The Birth Amid Blood and Fire

Zhao Jin followed Xiaohui to the Snowfall Pavilion.

Just as the girl had warned, Qin Yan was locked in the agony of a difficult labor—but the sight before him was far worse than he imagined. The chamber smelled of iron and damp linen, the flickering candlelight throwing shadows across the pale woman writhing on the bed. Though she was nine months pregnant, her belly swelled larger than most, grotesquely taut as if the child within were straining against her very skin. From dusk until midnight, she had labored, blood streaming like a river beneath her, staining the sheets scarlet.

Zhao Jin barked for a physician. The man was hauled from his bed, hair in disarray, dragged half-asleep into the pavilion. One glance at the bloody mattress and the pool spreading across the floor, and he muttered before he could stop himself, “So much blood… she cannot be saved.”

Zhao Jin’s eyes burned with a fury that could set the rafters aflame, yet he ground it down into a deadly calm. “Her. Save her. At any cost.”

The doctor hesitated, lips trembling, before bowing his head. “I will try.”

He forced bitter medicine down Qin Yan’s throat. For a moment, life flickered back into her like a candle guttering against the wind. But with it came unbearable pain. She thrashed like a skinned rabbit, body arching, gasping, sobbing. Her nails tore into the bedding.

Zhao Jin grasped her trembling hand, his own voice trembling despite himself. “Qin Yan, endure it. Stay with me.”

Her eyes fluttered open, pupils unfocused, a clouded glaze that seemed already halfway to death. A low moan escaped, and suddenly she bit deep into her cheek, blood flooding her mouth.

“Don’t—don’t bite yourself!” Zhao Jin pried her jaw open, shoving in his hand in desperation. But too late—like lightning she clamped down, her teeth sinking into his wrist with the ferocity of a starving wolf. Flesh tore; blood ran hot.

“You want to bite me, don’t you?” His lips curved into a wild, almost tender smile, ignoring the wound that gushed red. “Then bite. Bite as hard as you can. I know you’ve longed to drink my blood, to tear my flesh—you’ve just never had the chance. Now I give it to you. Qin Yan, bite me. I will not be angry.”

He freed his other hand to stroke her damp hair, smoothing it back from her clammy forehead as though comforting a child.

The doctor, stirring medicine at the side table, glanced at him as though staring at a lunatic. He muttered the only judgment that fit: “You are mad.”

And perhaps he was.

Even through the resonance of tonggan, I could feel Zhao Jin’s madness. In all his nineteen years, he had never cared for anyone. To him, servants were stones, bed-warmers dust, women playthings to be gathered and discarded. But Qin Yan—Qin Yan alone had stirred something raw and strange within him.

Pity. Regret. Longing. Pain.

Yes, regret. For the first time, Zhao Jin regretted. He regretted not noticing her pregnancy sooner, regretted leaving her to bear this danger alone. A thought bloomed, reckless and uncharacteristic: if she survived, he would grant her a name, no matter what his father or the clan decreed.

At last, after endless torment, the bleeding slowed. With the doctor’s aid, Qin Yan gave birth to twins: a boy and a girl, their cries thin but alive.

The physician nearly wept with relief. He held out the swaddled bundles, his voice trembling with joy. “Congratulations, Young Master! At last, you have heirs!”

Zhao Jin looked at them only briefly, joy flickering like a spark. But his gaze turned back at once to the still form on the bed. “And their mother?”

The physician’s tone grew grave. “The children live, but the mother needs nourishment, urgently. She must take medicine—but she is unconscious. Without her will, how can we feed her?”

So came the dilemma of the ages. How to give medicine to the senseless? Zhao Jin did not hesitate. He took the bowl himself, drank deep, and pressed his lips to hers, passing it mouth to mouth.

The doctor flushed crimson and turned aside. Xiaohui, on the other hand, stared with wide, starry eyes as if she were watching the scene of some scandalous play.

