Plum Blossoms in Spring

A Fu lost her parents when she was young and was raised in her uncle's home, where her aunt tormented her. Though still little, she was already strikingly beautiful. Her aunt only needed to wait until the time was right, then use her marriage to secure a life of wealth.

But when A Fu was eleven, the Xie family of the Marquis of Pingxi's residence in the capital took her in. Her food, clothes, and daily comforts were nothing like before. Madam Xie had been a close friend of her mother's and treated her well.

Her cousin Xie Yun, however, was always stern and unsmiling. When she gathered her courage and softly called him Cousin Yun, all she got in return was his dark gaze and a noncommittal "Mm."

Thinking he disliked her, she hid from him whenever they crossed paths.

Then, one day when she was fifteen, she was performing the Zhezhi dance by the waterside pavilion when she caught sight of him leaning against the corridor. One leg was propped up, and his usually cool, distant face seemed twisted with madness as he watched her with shadowed eyes.

A Fu was so startled that she twisted her ankle. Her cousin swept her into his arms to check her injury, then gave her a pair of jade shoes meant to nourish her health.

It turned out she had misunderstood him all along.

She was too inexperienced to know what that look meant for her.

From then on, she fell deeper one step at a time, until there was no way out.

Theme: Once love takes root, it runs deep.