She once believed no one but he could make her happy again. She once thought she had loved to the limit and would never love again. She once imagined herself shattered beyond repair, appearing alive but long dead inside.
Yet ultimately, she discovered that with enough time to wash away the past, year after year eroding old memories, the hidden parts would resurface. They seemed unfamiliar, like a previous life, now seeming too unreal.
So when her withered life suddenly blossomed with a familiar brilliance—a brilliance that even she found unreal—she couldn't help but feel afraid.
The sun climbed higher, and her feet grew numb from crouching. Yi Xiao lazily shook her mud-covered hairpin. She needed to move around to restore circulation. She decided to stay outside a while longer. No matter how vast and grand the pavilion was, it felt suffocating. Sitting idly indoors was even more torturous.
"Fu Yi Xiao!"
Feng Suige's furious voice thundered like lightning, startling her. She turned toward the sound, only to see a pair of eyes blazing with anger so intense it was almost unrecognizable.
"Why are you shouting so loud? Are you trying to get yourself killed?" Before Yi Xiao could finish scolding, Feng Suige had already charged over like a thunderbolt, yanking her up from the ground.
Her vision darkened. Her feet felt unsteady. Her wrist hurt—his grip was bone-crushing. But Feng Suige kept dragging her forward, heedless of her stumbling. After a good distance, Yi Xiao finally regained her senses, realizing she had been pulled out of the flower garden entirely.
Feng Suige's grip on her arm was so tight it felt like he might crush her bones. Yi Xiao gathered herself and started cursing, "Feng Suige, let go of me! What's wrong with you now?!"
Feng Suige suddenly stopped and turned to look at her, his jaw clenched. "You'd better think of a good explanation before we get inside," he said through gritted teeth. "Otherwise..."
He didn't finish. Ignoring her punches and kicks, he dragged her forward.
Several maids hurriedly approached. "Greetings, Prince, greetings—"
"Get lost!" Feng Suige roared. "All of you, get far away. Not a single person is allowed near."
He kicked open the door and threw Yi Xiao inside. She stumbled and steadied herself against the bed, then turned back to glare at Feng Suige, who had already closed the door. He stood with his back to her for a moment, then suddenly chuckled softly.
"Well, did I scare you?"
"You're just a senseless lunatic," Yi Xiao fumed. "You've gone mad and want to drag others into your madness!"
"Yi Xiao," Feng Suige released the door latch and walked to the table, sitting down and wearily rubbing his brow. "I'm really tired. Sing a song for me, will you?"
Yi Xiao, still angry, put her hands on her hips and sneered, "I'm afraid you've come to the wrong place. This is the Prince's manor, not some brothel. Do you want to hear a song? Too bad, I don't know how!"
"You're lying to me." Feng Suige's eyes blazed. "I've heard you sing before. Last time, you sang for me on the street."
Yi Xiao glanced at him. "You've heard it once. That should be enough. Why ask for more?"
"Please sing," Feng Suige said gently—so gently it made her guard slip. "Just this once. If you don't want to sing after this, I won't force you."
"Lunatic," Yi Xiao muttered, but she sat down at the table. "You said it. Just this once."
"Mm," Feng Suige nodded. "Just once."
Yi Xiao pulled out her hairpin and lightly tapped the empty teacup on the table, producing a clear, tinkling sound. She began to sing—a song about separation and longing, about waiting through seasons, about the unbearable ache of love that cannot be expressed.
Her voice was haunting, tender, filled with layers of pain that made the room itself seem to hold its breath.
When she finished, Feng Suige sat with his eyes closed, tears glistening at the corners. And when he spoke, his voice was different—softer, rawer. "Don't put on this act in front of me. It only makes me sick."
The words fell like stones into still water.
Yi Xiao looked up, dazed. His face had gone cold again, twisted with something that looked like disdain. The gentle man from moments before seemed like her own delusion.
"Sick?" Yi Xiao unconsciously repeated.
Feng Suige leaned forward, his voice dropping to something dangerous. "Yes, sick. Ping Ling. Xue Ying. Hong Yan. Yi Xiao—are you going to say you don't remember?"
Fu Yi Xiao sat there silently for a long time. Suddenly, she smiled—a forced thing, a weapon. "So you went to Ping Ling. What did you hear?"
Please, say something to me. Do something to me. The crueler the better. Dispel all the faint stirrings that have just risen in my heart. Don't let me harbor hope and illusions about you.
"Do I need to spell it out?" Feng Suige could no longer contain himself. His heart ached so much it almost convulsed, and his voice trembled uncontrollably. "Don't you know what you've done?! Do I have to name them for you to remember?!"
"Them?" Yi Xiao's forced smile grew fainter as she repeated the word.
Hearing this, Feng Suige furiously pounded the table and stood up, pacing the room like a caged beast. Suddenly, he stopped and pointed at her, his finger shaking with rage. "Are you playing dumb? You know what I'm talking about!!"
"I truly have no idea," Yi Xiao said with deliberate calm, looking at him provocatively. "What is Prince Feng worried about? Why not speak plainly? Who exactly are 'they'?"
Feng Suige was almost driven mad with anger. He forced out a few words through clenched teeth, each one a blade: "Your... paramours!"
With a crack, the teacup shattered in Yi Xiao's hand.
The spilled tea mixed with fresh blood, soaking a large patch of the embroidered tablecloth. Feng Suige's body lurched forward, then forcibly stopped. He made himself ignore her dilating pupils and the painful expression within them. He forced himself to disregard the strands of sympathy rising in his own heart.
"What's this, playing the victim?"
Yi Xiao didn't speak. Her indifferent expression, in Feng Suige's enraged eyes, had only one meaning—admission. Blinded by anger, he couldn't see the budding hope gradually withering in her gaze.
Yi Xiao wanted to give Feng Suige a contemptuous smile—but at some point, clouds had obscured the sunlight. With a flash of lightning and the following rumble of thunder, the smile froze on her lips.
Her tightly clenched, bleeding hand suddenly pounded her chest heavily.
Something in her heart instantly broke free from its restraints, surging forth in a moment, filling her to the point of overflowing and tearing open.
Was it because of his existence that she suffered such unbearable pain?
It was like a dream she once had. When she woke from the dream, her entire body was covered in wounds—inside and out, scarred all over. The physical injuries could heal, but the holes in her heart oozed pus and blood day and night. In those years, every time she opened her eyes in the night, they were hollow and tearless.
She had thought those wounds had healed. But unfortunately, thinking so was just that—only thinking.
And now, standing in the rain that had begun to fall outside his window, she understood the terrible truth: the wounds hadn't healed. They had only been dormant, waiting for someone to reach inside her chest and tear them open all over again.
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