Shi Qing was somewhat dazed from the blow. Clutching her cheek, she stared at Zhao Si in disbelief.
“You… you actually dare to hit me! You damned man! You actually dare to hit me? Where is the justice in this world?! To think there is a man who dares to beat a woman right here in Yulu Pavilion!” Shi Qing began to throw a tantrum, as if she had never imagined that Zhao Si would actually resort to physical violence—it completely shattered her worldview.
“Hmph.” Zhao Si gazed at Shi Qing with utter disdain, raising her arm once more and twisting her hands in opposite directions.
The “crack-snap” sound of shifting joints frightened the two young attendants beside Shi Qing so much that they turned and bolted.
“Hey! You guys! Bah! Rotten brats!” A trace of fear flashed across Shi Qing’s eyes, but it was quickly replaced by anger and resentment. “Zhao Si, is it? You… just wait. I, Shi Qing, am a figure of some standing in Cengzhou City. I will definitely repay this humiliation a hundredfold!”
“You? By your own accord?” Zhao Si laughed out of extreme anger, raising her hand as if to strike again.
“Husband!” Yun Qing called out anxiously, afraid that Zhao Si would come out on the losing end.
Assuming Yun Qing was afraid of her, Shi Qing wiped away the blood from the corner of her lips, swished her water-snake waist, and sat down triumphantly upon the long table, boasting, “Of course not by my own accord. I rely upon my old flame, Lord Hu. I rely upon my good sister, Yun Qing.”
“How could my wife possibly be your sister?” Suppressing her anger, Zhao Si disdainfully took her seat, turning her back to Shi Qing and facing Yun Qing.
Yun Qing pulled Zhao Si’s hand, dished out a bowl of bird’s nest soup for Zhao Si with one hand, and cut off Shi Qing’s line of chatter with the other.
“What good benefits did Lord Hu promise you?” Yun Qing asked with absolute nonchalance.
Shi Qing replied with supreme smugness: “Lord Hu said that if I can persuade you to marry him, he will reward me with a thousand liang of gold, plus a manor house, allowing me to leave this place of dust and smoke once and for all and enjoy boundless glory and wealth.”
With that, Shi Qing feigned a sympathetic tone and said, “It’s not that I’m talking carelessly, Yun Qing. The husband you’ve chosen is truly unsatisfactory. I’ve come here today specifically to thank you, you know. Ever since the news of Young Master Zhao wanting to redeem your contract broke out, the steps to my terrace were almost trampled flat. Aiyaya! I truly don’t know how to thank you enough.”
“Since we are good sisters, there is no need for thanks. But tell me, is a thousand liang of gold really enough for you, Shi Qing, to enjoy boundless glory and wealth to your heart’s content?” Yun Qing summoned Ying’er to serve tea to Shi Qing.
Shi Qing didn’t stand on ceremony either. Hooking her finger, she quickly wiped the lid, took a few sips, and then confided to Yun Qing: “I’ll tell you this, but don’t go spreading it to others. Apart from a thousand liang of gold, Lord Hu has also promised to gift me as a concubine to the Prince of Duan.”
“Are you certain it is the Prince of Duan?” Zhao Si seized upon the crucial point.
“It could also be the Crown Prince.” Shi Qing rolled her eyes in disdain, her tone full of contempt as she disparaged Zhao Si: “When women are talking, you men shouldn’t interrupt. You’d better just honestly eat your meal. Once you’re finished eating, briskly write up a letter of divorce and don’t stand around here getting in the way, delaying our sisters from achieving a brilliant future!”
With a crisp “crack” sound, the teacup in Zhao Si’s hand shattered abruptly. The shards burst forth from between her fingers like sharp blades, scattering all over the floor and clattering as they collided.
Yun Qing hurriedly grabbed Zhao Si’s hand to check whether she had been scratched by the fragments.
Seeing that the shards had only left a few slight bloodstains on Zhao Si’s fingertips, Yun Qing instructed Yan’er to fetch medicine on the one hand, while coldly instructing Ying’er on the other:
“Show them out.”
Hearing Yun Qing issue the eviction notice, Zhao Si immediately felt her anger subside. Picking up the bird’s nest soup, she fed a spoonful to Yun Qing and praised repeatedly: “As expected of the soup prepared for me by my dear wife. It is truly too delicious! I’m going to eat three or four bowls of it and exhaust the master chef of Yulu Pavilion.”
“As Husband wishes.” Yun Qing smiled and nodded.
“Mmm-mm!” Taking the opportunity, Zhao Si stole a kiss on Yun Qing’s cheek. When she looked back, she discovered that Shi Qing was actually scuffling with Ying’er near the screen.
The moment Zhao Si’s and Shi Qing’s eyes met, Shi Qing immediately perked up like a victorious rooster, swished her water-snake waist once more, pushed Ying’er aside, and called out loudly to Yun Qing: “Sister Yun Qing! Look over here! Look who I’ve brought with me! It’s Lord Hu.”
Having shouted, Shi Qing leaned upon a middle-aged man sporting a protruding potbelly and a wispy goatee as she sauntered right up before Zhao Si’s eyes.
Realizing that the newcomer was none other than Lord Hu, Zhao Si thought to herself: This is bad.
