Shen Zhaoning” who had been killed on North Mountain three years ago had also been surnamed Liu.

Bitao opened the oil-paper bundle. Inside was half a jade pendant.

“The one who died back then was my elder sister, Liu Fuchun.”

She was trembling from crying, but every word came out clear.

“After my sister took that arrow for you, the Shen Family was afraid of trouble, so they buried her as you. I entered the Shen Family because I wanted to find out how my sister died.”

My mind roared.

So the person who had stayed by my side all these years had never been a simple maid.

She had combed my hair, brewed my medicine, and secretly slipped me pastries when my legitimate mother punished me by making me kneel.

And every year, on the day of the autumn hunt, she stood guard beside my bed for an entire night.

I had thought she was afraid I would have nightmares.

She had been watching over me on her sister’s behalf.

I asked, “Then why did you run last night?”

Bitao looked toward Pei Yanzhi.

“Someone sent me a letter saying Lord Pei knew my sister’s body had been switched back then, but for the sake of his own career, he never overturned the case.”

Pei Yanzhi’s expression did not change.

But I turned to look at him.

“Is it true?”

He answered, “It is.”

The room fell deathly silent.

Bitao froze, seeming not to have expected him to admit it so quickly.

Pei Yanzhi said, “I was only nineteen then. My father had just died, and the entire Pei family was under investigation. I obtained half a page of the account book, and I knew there was something wrong with the corpse, but I did not have the ability to drag the case back into the light.”

His voice was very calm, as if he were speaking of someone else’s affairs.

But I saw the back of his hand beneath his sleeve, the veins pulled taut.

“That was why I set up her memorial tablet in the Pei family.”

He looked at Bitao.

“I would not dare call it atonement. I was only afraid that one day, there would be no one left who even remembered she had died.”

Bitao’s lips trembled.

All at once, I did not know what to say.

It was easy to hate someone.

But hating someone who had also failed to save the person he wanted to save was not nearly so satisfying.

Bitao pushed the oil-paper bundle in front of me.

“Miss, this is the other half of the account book my sister hid before she died.”

I lowered my head to look.

There was blood on the corners of the account book, but the writing was still clear.

The final line read: The Pass and Defense Documents for the illegal transport of ironware are hidden beneath the floor tiles of the Shen Ancestral Hall.

My heart sank bit by bit.

The Shen Family Ancestral Hall.

The place where I had knelt for ten years.

So it had not been punishment.

It had been guarding.