She had promised her mother she would live well, so she spent nearly all her family’s fortune securing help from her mother’s aunt, a member of the Langya Wang clan, and joined the Wang family’s southbound convoy to seek refuge with her aunt.
Jiangnan.
“Chen Baozhu, it’s an honor for you to become our young master’s concubine,” a servant barked, grabbing a woman dressed in plain clothes.
“If it’s an honor, then forgive Baozhu for being unworthy of it.” The woman answered bluntly, her refusal cool and firm.
“Chen Baozhu, you’re an orphan. If you marry into the Huan clan, you’ll have our protection. You still refuse?” Huan Silang asked.
“I do.”
“Why?”
“Baozhu already has someone she loves.”
“Don’t try to fool me, Chen.” Huan Silang scoffed. “Then tell me, which young lord dares to compete with me, Huan Silang, for a woman?”
“Xie Xuan of Chen Commandery.” The woman’s clear, ringing voice carried straight to the ears of the man behind the artificial hill.
She raised her face.
At last, Xie Xuan behind the artificial hill could see her clearly. She was not breathtakingly beautiful, but possessed a cool, clear grace of her own. Her skin was fair, as if nurtured by Jiangnan’s watery landscapes. Her brows and eyes were open and composed, her nose straight and elegant, her lips slightly pale and pressed together, outlining a strikingly firm, stubborn jaw. Most captivating were her eyes: clear and bright, her gaze calm as she looked directly at Huan Silang. There was none of the timidity or ingratiation that ordinary women showed when facing the great aristocratic clans, only an open, almost sharp clarity.
Xie Xuan felt something slam hard into his heart, stirring a faint, almost imperceptible tremor.
...Chen Baozhu.
He remembered her.
