On our wedding night, I swallowed poison to end my life.
The one who saved me was my general husband, who hated me to the bone.
He gripped my chin, his eyes glinting with ice. “Su Qingyue, I saved your life. From now on, your life belongs to me.”
Everyone said I had framed his elder brother for treason and collusion with the enemy, and deserved a thousand deaths.
He married me only to keep me imprisoned at his side, tormenting me day and night so I could atone for the Xiao family's sins.
But if I truly were so despicable,
why were the whip marks on my back left by his own hand?
And why, after I lost my memory, did I see such profound pain buried beneath the hatred in his eyes?
I decided to take a chance.
The next time he pinned me against the wall and demanded to know what I had forgotten,
I rose on tiptoe and kissed his icy lips, tasting blood and despair.
“General,” I whispered with a laugh against his trembling throat, tears rolling into his collar,
“do you hate me because my crimes are unforgivable,
or because you’re afraid to admit that you love me more than anything?”
Later, on the night the truth tore the dynasty apart,
he stood drenched in blood, sword pointed at the throne, then turned back to me with a hoarse, bitter laugh.
“Su Qingyue, I’ll bear your crimes.
In this life, the next, and every life after, you will be my wife.”
And at last, I remembered:
That disastrous marriage swap that destroyed everything
was the bloodiest path to survival I had laid for him with my own hands.
