When Horace fell ill all those years ago, every hospital wrote him off as a dead man.

But I refused to accept it. I begged doctors everywhere, prayed to every god I could find.

I walked endless roads and bowed my head until my forehead was raw, and at last I bought him one slim chance at life.

After that, I held everything in heaven and earth in reverence.

Anything that might do him good, I was always willing to try.

And he used that love of mine.

Again and again, he toyed with me like something in the palm of his hand.

Now the last of my stubborn hope drifted off like smoke.

I lifted a hand to wipe my tears and said quietly,

"Dad, let's call off the engagement."

"The one who'll be struck down by heaven for breaking the vow isn't me."

When he heard that, my father stopped pushing.

"All right. As long as you've thought it through for yourself."

"Don't worry about who you'll marry. Dad will find someone for you from the village."

"They're all boys I've watched grow up. More reliable than Horace!"

I murmured my agreement and hung up.

If the engagement was about to be broken, there was no reason for me to stay in the Gilbert house any longer.

I packed a few things and planned to leave at first light.

I had just fallen asleep when a phone call jolted me awake.

"Melinda, I went looking for spring water and got lost up in the hills."

"You're a mountain girl, you know the land. Come get me and bring me back, now!"

My stomach dropped.

Then Lillian's voice came through the line.

"How long do you think it'll take Melinda to come this time? I bet two hours."

"It won't take that long. With how much Melinda dotes on Horace, half an hour at most. A bet's a bet, Lillian, and if you lose, you owe Horace that striptease, like we agreed."

So it was another of Horace's little games to torment me.

Only this time, he'd forgotten to hang up in time.

And I didn't go rushing off the way I always had.

I put the phone on silent and went back to sleep.

In the gray light of dawn, someone yanked the covers off me.

Horace stood there glaring, his face dark with fury.

"Why didn't you come for me last night?"

"Do you have any idea that I lost the bet… do you have any idea how long I wandered around in those hills?"

"I nearly died out there trying to marry you sooner, and you could just lie here at home sleeping like a baby!"

A reek of liquor laced with perfume rolled off him.

I frowned and held my phone up to his face.

"This is what Lillian posted last night at midnight."

The two of them in the picture wore matching couple's outfits.

Holding hands, leaning into each other.

Zoom in, and you could even make out the lipstick mark on Horace's face.

He took the phone from me.

A flicker of guilt hid in the crease between his brows, almost too faint to catch.

But soon enough, he turned it back on me, just like always.

"That's Lillian's prank, AI-generated."

"After all these years together, you don't even have that much basic trust in me?"

"No wonder that peach tree refused to bloom all this time. I'd say it's because you never gave me your true heart at all!"

The words had barely left his mouth when Lillian pushed the door open.

She had Horace's coat draped over her shoulders, and she stretched into a lazy yawn.

"Horace, why'd you come back so early? I'm not even awake yet."

"Come keep me company a little longer, won't you?"

The fury vanished from Horace's face in an instant.

He turned to her with a soft little laugh.

"Grandfather's coming back to the old house today. I have to get over here ahead of time to get things ready."

"Stay and eat with us. Grandfather loves a proper, well-bred young lady like you."

With that, he turned his eyes back on me.

“Go make a few of the dishes Lillian likes.”

“I want pork and potato stew, crab-stuffed meatballs, and steamed fish. And no scallions or cilantro in any of it. Lillian doesn't like them.”

He didn't care how I felt, but he knew every last one of Lillian Summers's preferences by heart.

To him, his fiancée was nothing more than a maid who'd never be fit to show in public.

I pulled the blanket up over me and refused to look at Horace.

“I need to rest. I don't have time to cook.”

Beside him, Lillian pursed her lips and looped her arm through Horace's, all wheedling charm.

“How is it that the moment I show up, Melinda always feels unwell?”

“She wouldn't be faking it to avoid me because she can't stand me, would she?”

Losing face, Horace started to lose his patience.

He grabbed my arm roughly and dragged me off the bed.

“Quit putting on an act. Everyone knows you mountain folk are sturdy as oxen. You can do hard labor all day and be fine. So why are you suddenly so delicate?”

“Get up and cook. The Gilberts don't keep idle mouths around. I didn't get engaged to you so you could play the lady of the house!”

My bones cracked under his grip.

A sharp pain shot through the arm that had been injured all those years ago.

At my breaking point, I snatched the pillow from behind me and hurled it.

“Horace, you know full well why I can't stand her!”

The pillow grazed Lillian's cheek, leaving a faint red mark.

It was nothing serious, but it was enough to set Horace off.

He froze for three seconds, then seized the crystal ornament off the table and flung it hard at me.

“Melinda, you just won't stop, will you!”

“I'm talking to you nicely, and this is how you treat a guest?”

“Do you know who Lillian is? If you leave a scar on her face, you'll see exactly what I do to you!”

The ornament struck my head.

A thread of blood trickled slowly down my forehead.

