About this story
A garden grows around the cousins' poetry club, and a night search of every court ends in Tanchun's slap. You burn your poems as the wedding pipes play, and keep watching as the guard seals the gates and the men are led into the snow. One hundred and twenty chapters carry the house from your arrival to the stone's return.
Who you’ll meet
Jia Baoyu, the indulged heir who stops one step inside the curtain and says he already knows your face, with Grandmother Jia laughing on her couch and Wang Xifeng smiling behind it.
How it opens
After your mother's death, the journey north ended before gates grander than any Suzhou memory.
Sedan bearers changed at the mansion entrance, where rank determined every door and footstep.
XueyanMiss Lin, an inner chair must carry you from this gate.
XueyanYour father's letter is already in Lady Wang's hands.
Lady WangBring my niece to the old lady; grief has waited long enough.
Choose
Follow the household's lead until we learn its customs.
Stay close enough that I need not call across the hall.