My first HZGG fic, because I was inexplicably inspired YEARS (decades?) since I last watched the drama. I fairly inhaled all the available stories here and desperately wished the fandom was about 10x bigger. So here is my modest contribution.

This piece is stand alone, but hopefully will evolve into a planned short series of other "how they met" (possibly vaguely connected) one-shots if (WHEN) I get to them - because as romantic as the idea of an arrow-shooting cupid is, I don't trust it one bit.

Would LOVE any feedback. Working with these characters in this universe is still so new to me. xx


The Times Before Last

Heart of Gold

"Shao ye!"

It took Yong Qi several moments to realize Er Tai was trying to get his attention.

For one, it was loud. The streets of Beijing were crowded, especially in the afternoon on a warm spring day. Everybody seemed to be out. Women bargained for vegetables with a discerning eye, while men stood in groups, exchanging the day's news, and children scrambled underfoot, chasing each other and being chased by imaginary creatures. The bustle was a welcome change for a young prince used to order, but it was an assault on his palace senses.

For another, it took him a minute to realize it was him Er Tai had been calling. He was, and had always been, Yong Qi to his closet friend. While Er Tai addressed him by his formal title when occasion dictated, "shao ye" was reserved solely for trips into the city. Such outings and errands off palace grounds were becoming more frequent now that he was older, but they were still rare enough that Yong Qi felt almost like a different person, answering to an alien name.

But the main reason Yong Qi didn't immediately respond to Er Tai, was because he'd been distracted by a girl.

It wasn't how she looked, exactly, that had caught his attention, although he'd noticed her. The girl, perhaps in her late teens, on the verge of womanhood, was wearing plain peasant clothes – a simple cotton shirt and pants in light purple with a decorative trim. Her hair was piled in coils around her head, but a handful of braids spilled playfully past her shoulders. She had been wandering down the middle of the road, leisurely, almost carelessly. Rather too aimlessly for a girl out alone, he'd thought, as she passed him moments earlier. Her eyes were cast down demurely, but he saw her lashes flickering as she went by, and knew her darting glances were seeing everything.

And then, only because he was looking, he saw her pick pocketing. As she passed a hunched elderly man leaning heavily on a cane, her hand slipped deftly into his pocket, a movement so subtle he almost missed it.

Yong Qi froze, staring at her retreating back.

Thief, he wanted to call, but he was held by shock and the innate reflex not to draw attention to himself.

He blinked, trying to marshal his thoughts. The elderly man hobbled past him, and Yong Qi frowned. He noted the rough quality of his clothes, the deformed fingers that gripped the cane, undoubtedly from years of hard work and malnutrition, and the holes in his shoes, scuffed from the way he shuffled along. What could he have for that girl to take, and how did she know he had anything at all?

He looked around, searching for a glimpse of the girl. The thief. He caught a flash of purple. She had wandered off to the side of the road away from him. Her entire demeanor had changed. She seemed charged, full of energy. There was suddenly a little bounce to her step, and her eyes sparkled as she looked around, as though caught between curiosity and excitement, a girl on a much-awaited adventure into town.

Yong Qi was strangely impressed despite himself. Was this all a part of her act, a way to cover her trail?

"Wait a moment," he murmured to Er Tai, craning to keep an eye on the girl. "I'll be right back."

"What?" Er Tai frowned, eyebrows creeping up his forehead as he caught hold of his friend's sleeve, trying to catch his eye. "Aiy aiy aiy, I'm not letting you walk around by yourself in the middle of Beijing. Ah Ma told me to keep an eye on you!"

"You know he has no choice but to say that whenever you're out with me," Yong Qi retorted, still entirely distracted. "Don't worry – it'll be just a minute."

He turned into the crowd, ignoring Er Tai's mutter of exasperation, and could almost sense him rolling his eyes at his retreating back.

Yong Qi caught up to the girl just in time to see her bound up to another stranger – a stooped elderly woman this time, carrying two bulging bags. Another victim.

Caught between disapproval and fascination, he paused where he was, half-hidden from her by a vendor and his cart, where he could see without being seen.

"Nai nai!" He heard her voice for the first time, clear and bright, like polished brass. "Those bags look awfully heavy. Let me give you a hand."

She smiled back at the face peering up at her in surprise. Yong Qi noticed the old woman's eyes were clouded on one side, and doubted she could see very well at all.

"Here, let me carry these for you," the girl said cheerfully, as the woman surrendered her bags. For a wild moment, Yong Qi wondered if she was about to run off with them. "Tell me where you live."

