The Golden Hairpin

She suddenly realized that amidst the turmoil of these past few days, she hadn’t thought of him even once. It was as if he had already slipped from her life like the breeze that had just brushed past her ear, forever lost in the distance, never to return to her side again.

She herself was surprised—why, in the deepest recesses of her consciousness, had she never considered him her support?

Perhaps, from the moment he had presented the love letters she had personally written as evidence of her crimes to Fan Yingxi, the military governor, during her most desperate hour, everything between them had already become a thing of the past.

Now, the only thing that frightened her was Li Shubai’s injuries. That night, she had held Li Shubai close, enduring the endless, hopeless darkness with him. If he had truly never woken up, perhaps she would have completely broken down, lost forever in the wilderness, never to find her way out again.

As she watched Yu Xuan slowly approach, his features gradually becoming clearer in the sunlight—his celestial beauty, the grace of a noble youth—she suddenly understood in that moment that he was not just Yu Xuan.

He was her forever-vanished girlhood, those dreamlike, radiant, and splendid bygone days. Every time she grew dazed because of him, what she saw in her eyes might not have been the man she had once deeply cherished, but rather her own past—the Huang Zixiao who had lived forever in the bloom of sixteen, carefree and laughing, the envy of all.

And he was the witness, the participant, even one of the creators of her most beautiful days.

So she smiled faintly at him, as if smiling at her past self. She wanted to say, "Dreams of sixteen-year-old Huang Zixiao, how have you been?"

But no matter how beautiful the dream, one must eventually wake from it.

For a moment, Yu Xuan was stunned. He had imagined all kinds of reactions from her on his way here, but he had never expected her to smile like this the moment she saw him.

Huang Zixiao wore a eunuch’s robe with a large torn hem, covered in dust, her hair disheveled and face smudged, holding freshly dug yams in her hands. But she no longer cared, because to her, the person before her no longer mattered. So she casually gathered the gourds and yams from the ground and asked nonchalantly, "What are you doing here?"

Seeing her so at ease, Yu Xuan found himself at a loss for words. After a moment of silence, he walked over and picked two large gourds for her.

"Not the big ones—they’re too tough to cook," Huang Zixiao said.

He paused, then picked two tender green gourds and handed them to her before looking at her and saying, "I heard about Prince Kui’s accident and that all his eunuchs and guards were scattered. I remembered this was the area where we once got lost, so I thought you might find your way here by chance. That’s why I came to look."

She took the gourds and cradled them in her arms. "Thank you for your concern. I’m fine."

"I... remember you said you would return to clear your name. So I hope you’ll go back to Chengdu soon. When the time comes, I want to see you overturn the case with my own eyes."

"I will," she said, glancing at the hem of his robe damp with dew. "Thank you for coming to find me in the middle of the night.""The Western Sichuan Military Governor has ordered the mountains sealed for search. I could only sneak in at midnight." His gaze fixed on her, unwavering. "I knew you'd be alright... though a bit worse for wear."

Huang Zixiang carried the gourd and yams toward the small temple, glancing back at him with a faint smile. "Yes, I did promise to return and clear my name. Can't die too early."

Seeing the curve of her lips and the casual expression on her face, his steps slowed slightly, an odd sensation stirring in his chest.

That unconscious daze and distraction she used to have around him was gone.

The reflection of himself that had always lingered in her eyes had vanished.

His eyes dimmed momentarily, but he quickly caught up to her, following her into the temple.

Li Shubai was already mobile today, holding a struggling pheasant as he looked up at Huang Zixiang's entrance. "Do you know how to slaughter a chicken?" he asked.

"The all-capable Prince of Kui doesn't know how to kill a chicken?" she retorted.

"Can't be bothered," he said, tossing the bird to her. Spotting Yu Xuan behind her, he paused before adding, "Besides, I have you."

"Mhm, right," she replied absently, grabbing the pheasant by its wings and heading to the back.

Li Shubai sat in the shaded corridor while Yu Xuan stood amidst the reeds in the courtyard, bowing. "Greetings, Prince Kui."

Li Shubai waved a hand, dismissing formalities.

The two had little to say—one seated, the other standing—when suddenly a piercing shriek erupted from the back, followed by a flurry of colorful feathers darting out, splattering blood everywhere.

Yu Xuan reacted swiftly, chasing it down and pinning it firmly. Huang Zixiang rushed out with her dagger, looking flustered. "First time doing this... no experience..."

Li Shubai leaned against the corridor wall, remarking, "You seemed so confident earlier."

"Only watched the cooks do it twice..." She stuck out her tongue, taking the pheasant from Yu Xuan. The tenacious bird was nearly dead now. She twisted its neck for a final cut, squatting in the corridor to drain the blood.

Li Shubai surveyed the bloodstains strewn across the temple and mused, "If Zhou Ziqin showed up now, he might deduce an entire monastery massacre from this."

Huang Zixiang pictured Zhou Ziqin scouring the temple for blood traces and couldn't help but smile, lifting the pheasant. "I'll boil water to pluck it."

Yu Xuan hesitated, then stood to follow her. "Let me help."

She didn't refuse, letting him tend the fire while she cooked.

The flickering flames cast shifting hues of crimson, orange, and gold across Yu Xuan's face, dazzlingly radiant.

Between cooking tasks, Huang Zixiang glanced up at his flame-lit features, and a faint warmth stirred in her chest once more.

