"Shuang'er! Shuang'er, wait up!"
Tian Murong's voice rang out through the palace path as he hurried forward, only to slow to a stop a moment later, bent slightly as he caught his breath.
He pressed a hand to his side and let out a tired sigh. Ah, these legs truly were not what they used to be.
"Shuang'er!" he called again, this time with less authority and more resignation.
Then, without warning
"Boo!"
A small voice burst out from behind him, and Tian Murong stiffened so suddenly he nearly stumbled.
The next instant, the sound of childish laughter filled the air.
Tian Murong turned sharply, only to find young Wushuang, grinning from ear to ear, his eyes shining with mischief, clearly delighted by the success of his ambush.
"You naughty little thing!" Tian Murong scolded, though the fondness in his tone betrayed him at once.
Wushuang only laughed harder, entirely pleased with himself.
Shaking his head, Tian Murong reached out and caught the boy by the ear, tugging it just enough to make him yelp.
"Ah, Gege! Gege, be gentle!" Wushuang cried at once, grabbing at his brother's wrist. "Sorry, sorry!" Yet even as he pleaded, the mischief on his face had not faded in the slightest.
Tian Murong narrowed his eyes at him. "Look at you. You do not sound remorseful at all." He gave the ear another small pull. "What were you trying to do? Frighten your own brother to an early death?"
Wushuang winced, but still managed a laugh. "Gege is not that old. You cannot die of fright yet."
At once, Tian Murong tugged his ear a little harder.
"Ahh! I was wrong, I was wrong!" Wushuang shouted, finally sounding a little more sincere. "I will not do it again!"
Only then did Tian Murong release him. "That is enough playing for today," he said, straightening his robes. "Come. Let us head back."
Wushuang rubbed his ear with a pout before nodding brightly. Then the two brothers turned and made their way back together towards the mansion residence.
By the time they arrived, the evening meal had already been laid out.
Inside the hall, Their mother, Noble Consort Xie sat beside a long table laden with a rich variety of dishes. The warm fragrance of food drifted through the room as maids moved quietly around her, adjusting bowls, placing cups, and receiving her final instructions.
Before anyone could properly announce their arrival, Wushuang darted forward like a gust of wind and flung himself around her from behind.
"Mother!" he cried, giggling. "Guess what?"
Noble Consort Xie lowered her gaze to the Wushuang clinging to her and smiled, her expression softening at once. She reached down and wiped a streak of mud from his cheek using the edge of her sleeve.
"Let me guess," she said, amused. "You bested your brother again?"
Wushuang lifted his chin proudly. "Mm! You should have seen his face, he was truly frightened!"
Tian Murong, who had just stepped inside, rolled his eyes deeply toward the heavens."Mother," he said, bowing politely in greeting.
Noble Consort Xie smiled at him as well, though her amusement only deepened.
"Wushuang tricked me," Tian Murong complained, unable to hide the faint pout in his voice that did not suit his dignity in the least.
At that, Noble Consort Xie laughed outright. "Oh, you two..." she said, shaking her head fondly. "So troublesome, yet still so adorable."
She reached up and lightly pinched Wushuang's nose, earning a dramatic protest from him. "Come now," she said, settling properly into her seat. "The food is ready. Sit and eat first, and afterward you may tell me everything."
Wushuang immediately took the seat beside her, still brimming with energy, while Tian Murong sat across from them, once they had settled around the table, the meal began, but peace, as always, did not last long where Wushuang was concerned.
Noble Consort Xie had barely lifted her chopsticks when Wushuang leaned closer to her, his eyes shining with mischief.
"Mother, today Gege was so frightened his soul nearly left his body."
Tian Murong, who had just reached for a dumpling, froze mid-motion. "That is not what happened.
"
"It is exactly what happened," Wushuang insisted at once, pointing his chopsticks at him with great seriousness. "I only said 'boo' very softly, and Gege jumped like a startled rabbit."
Tian Murong stared at him in disbelief. "Very softly? You shouted into my ear like a ghost from the underworld."
Wushuang turned to Noble Consort Xie with a face full of innocence. "Mother, listen to him. He is exaggerating."
"I am exaggerating?" Tian Murong nearly laughed. "You hid behind a tree for half a quarter of an hour waiting to ambush me!"
"That is called strategy," Wushuang said proudly. "A great general must know patience."
Noble Consort Xie covered her smile with her sleeve, her shoulders trembling with amusement.
Tian Murong looked at her at once. "Mother, do not encourage him. He is already impossible enough."
But Wushuang had no intention of letting the matter rest.
"When he jumped," he said, turning back to his mother, "his face looked exactly like this.... "
He widened his eyes, opened his mouth, and clutched at his chest in an overly dramatic display.
One of the maids standing nearby immediately lowered her head to hide her laughter.
Tian Murong's face darkened. "Tian Wushuang!"
Wushuang nearly toppled over from laughing at his own performance.
"You even called my name twice," he continued between giggles. "'Shuang'er! Shuang'er!' Like an old scholar who had lost his reading glasses."
At that, even Noble Consort Xie let out a proper laugh.
Tian Murong looked both offended and betrayed. "Mother!"
"What?" she said lightly, still smiling. "It was quite a good imitation."
Wushuang beamed at receiving her approval. "See? Mother understands me."
Tian Murong set down his chopsticks with exaggerated patience. "Very well. Since Wushuang wishes to tell stories, let me tell the truth."
