Wen Yunwan urged the coachman to go faster and faster the entire way. The wheels were practically throwing sparks by the time they finally left the carriage behind them by a considerable distance.
She entered the changing room with practiced ease and took her usual riding crop. The moment she came out, she was greeted by the stable master’s obsequious smile.
“Miss Wen, you’re here.”
Wen Yunwan acknowledged him. “Where’s Xiaobai? Is he in good shape today?”
If he was not, she would ride another horse instead.
“He’s in excellent shape. Xiaozong and Xiaohei are doing well too. They’ve all been waiting for you.”
“Then I want Xiaobai.”
Wen Yunwan hardly hesitated. “Go bring him out.”
The stable master hurried off. As Wen Yunwan waited, she suddenly caught sight of a familiar figure moving in the distance. He seemed to have come out to fetch something before turning back into the shed.
It looked like Song Yanzhou.
She remembered that Song Yanzhou had known a great deal about horses in her previous life. Once, she had smiled and asked him how he had come to know so much, and Song Yanzhou had answered without the slightest attempt to hide it: he had once worked at a horse ranch.
So it had been this horse ranch.
At the time, she had only recently married Song Yanzhou. When she heard that he had worked at a horse ranch, she had immediately asked him, distressed, whether he had been bullied.
Song Yanzhou, who was already the Vice Minister of the Court of Judicial Review then, had merely shaken his head calmly and said, “It’s all in the past.”
But now, she was standing right inside that past.
So after the stable master led Xiaobai out, she still could not help asking, “I think I just saw Jieyuan Song here too?”
The stable master’s mind jolted, and he answered rapidly, “Yes, Jieyuan Song has had a difficult life. He has to feed the horses here to make a living. But now that he’s passed the jieyuan examination, we can’t very well keep employing him. Taking pity on his hardships, we gave him some money so he could continue studying in peace. He came today to collect it.”
Wen Yunwan had not understood such things before, but after spending so much time by Chancellor Song’s side, she could naturally see through them now.
He was feeling guilty.
She had no real connection to Song Yanzhou at present and had no business interfering, but she still offered a few words of advice.
“Jieyuan Song has an unlimited future ahead of him. Other people can’t even pass the jieyuan examination while devoting themselves entirely to their studies, yet he managed to pass while working and studying at the same time. If he comes back as a zhuangyuan one day, our Suzhou will have something to boast about for quite a while.”
The more the stable master listened, the more frightened he became. He nodded repeatedly in agreement.
Wen Yunwan could not say much more. She had said what needed to be said, so she mounted Xiaobai and rode off on her own.
“Song… Jieyuan Song, this is your compensation…”
The steward shakily held out forty taels of silver to him. “Not a single coin short. Please count it…”
Song Yanzhou’s pale hand took the bag, but he did not count it.
“There’s more.”
The three simple words frightened the steward so badly that he nearly dropped to his knees and kowtowed on the spot, only managing to stop himself at the last moment.
There were other people nearby.
After hesitating, he said, “Jieyuan Song, could we… discuss this outside?”
Song Yanzhou nodded and followed the steward, who looked as though he had just been granted a reprieve, outside. They found a tree and stopped in the shade behind it.
Thump—
“Jieyuan Song, I… I truly have no choice. I don’t have that much silver on hand anymore. Could you give me a few more days…”
“I—I know what I did back then was wrong, but at the time, I—I…”
The steward was nearly forty, yet he broke down sobbing in front of the sixteen-year-old youth. “I really had no other choice…”
“You will hand over double the reward money you embezzled over these years. And just as you whipped me when you were in a bad mood, you will whip yourself. That was what we agreed upon beforehand.”
The youth’s voice was utterly flat. “If you can’t produce the money, then whip yourself first.”
The calmer he sounded, the more frightened the steward became.
He did not even dare bargain. His lips trembled as he hesitated, but in the end he turned around to fetch the riding crop.
As he turned, Song Yanzhou caught a glimpse from the corner of his eye of a red skirt flying in the distance.
Wen Yunwan had been riding perfectly well when she saw Song Yanzhou follow the steward beneath the shade of a tree. The spot was rather secluded.
She had no idea what kind of wicked thing they were doing.
Remembering the way the horse ranch’s master had avoided her gaze, Wen Yunwan could have guessed with her toes how much bullying Song Yanzhou had suffered here.
With that thought in mind, Wen Yunwan found a tree not far from them, dismounted, and watched with little real interest.
Then she saw the middle-aged man, around forty years old, return beneath the tree carrying a riding crop.
A riding crop?
There were no horses there.
Was he going to whip a person?
For some reason, a scene from her previous life surfaced in Wen Yunwan’s mind—the time she had accidentally seen Song Yanzhou’s waist and abdomen.
Though they were husband and wife, Song Yanzhou seemed not to like letting her look at him. Even during intimacy, whenever her wandering hand moved downward, he would catch it and place it on his shoulders or back. Once, when she was in a hurry and tugged at his clothes, she had lowered her head and seen the crisscrossing scars across his waist and abdomen.
Song Yanzhou had quickly drawn his clothes closed after only one glance. His expression had been cold and desolate then. Wen Yunwan had thought she had displeased him and had lost interest as well.
Were those scars from this?
Was this the lightly dismissed “past” he had spoken of?
Wen Yunwan bit her lip, then walked toward them.
“Jieyuan Song, I—I…”
The steward held out the riding crop to him with both hands. “Please.”
The youth looked at him. A malicious smile suddenly flashed through his usually calm eyes. From the corner of his eye, he saw the red figure drawing closer and made up his mind.
“You do it yourself.”
The steward let out a startled sound. “Myself?”
“If you don’t hit yourself, the reward money will be quadrupled.”
He had always been a man of few words while working at the horse ranch. Those few words were enough to make the steward stop hesitating.
The steward gritted his teeth, hardened his heart, and raised the riding crop in his hand.
Crack!
Crack!
The sound of the crop striking flesh rang out. The skin on the steward’s back split open instantly, and the searing pain drove him to scream sharply.
He collapsed onto the ground in agony and looked behind himself.
“What are you looking at? You had the nerve to whip him, and you still think you’re in the right?”
The steward struggled to raise his head. The moment he saw her face, he was so frightened that he sobered completely.
“Miss… Miss Wen?”
Wen Yunwan flicked her riding crop, took two steps forward, and came between Song Yanzhou and the steward. With her back to Song Yanzhou, she watched the steward stagger to his feet and spoke lazily.
“Tell me, how else did you usually beat him?”
She had seen only one glance back then, but there had been many scars, hideously winding across his waist and abdomen.
He must have been beaten often.
Song Yanzhou looked at her striking back and found it somewhat strange.
Yesterday had been the same. Today was the same.
She was like a chivalrous hero with an overwhelming sense of justice. Though her figure looked delicate, she always shielded him—a man much taller and broader than she was—behind her without making a fuss.
The steward did not dare answer.
He had beaten Song Yanzhou more than once.
Wen Yunwan’s riding crop was specially made from excellent materials, and she had just put all her strength into whipping the steward twice. His back should now have been split open, with blood and flesh exposed.
“Today, today I truly had no intention of hitting Jieyuan Song…”
He could only try to offer a vague explanation. “Obviously…”
The rest of his words caught in his throat.
The youth standing beneath the shade of the tree had always possessed calm black eyes, but they instantly coiled around the steward like venomous snakes—cold and bloodthirsty, as though they would open their jaws and sink their fangs into his throat the very next moment.
It was the first time the steward had seen the youth reveal such a vicious expression.
He was warning him.