The living room was cast in a dim, amber glow, the flickering candlelight stretching shadows into grotesque shapes against the heavy mahogany furniture. Chen Hongluo sat motionless, her thoughts spiraling into a dark labyrinth of the past.

He had been ten years old. That was when Chen Chang’an first returned to the Huainan Manor.

At first, he had been a creature of pure terror. He would watch his sisters with wide, glass-brittle eyes, too frightened to join their games, often bolting the moment their gazes locked. Chu Yanran had once scoffed at his cowardice, turning to Hongluo with a sharp tongue: “You are the eldest daughter; what is there to be afraid of?”

It took a full year before Chen Chang’an began to thaw, eventually becoming clingy, desperate for even a scrap of their attention. The sisters, in turn, had grown fond of playing with him…

*Playing.*

They hadn't played with him; they had toyed with him. They handled him like a porcelain doll, stripping away his dignity for their own amusement. Recalling her own hand in those cruel diversions, Chen Hongluo let out a long, shuddering sigh.

*This house is no home,* she realized with a sudden, chilling clarity. *How terrifying that we never noticed.*

“Your Highness, the night grows deep. Shall I escort you to your chambers?”

Uncle Hu, having finally settled the Prince and the rest of the household, entered the room carrying a steady lantern.

Chen Hongluo shook her head weakly. “Uncle Hu, stay a moment. Keep me company… Tell me, you and Chang’an—you were quite close, weren’t you?”

Uncle Hu stiffened, his posture turning guarded. In the Huainan Manor, the hierarchy was absolute. It was strictly forbidden for the Princess Consort to know that the Ninth Prince found more kinship with the help than with his own blood.

“The Ninth Prince is of the most noble station,” Uncle Hu replied, his voice a practiced neutral. “How could he possibly have a relationship with an old servant such as I?”

“Even after his return, I merely attended to his meals and daily needs. It was duty, Your Highness, not friendship.”

Chen Hongluo leaned her chin on her hand, her eyes searching his. “My sisters all claim he had a habit of stealing. What is your truth, Uncle Hu?”

Uncle Hu shook his head with a firm, quiet conviction. “The Ninth Prince never stole a thing in his life.”

“Oh?” Chen Hongluo’s gaze sharpened. “How can you be so certain?”

Uncle Hu sighed, the weight of years pressing down on his shoulders. *How could I not know?* If the boy had truly been a thief, would he have lived such a hollow, destitute life under this roof?

Gritting his teeth, Uncle Hu made a choice. “Your Highness, the matter of the Princess Consort punishing the Ninth Prince over the Gold-Threaded Robe… I assume you remember it.”

Chen Hongluo nodded. It was impossible to forget. The Gold-Threaded Robe had cost their father ten thousand taels of silver—a birthday gift intended to make their mother the envy of every noblewoman in the capital. But Chang’an had sneaked into her chambers and was caught red-handed, draped in the silk, stroking the fabric with a look of trance-like devotion. Chu Yanran had been livid. The punishment had been brutal.

Uncle Hu opened his mouth to say more, then hesitated, swallowing the bitter words. “Forget it, Your Highness. Please, return to your room. The Ninth Prince… sigh, he is simply a pitiful soul.”

As Uncle Hu gestured for her to retire, Chen Hongluo’s heart hammered against her ribs. “Uncle Hu, Father and Mother are asleep. There is no need for masks. Speak plainly.”

“The evidence was clear,” she pressed. “Chang’an admitted to it himself. Is there some hidden truth?”

Uncle Hu clenched his jaw. “Your Highness, where did the Ninth Prince spend his formative years?”

“The Foundling Hall.”

“And what is that place, truly?”

“An orphanage,” Chen Hongluo said, a note of impatience creeping in. “I am the one asking the questions, Uncle Hu.”

“And I am answering them,” the old butler said solemnly. “You know he was an orphan. Do you know what an orphan craves most in this world?”

Chen Hongluo’s expression froze. Her hands began to tremble against the silk of her skirts.

*What does an orphan need most?*

*A family. A mother’s touch.*

Children raised in the cold vacuum of an orphanage do not want gold; they want the warmth of belonging. Their hearts are made of glass, shattering at the slightest cold front. When he returned to the manor, Chu Yanran had met his timidity with disdain. She had never offered him a mother's embrace.

So, he had sneaked into her room. He hadn't wanted to steal the robe. He had wanted to wrap himself in her scent. He had been stroking the fabric because it was the closest he could get to her skin.