Wushuang narrowed his eyes at once. "There is no need. I have already told it perfectly... "
"The truth," Tian Murong repeated, ignoring him, "is that your son spent the entire afternoon covered in mud, chasing butterflies, frightening servants, and behaving like a wild monkey who escaped from the mountains."
"I was not chasing butterflies," Wushuang protested. "I was observing them."
"By running after them with both shoes missing?"
Wushuang pouted. "Observation requires sacrifice." He took a dumpling and bit out of it.
This time, two of the maids failed to hold back their smiles.
Noble Consort Xie laughed so hard she had to set down her cup. "Wushuang, where were your shoes?"
Wushuang straightened up at once, clearly feeling this detail had become unnecessarily important. "One was lost in the pond," he admitted. "The other... followed it."
Tian Murong let out a sound that was half scoff, half victory. "You see?"
"That is not the point," Wushuang said quickly. "The point is that Gege was frightened."
"I was startled," Tian Murong corrected. "There is a difference."
"Oh?" Wushuang tilted his head. "Then why did you grab your chest like this?" Again he acted it out so dramatically that even the older maids around the hall had to turn away, their lips curved with quiet amusement.
Tian Murong pointed at him. "Mother, look at him. He feels no remorse."
"Because there is nothing to regret," Wushuang declared grandly. "A younger brother's duty is to keep his elder brother alert."
"A younger brother's duty," Tian Murong replied dryly, throwing a dumpling at Wushuang. "is to be less annoying."
Noble Consort Xie finally raised a hand, though her laughter had not fully faded. "Enough, enough. If the two of you continue, the food will grow cold before either of you swallows a single bite."
At once, Wushuang leaned against her arm with a grin. "Mother, Gege is bullying me."
Tian Murong looked at the ceiling as though seeking strength from the heavens above. "Mother, he says that after tormenting me all day."
Noble Consort Xie looked from one son to the other, her eyes warm with helpless fondness. "One of you talks too much, and the other complains too much. Between the two of you, this residence never knows a moment of peace."
"Then it would be too quiet," Wushuang said at once.
"And far more pleasant," Tian Murong muttered.
Wushuang gasped. "Mother, did you hear that? Gege wishes me gone!"
"I said no such thing."
"You meant it in your heart."
Tian Murong let out a slow breath. "Who is teaching you to say these things?"
Wushuang immediately pointed at him. "You are."
That sent Noble Consort Xie into laughter again, and this time the maids around the room could no longer hide their smiles. The hall, filled with warm lamplight and the sound of gentle family bickering, seemed brighter for it.
For that little while, there was no weight of rank, there was only a mother, her two sons, and the kind of happiness so ordinary that no one at the table could have known how precious it truly was.
Jian Wushuang stood by the window of his chamber, silent beneath the pale wash of evening light. In his hand, he held a single hairpin, his fingers tracing it with a care so reverent it was almost painful to witness.
It was the only thing of his mother's that remained with him.
Everything else had been taken on the day the charge of treason fell upon their household, every possession tied to her and his brother had been seized and thrown into the flames. Clothes, letters, ornaments, memories, burned until nothing was left but ash. Even now, after all these years, he could still remember it too clearly.
The fire.... the screams.... his mother's voice... His elder brother....
A sharp pain suddenly tightened in his chest, so fierce it felt as though a blade had been driven straight through him. Jian Wushuang's fingers flew to his chest, clutching at his robes as his face twisted with the force of it.
"Mother..." he whispered.
The word was little more than breath.
It sounded like a prayer, and yet it was not. Or perhaps it has once been, long ago, before grief had hollowed faith into something bitter and unrecognisable. But if it was a prayer, then to whom was it meant to be heard? Which god had listened when he begged and pleaded ten years ago? Which heaven had answered him then?
None.
The word faded from his lips.
Slowly, his hand fell away from his chest, though the ache remained.
Everything had been taken from him. Since his release from the Cold Palace, he had been wearing only the black and gold robes, colours of the Jian family. Never once had he dressed himself in the shades of the imperial house, as though even cloth itself could be rejected with enough hatred.
Even the name.
When he had been branded a traitor to the kingdom, that name had been stripped from him as well. Tian Wushuang. Once, it had been his by birth and by imperial decree. Later, after his title was restored, the Emperor had given him back the right to bear it again.
But what use was that name to him now?
What meaning could it possibly hold, after everything tied to it had been drenched in blood and fire?
So he had refused it.
In its place, he had chosen the Jian family name, his mother's family name. The one thing the court had not thought to burn completely out of him. Thus he remained Jian Wushuang in the records, and not Tian Wushuang, though the Emperor had said nothing when he himself insisted upon it, claiming he no longer deserved to bear the imperial surname.
A bitter scoff escaped him.
Deserve.
What a hollow word.
He stared down at the hairpin in his hand, his gaze dark and distant, as though seeing not the chamber before him but the ghosts that still walked behind his eyes.
Everything he had lost. Everyone who had been taken from him. His fingers tightened around the hairpin.
"Just a little longer, Mother... Brother..." His lips curved, but there was no warmth in it, only something cold, fractured, and terrifyingly calm. "They will join us soon."
He lifted his gaze into the deepening dark beyond the window, and his eyes held the quiet madness of a man who had already long since chosen his road.
"I will drag them all with me."