As the carriage sped away, Jiang Yuyao could clearly see the dilapidated plaque at the entrance of the alley, "Chansibo Mansion." A yellowed seal covered the peeling paint on the door, and the courtyard was overgrown with weeds. It was a far cry from the glory of the days when her grandfather was the Minister of Rites.
"Miss!" Madam Liao rushed out from the corner door, her fingers black with stove ash. "This old servant has made barley porridge."
"Get out of here!" Jiang Yuyao pushed her aside and rushed into the main hall. On the spiderweb-covered altar sat the tablet of her biological mother, its gilded paint already fading. She suddenly grabbed the tablet and smashed it against the window frame, "It's all your fault! If only you had been more capable back then."
Amidst the flying wood splinters, she caught a glimpse of a half-broken piece of letter peeking out from the bottom of her dressing table. It was a secret letter from the Third Prince of Beidi last month, inviting her to meet him at the Qixi Lantern Festival.
As dusk fell, Jiang Yuyao sketched the distant mountains in the mirror. The bronze mirror captured the sneer on her lips—since the Yongding Marquisate was unkind, don't blame her for sending Xinyi Zigu a generous gift. Tomorrow, Qixi Festival, she would make it known throughout the capital that the Fourth Prince's wife was a Northern Di spy.
Jiang Yuyao paused before the mottled vermilion-lacquered gate of the Chansibo Mansion, where copper bells tinkled in the autumn breeze. She gazed at the dusty gilded plaque on the door lintel, her nails digging deep into her palms. Three months ago, the imperially bestowed plaque reading "Protecting the Country Duke's Mansion" hung here.
"Miss, do you want to knock on the door?" the accompanying maid asked softly, holding the brocade box.
"Go back." Jiang Yuyao turned, her pomegranate-red skirt brushing against the bluestone steps, startling a few graybirds pecking at their food. She didn't want to see the man who had cost her her status as a daughter of a noble family, and she didn't want to be associated with this unlucky family.
"Yuyao! It's really you!"
A tearful call shattered the dusk. Liao Xianxian, holding up her gray skirt, squeezed out from the crack of the door, a silver hairpin askew in her hair. She pounced on her in the street and threw her arms around her neck: "I've been waiting for you for three days!"
Jiang Yuyao staggered, the scent of soap nuts mixed with cooking oil lingering in her nose. She frowned and pushed Liao Xianxian away, only then seeing that her once white and tender palm was now red and swollen. "What's wrong with you?"
"It's all Madam Xu's fault!" Liao Xianxian sobbed, wiping her tears. "She said that since you acknowledged your biological father, you should move all the things in Weiyang Garden to the Bo Mansion. Now I'm stuck in the middle of nowhere. Even the laundry maid dares to order me around!" She shook her blistered fingertips. "Smell it, my hands are full of the smell of soapberry!"
Jiang Yuyao caught a glimpse of the maids' snickering eyes and angrily shook off her hand: "The Fourth Prince's Mansion is not an orphanage. You and Songyi have been sisters since childhood, why don't you ask her for help?"
"If I can persuade you." Liao Xianxian stammered while twisting her belt, and suddenly heard the sound of wooden clogs shuffling from inside the door.
Xia Zhiyu came out, her round belly in her hand. A mahogany hairpin stuck askew in her hair, and a gold bracelet on her wrist looked out of place against her coarse cloth skirt. She stared at the golden phoenix hairpin inlaid with silk thread on Jiang Yuyao's temples and said with a smile, "Since the concubine has arrived at the door, are you leaving without paying your respects to father?"
"Let go!" Jiang Yuyao shook off her sticky hand, only to find two rough servants blocking her escape route. Xia Zhiyu dragged her toward the door, nearly tripping over the threshold and causing her pearl-embroidered shoes to fall off.
Upon entering the courtyard, Jiang Yuyao was choked by the musty odor, forcing her to cover her nose. The holes in the window paper in the main hall let in a cold draft. The eight-immortals table was missing a leg and propped up with bricks. Only the imperial sword hanging on the wall offered a glimpse of its former glory.
"Yuyao!" The hoarse male voice startled the sparrows under the eaves.
Jiang Yuyao turned her head and almost failed to recognize the man chopping wood - Hao Ren's messy hair was covered with grass debris, and his fat body was wrapped in a coarse linen short shirt. Where was the demeanor of a Confucian general when he was the Protector of the Country and held the military command?
"Dad doesn't even have money to buy wine now." Hao Ren rubbed his hands together and came closer, rubbing the calloused palms against her gold-woven cuffs. "I heard that you are favored by the Fourth Prince. Can you please come?"
"Who's your daughter?" Jiang Yuyao flinched back, her back bumping into the tilted rosewood antique display case. The dusty enamel vase shook and shattered at her feet.
Hao Ren's face suddenly changed, and he raised his hand and slapped her: "How dare you, little bitch, show off to me! If I hadn't switched you with the daughter of the Marquis Mansion, would you have been able to wear silk and satin for more than ten years?"
Jiang Yuyao stumbled, holding onto the doorframe. Her left cheek burned with pain. She stared at the reflection of a golden hairpin swaying in the broken porcelain on the floor, and suddenly remembered the jade hairpin Hao Ren had given her when she was 15 years old—the time he'd hidden behind the rockery and quietly called her "good girl."
"It's all for you and your sister!" Hao Ren picked up an axe and chopped it down on the woodblock, sending wood chips flying onto Jiang Yuyao's skirt. "Your mother said you were destined to be a phoenix, so I risked my life to help you! And what's the result? You're a money-loser who didn't even give me a winter coat!"
Xia Zhiyu leaned against the porch pillar, eating melon seeds, and sneered at the words: "What phoenix destiny? Do you think you are the queen in the storybook?"
"You know shit!" Hao Ren kicked over the bamboo basket with red eyes. "Master Yuantong himself did it back then."
"Master, be careful with your words!" the maid holding the wash basin suddenly interrupted with a sharp voice, her cloudy eyes glancing towards the west wall. Only then did everyone notice the tip of a black robe brushing against the top of a locust tree—the guards from the East Depot were recording words and actions on the wall.
Jiang Yuyao felt a chill run down her spine. She certainly remembered that rainy night when Aunt Liao had held her hand and sworn in front of the Guanyin statue, "I'll trade thirty years of my life for a phoenix coronet and a bridal robe for you. I must have it."
"Concubine?" Xia Zhiyu suddenly pulled her sleeve. "Since you're here, why not take a look at your boudoir?" She deliberately emphasized the word "boudoir" and led Jiang Yuyao through the corridor overgrown with weeds.
The moment she pushed open the door of the wing room, Jiang Yuyao's pupils suddenly shrank - her mother-of-pearl dressing box was lying wide open on the earthen kang, and the gauze curtains were torn by mice. The most eye-catching thing was that the painting "Hundreds of Sons and Thousands of Grandchildren" was still hanging on the wall. Aunt Liao had said that this was the proof of her "Phoenix Fate".
"The sedan chair coming to pick up the Fourth Prince's mansion has arrived!" the doorman suddenly shouted.
Jiang Yuyao ran out as if she had been pardoned, her skirt in hand. She ignored Hao Ren's curses and Liao Xianxian's cries behind her, and only realized her palms were bleeding from being pinched by her fingernails after she got into the sedan chair.
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