Batu shoved another small parcel of honey-preserved apricots into Xi Yu’s hand, grinning as he finished speaking, then melted back into the crowd—his goat-herding stick accidentally poking the hem of someone’s robe beside him.
According to Suo custom, at a royal betrothal feast, the newly pledged couple were to receive blessings from guests before the first bonfire.
Chieftains from various tribes came forward one by one, each offering a word of blessing and toasting with a bowl of wine.
Helu Xiong was the first to step up. He’d changed into a clean robe today, but his sleeves were still rolled to his elbows, revealing his thick, sun-browned forearms.
He swirled his bowl of mare’s milk wine in a circle through the air.
“Long and lasting—and most importantly, stop getting up in the middle of the night to sharpen your blade. It keeps your uncle awake.”
“Can’t do it.”
Que Zhi took the wine bowl, the corner of his mouth curving almost imperceptibly in the shadow of the fire.
“You little—!” Helu Xiong burst out laughing and gave him a hearty smack on the back of the head, hard enough that the people nearby gasped. But Que Zhi didn’t even budge.
Batu’s father had also come. He’d traveled a full day from the Helian tribe just to attend this betrothal feast.
He didn’t speak Han Chinese, so Batu translated beside him, stumbling through the words: “My father says—congratulations. Did you finish the dried meat? He asks if you’ve finished it, he’ll send more.”
“Not yet,” Xi Yu replied with a smile as he took the wine bowl. “But almost.”
Several old guard commanders, the master who’d taught Que Zhi mounted archery, and a centurion who’d once shared drinks with him at the border all came forward in turn, each carrying a bowl of mare’s milk wine.
Que Zhi had an excellent tolerance for alcohol, but he only took the tiniest sip from each bowl—at an occasion like this, he’d have to remain standing until the bonfires burned down, and no one pressed him to drink more.
Xi Yu, however, had his wrist stopped by Que Zhi just as he reached for the fruit wine bowl that Helu Xiong handed him. “Fruit wine is still wine. You’re only allowed one bowl today.”
Xi Yu looked down at the hand holding his wrist, then up at Que Zhi. “You’re already starting to manage me.”
“Mm.” Que Zhi took the fruit wine bowl and drank it for him.
Helu Xiong watched from the side, shaking his head, and remarked to the old Khan: “This kid used to not even listen to you out on the hunting grounds. Now look at him—obedient as can be.”
The old Khan held his wine bowl and replied unhurriedly: “What he obeys is not the words, but the person.”
The feast continued late into the night.
The bonfires slowly burned low, the long chants shifted to a slower melody, young women dozed off against haystacks, and a few old guards still sat by the embers playing drinking games, their voices growing increasingly slurred.
Batu had fallen asleep leaning against Halbala, though the goat remained awake, quietly chewing its cud, occasionally bleating toward the fire—as if keeping watch in its master’s place.
Xi Yu sat on the grass, leaning against Que Zhi’s shoulder, still clutching the bundle of blue flowers.
Tucked among the blooms was the parcel of honey-preserved apricots Batu had given him. He unwrapped the oil paper, ate one, fed another to Que Zhi, then tilted his head back to look at the stars.
“It’s different here from the Gobi,” he said. “The stars on the Gobi are cold. Here, the stars feel like bonfires—warm.”
“It’s the same sky.”
“Not the same.”
He rested his head on Que Zhi’s shoulder, his voice dropping very soft. “The Gobi sky only had me. This sky has you.”
After the betrothal feast, the days suddenly slowed down.
Waking in the morning, the poplar leaves outside the window had begun to turn yellow. A thin layer of frost coated the edge of the stone well in the courtyard, melting as the sun rose, turning into fine droplets clinging to the well rope.
The kitchen stove never went out, day or night. The smoke curling from the chimney carried the mingled scent of mutton fat and dry poplar wood—a smell that, once you’d breathed it long enough, felt like home.