"Good girl." The old woman nodded appreciatively. Gripping the girl's sleeve with a clawed hand, she nudged her in the direction of her home. Yong Qi followed at a distance, hoping he would not have far to go, or Er Tai would verbally skin him by the time he returned.

He trailed the duo down two streets, to a quieter part of the city.

"Nai nai," the girl was saying, "tell me about your grandchildren."

The elderly woman chuckled. "Who says I have grandchildren?"

The girl made a sound between a laugh and a scoff. "You have potato here enough to feed a village. How many do you have?"

"Four. The oldest is twelve, and the youngest is only two. They're good children – they take care of each other."

"Children need more meat, nai nai."

Now it was the older woman's turn to scoff. "And pray tell, where am I going to get the money to buy meat? I'm a widow, and my son died just this past winter, leaving behind a sickly wife and four children."

The girl made a sympathetic sound, but said nothing.

The two of them slowed, and stopped in front of a squat building, it's entrance a mere hole in the wall. Yong Qi stopped as well, feeling his heart rate pick up. Was this girl now going to steal from this elderly woman with the hoard of mouths to feed, who lived in this sort of place?

"Thank you, girl." The elderly woman patted her hand, affectionately. "My joints – they're not what they once were."

"It's not a problem." The girl had a radiant smile, and even Yong Qi could have believed her sincerity. "I hope your grandchildren will always have enough to eat."

As she handed the bags back to the old woman, Yong Qi saw a flash of something coppery in her hand as it dipped briefly into the woman's bag.

What was she doing?

He watched her, while she watched just as silently as the woman disappeared into the hole in the wall. Suddenly, she whirled around to him, before Yong Qi had time to retreat.

"And you, why are you following me?" Her voice, so sweet just moments ago, sounded almost brash, like she was ready for a fight. But was she defending, or attacking?

"Following you?" Yong Qi repeated blandly.

"Don't think I didn't notice. I passed you back there – " she waved an impatient hand in the general direction of where they'd come. "So how did you end up here? Were you also helping an old lady with her groceries?"

Yong Qi looked into her blazing brown eyes. Her eyes were a challenge, her straightforward manner and dripping sarcasm inviting him to lose his palace-bred etiquettes and speak freely. But Yong Qi couldn't quite figure out of he should engage her as a lady, as a criminal, or as something else entirely.

He moved closer, now that he'd been found out. "What are you doing?"

The girl pressed her lips together. She stayed silent, but neither did she look abashed at being caught red handed.

"Were you really only helping an old lady with her groceries?" His tone was gentler than he intended. For some reason, he couldn't quite levy the accusation he'd meant to on the slip of a girl standing in front of him.

She bristled, anyway. "Perhaps I was. Perhaps I wasn't. You can think whatever you like," she told him, huffily.

"Stealing is wrong," he persisted, his voice still quiet.

"Stealing? Is that what you think I'm doing?" For a moment, the girl stared at him. Then she laughed, and it wasn't a happy sound. "Never mind. Look at you, standing there in your fancy clothes (Yong Qi had intentionally worn his least fanciest clothing into the city). You're probably a rich merchant's son, and I bet your house is bigger than this entire block. You probably have a roomful of cooks and a servant to wipe for you after using the toilet. Do you know what it's like not having enough to wear? Do you know what it's like to be hungry? Shao ye, you've never wanted for anything, have you? You wouldn't understand."

Yong Qi couldn't remember the last time anyone had spoken to him with this kind of insolence, this kind of anger. The words seemed to tumble from her as if she couldn't control it. But he stood there, and let her dress him down. For she was right about one thing – evidentially more than one thing, minus the crude imagery of the toilet – he didn't understand.

He didn't know her life, or what hardships she'd met that had her resorting to petty crime.

"So help me," he said, pointedly, when it became clear the girl was out of breath. Her eyes widened. "Help me understand."

She sighed, rolling her eyes like she was speaking to a child, or to someone extremely daft. "That old man back there – he's disabled. Just look at the way he limps. Without a new pair of shoes, his feet will chafe. It would cause injury, maybe infection. He could die. And this lady… I knew by the bags she carried that she was feeding a whole family, and by the way she held herself that it wasn't a happy situation. She looked resigned… but not yet ready to give up." The girl sighed again, but it was a different sort of sound. He had the impression that she had gotten lost in some unnamed emotion, and had forgotten he was there.

