Chapter 5 - The Bitter Feast
The next morning, the reality of their new life settled over the Qui household like a heavy, suffocating frost.
Without the Wei family's allowance, Qui Song was forced to sell his personal horse and carriage just to pay off Dong Lani's immediate debts to the tailors and avoid a public jail sentence.
With no servants left to cook or clean, Dong Lani was forced to enter the dark, cold kitchen herself. Her manicured fingernails were chipped, her hands covered in black soot as she struggled for two hours just to light a fire using damp twigs she found in the backyard.
"Teacher Dong!" Mei cried as she walked into the kitchen, wearing a plain cotton dress that had been left behind. "I'm hungry! I want sweet lotus soup and steamed buns!"
Dong Lani, red-faced and covered in ash, blew a lock of hair out of her eyes and glared at the eight-year-old girl. "There is no sweet lotus soup, Mei! Can't you see I'm trying to boil plain rice?!"
"I don't want plain rice!" Mei shouted, stomping her foot. "Mommy always gave us fresh fruit, honey cakes, and warm milk every morning! You're a terrible cook!"
"Don't you dare speak to me like that!" Lani snapped, dropping her wooden spoon with a loud clatter. "I am not your mother! I am the lady of this house now!"
"You're not a lady!" Yuan yelled from the doorway, his face pale and angry. "You don't even have a maid! Mother's maids were nicer than you!"
"Quiet! Both of you!" Qui Song roared, walking into the kitchen wearing a stained robe he had been forced to wash himself—and failed miserably at doing so. "Lani, why isn't breakfast ready?! I have to go to the Magistrate's office in an hour to dispute the financial claim!"
"How am I supposed to cook with no firewood and no ingredients?!" Lani screamed back, tears of frustration finally breaking through her vanity. "You told me I would be living like a queen, Song! You told me your wife was just a boring, useless woman who didn't appreciate you! But she took everything! We don't even have salt!"
"You are the woman of the house now!" Qui Song shouted, his voice cracking with panic and humiliation. "Act like one! Stop complaining and feed my children!"
For the first time, Dong Lani looked at Qui Song not as a powerful, wealthy benefactor, but as a weak, desperate man screaming in an empty room.
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And for the first time, my children looked at Dong Lani not as a sweet, fun playmate, but as the source of their sudden, miserable poverty.
Meanwhile, across the city in the luxurious Wei Estate, I sat in a sunlit pavilion overlooking a private lotus pond, wearing a gown of woven gold thread, surrounded by my aunt, my loyal servants, and the quiet peace I had missed for seven long years.
