Tang Jiu Qing

escaped by the skin of his teeth.

Without lifting his eyes, he answered, “I don’t like his shoes.”

Zechuan said evenly, “Do you have money? You’ll have to pay for this, you know.”

“I’ve got plenty of money,” Xiao Chiye replied, his voice cold. He rummaged in his belt’s pockets and came up totally empty.

Shen Zechuan waited a moment before turning to the tavern-keeper. “Put it on the good sir’s tab. He’s got plenty of money.”

Xiao Chiye took a swift step closer and said lightly, “You use this flesh to bewitch others. What do you expect me to think you’re after if you look at me like that?”

Unperturbed, Shen Zechuan answered, soft-voiced, “But I was born with a pair of affectionate eyes.”

When Xiao Chiye got a clear look at the man before him, he licked away the blood between his teeth and called out to him as though to a lover. “Oh, Lanzhou.”

Zechuan suddenly, strangely, understood the meaning behind Xiao Chiye’s actions.

He wanted to go home.

He wanted to go home, proudly and honestly, as himself.

Shen Zechuan looked at Xiao Chiye’s shoulder, which rose taller than the top of his own head. He smiled up at him. “I can stand on tiptoe and hold the umbrella.”

They had no one to lean on but each other—so why not tear into each other until they were bloody?

This life was already rotten enough.

The two of them were trapped in Qudu, yet the way he said it was so genuine and sincere. Xiao Chiye had told his share of lies in the past, but in this moment, it sounded as if he had never believed anything more. He was like a wolf pup collecting the stars, hoarding them all just to stuff them into Shen Zechuan’s hands, like that little jewelry box of pearl and jade earrings.