Two doses of century-old ginseng were forced into her body this way. Yet Qin Yan remained pale as porcelain, her lips bluish, her skin cold to the touch.

Zhao Jin’s heart hammered, panic breaking through his composure. “Why isn’t she waking?! Why?!”

The doctor spread his hands in helpless shock. “She… she has no will to live.”

The words rang like thunder.

Most people clung to life with desperate instinct. But Qin Yan seemed different. With the children delivered, she seemed freed, her soul sinking into the depths. No matter what rare medicines were poured into her, she did not stir.

Zhao Jin seized the two infants and laid them beside her. Their shrill cries filled the chamber. Still she did not move.

The physician sighed. “She refuses life itself. Unless… unless the young master speaks to her, reminds her of something—or someone—she cannot abandon. Perhaps then her heart may awaken.”

He gathered the newborns and Xiaohui, withdrawing to leave the chamber in silence.

Zhao Jin sat by her bed for a long while, staring at her pale lips, her fragile chest rising faintly with each shallow breath.

At last, he bent close, his lips brushing her ear. His voice broke into a whisper.

“Qin Yan, it’s me. Zhao Jin. Wake… please wake. We have children now. A son and a daughter. Won’t you open your eyes and see them?”

No response.

So he spoke more. Of the day he first saw her. Of the way she alone had made his heart stumble, a feeling he had never admitted aloud. His voice was raw, filled with secrets he had never told another soul. Was it love? He did not even know.

“Wake, I beg you. I’ll cherish you, I’ll honor you. Just open your eyes…”

His voice cracked, and he bowed his head, tears spilling against the bedding. For two full hours he spoke, until his lips split and bled, but she lay unmoving, slipping ever closer to death.

At last, desperation twisted his resolve. He spoke the words he had sworn he would never utter.

“Qin Yan… Yu Hanjun has married now. A daughter of a martial clan, beautiful and proper. But he—he never forgot you. He sent me letters, offering a fortune to have you returned. I refused. But… if you wake now, I’ll give you back to him. I’ll send you to Yu Hanjun. Just… open your eyes.”

He did not even know if he spoke truth or lie. Perhaps it was only a ruse, a test. But the test worked.

Her lashes quivered. Slowly, painfully, her eyes opened—clouded, unfocused. And the first thing she saw was Zhao Jin.

“Qin Yan!” His joy burst forth like sunlight—only to vanish in the next instant, crushed beneath a storm of rage. His heart felt trampled into dust.

“So it’s true. You woke… because of him.”

He forgot she had just borne children, forgot she hovered at death’s edge. His hands seized her shoulders, grip iron, knuckles whitening.

She blinked, dazed, confused, not even understanding what he said.

But he bared his teeth in a cruel laugh. “You think I’d ever let you go? Dream on. Yu Hanjun is wed now. Do you hope to crawl back as his concubine? Qin Yan—alive, you are mine. Dead, you are my ghost. Only I may cast you aside. You will never leave me of your own will!”

Outside the chamber wall, my own body shook. My heart pounded so hard I thought it might burst.

Never had I felt Zhao Jin’s fury so unrestrained, his shame so raw. This proud, untouchable man had bent low once in his life—had bared his heart—and believed it crushed beneath her indifference.

I trembled, drenched in sweat. Gongsun Bai caught my arm as I staggered.

“Brother Su, what’s happening?”

I shook my head, teeth chattering. “Zhao Jin’s fury… it’s terrifying. Just now—he wanted to kill her.”

“What? Why?”

Clutching my chest, I forced the words out. “He thinks… he thinks she woke only because he promised to return her to Yu Hanjun. That’s why he wanted to kill her.”

From this scene alone, it seemed a damning truth. But I, who had seen Qin Yan’s memories, could only cry injustice.

She had been drowning in darkness, pulled back only by medicine and chance. Who could say which word, which sound had stirred her? If fate had shifted slightly—if she had opened her eyes at his whispered “I love you”—would everything have been different?

Alas. It was all time, and fate, and cruel mischance.