The Sickly Girl and the Border Town Fool - Chapter 4

Apprenticing with a carpenter was no easy thing.

I had seen Zhao Heng empty chamber pots for his master’s family and wait on them like a slave.

I thought of Yang Jiaoyue.

She was beautiful and clever, with a grasping mother and a penniless pedant for a father. Born into such a family, she would most likely have become a rich merchant’s concubine at sixteen.

Instead, she caught hold of Zhao Heng like a rope and hauled herself from the mire, changing her fate.

In a place like Apricot Blossom Alley, a girl dressing beautifully and attending an academy every day was a legend in itself.

That was how Yang Jiaoyue met the scholar who would place first in the imperial examinations.

Resting my chin on my hand, I asked Zhao Heng, “Why were you so good to her?”

He kept hammering, head lowered. “When I was little, I nearly starved to death in the snow. She fed me a bowl of mutton soup. Later, her mother promised Jiaoyue would marry me if I made something of myself. Her father was a poor scholar and they had little money, but she cried because she wanted to study. Then she cried because the other girls at the academy wore fine clothes. And so…”

“I see. So you don’t know why. You simply devoted yourself to her. Calling you a colossal fool seems perfectly fair.”

He glared at me, then looked bewildered. “I don’t know either! Every time I saw her, my brain turned to paste. Perhaps that was the thing they talk about in romances—the, the…”

He could not force out the word *love*. Blushing and stammering, he resorted to telling me that a little girl could not understand.

How innocent.

My legs had gone numb from crouching. I rose and shook them out.

Zhao Heng looked up at me, his eyes dark and bright.

Years of traveling with caravans had tanned him nearly black, blurring even his ruggedly handsome features. Only those eyes remained distinct—sincere, moving, and utterly clean.

“Wang Pan, I mean it,” he said. “I must go beyond the pass tomorrow. I’ll earn enough to send you to school. Then you can have a fine future like Yang Jiaoyue and marry a good man.”

I should have mocked him for being a fool addicted to raising girls.

But the words would not come. Something sour lodged in my chest.

I wiped the sweat from his forehead with my sleeve and casually invented a prophecy. “If you disobey me and insist on leaving the pass, you’ll die a violent death. With no one to care for me, I’ll be abducted by traffickers, taken south, and sold as a songstress. After endless abuse, I’ll die in tears.”

Zhao Heng’s face went white.

As I spoke, I even warbled a few notes in character.

Then I lowered my head, patted his cheek, and said tenderly, “We aren’t true family anyway. Go if you wish. Leave me alone to die sick and friendless in some far-off land. Isn’t that right, Brother?”

Five springs passed over the apricot trees at the mouth of the alley.

One day, as I walked beneath them, a golden apricot dropped into my arms. I took a bite. It was deliciously sweet.

Looking up at the branches, I decided to have Zhao Heng pick some after dinner.

We had missed them the year before. The miser from the tofu shop had taken more than half the fruit for himself, and the neighbors had been so furious that they boycotted his shop. Guilty, the owner made the apricots into preserves and delivered a few to every household.

By the time he reached me, only a few shriveled, sour pieces remained.

Zhao Heng chased him away, then took me to the pastry shop on East Street and bought several packets of the finest candied fruit.

Shopkeeper Wang laughed. “The moment Zhao Heng has a little spare money, he spends it on treats for you. That isn’t how a man raises a sister. It’s how he spoils a young wife.”

The remark struck Zhao Heng’s sorest spot.

His face darkened. “Stop talking nonsense! We swore before the City God. We are brother and sister!”

The shopkeeper did not want to provoke him.

But as we left, I heard him mutter, “Five years, and he still hasn’t forgotten Yang Jiaoyue. She’s been an official’s wife in the capital all this time.”

Zhao Heng stumbled and nearly fell.

He looked at me as if he wanted to say something.

I kept eating my candied fruit. Spotting a fish stall, I said, “Let’s buy a fish.”

“Eat, eat, eat! I nearly fell, and all you can think about is fish.”

I stared at him in confusion. What had set him off?

Scowling, he counted out his money and went to choose a fish. He was so fussy that Big Li, the fishmonger, lost patience.

“I know your wife likes them fat. This one. Take it!”

“She’s my sister! My sister!”

Big Li curled his lip.

Zhao Heng grew even more irritable. He carried the fish home in silence and banged every pot and utensil as he cooked.

After some thought, I went into the kitchen. “I know you stopped longing for Yang Jiaoyue long ago.”

His head snapped up. The corner of his mouth lifted. “Good. As long as you know.”

I popped a piece of candied fruit into his mouth.

He bumped my shoulder and mumbled, “Go wait outside. There’s too much smoke in here.”

I obediently left. A moment later, I heard him humming.

Whenever I thought about Zhao Heng, I could only sigh. His moods changed like a haunting.

Without realizing it, I had been standing at the alley entrance for a quarter of an hour.

I looked at the sky. Why was Zhao Heng not back yet? He usually returned from the barracks by now.

Right. He had stopped traveling beyond the pass with caravans years ago.

Five years earlier, I had forced him to study, learn his letters, and recover his health. Later, he joined the Northern Frontier Army.

Zhao Heng had a gift for commanding men. His early years had been spent fighting bandits for his life, and he knew every route beyond the pass. After several successful campaigns against them, he had risen to captain of a thousand.

As I peered down the street, one of his men came sprinting toward me in a panic.

He stopped, gasping. “Coroner Wang! Disaster! The captain is fighting the young master of the escort agency!”