A Song to Drown Rivers

by Ann Liang

Lush grass grew over the places corpses had been left to rot, back when there weren’t enough villagers remaining to help bury the bodies. Butterflies fluttered from one branch to another, where blood had once stained the leaves. Nature had healed faster than we had.

My memory had not done his beauty justice, just as remembered pain was always duller than actual pain.

And how many people under Heaven were really fortunate enough to know happiness? Happiness was a side dish, like the sweet, sticky rice cakes Mother made during the festivals, or the glutinous balls stuffed with rich sesame paste. But revenge—that was the salt of life. Necessary. Essential.

Later, though, I would wish I had stayed longer. Woken them up, held them close. Given them the chance to say a proper goodbye. But such things only occur to you in hindsight, framed by the before and after of everything you’ve endured; when it is still happening, all you care about is what lies ahead.

“It’s no reason to let your guard down. Have you not heard that the loveliest flowers are usually the first to be plucked? Your beauty is dangerous—to others, but also to yourself.”

In a world where everyone will demand something from you, it requires a certain degree of selfishness to be happy, you know.”

“We are most tempted by what we cannot have. Men will dream of the mountains they have yet to scale, the rivers they have yet to set sail upon, the plains they have yet to conquer. They are told from birth everything belongs to them, and so when something does not, they view it as a personal challenge.” I thought about it longer. “But also, from a distance, everything looks more beautiful; we are better able to conjure our own fantasies about them. Sometimes the fragrance of a feast is better than the taste itself.”

“The heart is a fickle thing; it takes and takes. It is easily swayed, and tempted, and made weak. Too many have fallen victims to their own irrational desires. But the mind—the mind is dependable, accurate, deadly. It destroys the enemy, not the self, and ensures that we do what we need to, not what we want.”

When men say they want a lover, what they often mean is they want a mirror; they wish to see themselves reflected back at them in the best light.

bruh

“Don’t take anything I say to heart; I only ever spew out nonsense.”

real lmaooo

Why does it seem to me that the court’s idea of a lady is a beautiful, dull shell who has no personality and makes no sound, Zhengdan had complained to me afterward. They would be better off marrying a statue.

I’ll admit: I would never have expected such tenderness from a wolf.

“Of course, there are things I love,” she went on, “if power counts as one of them. And pretty things. Maybe that makes me vain, but isn’t it natural to be drawn toward what’s beautiful?”

alr diva

For men, it was so easy; the path to power was so direct. But we had to manipulate and maneuver and claw our way to gain half of what they did.

“You are different from how I imagined, you know.” I smiled slightly. “Aren’t we all?”

Be careful, I wanted to warn her, a pang in my chest, that old affliction of the heart. Love is a knife; it cuts both ways.

I had finished weaving my embroidery. Now I could only hold my breath and pray he recognized the picture within it.

Perhaps history would remember him as a hero. But a hero to many was still a villain to one.

“When the hares have all been caught, the hunting dogs are cooked.”