“Why do you want to know?” Shao Qing finally said.
“You clearly suffer from some sort of...condition. You fumbled our bargain. I deserve to know why.”
Shao Qing looked at her. She couldn’t tell if he was thinking, or if his mind was merely blank.
“Fine.” He stood up slowly. “Let’s start walking.”
The two, still dripping wet, continued deeper into the trees.
Zhi Lan supposed the beginning would be a good place to start. Had he always been this way? She drew in a shaky breath. “What were the circumstances of your birth?”
Shao Qing glanced at her for a moment. She wondered if she had been too rude in her questioning before he finally spoke. “I was found in the back of a pleasure house. They say my mother was one of the courtesans there, but no one would claim me so I was sent to the orphanage as an infant.”
“Were you treated well there?” Zhi Lan ventured to ask. She wanted to keep him talking, terrified that he would revert back to an inanimate puppet like before.
He shook his head. “There was never enough to eat and we were put to work, harvesting silk from silkworms.”
Zhi Lan blinked rapidly, wiping the pond water out of her eyes. “I thought orphanages were supposed to take care of children until they were adopted.”
“Adoption is rare in Zhu City. Most prefer to raise their own. And the children who leave the orphanage with a guardian are likely to be servants...or worse.” He said all this without feeling. Zhi Lan was almost afraid of what else he was going to reveal.
“So you spent your childhood there?”
“Not all of it. I ran away.”
She nodded slowly. “Then you joined a band of thieves?”
“Not immediately.” His pale gaze slid to the red pouch in Zhi Lan’s hand, which she had held onto since Shao Qing never made a move to take it back. “I had a little sister, Su Su.”
Zhi Lan held her breath. So that was who he had been apologizing to in his sleep.
“She was found in the same place I was, three years after me. Perhaps we were blood-related, perhaps not. Either way, we had kinship, and we took to each other,” Shao Qing said. “Su Su had a sickly constitution. The winters in the orphanage were harsh, the rules were strict, and the hours we worked only made her worse. I knew she wouldn’t survive for long if we went on.”
“You ran away with her for her sake?” Zhi Lan asked gently.
“That was what I told myself. But it was a selfish decision. I ran away because I chafed under the rules, and I thought there were better things waiting for me. That I could feed and clothe us better than the orphanage could.”
“How old were you?”
“Thirteen.”
Mere children on the streets of an expansive city. Zhi Lan thought of her own childhood, of the fields and rolling hills, of the rivers and houses that held well-meaning adults and her own caring family. She had never been without protection or warmth when she was that young. Children were not meant to suffer so.
Zhi Lan fidgeted with the pouch in her hands, shivering. Her clothes were still wet, but their walking warmed her limbs. “How did you manage?”
Shao Qing shrugged. “We begged and we stole. It was difficult for me to find a respectable job—no one trusted a lone child. Without money, we slept on the streets. But I was too proud to go back to the orphanage. Su Su didn't want to return either...though, perhaps she was only humoring me.” He said all this with cold composure, as if the story didn’t affect him at all. “Eventually the proprietor of an herbalist shop took pity on me and let me be his errand boy. For a time I was making enough to feed Su Su and myself, though not enough for permanent shelter. I thought we were living grandly. Our stomachs were full, we slept under the stars, and we could go wherever we pleased.”
“That’s good,” Zhi Lan said softly.
“Su Su thought I was...” Shao Qing let out a mirthless laugh. “She thought I was her hero.”
“Of course. You rescued her from the orphanage and took care of her, like any good brother would.”
He did not disagree with her, but he didn’t look like he agreed, either. “My foolishness caught up with me. My employer was generous and often I ended the day with more coin than we needed to spend. Su Su was eager to help, so I let her keep our money safe while I worked.”
Shao Qing’s eyes slid to the red pouch in Zhi Lan’s hands. The accessory suddenly felt heavy.
“There were other boys on the street who decided we were easy targets. They took everything we had. Including Su Su’s life,” he said shortly. “I saw it happen but I was too afraid to stop them.”
