At eight years old, Shen Wei was plucked from the mud by Xie Lin, a powerful man who held the court in his grasp, and became his cherished adopted daughter.
For ten years, he doted on her. She was a precious gem he had painstakingly shaped, a shield against pressure to marry, and, in his midnight reveries, the double he sketched in his mind's eye.
She smiled obediently, swallowed the poison-sweetness from his fingertips, and played the part of an ignorant puppet.
At her coming-of-age ceremony, he announced their wedding date before everyone. She lowered her head shyly, as the blade in her sleeve gleamed coldly.
Everyone said Xie Lin loved her deeply. Only she knew that the portrait in the secret compartment of his study, of a woman who looked seven-tenths like her, was the cinnabar mark on his heart.
On their wedding night, with red candles flickering, he murmured the name of his moonlight in his drunken haze. Smiling, she handed him the nuptial cup, her eyes glinting: "Husband, it's time to take your medicine."
As poisoned wine slid down his throat and the truth tore everything apart, she stroked his furious, stunned face. "Lord Xie, did you ever see clearly who I really look like?"
The palace doors burst open. The crown prince, missing for years, stood with sword in hand, his features almost identical to hers. "Elder Sister, is the blood of the man who murdered our father still warm?"