*Oh God,* Hongluo thought, the realization hitting her like a physical blow. *It wasn't theft. It was a prayer.*

*He was just a child trying to find his mother.*

Tears spilled over, hot and uncontrollable, as she wept in the silence of the rainy night. Uncle Hu did not offer comfort; he only spoke the final truth. “The Fourth Princess said he stole her medicine. I do not know the facts of that day, but I know the boy. He would not take what was not his without a desperate reason. He was an orphan, Your Highness. He always felt like a guest in his own home.”

He let out a heavy sigh, but the sound was drowned out by the thunderclap of realization in Hongluo’s mind. She sprang to her feet, her eyes wide. “The Foundling Hall! He didn’t go to the academy, and he isn’t here. He went back to the only place that ever felt like home!”

“Uncle Hu, ready the carriages! Now! I have to find him!”

Uncle Hu looked pained. “Your Highness, the hour is late and the storm is fierce. The Foundling Hall will be barred for the night. Tomorrow morning, after I report to the Prince, I will accompany you myself.”

Chen Hongluo looked out at the black, weeping sky and nodded reluctantly. Back in her chambers, surrounded by the suffocating luxury of the Huainan Manor, she collapsed onto her bed. *What have we done to him?*

In the servants' quarters, Uncle Hu warmed a pot of cheap, burnt wine, staring into his cup with watery eyes. “Ninth Prince, I do not know if speaking out was right or wrong. I only wish for your suffering to end.”

In the vast, sprawling expanse of the Huainan Manor, only a single servant mourned the boy’s absence. It was a bitter, damning irony.

***

The following morning, the plum rains showed no sign of relenting. Chen Hongluo, pale from a sleepless night, found Chen Zhan already at the head of the breakfast table.

*Eat without speech; sleep without word.*

The dining hall was a theater of silence, the only sound the rhythmic clink of silver against porcelain. Chen Zhan finished his bowl of abalone soup—delicacy sourced from the distant coast and rushed to the manor by elite couriers. A single bowl cost more than Chang’an’s entire yearly allowance.

“Father…”

Chen Zhan raised a hand, silencing her until he had finished. He wiped his mouth with a silk kerchief. “Uncle Hu informed me of your theory. Go to the Foundling Hall. Take a caravan of gifts; do not let the manor lose face by appearing stingy. I have also ordered the Scout Battalion to sweep Jiangdu. That rebellious boy will be found.”

Chen Hongluo bowed her head, a bitter taste in her mouth. *His son has been missing for nine days, and all he cares for is the ‘face’ of the manor.*

By midday, ten carriages departed in a somber procession. The Foundling Hall was a grim, government-run institution that survived on meager subsidies. As the population of abandoned children grew, the silver never stretched far enough. When the head of the hall, Zhou Cuihua, heard that the Prince of Huainan had sent a delegation, she was ecstatic. Dressed in her best patched rags, she waited in the mud and rain.

As Chen Hongluo stepped from her carriage, Zhou Cuihua dropped to her knees in the slush. “Blessings upon the Princess! May you live a thousand years!”

The wind whipped a strand of white hair across the old woman’s face. Uncle Hu held a wide umbrella over Hongluo as she gestured for the woman to rise. “Head Zhou, please. My father worries for the orphans during these storms. He has sent blankets and grain—enough to last three months.”

Zhou Cuihua’s face transformed with joy. “The Prince’s mercy is boundless!”

While Uncle Hu managed the offloading of the supplies, Chen Hongluo stepped inside the hall. The air was thick with the smell of damp wood and thin porridge. Dozens of children looked up, their eyes wide and hauntingly bright.

Suddenly, a small girl, no older than three, broke from the group and threw her arms around Hongluo’s legs. Her tiny face was a mask of desperation.

“Mother… Mother, you came back!”

“Hong is a good girl,” the child sobbed, clutching Hongluo’s fine silks with muddy hands. “Hong won’t eat much. Just a little bit. Please, don’t leave me here again. Take Hong away… please!”

The girl’s wail broke the dam. One by one, the other children began to cry, rising from their benches with reaching arms. They all surged forward, a sea of small, broken souls, all of them crying out the same word—the name they whispered into their pillows every night.

“Mother!”

“Mother, take me home!”

Standing in the center of the storm, Chen Hongluo felt her heart shatter into a thousand jagged pieces.