Chapter 44

 

The white porcelain candlestick’s flame flickered brightly, illuminating the young man kneeling by her bedside, revealing every detail of his face, down to the neat lines of his eyebrows, with nothing left in shadow.

After he finished speaking, he raised his head slightly and looked at her, his eyes fixed on her face with a serious expression.

He was always like this, kneeling down to her at every turn.

Especially tonight, the tone of his voice and the way he looked at her made her secretly feel a little guilty about not being good to him, as if she had really done something unforgivable and wrong to offend him.

Soon she came to her senses, sat sideways and moved forward, closer to him, leaned over and stretched out a hand.

“You get up first! I told you not to talk to me like that!”

His body did not move at all, nor did he respond to her words. His eyes just dropped down and stopped at her hand that was reaching out to him.

As she moved, her sleeves were pulled up, revealing part of her wrist. The candlelight illuminated the criss-crossing scars on her skin, and the blood seeping from the broken skin was still faintly visible.

Xuyu quickly noticed where his gaze was, and quickly withdrew her hands and quietly put them behind her back to prevent him from seeing.

“I have just applied the medicine you sent me. It will be healed soon and it doesn’t hurt.” She explained hurriedly.

“Besides, one of them is my niece and the other is my cousin. As long as there is still a glimmer of hope, how can I abandon them?”

After she finished her explanation, he still kept silent, let alone get up.

Xuyu experienced this person’s stubbornness for the first time, and had no choice but to compromise: “I understand.”

His expression seemed to have eased a little, and he spoke again: “Princess, please keep it in mind.”

Xuyu sighed inwardly, “Yes, I remember! Can you get up now?”

“This minister has another request. Princess, please grant it.”

“Say it.”

“This minister know this minister shouldn’t do this, but for Princess’ sake, before you returns to your position, if you’re going anywhere in the future, you must let me know in advance.”

Xuyu sighed again: “I remember it!”

“One more thing.”

He never stopped.

“For the convenience of communication, this minister will live in the west courtyard across the wall from Princess. Whenever Princess needs anything, please call this minister.”

“Got it!

“So you can get up now, right?”

He moved his shoulders and finally stood up from her bedside.

“Thank you for your understanding, Princess.”

Xuyu was completely defeated in front of this man. He kept calling her princess and seemed very respectful, but in fact, his words were all meant to make her listen to him.

From now on, he could kneel wherever he wanted, shout whatever he wanted, and do whatever he wanted.

Just let him be.

She hummed casually, turned sideways to face him, and then continued to wipe her long hair while reminding: “You have nothing else to say?”

Pei Xiaoyuan said: “Tell me everything that happened after you got on the boat.”

Xuyu then recounted what had happened, how the water leak was discovered, how Feng Silang drowned himself in despair, and how Prince Kang killed people and abandoned the two girls and left.

As for how she saved people, only two sentences were mentioned briefly.

He listened to her entire story attentively, then remained silent for a moment. Finally, he looked at her deeply and said, “Princess’s great righteousness and abilities are beyond what ordinary people can achieve. This minister admires you very much.”

He sounded serious.

It must be not easy to get his recognition.

Xuyu couldn’t help but feel her heart race and her ears grow warm from the praise. She closed her mouth and said nothing more, continuing to dry her hair. After a while, she noticed that he, too, seemed to have nothing more to say, yet he didn’t leave. He still stood by her side as before, quietly accompanying her.

This might not be a big deal, but once she noticed this situation, she didn’t know what he was thinking. The atmosphere suddenly became ambiguous. Not only that, she was also surprised that she seemed too casual in front of him. She was only wearing thin inner clothes.

She quietly and calmly moved bit by bit so that she could turn her body a little further from him.

At this moment, as if he was also aware, he suddenly stepped back a few steps, saying, “Princess, you have been frightened today, please go to bed early. This minister will leave first.”

Xuyu hummed, without even looking at him, and only listened to the sound of his boots as he left. Suddenly, she remembered something and turned to call him, “Wait a minute.”

Pei Xiaoyuan had already walked to the door and was about to raise his hand to close the door for her, but when he heard her words, he stopped and looked over.

“A few days ago, I told you that Chief Guard Guo, who died trying to save me, has a son who survived. Do you remember?”

Pei Xiaoyuan immediately said, “His name is Guo Guo’er, right? I have already asked people to look for him, and there should be news tomorrow. When I find him, I will and bring him back to you.”

“Thank you for your trouble. But if you find the person, I’d better go and pick him up myself.”

He looked at her and nodded: “Alright. Wait for my news. Go to bed early.”

After he finished speaking, he gently closed the door.

As the sound of boots gradually faded away and disappeared, Xuyu slowly stopped wiping her hair. Finally, she put down the towel and looked at herself in the mirror.

Her hair was disheveled and her clothes were thin and light, giving her the look of a lazy girl staying at home.

She didn’t quite understand what had come over her. Even though she knew he was coming, she hadn’t minded at all and didn’t think of these things. She couldn’t help but feel a little annoyed, and she pressed the mirror to remind herself in her heart.

Pei Ji’s nephew behaved dignifiedly and had a clear conscience.

In the future, when they live in the same house, separated only by a wall, there would inevitably be many encounters like tonight.

She’d better be more cautious so as not to embarrass him.

The lights in the windows were off, and the bright moonlight hung over Yongning Mansion. Across the wall, a small insect hidden in some corner of the west courtyard chirped tirelessly all night, accompanying people to sleep.

