Chapter 88: Bonds and Betrayals (1/2)

The letter began with a question that stirred the embers of memory: where had Lin Ting found this portrait, and did its subject still walk among the living?

Years had passed since Li Jingqiu last saw the face in that painting, yet its features lingered in her mind like a half-forgotten dream.

His name was Ying Zhihe, a boy who had lived next door in her youth, their families bound by proximity but divided by discord.

He was a lean figure, all sharp angles and quiet resolve, consumed by a singular ambition: to pass the imperial exams.

Not for fame or wealth, he claimed, but to rise high enough to serve the people.

Those words, earnest and unyielding, had etched themselves into her memory, perhaps because they were so unlike anything she’d ever heard.

Li Jingqiu’s world was small, hemmed in by the walls of her family’s inner courtyard and shaped by her father’s merchant ways.

To her, life was a ledger of profit and loss.

Merchants chased silver, scholars chased titles—both, in her eyes, were after the same thing: a way to climb above the rest.

Ying Zhihe’s lofty talk of serving the people sounded like a pretty story, one she couldn’t bring herself to believe.

Their families, though neighbors, were oil and water.

Her parents sneered at the Ying household’s poverty, mocking Zhihe’s dreams as the delusions of a boy without prospects.

“No noble sons rise from humble homes,” they’d say, their words dripping with disdain for his endless studying, as if his books were a betrayal of practical sense.

His father’s failure to even secure the lowest scholarly rank only fueled their scorn; many in the neighborhood shared their doubts, dismissing Zhihe as a dreamer doomed to follow in his father’s obscure footsteps.

Yet Zhihe’s parents, unbowed, poured every coin they had into his studies, even if it meant selling their last possessions.

They, in turn, looked down on Li Jingqiu’s family, calling them frogs at the bottom of a well, blinded by the stench of their own coin.

Back then, her father was still scraping by, unable to afford a move to a better district, so the two families remained uneasy neighbors.

Their quarrels were a monthly spectacle, with smaller spats flaring every few days.

The air between them crackled with hostility.

In these clashes, Li Jingqiu’s parents always held the upper hand.

Zhihe’s parents, with their scholarly airs, wielded insults like “a disgrace to civility” or “beyond reason,” but their refined barbs were no match for the sharp tongues of merchants.

Li Jingqiu, though, found the arguments endlessly entertaining, lingering nearby to catch every word.

Zhihe was often there too, not to gawk like she did, but to plead with his parents to let the feud die.

She hadn’t thought much of him at first—just another boy, stubborn and strange.

But one day, she saw him, gaunt and hollow-cheeked, his body whittled down by hunger to save money for books and ink.

He looked fragile enough to be toppled by a breeze.

Moved by a rare impulse of kindness, she pressed a steamed bun into his hand.

He refused at first, his pride as stubborn as his dreams, but she was insistent, shoving the bun into his mouth with a grin.

He froze, wide-eyed, as if she’d done something unthinkable.

“You’re a year younger than me,” she said, her tone half-teasing, half-commanding.

“Call me Sister Jingqiu from now on. Do it, and I’ll give you another bun. Deal?”

He pulled the bun from his mouth, his silence stretching so long she nearly walked away.

But then, in a voice soft yet clear, he said, “Sister Jingqiu, thank you.”

The words carried a quiet sincerity that caught her off guard.

Delighted, she tossed him another bun, her grin widening.

He stood there, one hand clutching the bun, the other cradling a tattered book.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice low, “for what my parents say about your family.”

They’d called her household cold, obsessed with money, devoid of humanity.

She bit into her own bun, waving off his apology.

“My father calls your family useless. Let’s call it even.”

He took a slow, deliberate bite, eating with a grace that belied his hunger.

‘No rich man’s fate, but all the manners of one’, she thought.

Her gaze flicked to the book he held like a treasure.

“You read all day. Doesn’t it bore you?”

She could read, but those dense, cryptic texts made her eyes glaze over.

The thought of poring over them endlessly was unimaginable.

He smiled, a faint curve of his lips.

“Books show me things I’ve never known. I love them. How could they bore me?”

She studied him, then smirked.

“So you’re one of those bookworms the stories talk about?”

He didn’t bristle at the label, only brushed his fingers over the book’s worn cover.

“Confucius said, ‘If I hear the truth in the morning, I can die content by evening.’ That’s how I feel. Books hold truths worth learning.”

The quote sailed over her head, but his meaning landed.

She scoffed, “Your family’s so poor you probably can’t even scrape together the money to travel for the exams.”

“I’ll copy books for others,” he said calmly.

“That’ll earn me enough to get to the capital.”

She let out a skeptical “tch.”

“Copying books? You’d wear out your hand before you made enough.”

He said nothing, his silence like a wall.