Seizing the initiative, Shi Qing leaned against Lord Hu’s shoulder and whispered pillow-talk, blowing wind in his ear and adding fuel to the fire: “Aiyoyo, Lord Hu! You must know that Yun Qing completely disdains your ninth-rank official post! She said that if she is to marry anyone, it simply has to be none other than the Prince of Duan, who is about to ascend the throne.”
Shi Qing’s words acted like poisonous thorns piercing into Zhao Si’s heart, causing her to swell with blinding rage upon hearing the first half, and fill with mounting worry upon hearing the second.
That’s right, this vicious woman! She was actually trying to harm Yun Qing through Lord Hu’s hands!
Zhao Si was about to take action when Lord Hu completely defied expectations.
With a thunderous cry of “Audacious!”, Zhao Si witnessed Lord Hu lightning-fast swing around and slap Shi Qing hard across the face.
Lord Hu said furiously, “Walls have ears, you tactless bitch! Stop trying to drag me down! The Prince of Duan is a member of the imperial family; how could affairs of the royal house be something you and I are permitted to discuss idly?”
Before the echoes faded, Lord Hu shifted his tone, smoothed down his lapels, pulled up his robes, and sat down. Directing an admiring,惜才 (cherishing talent) gaze toward Yun Qing, he earnestly advised: “It’s all about Yun Qing, though! As the saying goes in storybooks, ‘Pitiable is the steadfast virtue of the stopped loom, lamentable is the poetic talent of chanting catkins.’ Yun Qing, you are a paragon of both talent and beauty; this old man truly cannot bear to see you cast your pearls before swine and squander yourself in the hands of a commonplace mortal. You must ponder this deeply, Yun Qing…”
Lord Hu spoke with such earth-shattering earnestness that Zhao Si’s scalp tingled.
What do you call being deep and calculating? What do you call cursing without using a single dirty word? Right here before her eyes was a prime example! Didn’t the storybooks also say, “Better to tear down a thousand temples than to wreck a single marriage”? Why didn’t he, Lord Hu, learn a thing or two from that?
Zhao Si began mentally complaining from Lord Hu’s very opening remark of persuasion. Seeing that Lord Hu showed no intention of stopping, she simply had Yan’er fetch her a plate of melon seeds. Listening while munching away, she would flick the seed shells wet with her saliva right onto Lord Hu’s robes.
Lord Hu persuaded: “Yun Qing, that husband of yours is all show and no substance—he’s completely hollow inside. He’s no match for this old man’s golden spear that never grows old!”
Yun Qing remained silent.
Zhao Si crooked her finger, flick!
Lord Hu persuaded further: “Yun Qing, I’ve looked into it thoroughly. That husband of yours is so poor he’s practically begging for food, while my family owns thousands of acres of fertile land!”
Yun Qing remained silent.
Zhao Si crooked her finger, flick! again!
Losing his patience, Lord Hu stood up, turned his back to Yun Qing, and said coldly, “Yun Qing! Do not be so stubborn. That husband of yours is illiterate; he cannot compare to a three-session Jinshi like myself. Have you forgotten? The very first time we met, you and I exchanged innermost thoughts and wrote poetry to present to this official. Those two lines were truly written so marvelously: ‘Half a courtyard of purple snow un-swept for long’…”
Zhao Si gripped the melon seeds in her hand, thinking to herself that while she didn’t remember many poems right now, she had memorized six lines of poetry this morning. If she remembered correctly, Lord Hu’s second half line should be “idly casting aside hairpins and sashes to face clear chanting.”
And Yun Qing indeed reacted the moment Lord Hu recited “idly casting aside hairpins and sashes to face clear chanting.”
“My lord has remembered incorrectly. This is not a poem written by Yun Qing. It is a death poem copied out by the former Prime Minister Zhu Youming. Yun Qing merely admires his character, which is why she copied down these two lines, and it just so happened to be seen by my lord.”
Yun Qing spoke neither humbly nor arrogantly, as if everything were purely a coincidence.
Upon hearing this, Lord Hu actually paused for a moment, then suddenly choked up with emotion.
Zhao Si assumed Lord Hu was just mortified over misidentifying Yun Qing’s poem and felt ashamed of losing face.
Unexpectedly, Lord Hu turned around, his eyes reddening as he looked at Yun Qing gazing at Yun Qing, yet seeming to look at an old friend of the past and said, “Yun Qing, do you know that Pingkuan and I were fellow successful candidates in the same imperial examination? The reason I am content to live a peaceful life in this remote place is entirely because of what happened to Pingkuan back then.”
“Ah, perhaps you don’t know Youming’s style name!” Lord Hu poured himself a cup of wine, splashed it onto the ground, and wept with a mixture of tears and laughter. “Pingkuan, you have been gone for nine full years; do you know that there is still someone in this world whose heart yearns for you?”
Having poured the libation, Lord Hu lost his stamina and sighed wearily to Yun Qing: “Yun Qing. Both you and Shi Qing are extraordinary women of Cengzhou. Since she came looking for you, she came with good intentions. If you let her leave empty-handed, it would be returning kindness with enmity. Thus, as your humble host, I shall put up a thousand liang of gold why don’t you have a match and compete with her?”