Her best years had been spent with someone like him—no waste there. A pity, though...

He looked up at her, their gazes meeting briefly. After a pause, he asked softly, "Where will you start?"

She knew he meant her plan to reinvestigate her family's massacre. Without hesitation, she answered, "Everyone in the Governor's residence."

"You suspect an inside job?""An inside job is always more convenient than one from the outside, so we must investigate thoroughly first," she said, then raised her eyes to look at him slowly, adding, "When the time comes, everyone will have to be screened again, and you are no exception."

He nodded, gazing at the flames in the hearth, and asked quietly, "What about yourself?"

Huang Zimo lowered her head silently to stir the soup, replying, "You still don't trust me."

He shook his head. "I can't make myself forget what I saw that day."

A slight chill ran through Huang Zimo's heart. She knew he was referring to what he had once told her—that before her parents' deaths, she had taken out a packet of arsenic and stared at it with an eerie expression.

She chopped the yam into pieces, tossed them into the earthen pot, and covered it before saying, "In that case, let's carefully recount everything we said and did that day."

Yu Xuan nodded, added two thick pine branches to the stove, brushed the dust off his clothes, and stood up.

Huang Zimo reached up to touch her hair. Amidst such turbulent times, the hairpin Li Shubai had crafted for her had not been lost, which even surprised her. She pressed the scroll pattern and pulled out the jade hairpin inside.

"On the twenty-fifth day of the first month, I concluded the case of the daughter poisoning her entire family and returned from Longzhou. It was already late, so we didn’t meet that night, correct?"

Yu Xuan nodded in confirmation.

"On the twenty-sixth, I slept until the end of the mao hour when I heard you lightly knocking on my window."

This had been their habit for years. Every time Yu Xuan tapped on her window, she would open it a crack, and he would pass her the flowers he had prepared for her.

That day, Yu Xuan had brought her a branch of green calyx plum.

Watching her mark the end of mao hour on the ash-covered ground, Yu Xuan pointed to the space above it and said, "At the beginning of mao hour on the twenty-sixth, I passed by Qing Garden, where the gardener Feng cut that branch of green calyx plum for me."

Huang Zimo drew a faint dot to indicate the beginning of mao hour.

"At the end of mao hour, I knocked on your window, but you didn’t respond. I waited a while and knocked again, but there was still no answer. I thought you might have already gotten up and left. Then I noticed the window wasn’t closed, so I asked, 'Axia, are you there? I’m opening the window,' and lifted it just a crack to look inside—" Yu Xuan's eyes still held fear as he spoke, "I saw... you were already up, standing motionless in front of the dressing table, holding a packet in your hand. And I recognized the wrapping—it was the packet of arsenic we had bought together."

Huang Zimo drew a cross under the end of mao hour, exhaling deeply. "Since we last met, I’ve gone over that day in my mind countless times. My memory doesn’t match yours."

Yu Xuan nodded and asked, "How do you remember that day?"

"At the end of mao hour, I heard you lightly tapping on my window, so I threw on my clothes and told you to wait a moment. By the time I was dressed, you had knocked a second time. Then I opened the window and took the green calyx plum from you."

Yu Xuan frowned slightly and asked, "How many flowers were on that branch of green calyx plum?"Huang Zixiang was momentarily at a loss. After a moment's thought, she replied, "About four, or perhaps five... The stem was too long, so I cut off the lowest one and tucked it into my hair."

"Four flowers, two buds. I remember clearly," he said.

His certainty caused an involuntary flicker of faint fear to cross Huang Zixiang's face.

The carefully constructed illusion she had held onto for so long suddenly collapsed in an instant. Her once unshakable memory now seemed unreliable even to herself. The world around her twisted into an unrecognizable haze of uncertainty.

Struggling to steady herself, she drew a circle next to the mark with her hairpin and continued, "After finishing my toilette that day, I wore my usual tortoiseshell hairpin, the green plum blossom you gave me, and the paired-fish jade bracelet we designed together last year before having it carved. My outfit was a Sichuan brocade jacket in pine resin color embroidered with crabapple branches, paired with a honey-colored skirt."

After a brief recollection, he nodded. "Yes, tied with a purple love knot."

"Rose purple," Huang Zixiang confirmed.

"Then Miwu brought breakfast, but you said since the timing was awkward anyway, we might as well have enough food to last through lunch."

"We finished eating by 7:30 in the morning. We went to the garden to pick plum blossoms. By noon, my grandmother and uncle arrived."

"Right. Being an outsider, I excused myself. Later, while passing by Qing Garden, I happened upon some friends who dragged me into discussions. By evening, the group went to Xinghua Village for dinner. I didn't return home until the second watch, well past curfew. They'd plied me with too much wine, and I encountered patrol soldiers—fortunately they recognized me and escorted me home."

Huang Zixiang traced each detail in the dust on the ground, reconstructing the events of that day. Yu Xuan sat silently by the stove, watching her intently, just as he had so many times before when she would meticulously analyze cases. Her long lashes cast shadows over her bright eyes, yet couldn't obscure their sharp, penetrating gaze.

That gaze suddenly shifted to meet his face. Only then did Yu Xuan realize with a start—this wasn't the past, wasn't those bygone days. After the cataclysm that had forever altered the course of their lives, they now sat behind this temple, as if frozen in time yet knowing they could never return to what once was.