A Single Tie Of Long Hair Seals A Lifelong Commitment - Chapter 62

The person in her arms fell silent for another moment, as if contemplating the consequences of giving an answer.

After a moment of deliberation, Chen Liangyu replied with the same sickly voice, “It doesn’t count.”

Her voice was weak and listless, revealing her extreme physical frailty.

Earlier that day, Zhu Ying had checked Chen Liangyu’s pulse and instructed the maids in Liangyuan to keep the medicine constantly brewing, in case of an emergency. However, Chen Liangyu claimed she was fine and ordered the stove to be taken away. Medicine that is freshly grabbed and brewed takes a considerable amount of time, and the heavy, bitter smell naturally permeated the bedroom in Liangyuan. It was indeed not a pleasant aroma.

Chen Liangyu was abnormally, almost grotesquely, different today. She was once a falcon soaring above ten thousand miles of blue sky, daring to challenge the firmament, but she seemed to have changed her nature overnight, shrinking into Xie Wenjun’s embrace like a wounded fledgling.

The cause of all this was nothing more than a minor fever.

After saying, “It doesn’t count,” Chen Liangyu finally seemed to quiet down, ceasing her restless shifting, and her breathing gradually became even.

Of course, Xie Wenjun did not let go of the opportunity to take liberties with her. Thinking she had fallen asleep, she pinched her cheek, tugged at her jowl, and playfully fiddled with her earlobe, enjoying herself immensely. Finally, her fingertip landed on Chen Liangyu’s lips.

The crimson lips were hot with fever.

They had once indulged in a drunken, wild storm in a private place, falling and unraveling together, as if to swallow the trauma swirling in each other’s hearts. In the end, they tacitly concealed the incident, letting it pass, never mentioning it again.

They treated it only as a shameful, illusory, and dissolute dream.

Xie Wenjun was unwilling to stop there.

The age of silk brocade, with white teeth and dark brows.

Gazing at the returning figure from the jade terrace, seeking the stars with raised eyes.

So, as the future is long, she insists on seeking the unattainable.

Her heart rate quickened unconsciously, and an impulse she could not suppress quietly spread and surged. Xie Wenjun moved her jade finger away and drew a little closer.

Chen Liangyu let Xie Wenjun play with her for a long time, motionless. Only when Xie Wenjun’s loose strands of hair brushed her skin did she frown slightly. Xie Wenjun quietly asked, “Are you awake?”

A moment later, Chen Liangyu spoke, “Awake.” Her eyes were closed, yet she could feel how close their lips were at this moment.

“Don’t bite me,” Chen Liangyu said, having been bitten by her before.

Since you said it, then I must.

Xie Wenjun’s pearly white teeth flashed as she abruptly leaned in, but before she could touch those thin lips, Chen Liangyu lightly dodged her.

Chen Liangyu said, “Stop messing around, you’ll catch my sickness.”

Xie Wenjun did not linger on that spot. She leaned over and sucked on Chen Liangyu’s earlobe, biting down with her teeth.

The force was not heavy, but it was provocative. Chen Liangyu seemed to have received an immense stimulus, and her sleepy eyes snapped open. She pressed on Xie Wenjun’s shoulder and flipped over, pinning her beneath her.

One hand clasped Xie Wenjun’s wrists above her head.

Xie Wenjun was completely immobilized beneath her, and her weak attempts to twist free were utterly thwarted by Chen Liangyu’s brutal grip. It was then that she realized she should not have believed the lie that Chen Liangyu was too weak to resist.

Chen Liangyu’s gaze frantically searched for something, falling upon Xie Wenjun’s bright red earlobe. In retaliation, she buried her head and bit down.

Xie Wenjun gasped.

Chen Liangyu gradually increased the force of her suckling.

When she raised her head again, a striking crimson mark was clearly visible on that pale, flawless skin.

Looking at her handiwork, a subtle, triumphant smile flashed across Chen Liangyu’s lips for having successfully implemented her revenge.

