Top Scholar

Chapter 206 Embroidered Sachet

The afternoon sun slanted through the carved window lattices of the embroidered building, casting diamond-shaped spots of light on the large rosewood table.

The scroll had been completed and put away, and now the table was filled with various fabrics and a basket of colorful threads.

Huang E sat upright at the table, her left hand steadily holding a bamboo frame, the smoky blue silk on the frame as smooth as a mirror. Her right hand lightly twisted a silver thread, and she wielded the needle like a brush, outlining the delicate curves of orchid petals on the silk.

After finishing the petals, Huang E changed the thread and the stitching technique. With each rise and fall of the needle, the deep green silk thread was layered and embroidered, revealing the veins of the orchid leaves in exquisite detail, as if the leaves would sway gracefully if a breeze blew by.

After embroidering the entire orchid, she took out ink and thread and carefully traced the character "Su" in an inconspicuous place, making it appear and disappear, just like the hazy and incomprehensible feelings in her heart.

To the left of the large rosewood table, Xiaotian was also embroidering a sachet. Knowing her limitations, she chose the simplest square sachet and only embroidered a small three-petaled flower on the front.

The crooked outlines of the petals are drawn with red and pink silk threads, and although the slanted stitches are not smooth, they still roughly create variations in shade. A few gold dots of varying sizes are used for seed stitch embroidery at the stamen. Overall, the shape of the whole flower is already emerging.

"Sister, I've finished embroidering another flower..." After finishing the last stitch, Xiaotiantian breathed a sigh of relief, raised the bamboo frame, and showed her work to her master.

She glanced at herself first, then stuck out her tongue sheepishly and said, "It's still ugly."

"Not bad, not bad, this seed stitch is quite good, much better than the previous one." Huang E could see her strengths and praised, "I really can't believe it's only been two days since you started learning embroidery."

It turns out that Xiaotiantian has already embroidered several identical three-petaled flowers, each a different color. She needs to embroider five, and this is only the fourth one...

Huang E gave Xiao Tiantian some more pointers, and sure enough, she made progress again when she embroidered the next flower...

"You're really skillful; you'll be a master apprentice soon," Huang E said with a pleased smile.

Just then, another "ouch" was heard from the other side of the table.

Huang E turned to look at She Yunluo sitting there, and her smile involuntarily turned into a bitter smile.

She sat there, her back taut as if facing a formidable enemy, her knuckles white from gripping the bamboo frame tightly, and her other hand holding an embroidery needle in a gun-like posture, as if she were about to engage in a sword fight rather than embroidering.

The embroidery needle in her hand was like a wild horse, the thick needle and thread twisting and turning, the gaps between the stitches wide enough to fit an ant. Before she could even embroider a single petal, the needle tip had already pricked her a dozen times, leaving spots of She Yunluo's blood on the pale silk...

"What a damn thing!" She Yunlu cursed, sucking on her injured hand twice. She mumbled, "Why do you Han women like to play with dangerous things?"

"Was it dangerous? How come Xiaotian is alright?" Huang E asked with a smile.

“I got pricked too.” Xiaotian held up her index finger to show her the only red dot on her fingertip.

"You call that being pricked? My left hand is practically pierced into a pig's trotter..." She Yunlu slammed the embroidery hoop onto the table in frustration.

"Don't make things difficult for yourself," Huang E laughed. "Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. Spare your poor pig's trotters."

Actually, she just couldn't bear to watch anymore... Huang E had never seen such a tragic scene of embroidery before.

The blood-stained rags and tangled threads on the table were all She Yunluo's handiwork. Yet, she remained stubborn, refusing to give up even with her hands so badly injured.

"No, I've already boasted to Big Stubborn Ox that I'd embroider the most beautiful sachet in the world for him, so he won't always think that we Luo Luo women aren't as skillful as Han women."

"..." Huang E glanced at Xiao Tiantian, who had started learning at the same time, and who was already skilled at seed embroidery. Thinking to himself that he wasn't wrong, she smiled and said:

"How about I help you?"

"Okay...no!" She Yunluo resisted the temptation and shook her head firmly, saying, "I'd rather he laugh at me than take another woman's things as a substitute."

"If you don't want it, then don't. Don't use such harsh language. What do you mean by 'other woman'?" Huang E said, both amused and exasperated. "Then I won't bother with you anymore. You can embroider it yourself."

"Good sister, you still have to keep an eye on me." After a while, She Yunluo smiled ingratiatingly and picked up the blood-stained embroidery hoop, saying, "I've already finished half of this embroidery, but it's stained with so much blood. What do you suggest I do?"

Huang E thought for a moment and said, "Why don't you finish embroidering first, and I'll help you wash it, but I can't guarantee it will be clean."

These days, bloodstains are hard to remove; scrubbing too hard will cause the fabric to fade.

"Is there any other way?" She Yunluo asked.

"Shall I change it to a branch of red plum blossoms for you?" Huang E said again.

"Great idea! I love red the most!" She Yunluo was overjoyed upon hearing this, shoving the bamboo frame into Huang E's hands with a sigh of relief, "Please, please!"

"You need to help again?" Huang E said with amusement.

“It’s different. You’re helping me revise it, not embroidering it!” She Yunluo said emphatically.

"Alright, she's starting to look like a future female chieftain." Huang E shook her head and smiled, then put down her embroidery frame, replaced the needle with red thread, and began to help She Yunluo make corrections.

She Yunluo initially sat to the side watching intently, but after a while she changed to resting her chin on her hands, and then fell asleep.

