The courtyard fell silent. Jiang Zhaoxue’s expression changed from relaxed to serious, and her brows furrowed.
“What’s wrong?” Xiao Chenghuai put away his joking expression and asked with concern.
“Princess Consort?” Granny Cui called out cautiously.
Jiang Zhaoxue took a deep breath and calmed herself down. She stood up and said to Granny Cui:
“Everyone else can leave.”
Granny Cui was stunned, but seeing that Jiang Zhaoxue did not look like she was joking, she waved her hand and led the servants in the courtyard away.
Now, only the two of them remained. Jiang Zhaoxue placed the letter in front of Xiao Chenghuai.
“This is my master’s mark. He has never taken the initiative to contact me before, unless something extremely important has happened.”
After hearing this, Xiao Chenghuai became somewhat interested. He lowered his head and looked at the words on the yellow paper.
“Floods in the capital. Within three months, a great disaster will occur. Saving others is saving yourself!”
For the first time, a shocked expression appeared on his usually cold face. He looked up at Jiang Zhaoxue.
“Who is your master? How does he know what will happen in the future?”
“I don’t know.” Jiang Zhaoxue shook her head. She looked at the moonlight, as if recalling events from a long time ago. “I lived in an old abandoned temple for more than ten years, but I never knew my master’s name. Where did he come from? Why was he living in that broken temple?”
Xiao Chenghuai did not speak. He simply pushed the plate of pine nut kernels in front of her toward her hand.
Jiang Zhaoxue reached out, picked up a pine nut kernel, and put it into her mouth.
“I told you before, the Jiang family used my master’s life to force me. If I refused to marry here for the ritual marriage to bring you good fortune, they would capture my master and accuse him of kidnapping the daughter of a eunuch.”
“The Jiang family is truly despicable!” Xiao Chenghuai clenched his fist. “Then how did your master react?”
Jiang Zhaoxue thought for a moment.
“At that time, my mind was filled with thoughts of not dragging him into this. If it really came down to it, I was prepared to fight the Jiang family to the end. But he was the opposite—he told me to hurry and come here.”
“Last time, I asked Granny Cui to investigate. It seems that Master is no longer in the old temple…” Jiang Zhaoxue coughed a few times. “Alright, alright. Let’s stop talking about useless things.”
She cleared her throat.
“Let’s talk about the important matter. If the flood really happens, what should we do?”
Xiao Chenghuai pondered for a moment.
“The emperor is already wary of this prince. Now that my health has not recovered, it is better that I avoid appearing in public.”
“Then what are you planning to do?”
“We need to find someone reliable. We cannot expose the Jing Prince’s residence.”
“Then call him over.” Jiang Zhaoxue said. “The sooner, the better. Time waits for no one.”
Xiao Chenghuai nodded and was about to speak when he suddenly coughed twice.
Jiang Zhaoxue frowned as she looked at him.
“With this broken body of yours, can you even hold on until the flood comes?”
Xiao Chenghuai wiped the corner of his mouth and said calmly, “This prince won’t die. You can rest assured.”
Jiang Zhaoxue rolled her eyes.
“The day I entered the manor, you were already half-dead. And you’re telling me to rest assured?”
Xiao Chenghuai said word by word:
“Can you stop bringing up old matters?”
“This is called stating the facts.” Jiang Zhaoxue imitated his tone and emphasized each word heavily.
Xiao Chenghuai looked at her and laughed.
“Jiang Zhaoxue.”
“Hmm?”
“Are you coming to the main room tonight to sleep with me?”
“It’s already getting late. You should rest early.”
Jiang Zhaoxue acted as if she hadn’t heard him and walked toward the other side.
Xiao Chenghuai called out, “Everyone can come in.”
He secretly sighed. Ever since this girl married into the manor, she had never slept with him. Could it be that she disliked him because his health had not recovered?
The servants standing at the entrance of the main courtyard entered one after another. Laifu pushed Xiao Chenghuai’s wheelchair into the study, and the surroundings gradually became quiet.