Afterward, she seemed utterly exhausted and collapsed onto Xie Wenjun’s body, the grip on Xie Wenjun’s wrists immediately loosening. Her ink-dark hair spread like silk, gently covering the faint, dark red mark on Xie Wenjun’s neck.

Only then did Xie Wenjun manage to free her hands. She moved with minimal action, seemingly afraid of disturbing something. After waiting a while and seeing that the person draped over her had no intention of getting off, she pulled the silk quilt up, tucking Chen Liangyu’s exposed shoulder inside.

“Why did you say that day that I shouldn’t hate you for too long?”

Chen Liangyu’s voice was nasal, “Because… I didn’t hate you for very long either.”

Xie Wenjun half-chided, half-whispered, “Are you admitting that you hated me before?”

Chen Liangyu rubbed against her chest a few times and slightly lifted her face, “Your Highness, it was my fault.”

After this commotion, the two people within the bed curtains seemed to have forgotten that there was a poor soul outside, the one who was busy brewing medicine by the stove in the small kitchen. Steam rose from the earthen pot. Zhu Ying added another erqian (two qians) of coptis root, and just by smelling it, an overwhelming, suffocating bitterness assailed the senses.

Zhu Ying strained the bitter, hellish broth into a bowl and said to the maid waiting outside the wing room, “Make sure your Great General drinks every last drop. Wait, I’ll personally watch her drink it. Open the door for me.”

In the bedroom, the bed curtains were only half-drawn.

Chen Liangyu disliked having the curtains closed; it was a habit. In the army, even when sleeping, she needed to be able to scan her surroundings and see everything to feel secure. Bed curtains were usually hung to shield against candlelight at night, but for Chen Liangyu, they only served a decorative purpose—to look nice and prevent the bed from looking too bare.

Through the half-drawn curtains, Zhu Ying saw an extremely peculiar posture inside. She nearly dropped the medicine bowl.

She cleared her throat and coughed once.

The figures piled together beneath the quilt stirred. Chen Liangyu endured her splitting headache and sat up halfway. She took the medicine bowl from Zhu Ying’s hand and, without expression, drank it all in one go.

She placed the empty bowl back on the tray. Zhu Ying still stood rooted to the spot; her expression solemn.

Xie Wenjun’s gaze turned cold, “Don’t you withdraw?”

The dignified Grand Princess was disheveled, appearing as if she had just suffered an immense shock, and her complexion was poor.

Zhu Ying snapped out of her contemplation, startled by Xie Wenjun’s sudden change in tone. As she looked up, she noticed a conspicuous patch of red on Xie Wenjun’s neck.

Subcutaneous contusion.

It was caused by external force, but it was not a wound; in that location, it conveyed an indescribable sense of ambiguity.

Zhu Ying picked up the tray and said, “This subordinate takes her leave.”

After exiting the bedroom in Liangyuan, Zhu Ying did not know where she was going and unconsciously found herself back in the small kitchen. A junior maid was tidying up the stove and the medicinal dregs. Zhu Ying looked at the dregs the maid had poured onto the paper, lost in thought.

The junior maid asked, “Doctor Ying, what’s wrong?”

Zhu Ying was absent-minded. She squatted down and poked the medicinal dregs, “Your Great General might have contracted another illness; this prescription won’t cure it.”

The junior maid asked, “What illness?”

Zhu Ying said, “An incurable disease.”

The junior maid’s brows also showed a hint of worry. She had only been bought into the Marquisate a short time ago and had already passed the indenture period. She was assigned to Liangyuan for her quick and nimble hands. The Great General never treated her subordinates harshly. If she had an incurable disease, wouldn’t she be reassigned elsewhere, perhaps even to a different master?

“Then what should we do? Will the Great General die?”

