My surname is Qiu, my name is Ziluo, and I am 21 years old this year.

From the day I remember, I have been with Mrs. Xu. It is said that I am an orphan, Qiu, my original surname, and Ziluo was the name given to me by Mrs. Xu. I was adopted by them since I was a child. However, I did not have the blessing of being the eldest lady of the Xu family because I was just a maid.

In the Xu family, all the maids have to do their own jobs and be busy, and I am no exception.

When I was a child, I might have taken into account my young age, so the task assigned by the butler was to pick strawberries in the strawberry field. I would always wear a small floral skirt, hold a small bamboo basket, and sweat a lot in the warm sunny strawberry field.

I have never worn a new piece of my own clothes. All my small skirts were made for me by an older maid using the beautiful curtain cloth that I had removed from home.

Her name is Kelly, and she is the aunt who lives with me in a nanny room. She is a tailor who is specialized in sewing and other work.

There are 8 beds in our nanny room, all of which are maids. At the Xu family, there are many such nanny rooms because the Xu family is too big, and it looks like a museum.

When I was six years old, I was no longer responsible for picking strawberries. The Butler gave me a worksheet that belonged to me. I couldn't fully understand the words on it at that time, but after I took them back to the nanny room happily, Aunt Kelly frowned and took my worksheet to find the Butler.

I didn't know why Aunt Kelly was so angry at that time, but just hid behind the stone pillars at home and listened.

Aunt Kelly told the butler: "She is only six years old and can't do so much work. She cleans the floor before dawn and has to go to the kitchen to wash dishes. She is still a child, and she should go to school! The young master has been in kindergarten class since he was three years old, and she will be seven years old after this winter!"

The housekeeper said, "I have no choice, this is what the wife means. Besides, how can Qiu compare with the young master? She is just a maid, why should she send her to school?"

I wiped my tears and ran back to the nanny room barefoot and waited quietly. After Aunt Kelly came back with regret, I looked at her with a big smile: "Aunt Kelly, don't be angry. I will do whatever the butler arranges for me to do. I can do it."

Aunt Kelly looked at me and hugged me in her arms with a look of distress: "I don't know what my wife thinks. You are still so young, how can you do so many things."

Although my heart was full of desire to go to school, I still had to surrender to the arrangement of fate.

Since then, I rubbed my eyes and got up at 4:30 every morning, then held a small basin of water, rubbed a towel, and started from the first stairs in my house, wiping one step at a time and one step upwards.

At the beginning, I always shed tears in grievance because of my sore arms. I was still hungry. The aroma of cheese always drifted from the kitchen beside the stairs, but I could only smell it, and even the shadow of food could not be seen.

This kind of life lasted until I was ten years old. After I was ten years old, Mrs. Xu suddenly called me to her side, and I became her personal maid.

Although I still have endless dirty and tiring work to do, Mrs. Xu gave me a chance to read and write.

I didn't know Chinese before, and everyone around me spoke English, and my English spoken language was also very good, but I didn't ask me to spell the sentences I said. In other words, I was just an illiterate who could speak but did not recognize English.

I am eager to learn how to spell English, learn its grammar, how to write, and things that are more profound.

But Mrs. Xu asked me to learn Chinese with Young Master Xu, and from that day on, everyone around me was speaking Chinese.

Mrs. Xu said, I am a Chinese, and every Chinese must learn the language of his motherland.

When she said this, her eyes were bright and I realized that Mrs. Xu was a person who missed her motherland very much.

The Chinese class is very strict. If I cannot complete the knowledge taught by the teacher, I will be punished to hit the palm of my hand. It was the teacher who beat it with a small bamboo, which was very painful.

Despite this, I am still very grateful.

I often think that if it weren't for Mrs. Xu, I might have starved to death.

Mrs. Xu is the most perfect woman in my eyes: she is elegant, beautiful, gentle, quiet, full of wisdom, loving and kind.

She likes art. There is a whole floor in the castle, all of which are famous painting galleries set up by Mr. Xu for Mr. Xu, as well as her own independent art studio.

When she paints, she doesn't like to disturb others, nor does she like to get close to others. She only asks me to make coffee and bring it to her table. Whenever the sun sets, she will always stare at the east sky, and sometimes she will shed tears. When she has finished her longing for her relatives in the distance, she will turn her head to look at me. Her kind and alienated eyes are very ethereal, as if she is fantasizing about another person through me.

Because of Chinese class, my young master and I became good friends.

He said that when he heard my family call me "Qiu", he thought it was not nice, so he wanted to give me a nice English name.

I waited with anticipation until I was fourteen years old. Once, Mr. Xu and his family went to Paris for vacation. I heard that the winter there was very beautiful. The young master insisted on taking me with me. We spent Christmas together in Paris. Snowflakes fell on the sky. I happily stretched out my little hand and jumped and laughed on the snowy streets.

That was the first time I left Xu Family Castle and saw the outside world. I was full of novelty about everything.

The young master looked at me quietly, with a smile on his lips. He stepped forward and pulled me, looking at my eyes, and said softly: "Do you know, how beautiful your eyes were just now? They are the clearest and cleanest eyes I have ever seen."

After saying that, he held my face and kissed my forehead. I was shocked and said, "I have thought of your English name for you. Lillian is pure and has the meaning of a vow to God."

"A vow with God? Pure? Lilian?"

I murmured slightly, and he took my hand and wrote the spelling of my new name in my palm. I remembered it with my heart and looked up at him. His smile was so warm and charming in the sun.

After returning to the Xu family castle, the young master summoned all his servants and officially announced that he would not call me "Qiu" in the future, but would call me "Lilian".

But a week later, Mrs. Xu arranged for me to leave the Xu family and go to Singapore to study. The young master found her wife and got angry. However, the wife said that Singapore is more suitable for me to study and would not pick me up again in the future.

Seven years have passed in a flash. Now, I am 21 years old. Mrs. Xu said that I can go back to Xu's house.

Looking at the air ticket that can fly back to the United States in two days, I remember the castle that carries the most years in my life, and my prince, Xu Ning. Will you still remember me?
Chapter completed!