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Madame Ying followed the same ritual as her husband.
Then it was He Lingchuan’s turn.
He Chunhua stood at the front, face somber, voice weighty as stone. “Kowtow to your great-grandfather.”
“Kowtow to your grandfather.”
“Kowtow to your grandmother.”
“Kowtow to your second granduncle.”
* * *
Name after name, generation after generation.
By the time He Lingchuan finished all thirty-six kowtows, his head was spinning a little. The last one had been for his ninth uncle, who was his father’s youngest brother, only six years old when he had been sentenced to death by waist-chopping and left displayed in public.
One hundred and twenty-seven members of the He Family’s main branch—from elderly men in their eighties to that six-year-old child—none had escaped. Only He Chunhua had lived.
Then came He Yue’s turn.
The brothers brushed shoulders as they passed each other. As they crossed, He Lingchuan silently mouthed at him, exaggerating every syllable, “Go easy!”
Even with his own thick skin, his forehead was flushed and swollen from the thirty-six strikes. He Yue, with his finer features and tender skin, did not fare so well. In previous years, Old Steward Mo had always had to apply medicine to his forehead afterward.
He Yue’s eyes flicked toward him, but his face did not change.
When he knelt and began to kowtow, the sound of his forehead hitting the mat was no lighter than his older brother’s.
As He Chunhua watched, his gaze went slightly out of focus, as if his attention...
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