The fourth day of the eleventh month, in the fourteenth year of Jinghe.
On the third day after Shen Duan returned home to await impeachment proceedings, the Capital saw its heaviest snowfall of the winter.
The snow began falling at midnight and had piled half a foot deep by dawn.
The stone lions outside the Shen Residence had half their heads buried in snow.
For three days, everyone in the Shen Residence had felt a stone weighing on their hearts.
Shen Duan had been ordered to return home and await impeachment proceedings.
For the first time, an imperial decree had placed a "seal" on the Chief Minister's residence.
By dusk, the snow was falling harder.
The gatekeeper at the Shen Residence huddled in the gateway, stamping his feet for warmth and breathing out white mist.
Just then, an unfamiliar young man emerged from the curtain of snow and thrust a blue cloth bundle into his hands.
He said only, "Feng Residence," then turned and vanished into the boundless snowfall.
The gatekeeper stood stunned for a moment, then hurried inside with the bundle.
The steward of the Shen Residence took the bundle in the inner quarters and hefted it. It felt like a book.
"Ah, our master has only just been ordered to 'await impeachment proceedings.'
"And now the Feng Residence sends something over. What does this mean?
"Have they come to laugh at him, or to finish him off?"
Muttering, he stood outside the study with the bundle for a long time. In the end, he knocked.
"Come in."
Shen Duan was seated behind his desk, leafing through an old book. Hearing footsteps,
he raised his eyes, his gaze lingering briefly on the blue cloth bundle in the steward's hands.
"Master, this came from the Feng Residence." The steward