Realizing she’d been too sharp, she backtracked.

“I’m not looking down on you. I’m just curious how you’ll manage.”

“I know,” he said, his tone even.

Still, guilt gnawed at her.

To shift the mood, she asked, “I’ve seen you studying late at night, no lamp, just moonlight. Aren’t you afraid you’ll ruin your eyes?”

He blinked, surprised.

“How do you know that?”

She explained that she often stayed late at her father’s shop, returning home in the dark.

Their courtyards were close, the dividing wall low enough to glimpse his yard, where she’d see him reading by the moon’s pale glow.

He nodded, understanding dawning.

“But why have I never noticed you coming back?”

She laughed, half-exasperated.

“You’re too lost in your books. I threw a pebble near your feet once, and you didn’t even flinch. I was starting to think your books were hiding gold.”

In truth, she’d wondered if he ignored her because she was a merchant’s daughter, unworthy of his notice.

He shook his head.

“They say there’s a ‘house of gold’ or ‘a beauty like jade’ in books. But that’s not what I seek. I want to pass the exams, become an official, and serve the people from a high place.”

She snorted, unconvinced.

“Keep dreaming. The officials I know are all crooks. Our county’s magistrates talk about serving us while pocketing our silver behind our backs.”

His face grew serious.

“That’s why someone needs to change things.”

She finished her bun, brushing crumbs from her hands, and gave him a sidelong glance.

“You sure think highly of yourself.”

He didn’t argue.

He knew words alone wouldn’t sway her—only deeds would prove his worth.

She turned to go.

“I’m heading home. Keep reading, bookworm.”

A few steps later, she paused and turned back.

“Why don’t you come to our shop at night to read? Help me move some things when you’re free, but otherwise, you can just study. It’s quiet when there’s no customers.”

The shop saw little business after dark, but her parents insisted she stay, citing her strength and fearlessness.

A shop needed light to function, so an oil lamp burned until closing—a light Zhihe could borrow for his books.

He hesitated, torn by their families’ feud.

“Is that all right?”

She grinned, already scheming to lighten her workload.

“Sure, just do a bit of work. And don’t let my parents or yours find out. It’s our secret.”

He bowed deeply, his gratitude plain.

“Sister Jingqiu, thank you.”

Unfamiliar with such courtesy, she waved it off with forced nonchalance.

“No need for that. We’re neighbors. Come tonight, and if anyone asks, say you’re buying something.”

And so, for two years, he called her “Sister Jingqiu” and read by the shop’s lamplight.

His quick thinking kept their secret safe.

Then, by a stroke of fortune, her father struck it rich, transforming from a struggling merchant to a man of wealth.

They moved away at once, and she never saw Ying Zhihe again.

Years later, as a married woman, she heard tales of his deeds as an official—honest, devoted, true to his word.

By then, she was Mistress Lin, wife of Master Lin the Third, with no desire to reconnect with the boy who’d once been her neighbor.

To reminisce about old times risked the accusation of chasing influence; in the end, they were but fleeting figures in each other’s stories.

In her letter, Li Jingqiu poured out her memories of Ying Zhihe, then turned her pen to a scathing rebuke of her daughter, Lin Ting.

Page after page brimmed with indignation—how could Lin Ting, her own flesh and blood, fail to mention her journey to Ancheng with Duan Ling?

The news had reached Li Jingqiu only through Madam Feng’s gossip, long after Lin Ting had left.

Her tirade climaxed with a sharp command: return to the capital at once.

Almost as an afterthought, she added a curt request for Lin Ting to pass her regards to Duan Ling.

Lin Ting’s eyes raced over the letter, devouring its contents in moments.

She thrust the pages into Duan Ling’s hands.

“My mother knows Ying Zhihe.”

Her mind churned, piecing together fragments from the past.

During the capital’s plague, Ta Xuening had sent men to watch over them—not out of malice, but to shield them from sickness.

Could Ta Xuening be Ying Zhihe?

Was his concern for her marriage rooted in his old acquaintance with her mother?

It seemed excessive for a mere neighborly connection.

Perplexed, Lin Ting frowned.

Duan Ling, ever swift, had already reached the letter’s final page.

“What’s your plan?” he asked, his voice steady.

She spread her hands, dismissive.

“It’s my mother who knows him, not me. I’ve no ties to him, so there’s nothing to do.”

Her curiosity about Ta Xuening’s motives—why he’d watched them, whether he was truly Ying Zhihe—stemmed solely from a daughter’s worry for her mother’s safety.

Now, certain he posed no threat to Li Jingqiu, Lin Ting felt a weight lift from her shoulders.

Duan Ling disposed of the letter with his usual calm and shifted to practical matters.

“Let’s head to the yamen.”

Lin Ting dug in her heels and said, “I’d rather sleep at home today, not at the yamen.”