Horace realized he'd gone too far.

He hurried to take my hand, wanting to tend to the wound.

I shook him off, no patience left for any of it.

“I don't need your help. I can walk on my own.”

“From this day on, I will never set foot in the Gilbert house again!”

“That's not what I meant……”

Horace started to explain on instinct.

But when he glanced at Lillian beside him, he pulled his hand back.

“I know there's some misunderstanding between you and Lillian, but what happened back then wasn't all her fault.”

“It's been so many years. Do you really need to keep clinging to such petty things?”

Back then, my mother was gravely hurt saving old Simon Gilbert.

To repay the debt, the Gilberts brought me into the city for schooling.

They treated me with courtesy at every turn, yet there were always those who bullied me on purpose for where I'd come from.

Lillian was the worst of them all.

She cut off my hair. She pushed me down the stairs.

She even tried to tear off my clothes and take photos to ruin my future.

At the last moment, it was Horace who stepped forward and shielded me with his own body.

He faced Lillian and said, his voice ringing with conviction,

“Where someone is born doesn't decide everything.”

“Melinda has done nothing wrong. Her birth is no excuse for you to bully her.”

That day, the setting sun fell across Horace and stretched his shadow tall above me.

From that moment, I fell hopelessly in love with him.

I would rather give up half my own lifespan than fail to save him.

But how could the girl I was back then ever have imagined it.

The one who had once stood up for me.

Now stood on the other side, against me.

Too exhausted to argue anymore,

I let out a sigh and said, flatly,

“Horace, let's end the engagement.”

“Since you care about Lillian this much, I'll let you have her.”

Horace stalled for a moment.

The guilt of a second ago curdled into the cold laugh of someone caught out.

"Break it off? Melinda, are you out of your mind?"

"You clung to my side like a leech for eight years and wouldn't leave. And now you want to break it off? Who's going to want you?"

Lillian let out an open sneer.

"Country girls really are the scheming type. She's even learned to play hard to get."

"I heard you nearly got defiled saving Horace back then. A woman like you, leaving the Gilberts? They'll probably run you out of town in disgrace."

What I'd done for Horace back then went far beyond that.

I'd climbed the nine thousand steps of the temple stairs on my knees. I'd prayed in hundreds of shrines.

Anything that might save him, no matter how bitter or hard, I was willing to do it.

Everyone said I'd throw away my own life for Horace.

A few con men heard that and set their sights on me.

In the end I slit my wrist and threatened to die before they finally backed off.

I'd thought all of that was proof of how I loved him.

I never imagined that in their eyes it was only leverage to use against me.

The memories tightened around me like a halter until I couldn't breathe, until I couldn't stand one more moment in this place.

Just then a message from my father came through on my phone.

"We've settled on someone for you to marry. A man from the village, someone we know inside and out."

"He knows you love peach blossoms, so he reserved half a hillside of peach trees just for you. Come home and we can hold the wedding right away!"

Horace looked down and caught the word "marry."

Whatever guilt he'd had drained away, and he grew bolder still, laughing coldly.

"See? You can't actually leave the Gilberts."

"That little village of yours is so backward and superstitious. Where can you go, besides marrying me?"

Anywhere.

Anywhere was better than here.

When he saw me still walking toward the door, still refusing to come to my senses, Horace lost the last of his patience.

Staring at my back, humiliated and furious, he shouted.

"Melinda, take one more step and I'll chop down the peach tree in the yard right now!"

My foot stopped. I didn't turn around.

"Do whatever you want."

That tree was tied to Horace's own fate, not mine.

I moved out of the Gilbert house, and a cold war began between us.

In eight years, it was the first time.

Before, the moment he was unhappy, the moment he used the peach tree to vent his temper at me, I'd bow my head right away.

But this time, no matter how many threatening messages Horace sent, I didn't waver.

In the end, Horace sent me one line.

"Melinda, you'll regret this."

I thought he was going to bring up the peach tree again.

I didn't expect that not long after, I'd get a call from my father.

"Melinda, your mother's not going to make it. Come quickly, come see her!"

"Somebody sent your mother a video. I don't know who."

"It said the Gilberts' peach blossoms haven't bloomed for years because you've broken your marriage vows. Your mother couldn't take the shock, and her condition suddenly took a turn for the worse…"

Who else could it be.

The only people who could have gotten that video were Lillian and Horace.

By the time I reached the hospital, my mother had barely a breath left.

She clutched the bridal gown she'd embroidered with her own hands and looked at me.

There was bitterness in her eyes, and heartache.

And I didn't even have the strength left to cry.

Kneeling at my mother's bedside, I wept and told her everything that had happened lately.

In the end, we agreed to hold the wedding early.

To cut every tie with Horace, once and for all.

There was no time, so the wedding was set near the hospital.

Apart from the closest family on both sides, there wasn't a single extra guest.

I had just changed into the bridal gown and was ready to go out and be married when Horace suddenly burst in.