Page 59 of A Song to Drown Rivers
“She seems quite young to already be working,” Fuchai said.
I glanced at his face. He was being serious.
“You do not know what it’s like out there,” I told him. “In any village, girls half her age would be working harder jobs.”
“Really?” His eyes widened.
Him and his sheltered naivete. “Of course.”
“But why?”
Did he really not know? No, his expression was pure innocence, a boy who had spent his life behind golden walls. Even when blood flowed before him, it was onto marble tiles, and under his command. “They have to,” I said, my tone light as our boat floated down the canals like a creature in the mist, “in order to survive.”
I remembered the first time my mother had taught me how to wash raw silk. I was four years old then, only just big enough to walk without stumbling. She had been kind with me, and patient, treating it like a game.See this?she’d asked, holding the dry silk up to the light.Watch how it changes.Then she’d dipped it into the water, scrubbing hard with her rough and blistered fingers, andheld it up again. I’d clapped in delight, and she’d passed the next roll of silk to me.Now you try.
This, I remembered too: The silk had been tougher than I expected. It hurt my fingers when I held on to it for long, and it was so heavy that when it was soaked through in water, I’d almost tumbled headfirst into the river with it. My mother had reached out at the last second, grabbing my shoulders to steady me.
Is it too difficult for you?she’d asked.
The skin on my hands burned. But I’d shaken my head firmly, not wanting to disappoint her.
Suddenly the boat gave a lurch, startling me back to the present. There was a flash of color in my vision, and time seemed to warp around me. I saw the entire scene unfurling in startling detail: the servant who’d been walking past us with a pot of boiling water—presumably to make tea—losing balance, the fear in his eyes as the lid fell and the water spilled out toward me.
“Careful!”
A warm arm encircled me, yanking me back. My eyes squeezed shut. But the burning pain I anticipated never came. There was only the servant’s babbled words over the rushing water, his voice high and choked with panic.
“I’m so sorry— I’m so sorry, Your Majesty— Let me help you get something… I’m sorry, this clumsy servant deserves to die—”
Your Majesty?Slowly, heart pounding furiously, I opened my eyes again, and my breath stuck in my throat. Fuchai had wrapped his arms around me, shielding me with his own body. A patch of bright pink skin shone on his wrist, raw and ruined, his rolled-back sleeves soaked through. The water was so hot it was still steaming, little white wisps rising to the sky.
He had protected me.
There had been no room for hesitation. To have acted in time—it could only have been natural instinct, his very first reaction. Akind of inexpressible pain filled my chest, as if some part of my heart had been burned.
“Are you hurt?” he asked me, his voice rough. I shook my head, but still he stepped back and scanned me closely from head to toe, stopping only when he made sure that I was unscathed. “Good,” he said, sounding genuinely relieved. “That’s good.”
Beside us, the servant seemed close to tears. He was disciplined enough that he prostrated himself on the deck of the boat without even being asked, his shoulders trembling like a leaf. “I’m sorry,” he repeated. “I’m sorry, Your Majesty, please forgive me…”
“Stop your yapping,” Fuchai said irritably. “Do you want to give me a headache as well as a burn mark?”
The servant made an audible gulp and said no more. Of course, it was possible he had gone into shock.
“How bad is it?” I asked Fuchai, inspecting his wrist. The skin had started to pucker. It was painful just to look at.
“Terrible,” Fuchai said with a pronounced grimace. “It hurts so much I can’t even think straight.”
“Really?” My heart pinched, the concern showing on my face only half-pretend. I should not have felt anything at all, but—perhaps I was not as cold as I wanted to be. And I could not deny the truth either: that he had been injured because of me. None of this was how I’d planned the trip to go. “You,” I called to the servant, who was still in that lowly, trembling position. “Go and fetch some soy sauce. And bandages, if you have any. If not—then clean cloth will do.”
“Y-yes, Lady Xishi.” He raised his head slowly. “I—I will go right now—right this very instant—”
“Hurry.”
He scampered away, stumbling twice when the boat rocked against the waves, and disappeared behind the cabin.
Fuchai uttered a low sound of pain, dragging my attention back to him.
“It still hurts,” he said.
