A Zhao is a disheveled, daydreaming woman, known as the mad widow within ten li of the village.
Everyone avoids her and gossips about her.
A Zhao doesn't understand their stares. She likes sitting by the stream and keeping the village children company.
But the children don't want to play with her.
Later, A Zhao finds a man, someone who looks like her younger brother.
The handsome man lies motionless by the stream, weakly lifting his eyelids.
Numb. Empty.
A Zhao doesn't understand what she's seeing, but she wants to take him home, so she'll have someone to play with.
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Pei Huisong was born the Crown Prince of Great Zhou. He was self-disciplined, courteous, and a gentleman through and through. But then he was betrayed by his trusted aides and plotted against by his father, falling from the clouds into the mud.
Half his leg was crippled, and scars marred the handsome face he once had. He ended up wandering among the common folk, clinging to life.
Then a mad widow picked Pei Huisong up and took him home.
The widow was eccentric and disheveled, and she loved sharpening knives in the middle of the night.
The villagers said she was a mad widow and warned people to stay away from her.
But when the mad widow they despised saw someone insulting Pei Huisong, she rushed forward with a woodcutter's axe and said, "Who dares hurt my little brother?"
A stir suddenly rose in Pei Huisong's battered heart.
-
He washed A Zhao's face, combed her hair, and painted her eyebrows. He earned money to pay for her medical care, and even fought his way back into the treacherous imperial palace.
He'd planned to raise A Zhao as his daughter.
But when her mind cleared, she bashfully said, "Little brother, I want to get married. Can you help me find a good husband?"
Pei Huisong crushed the jade hairpin in his hand, then gently arranged her hair.
"No."
Reading Guide:
1. A mutual-healing story.
Theme: Even when you fall into the dust, you can still get back up.
