A Late Spring

"The spring sun slants late; all spring, the door stays shut."

In the sixth year of Xianchun, spring in Lin'an was steeped in the waters of Tiger Run Spring.

Shen Qichi was the most downcast of the three young masters of the Duke of Zhenguo's household.

His father commanded the army, his eldest brother was made a marquis, and his second brother had earned the top score in the imperial examinations.

He alone had failed the exams and fallen ill. He retreated into the mountains around Tiger Run Temple, spending his days listening to the spring and drinking tea, intending to rot away in this long spring lethargy.

Until he ran into Wen Mian at a teahouse.

She wore a faded blue cotton robe, her eyes as still as a pool of dead water, as if she felt no attachment to the world.

Shen Qichi thought she was merely a widowed tea seller, but she recited, "A single leaf of Longjing, and spring awakens across ten thousand mountains."

In that moment, two souls pretending to sleep glimpsed the embers still burning in each other's hearts through the curling tea smoke.

One was a fallen noble who wanted to "sleep until death"; the other, an orphaned daughter of a disgraced minister who was "waiting to die in despair."

In this false spring on the eve of a fallen dynasty, amid the sound of Tiger Run's waters, they affirmed for one another the weight of being alive.

Theme: In a false spring on the eve of a fallen dynasty, two souls pretending to sleep cherish one another amid the tea smoke of Tiger Run, finding a glimmer of clarity that lets them go on living.