Jiang Zhaoxue turned around and entered the side courtyard. This place had originally been used to store miscellaneous items, but after she arrived, she cleared it out and moved in herself.
The small courtyard was not large. There were three small rooms: one was used as a bedroom, one stored her jewelry and silver, and the other was temporarily empty. Sometimes, she would sit quietly inside.
A large old locust tree grew in the courtyard. In winter, it was completely bare, with only a few withered branches reaching toward the sky.
Granny Cui had arranged for a stone table and two stone chairs to be placed in the courtyard. But in this freezing winter weather, who would want to sit outside and enjoy the shade?
Jiang Zhaoxue preferred the reclining chair in the main courtyard. The charcoal fire there burned stronger and it was much warmer.
She pushed open the door and entered the room. Yuzao had already returned ahead of her and had been busy inside for quite some time.
The charcoal brazier crackled, and the bedding had been neatly arranged.
“Princess Consort, you’re back.” Yuzao pointed at a bowl of red date soup on the table. “Drink some to replenish your energy and blood. It will help you sleep better tonight.”
Jiang Zhaoxue picked up the bowl and took two sips. The warm, sweet soup flowed down her throat, warming her stomach and sweeping away the chill from her body. She put the bowl down.
“You should drink some too.”
Yuzao responded and carried the empty bowl out. When she reached the door, she poked half her head back inside.
“Princess Consort, if you have nightmares at night, just call for this servant. This servant is right next door, and my ears are very sharp.”
Jiang Zhaoxue smiled and rubbed Yuzao’s hair.
“Got it. Go to sleep.”
Only then did Yuzao close the door and leave.
Jiang Zhaoxue sat on the edge of the bed without lying down immediately. She took out the yellow paper from her sleeve and looked at it again under the candlelight.
In her memories, her master was very thin and not tall. His hair was gray, and he always wore an old, dusty gray Daoist robe. He walked slowly, looking as if he was already close to being buried.
That old man could see things that others could not. But his eyes truly were blind.
Jiang Zhaoxue extinguished the candle, removed her outer robe, and crawled into bed.
The quilt had been newly stuffed with cotton by Granny Cui. It was thick and soft, but its weight pressed down on her slightly.
She was still grateful to her master. That old man had taught her how to read a person’s aura, draw talismans, perform divination, and break curses. When Jiang Zhaoxue was a little older, in her teens, her master began making her recite prayers for the dead. Spending an entire night doing so would only earn her a few copper coins.
That old man was sometimes like a true master, but at other times he was completely eccentric and unpredictable.
Once, when he saw that there was no food left in the old temple, he inexplicably became angry. He directly threw her into a mass grave and told her to fight with wild dogs for offerings to eat, otherwise she would starve to death.
When there was no firewood to burn in winter, she was sent to the graves to collect dry branches. That gloomy and terrifying place would make anyone’s hair stand on end, but after going there so many times, Jiang Zhaoxue gradually stopped being afraid.
As for summer, when mosquitoes were rampant, the old man tied her to a tree and fed her to the mosquitoes… and even called it cultivation training.
Hate? Jiang Zhaoxue tilted her head and thought about it. She couldn’t say she hated him. After all, it was her master who had taken her in.
If he had not put her through all those hardships, she would not have the abilities she had today. Without those skills, as a woman like her, Jiang Zhaoxue would have no idea where she would have died. How could she have possibly married into the Jing Prince’s residence, sat here lost in thought, and slept peacefully without a care?
She knew that perhaps her master had his own difficulties. No matter how she looked at it, that old man was still a good person.
She remembered one summer when Jiang Zhaoxue had been caught in the rain outside and developed a high fever. She was unconscious, her small face flushed red and burning hot.
Her master stayed by her side for three days and three nights, using all the money he had saved over several years for alcohol to buy medicine.
After her fever finally broke, the old man had become much thinner, his beard messy and unkempt. He cursed while grumbling:
“If you had died, all these years of teaching you would have been wasted!”
If she ever got the chance, she would have to ask her master about his background in person.