In her dream, she became a master embroiderer, capturing the beauty of Luzhou city in her embroidery, which startled the stubborn ox, causing it to bellow loudly...

This thought made her extremely proud, and she even chuckled in her dream.

~~
When She Yunluo was woken up, the light in the embroidery room had already turned dim.

"Oh, I wasn't asleep for very long, was I?" She Yunluo wiped her mouth and asked, still a little dazed.

"It won't be long, just an hour." Huang E tossed her a sachet embroidered with a 'Red Plum Blossom Braving the Snow' design and said, "I've fixed it for you."

"Thank you..." She Yunluo picked up the beautiful sachet and examined it closely. She saw that Huang E had used gold thread to outline the gnarled branches. The specks of blood had been cleverly embroidered into the shape of red plum blossoms, the bloodstains and embroidery threads blending seamlessly, even carrying a touch of ink painting. "It's so beautiful..." she exclaimed, then said with some regret, "But this can't really be considered as something I made."

“Why can’t it count?” Huang E said seriously, “Look at those red plum blossoms, they are all dyed with your blood. Is there any more precious sentiment in this world than this?”

He paused for a moment, then laughed and said, "Besides, it's not finished yet, you have to fill it in yourself."

"Yes, yes!" She Yunluo was convinced and said happily, "This is my real hard work!"

“Yes, it’s genuine.” Huang E and Xiao Tiantian nodded together.

"Sister She, when are you going to give it to my second brother?" Xiao Tiantian suddenly asked.

“Of course, it’s the day before the Dragon Boat Festival,” She Yunluo said.

"That day might not work; it seems we need to go back to Hejiang for the festival," Xiaotian reminded her. She was a professional matchmaker.

The story of the matchmaker originates from Wang Shifu's Yuan Dynasty zaju play, "The Story of Cui Yingying Waiting for the Moon in the Western Wing"...

“Alright, I’ll give it to him on the third day of the Lunar New Year,” She Yunluo said.

She sees Su Tai every day, so it doesn't bother her.

Huang E was a little disappointed, as she had thought they could go watch the dragon boat races together during the Dragon Boat Festival.

After all, it had been two months since we last saw each other after Qingming Festival.

~~
In the evening, Su Lu walked to the intersection where he had met Xiao Tiantian the day before. After waiting for a while, he saw the familiar sedan chair coming from the west side of the street.

"Brother, were you waiting for me?" Little Tiantian happily jumped off the sedan chair and ran to him.

“Yes.” Su Lu smiled and produced a long string of candied hawthorns, handing it to Xiao Tiantian.

"Thank you, brother." Xiao Tiantian happily accepted it, but noticed that Su Lu's hand was still open.

"A surprise?" Su Lu didn't stand on ceremony with her.

"Of course!" Xiaotian then accurately pulled a square sachet from her sleeve and placed it in his hand, saying, "This is the best one I've ever made. Isn't that a surprise?"

"Of course!" Su Lu forced a happy smile, held the sachet up to her eyes to examine it carefully, and praised, "It's so well embroidered! Did you really only learn it for two days?"

"Hehehe." Little Tiantian laughed, showing her little tiger teeth, and said, "You and Sister Huang use the same words."

“That’s what you call great minds think alike,” Su Lu said with a smile.

"Haha, brother, are you disappointed?" Xiao Tiantian then teased, "I thought the surprise would be Sister Huang's sachet, but it turned out to be my sister's."

"Knowing that, why don't you hurry up and take it out?" Su Lu finally couldn't hold back and said.

"No." Xiaotian spread her hands and said, "I also thought Sister Huang asked me to bring it to you, but in the end she didn't mention it, so I didn't dare to ask."

"Do you know why?" Su Lu asked, somewhat unsettled.

"I was wondering, could it be because we're not in Luzhou for the Dragon Boat Festival?" Little Tiantian, though young, was quite shrewd and perceptive. "Sister Zhu had already made plans to go see the dragon boats together."

"But something came up unexpectedly," Su Lu said with a wry smile. "Didn't you explain it to me?"

"I did explain," Xiaotian said softly, "but Sister Huang wasn't angry, so I didn't say anything more."

She paused for a moment, then added, "But she didn't return the book today either."

"You still say you're not angry." Su Lu sighed, but then thought about it and realized that didn't make sense. Huang E wasn't the type to throw tantrums, and besides, their relationship hadn't progressed to that point yet.

"..." He felt that Huang E's reaction was a bit unusual, and he couldn't help but ponder it on his way home.

“She didn’t say anything to you, didn’t give you the sachet, and hasn’t even returned the book…” Su Lu murmured.

“Yes.” Xiaotian nodded while eating candied hawthorn. “When I left, I specifically asked her if she had any messages for you, and she said no.”

"No..." Su Lu suddenly slapped his thigh and exclaimed, "I understand!"

"What do you understand?" Xiaotian asked curiously.

"If it doesn't exist, it doesn't exist; if it doesn't exist, it doesn't exist," Su Lu laughed heartily. "My riddle master, are you playing riddles with me again!"

"What does this mean?" Xiaotian was very anxious.

"Hahaha, I won't tell you!" Su Lu laughed.

"Brother, you're getting revenge on me!" Xiao Tiantian stomped her feet, then couldn't help but laugh, "Don't be wrong, you'll have made a wasted trip."

"No, that won't happen." Su Lu said confidently, "We've been corresponding for so long, we still have that much understanding."

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(End of this chapter)