Both Sect Heads Wanted Out of the Marriage, So They Tried to Ruin the Town Together novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Forty Eggs and a Goat

By breakfast the porch held forty eggs, six chickens, a sack of turnips, a hand-stitched quilt and a second goat.

The goat wore a red ribbon and an expression of ownership.

Whoever had brought it had tied the bow and run.

"The Hearth cannot accept livestock," said Zhuyuan from the doorway. "It would be inappropriate for the Hearth to..."

"Is that a no?" said Luoyi, around a mouthful of turnip.

"It is a statement."

"A statement isn't a no. Say it to the goat."

Zhuyuan faced the goat.

The goat faced Zhuyuan.

"I'm afraid," he told it gently, "that at present the Hearth is not in a position to... that is, perhaps in the spring..."

The goat ate the ribbon.

"No," said Luoyi, to the goat, to the lane and to the whole hill. "No more goats. Pass it on."

Down the lane, somebody passed it on.

Steward Ma made a small neat mark on his sleeve, under her name, not his.

By noon the gifts had spread to the yard, the well and the roof.

Three ferrymen brought a barrel of salt fish, and a carpenter brought a new door for the goat room.

Nobody would take a coin.

"You pulled a boy out of the river," the carpenter said, almost angrily. "Let a man say thank you."

Zhuyuan took everything else, because he could not stop himself, and wrote every name in his little book.

By sundown she said no eleven more times on his behalf.

No to a second quilt, no to a third goat, no to a man who wanted to name his son Hearth.

Each time, Zhuyuan stood behind her shoulder and let out a breath.

"I'll refuse for you," she said at last, when the lane was empty. "From now on. All of it."

He turned, and for a moment the lamp showed her his whole face, plain and astonished and glad.

"For the Hearth," she added quickly. "Not for you."

"Of course," said Zhuyuan. "Entirely for the Hearth."

She did not like how the corner of his mouth moved.

The bath came at dusk, an enormous cedar tub carried up the hill by four ferrymen as one more gift.

Steward Ma set it behind the folding screen in the bedroom, filled it with hot water and left the room very fast.

Luoyi peeled off her robe and sank in to the chin.

"I could sit with my back to the screen and read the petitions aloud," Zhuyuan offered from the far side. "It would be efficient."

"Number nineteen first. I saw you hide it."

Paper rustled.

"A lantern race on the river at the Autumn Fair," he read. "Forty-two households."

"No."

"I have written, we are considering it."

She snorted and shut her eyes.

"If you had a free year," she said to the steam, "with nobody wanting a single thing from you, what would you do?"

A long pause behind the screen.

"Walk," he said at last. "Somewhere long. And you?"

"Sail."

"Where?"

"None of your business."

"Of course," said Zhuyuan, and she could hear him smiling at the wall.

She opened her eyes.

Over the top of the screen she could see the line of his shoulders and the silver cord on his hair.

"Head Jiang."

"Mistress Tang."

"Put the petitions down and get in."

The paper hit the floor before she finished the sentence.

He came round the screen already pulling at his sash, and the robe dropped, and the sight of him stopped her breath.

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