In a palace deep in the imperial palace, the emperor was still awake late at night. Before he had finished listening to the report from Yuan Zhi who had come to deal with the matter, the back of his hand, which had once killed countless people with a sword, was covered with blue veins. He fiercely bent a memorial under his palm and crumpled it into a ball.

His eyes shone with anger, as if he had turned into a ferocious beast ready to devour people. He roared, “Go and call Crown Prince to Zhen! Now!”

Yuan Zhi had just talked about how the Feng family’s son died due to a leak in the pleasure boat and that Prince Kang and the two county princesses were almost killed. He did not explain some of the details he had learned, let alone mention the report about the young painter that the emperor had originally asked him to report today.

Knowing that the emperor was furious, he put other matters aside for the time being, hurriedly left and dealt with this matter first.

At the same time tonight, in a quiet villa located in the Nanshan Mountain outside the city, deep within layers of heavy curtains, a beauty lay across the bed, her jade-like form waiting for the prince’s affection.

The current Crown Prince Li Mao breathing in the faint fragrance—whether from the incense burner by the bed or from Yinnang herself—that lingered on her body, regretting only that the night was fleeting, and dawn would soon break.

Li Mao left the city yesterday under the pretext of hunting. But the reason for him leaving the city was precisely Yinniang, who was lying beside him at this moment.

He had known her for a long time, but at that time, he was just the eldest son of a prince mansion whose stepmother was favored and could gave birth to a child to take his place at any time. While she was the imperial grandson’s sweetheart. He could only watch from afar. Later, he became the crown prince, and she became a lowly courtesan, but he was still far from being able to bring her under his wing.

Even now, he didn’t have enough confidence to take her to his side. She was the daughter of a criminal who was plotting rebellion with the old party.

The only thing he could do was to secretly buy her out and meet her occasionally.

He didn’t know why he was so obsessed with this girl. Perhaps she was the epitome of everything he had been wanting since he was a child.

The night clock announced the fifth watch. Daybreak was approaching. He had no choice but to return to the city.

Thinking that this was the last moment he had stolen, and that he didn’t know when he would be able to come out again, he invited her to come closer and whispered a few words in her ear.

Yinniang’s starry eyes were half open, as if she had not yet woken up from her sleep, but after hearing what he said, she smiled and gently hit him, but finally obeyed and turned over to sit on top of him.

Amid the gentle rise and fall of the rippling waves, Li Mao, who had been resting with his eyes closed, suddenly felt a surge of excitement. After so many years of cautiously guarding his position as Crown Prince, it seemed like he was finally starting to see a glimmer of dawn ahead. He suddenly felt very excited, raised his arm to drag Yinniang down to him, and flipped himself over, pressing her beneath him.

“You will have to suffer for a little longer.”

He placed his lips next to her ear and made endless tender promises.

“But when I am able to take full control, the first thing I will do is to bring you into the palace.”

The lazy hair that Yinniang had tied up last night had already become a mess. She lay back on the pillow weakly, staring at Li Mao’s handsome face. After a moment, a smile slowly blossomed on her lips.

“Thank you, Your Highness…”

The voice suddenly broke, and then turned into sobbing, like a delicate flower crushed at its core, like a shattered flute or a broken zither. The winding sounds wove together, and despite the layers of heavy curtains, they still reached the corner of a nearby side chamber.

Li Yan sat quietly in a dim corner of the chamber where the morning light could not reach, with his eyes closed and his head leaning against the wall, as if he was in a trance.

“Your Highness!”

“Your Highness!”

Suddenly, at this moment, on a corridor outside the bedroom connecting to the courtyard, there was a rapid sound of footsteps coming from far away, as if someone was running towards them from outside.

He suddenly opened his eyes and listened attentively.

A palace envoy from Chang’an arrived at the villa overnight, delivering His Majesty’s oral order, ordering the Crown Prince to return immediately to meet the emperor without delay.

When Li Mao was being helped to dress, although he tried his best to appear calm, the subtle movements of his Adam’s apple sliding up and down as he kept swallowing revealed his panic and even fear at the moment.

It was wrong for him not to attend Prince Ning’s banquet yesterday, but even if the emperor knew about it, he would never send someone out of the city to summon him overnight.

The only possibility was that something else happened.

And his premonition told him that what was waiting for him would definitely not be a good thing.

The emperor had not summoned him alone for nearly half a year. Although this made his uncle Liu Ceye deeply uneasy and asked him to write a letter several times to express his filial piety and longing to see the emperor, in addition to uneasiness and speculation, he actually felt a little relieved.

He was afraid of his father. He had been like this since he was a child. Even now, in his thirties, he was still afraid of his father.

The emperor’s gloomy and majestic face emerged in his mind, and he suddenly felt a surge of panic in his heart. He didn’t ask Wei Yinniang to help him put on his boots. He put them on himself chaotically, said hurriedly, “You stay here a few more days,” and turned around and left quickly.

Wei Yinniang squatted in front of the bed, listening to the chaotic footsteps of him and the people outside gradually fading away and disappearing, and slowly sat down on the ground.

The candle was weak, the window was gradually getting brighter, and the dim morning light penetrated the deep curtain that flooded in like water.

After an unknown amount of time, a pair of arms reached out from behind her, and with great love and affection, they gently lifted her up from the cold ground and put her back on the bed.

Wei Yinniang opened her eyes, met Li Yan’s eyes that were looking at her tenderly, and tears began to flow.

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