The military family was extremely superstitious about the word “death.” Furthermore, the Marquis of Xuanping’s Mansion had suffered three major bereavements in less than a year—although the masters had not given an explicit order, the stewards and the senior momo (nanny) had clearly ordered them to avoid all inauspicious words such as “die,” “perish,” “dead,” and “deceased.”

Realizing she had violated the taboo, the junior maid covered her mouth in fear. But it was too late. A supervisory pozi (older woman) charged in from outside with wide-staring eyes, immediately slapped the junior maid across the face, and hissed, “You little slut! Who are you trying to curse to death? We taught you when you entered the residence what you could say and what you couldn’t, did you treat it all as wind blowing past your ears?”

Tears welled up in the junior maid’s eyes. She held them back but was simply too wronged. Her face crumpled, and she began to cry.

The supervisory pozi roared, “Shut up, you foul thing!”

The junior maid swallowed her sobs, whimpering softly.

Zhu Ying stepped forward to mediate, “Momo, please don’t be angry. This girl is just anxious about the Great General’s illness. Everyone must die eventually, there’s no need to avoid it.”

The supervisory pozi said, “Doctor Ying, you are not a member of our household, you follow our Great General. I treat you as a guest, and the rules and decorum of the manor don’t apply to you. But don’t play the good guy and side with the subordinates when I am disciplining them. They won’t remember your kindness; instead, they will resent us older women and continue to break the rules. I am of a ripe old age, how can I not know that everyone must die? But look at the state of the Marquisate—the Old Marquis, the Old Madam, and the Eldest Young Master… If the servants speak of death and life, and the Great General, the Madam, and the Marquis hear it, won’t it stab them in the heart? You may be favored by the Great General and the Grand Princess, but don’t take advantage of your favor and your small knowledge to lecture others.”

Zhu Ying had not expected to be scolded by this momo just for saying a single sentence. She thought to herself that the people of the Marquis of Xuanping’s Mansion were indeed not to be trifled with, and repeatedly apologized, “Momo is right, I spoke out of turn.”

After the supervisory pozi left, Zhu Ying pulled out a cooled egg from somewhere, peeled it, and placed it on the junior maid’s face, “Don’t worry, your Great General won’t die.”

The junior maid looked up, tears still streaming, “But didn’t you say it was an… illness?” Having been slapped, she did not dare to say the word “incurable.”

Zhu Ying laughed at her innocence, speaking mysteriously, “This ‘incurable disease’ is not that ‘incurable disease.’ In short, it won’t kill anyone.”

Not long after drinking the medicine, Chen Liangyu’s temperature dropped a bit. She curled up in the crook of an arm and fell into a deep sleep, and she did not wake up midway through the night.

The night quickly flowed away.

Xie Wenjun could not sleep. Only when Chen Liangyu turned over did she manage to withdraw the arm that had been pinned all night; half of her body was numb. She smoothed the hair near Chen Liangyu’s ear, gazing at her quietly for a long time, then lightly got out of bed to dress and wash up.

Shangyong City is a cage, and a cage cannot hold a bird of prey like the hawk.

Chen Liangyu’s world is not in Yongdu.

And now, it was time to let her go back.

Before this, when people across the court and the public spoke of the fire attack on Qilian Pass, they all claimed that Chen Liangyu had a stroke of great luck, gaining her military merit by simply picking up a big gain. Similarly, when discussing the quelling of the Nanzhou rebellion and the conquering of Yongdu to enthrone the new Emperor, some claimed it was not solely her achievement. There was much discontent.

After this battle, those who spoke ill of her were all silenced.

The historians spared no ink, writing excitedly with their wolf-hair brushes, “Heaven Protects Great Lin,” elevating her to a god-like status and greatly praising her for possessing the demeanor of her maternal grandfather, the Military God He Niangong.

Amidst the earth-shattering reputation, the choice for the long-vacant position of Grand Marshal of the Northern Border’s Three Prefectures and Sixteen Cities seemed to have become an unspoken understanding across the court.