After Pei Yanzhou died in battle, Lu Qingci spent ten years as his widow.
She sold her dowry to cover the marquis household's debts, cared for her bedridden mother-in-law, raised the two Pei children who had lost their mother, and petitioned for her late husband to be honored as a loyal martyr. Over those ten years, she went from the most celebrated beauty and poet in the capital to a virtuous matriarch praised by all.
But in the end, the two children she had raised with her own hands stood in front of their birth mother and called her jealous and wicked. Her second uncle-in-law embezzled her dowry. The clan elders forced her to keep up the Pei family's respectable appearance. Finally, a cup of poisoned wine brought her life to an end.
When she awoke again, Lu Qingci had returned to the day the news of Pei Yanzhou's "death in battle" reached the marquis estate.
Everyone in the household expected her to cut off her hair, swear an oath, and remain chaste for life. Instead, she removed her mourning hairpin in front of everyone and opened the estate's account books.
She refused the chastity arch, reclaimed her entire dowry, and turned to seek marriage with Gu Chenyuan, her late husband's sworn political enemy and the youngest chief councilor in the dynasty.
Gu Chenyuan was cold and taciturn, and rumor had it he had no interest in women. He agreed to the marriage on just three conditions: "Don't take concubines for me, don't raise someone else's children for me, and you don't have to be a virtuous wife."
Lu Qingci asked, "Then what should I do?"
He handed her half of a household registration reform proposal. "Do what you want."
And so the matriarch who had been confined to the inner household in her previous life stepped into the court.
Pei Yanzhou knelt in the rain, begging her to spare him a glance, while Gu Chenyuan stood at her side with an umbrella and reminded her mildly, "Madam, he's making you late for the court's policy meeting."
Later, the throne changed hands, and Gu Chenyuan came to wield power over the entire court. Everyone guessed he would depose the emperor and claim the throne for himself. He burned the petitions urging him to ascend, and handed her only a love letter he had started years into their marriage but still never finished.
"We can share the realm's rule."
"Lu Qingci, could you share a little of your true affection with me, too?"