Xi Yu noticed he’d gained a little weight.
Not the kind you could see at a glance, but each morning when he tied his belt, the sash needed to be loosened by half a finger’s width more than before.
When he told Que Zhi about this discovery, Que Zhi was squatting in the yard brushing the black horse’s mane. He looked up at the words, his gaze traveling from Xi Yu’s face to his waist and back again, then said, “Still too thin.”
Xi Yu leaned against the doorframe, holding the now-empty bowl of goat’s milk, and shot back with utter confidence: “You said I was too thin back in that border town too. I was thin then. I’m not thin now. If I get any fatter, these clothes won’t fit.”
“If they don’t fit, we’ll have new ones made.” Que Zhi stood up, set the brush by the bucket, shook the water from his hands, and as he passed by, casually pressed down the stray tufts of hair that had stuck up from sleep.
The old cook in the kitchen was the first to notice the change.
He’d worked in the royal court for thirty years—cooking for the old Khan’s father, then the old Khan himself, and now for the young master.
In the past, cooking for Que Zhi was simple: plenty of meat, thick flatbread, and rich broth would do. The young master never cared about flavor.
Now there was the young master’s promised partner—someone with a light palate, a sweet tooth, a distaste for grease, who took honey in his goat’s milk and fermented cream on his flatbread.
The old cook varied the menu every morning—melon chunks drizzled with fermented cream one day, raspberries tossed with honey the next, dried apricot and millet porridge the day after.
His apprentice asked why he’d suddenly grown so particular. The old cook tapped his pipe against the stove and said, “You wouldn’t understand.
The young master’s partner finishes every meal—not a single grain of rice left in the bowl. A cook can’t stand seeing food left behind. The cleaner he eats, the more you want to make him something even better.”
And every time Xi Yu brought his empty bowl back to the kitchen, he’d leave a small bundle of dried fruit or a few pieces of toffee on the counter, saying they were for the kitchen staff to share.
He never came empty-handed, and he never took anyone’s service for granted.
The old horse-trainer at the stables also took a liking to him.
Xi Yu had been learning to ride for an entire autumn, and he still wasn’t very good at it.
Not for lack of effort—he genuinely had no talent for it. He kept forgetting to step into the stirrups when mounting, and the black horse had stepped on his toes twice. The bruise from the second time still hadn’t faded.
The old trainer said he’d worked at the stables half his life and had never seen such a hopeless student. Central Plains folk probably just weren’t built for riding.
But every time he said that, he’d still hand Xi Yu the reins, help him onto the horse’s back, and lead the animal along at a slow walk.
Because Xi Yu always brought food whenever he came to the stables—sometimes fresh flatbread from the kitchen, sometimes honey-preserved apricots from the market, sometimes dried mutton that Batu had brought from the Helian tribe.
Xi Yu would shove the food into the old trainer’s hands, say, “I’ll be troubling you again today,” and then go fetch the horse on his own.
The old trainer, chewing on dried meat, mumbled to his apprentice beside him: “This kid could stay hopeless his whole life, for all I care. I’m not retiring anytime soon.”
Even the guards at the palace gate had grown used to his presence.
When he’d first arrived at the royal court, the guards would give him a second look—this scholar from the Central Plains, with a face far too handsome, that thin flush at the corners of his eyes as if painted on, and his right sleeve missing a strip of fabric, fluttering empty as he walked. They’d heard he was the young master’s guest.
Now, when the guards saw him approaching from a distance, they’d push open the palace gate in advance and ask, “Is the young master heading to the market or the stables today?”
Xi Yu always stopped to answer—sometimes the market, sometimes the stables, sometimes just to check if the old woman at the city wall had any new melons at her stall.
Once, Batu asked Xi Yu if he missed home. It took him a beat to realize Batu meant the Central Plains.
Xi Yu leaned against the old poplar tree and was quiet for a moment. “I never had a home before.”
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