Yong Qi was silent for a minute, processing her words, and it took another minute for the implications to hit. He stared hard at her then, startled into taking a step forward, so he was almost right in front of her. "What are you saying? You mean – were you… you were giving them money?"

The girl's expression brightened considerably as he caught on. "It wasn't obvious, was it? It's not as hard as it looks. I do know some qing gong – and it's not all about walking on water and flying through the air, you know (as though Yong Qi ever thought that). I can be stealthy."

"But you – you are…" Yong Qi shook his head slowly, lost in wonder.

"Just a girl?" She supplied, cheekily. She was filled with vibrancy, now that she wasn't glaring at him.

"No! Well… yes, but – " He didn't know quite how to say what he wanted to say, but he knew he hadn't left Er Tai standing in the middle of the busy Beijing intersection just to follow a girl. He had been chasing a riddle, armed with the unsettling sense that something was not quite what it seemed. The puzzle had left him suspicious yet fascinated, wary and touched. Had left him humbled as he came up hard against a most unexpected twist.

And now he had an answer, of sorts, in the form of this girl with the giant doe eyes and inquisitive brow, whose spoke like a crass soldier and wore her emotions on her sleeve. Who was boastful and generous, impertinent, impatient, with a heart of gold. From the performances he'd witnessed, Yong Qi had no doubt she could lie, and lie well, and yet she was authentically, alarmingly transparent.

But somehow, he was left with only more questions, a desire to know more about her that went beyond curiosity.

In the end, he asked the least offensive. "And you? Do you have excess enough that you can afford to give it away like this?"

The girl shrugged. "I earn my money, and we make do. Today was a good day – we earned more than expected. Where I live, I already support an entire host of old and young people with no blood relation to me – why does it matter who I help?" She sounded almost defensive. "We all have to look out for each other."

Yong Qi couldn't help the look of incredulousness that had crossed his face. He had more questions as he listened. Where did she live? Who did she live with? What had happened that made such a young woman into the primary provider for her home? But the questions slipped his mind at her bold declarations. She sounded more stoic than heroic, but it took his breath away.

How many books had he read? How many lectures had he sat through at the schoolhouse? How many hours had he sat – sometimes stood – by his father's side, listening to the latest policies and problems of their country? He had studied economics, analyzed battles, prosecuted criminals.

And here was this girl, goodness personified, who was doing the work of a country with no expectation of recognition or promise of reward. If only his father could hear her. If only his court could hear her.

But she was only telling him. And perhaps he needed to hear it, most of all. He'd thought the worst of her, but she'd brought out her best.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" She was tilting her head, looking at him curiously, and he realized he'd let the silence go on far too long.

He took a slow breath. "Admiration," he told her honestly.

Her intake of breath was one of surprise. "For me?" Her brows furrowed. She was not used to praise.

He nodded earnestly and moved to stand closely next to her, ever aware he was overstepping the boundaries of propriety. He did not know how to speak as unreservedly as she had, but he hoped she could hear the sincerity in his words. "I misjudged you – forgive me. I never expected to find myself so inspired in the backstreets of Beijing. You're a good person, doing a good thing. Really."

Her face flushed in pleasure and she looked down with a smile and a shrug, ducking her head, speechless for the first time since they'd met.

He smiled back, catching her eye as she peered at him from beneath those unusually long lashes. They stood, smiling foolishly at each other, for surely longer than was necessary or appropriate.

"I should get going, it'll be dark soon," she announced suddenly, shaking him out of the moment. He thought he could detect a hint of reluctance.

Yong Qi nodded, just as unwillingly. "As should I – my companion will be cursing everything about me by the time I get back." She shared a chuckle at this.

There was a bewildering moment of awkwardness as both tried to figure out how to extract themselves from the other.

When they'd managed it, the girl gave him a swift grin before turning away. She'd taken a few steps away from him before turning back just as abruptly. "Don't follow me, anymore."

Yong Qi had made no effort to move. "I'm glad I did," he said.

They shared another smile.

She turned again. Another few steps. She had almost made it to the end of the street. This time, she twisted to look back at him. "If you ever find yourself with more than you need, maybe you could join me."

No Shao ye. No biting sarcasm. Just sincerity, radiating from her entire being.

He felt something twist in his chest. If only she knew. Yong Qi nodded at her, not trusting himself to speak.

She gave him one last smile and a wave, before disappearing around the corner. He waited just a beat longer, suppressing the urge to call after her, before turning to ford his way back into the crowds to where Er Tai was waiting.

I heard what you said.

I do have more to give. I have everything to give.

Who are you?