“I think it’ll have whatever you like.”
Su Su sighed dreamily. “I can’t wait.”
Shao Qing mussed her hair and told her to go to sleep. She had curled herself against him, her breathing soft and even as she dreamed about great heroes with inordinately long arms. Shao Qing spent the rest of the night wide awake, anxiety roiling in his gut, wondering if they would make enough coin to eat tomorrow.
Now it seemed that his made up hero Mu Chen had taken the form of Magistrate Li and his father. Shao Qing had been swept into a giant mansion that had everything he could ever want. Yet he could not share any of it with Su Su, who had believed the story with all her heart.
It was a cruel joke.
Some days Shao Qing fell back into numbness. It was a different sort than what he had been used to. This numbness was bitter and persistent, like a dull ache from an old wound, muffled yet acute. It hurt to inhale. It hurt to pretend everything was fine when it hadn’t been for so long.
His parents threw him worried glances. His mother visited him daily, wishing to get to know him even when Shao Qing barely knew himself.
He did learn more about her, though. She liked wisteria flowers, hated embroidery, and preferred her bird’s nest soup atrociously sweet. His father Wen Jun, true to his name, was studious and handsome. He was soft-spoken and liked to watch birds in the garden, often referring to a book with illustrations of different bird species.
The sparrow on the first page reminded Shao Qing of Zhi Lan.
It seemed the only times he wasn’t numb or in pain, it was when he was thinking about her. During the days he would replay the conversations they had, smile at the things she had said to him and cringe at some of the things he had said to her. Some nights he grew unbearably warm, his body stiff with wanting, until he coaxed himself to climax with the memory of their kiss. He’d fall asleep, dazed and flushed. Shao Qing had thought pleasures of the flesh were not to his taste, but this was different from the night of false intimacy with the faceless courtesan. He knew Zhi Lan. He knew how kind and passionate and generous she was—he knew her soul.
And he missed her.
Two months passed. When Shao Qing was well enough to leave his room, his father began teaching him how to read. Whether he was horrified that his son barely recognized ten characters in all, he didn’t show it. Instead he demonstrated the proper way to hold a brush and the six basic strokes that constituted a character. He read him classic books, folktales, and poems. There was an eager earnestness to Wen Jun. He treated Shao Qing gently, as if he were still the infant boy who had been spirited away. Shao Qing did not inherit his father’s love of study, but he applied himself nonetheless, practicing his writing and listening attentively when Wen Jun read. He found that he did not want to let his father down.
When Shao Qing had learned enough characters, he composed a letter to the newly appointed magistrate of Zhu City, requesting him to look into the city’s orphanages. He was sure they had not ceased their exploitative practices since he had left. Shao Qing felt more at peace when the letter was received, knowing that for now, he had done what little he could for the neglected orphans.
Some weeks after the summer solstice, Shao Qing and his father sat beneath the pavilion that overlooked the pond, in the middle of one of their lessons.
“Are you happy here, son?” Wen Jun asked.
Shao Qing was copying a sheet of characters. He paused his brush, a drop of ink splashing over his work. He had made his brush too wet again. “I’m content, Father,” he said.
“I know you left a life behind,” Wen Jun said. “It is not our...it is not my intention to isolate you.”
Shao Qing had only left the manor once since he arrived. A servant had gone with him all the way to the bamboo forest in Zhu City, laden with incense and a basket of perfectly ripened peaches. Shao Qing had knelt in a clearing and made a mound of dirt and fallen bamboo leaves, withdrawing a small wooden spirit tablet he had carved himself and sticking it into the grave. He arranged the peaches before it, then burned the incense, its fragrant smoke curling and dissipating in the air. Three times he kowtowed, his forehead touching the earth where he and Su Su had lain under the stars all those years ago. His tears wet the ground—as potent an offering as wine.
Shao Qing had been selfish in his grief. But now, he vowed to provide for her in the afterlife, something he’d failed to do when they were both living, and hoped that her soul would be at peace.
When he returned, Shao Qing felt that he could breathe again. He never ventured out since. After all, where was there to go? There was food and clothing and shelter inside.
“It wasn’t much of a life,” Shao Qing told his father. He thought back to his days on the streets, then his days with Yao’s gang. He’d spent most of it in squalor, numb to almost everything. The heists were the only high points he could remember. Sometimes he missed Yao and the others for their banter, but he didn’t mind his newfound peace.
With his soul back, the quiet life at the Li manor was more interesting than anything Shao Qing had ever experienced. He had forgotten there was a whole spectrum of colors to see. He felt the wind acutely on his skin. There were notes of earth and forest in the air. And the willow trees seemed to sing when a breeze blew by, its boughs swaying like the hem of a silk skirt. He wondered if this was how Zhi Lan saw the world in her artist’s rapture.
“That painter girl. Do you think of her?” Wen Jun said.
Shao Qing shifted uncomfortably. Where his thoughts strayed regarding Zhi Lan was not exactly something he wanted to share with his father.
“You are allowed to have visitors, son. As long as they’re the respectable sort.”
Shao Qing nodded once and returned to his writing. If there was one thing he missed about being a thief, it was his freedom. Respectability had been far from his thoughts—a bothersome thing for the nobility. He found that he chafed under such considerations now.
After a moment of silence, Wen Jun finally said, “I’ve taken the liberty of inviting her and her master.”
Shao Qing looked up at this. “Father, I—”
“They will be arriving today. Very shortly, if I’m not mistaken.” A slight smile turned up the corners of his mouth, making him look several years younger. “I have a previous commitment. I trust you’ll handle things.”
Shortly? How short was shortly?
