Chapter 14: A New Arrival

The days passed. Every few days, Chenxue summoned Yanfan on one pretext or another. The tea had gone cold, the flowers had wilted, a lantern under the eaves hung crooked—she could always find a reason to scold him. After the scolding, he stayed.

Sometimes they were in her room, sometimes the study. Once they even went to the attic where old furniture was stored. As Yanfan protected her back, he muttered that there was too much dust and he would need a cleaning surcharge next time. She slapped his forehead.

She paid him in spirit stones, though they argued before every payment. He insisted on being paid according to his work; she insisted that the amount was whatever she said it was. They could go from price to his attitude, then from his attitude to how future appointments should be made. In the end, she always settled the matter with, “One more word and I’ll deduct everything.”

However fiercely they argued, two days later she would turn up near the west courtyard again, her eyes drifting toward the woodpile.

Qiutang grew accustomed to it. One bowl of mung-bean soup became two, then she switched to snow-fungus soup because she thought her mistress had too much inner heat lately and needed cooling down. She chose not to ask where that heat came from.

Song grew accustomed to it too. Whenever he saw the young miss returning from the west courtyard, he automatically took another path, muttering, “I saw nothing.” Later, however, he would add two pieces of meat to Yanfan’s dinner and pat his shoulder. “Eat more. Build up your strength…”

At times Chenxue even thought the dream might truly have been only a dream. Perhaps she lived in an ordinary world with no all-conquering hero and no death beneath his hand, only a stingy man under the trees who held her while talking endlessly about money.

Then came that evening.

She had finished dinner with her parents and was passing the outer wall of the west courtyard when she saw Yanfan standing near the moon gate. A basket of chopped wood rested on his shoulder, ready for the kitchen, but his feet were rooted to the ground. He was watching a man speaking to Steward Song nearby.

The stranger wore a faded gray jacket. His square jaw and dark, weathered skin made him look like an ordinary hired laborer. He bowed respectfully as he spoke to Song, his voice too low to hear from a distance. Song checked a register and pointed toward the rear storeroom. The man bowed again and went that way.

Everything appeared normal. Yet Yanfan remained still, tracking the gray-clad man with a slight frown. Only after three long breaths, when the man rounded the storeroom wall, did he look away.

From the corner of the corridor, Chenxue had seen his expression clearly. Her heart dropped. She had seen that look in her dream on the night before he left the Yu Estate: calm, alert, as though he had sensed danger approaching.

She gripped her sleeve. “Who is that?”

Qiutang followed her gaze and caught sight of the stranger disappearing around the wall. “Oh, him. Song said he was hired a few days ago. His surname is Sun; I think he’s called Sun Da. A shipment of spiritual materials came into the storeroom, and there weren’t enough hands, so Song hired temporary workers to move it.”

“A new laborer?” Chenxue frowned. “Don’t we have enough servants? Why hire outsiders?”

“Don’t you remember, Miss? Last month you thought Old Madam Liu was too slow sweeping the rear courtyard and sent her to the laundry. Xiao Li took leave to visit his family, and the kitchen is short-handed too. Song mentioned it twice, and Madam said the storeroom only needed help temporarily, so he could hire workers until Xiao Li returned.”

She added, “Sun Da has been here three or four days. He works honestly enough and doesn’t talk much.”

Three or four days. Chenxue counted silently. She hadn’t gone near the west courtyard much lately. The last time she had summoned Yanfan was three days ago in the study. For once he hadn’t haggled with her. She had thought he was finally behaving, but now his silence seemed more like someone preoccupied.

“Let’s go.” She turned back, walking much more slowly than before.

Qiutang noticed the sudden change in her mood. Without asking questions, she quickened her steps and moved ahead of her mistress.