The Young General's Love Came Too Late

A recommendation for my friend's upcoming novel: My Cousin Helps Me Take Down a Scumbag, an aloof top scholar x a pampered fourth young lady, by Yizhi Tuqiu Jun. Blurb at the end.

Blurb:

In her previous life, Si Yuan knew how to seek good fortune and avoid disaster, and was a renowned divination master in the capital. But there was an unwritten rule in her craft: she could divine for others, but not for herself.

At the age of fifteen, Si Yuan broke that rule and tossed a coin to divine her own marriage. From then on, she set her heart on the Heir of Prince Huai.

Two years later, he accused her of treason. In a freezing prison, a bowl of poison brought her life to an end.

As she lay dying, she saw Bai Yueyi, a bastard son of the prince's household whom she had once neglected, arrive to break her out in a general's armor still reeking of blood. "I've returned from the battlefield. Could you... look at me once more?"

His grief cut to the bone.

Si Yuan regretted everything.

*

Reborn in a single day, Si Yuan opened her eyes in the embroidered chambers behind the marquis's vermilion gates and found herself back at the age of fifteen, before she was betrothed.

With anger and guilt filling her heart, she married into the prince's household again without looking back. This time, she became the legal wife of Bai Yueyi, the prince's bastard son, all for the sake of receiving the look he'd given her in her previous life.

She shielded the mistreated young general from every cold stare and used her divination skills to arrange everything, helping him rise to command the frontier armies.

But then an imperial edict decreed that he would marry the noble Princess Yunyang.

Si Yuan tossed three coins. The signs declared them a perfect match, destined to be a talented man and a beautiful woman. The string in her heart snapped.

It turned out she was the one who should leave.

*

The young general Bai Yueyi had endured people's cold stares since childhood. After years of keeping his feelings hidden, he was guarded and distant toward everyone.

Then Si Yuan, the marquis's daughter, far above his station, said she wanted to marry him.

He fell for her.

She married him and was skilled at divination, too. She said his fate was missing a person whose name had eighteen strokes. Si Yuan's name was one stroke short, but he didn't mind.

Only when the emperor arranged his marriage did he learn that Princess Yunyang's name had exactly eighteen strokes. Si Yuan had run away.

Bai Yueyi defied the imperial decree alone and remained unmarried for three years. He searched madly for the woman who had left him, and at last found the person he loved in a divination shop in the southwest.

He thought: If your name is one stroke short, I'll spend my whole life adding it.

[!!Important!!: One couple, both chaste; the divination details are not researched and serve the plot; a sly, mischievous marquis's daughter x a scheming, devoted wolf-dog general]

A sweet little story recommended by my friend: My Cousin Helps Me Take Down a Scumbag, by Yizhi Tuqiu Jun. Her older cousin secretly loves her and wins her over; the other cousin gets his comeuppance.

The Duke of Tang's family fell from grace overnight, leaving Fourth Miss Tang homeless. Fortunately, she had been engaged since childhood to her cousin on her mother's side, Song Yan, and could at least find shelter with him.

But Song Yan couldn't stand his fiancée. She was so timid and cautious, always walking on eggshells, and he wanted nothing more than to break off the engagement.

Yet just days after breaking it off, he heard that Fourth Miss Tang had a new marriage prospect. On the day the young woman exchanged betrothal gifts, she wore a red gown trailing along the ground, bewitching and radiant.

She was a peerless beauty.

Song Yan regretted it.

He couldn't sleep at night, and, heartbroken, knocked on Fourth Miss Tang's door. "Yin'er, I have something to tell you."

But when the door opened, his young uncle stood there with his hands behind his back and said coolly, "Why are you looking for your aunt by marriage?"

*

Song Xin was as refined as a jade tree and had been named the top third-place scholar by imperial decree. He was the pride of the Song family. Unfortunately, he was so haughty and aloof that even after matchmakers had worn a path to the Song family's door, he remained alone.

The more aloof he was, the more curious people became about what sort of young woman such an ethereal figure as Song Xin would marry.

No one knew that whenever his distant gaze fell on Fourth Miss Tang, it had long since grown heated.

He kept his feelings hidden, careful and cautious.

Until the day Fourth Miss Tang called off her engagement. Song Xin, usually so cool and reserved, swept up his robe and knelt before his father. "The Tang and Song families have been friends for generations. This marriage cannot be called off. I am willing to marry Fourth Miss Tang."

*

The night air was cool beneath the red gauze bed curtains.

Tang Yin untied Song Xin's sash and respectfully called out, "Uncle."

But the man lifted her delicate chin with his folding fan. "I'm your husband."

Tang Yin slowly raised her head and fell into a pair of gentle eyes.

After her family fell into ruin, she lived in fear, scraping by in the Song household, only to have her cousin break off their engagement.

A heavy rain fell on the day their engagement ended, soaking the letter about her seriously ill mother needing money.

Song Xin held an oil-paper umbrella over her head, and gave her a place to stand beneath the sky.

[Go add it to your reading list!]

Theme: Women are just as capable as men. They can hold up half the sky.