Wind And Snow On The Jade Steps - Chapter 2
The horse and the shadow brushed past each other, crying out in unison.
In a certain sense, Shen Zhishu was an incredibly cautious person.
Specifically, she turned her face mask over and over, inspecting it several times, and even held it under her nose to sniff it. She checked it for about the time it takes half a stick of incense to burn before finally tying it over her face.
Her attendant laughed and said, “You are being overly careful. Do you really not trust your own subordinate? I’ve been following Lady He ever since you left the capital.”
Shen Zhishu shook her head, “It’s not that I don’t trust you, it’s that I’m afraid someone might have set a trap for you without you even realizing it.”
The lower half of her face was covered, leaving only her peach-blossom eyes visible. Her lashes were thick, and her eyes held a glimmer of light. When she stared directly at someone, she appeared to have a sense of, for no particular reason, deep affection.
The attendant stood under this “affectionate” gaze for a moment and suddenly felt uneasy, lowering her head to fiddle with her hair.
She fiddled with it for quite a while, but out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Shen Zhishu was still staring at her. A sudden wave of panic rose in her heart.
Could the young General Shen have taken a liking to me?
Come to think of it, the position of the General’s wife is still vacant…
The attendant’s thoughts raced, and she suddenly became quite bashful. She looked up very slowly and gently. Her originally blunt voice suddenly turned soft and flirtatious, “General, why are you looking at me like that?”
Shen Zhishu asked, “Did you eat green vegetables for lunch?”
The attendant replied, “Does the General even pay attention to what I eat?”
“Not usually,” Shen Zhishu said steadily, “it’s just that there is a vegetable leaf stuck between your teeth. I watched for a long while and felt too embarrassed to remind you, but since you never noticed it yourself, I decided to ask.”
The attendant was speechless.
The attendant ran off in a huff.
Actually, she didn’t exactly run away in anger, but rather because Shen Zhishu followed up with, “Stay here and take a break, let me wander around alone for a bit.”
The horse beneath her was not her usual mount. It was thin and small, so Shen Zhishu didn’t have the heart to push it to a gallop. She quietly wandered through the alleys, slowly heading toward the west of the city.
As the sun sank behind the mountains, curls of cooking smoke rose from the small alleys every few stretches, signaling that ordinary families were starting their evening meals.
Shen Zhishu halted her horse and looked up for a while. She suddenly wondered what life would be like if she hadn’t joined the army, but had instead followed a tutor to study literature and walked the steady path of her mother, Minister Shen.
She likely would never have left the capital, and her family would have lived together in harmony. Every evening, a plume of smoke would rise above the Shen residence just like this.
It wasn’t like now, having been separated for eight years, to the point where the memories of Mother Shen and Mother He’s faces were nearly worn smooth.
Lost in thought, she realized she had unconsciously wandered in front of the Shen residence.
Since Mother Shen had been promoted to Minister of Rites, the Shen residence had expanded significantly. It had been rebuilt with carved beams and painted rafters, looking grand and magnificent.
A shimmering golden plaque hung above the main gate, with the words “Shen Estate” written in clerical script.
The gates were closed. Shen Zhishu hesitated for a moment, tied her horse to the stone lion at the entrance, and slowly stepped forward to knock.
However, as soon as she finished knocking, she regretted it.
Mother Shen had already entered the palace, Mother He was currently at the General’s Mansion, and the two old grandmothers had already passed away. So, who would be inside the Shen Estate now?
Shen Zhishu slowly closed her eyes and let out a long sigh in her heart. She wondered if that group of overly boisterous concubines from her memory had changed their personalities after her eight-year absence.
She assumed they hadn’t, as the hearty laughter of Auntie Xue could already be heard faintly from behind the heavy gates.
Shen Zhishu had taken up martial arts specifically because of Auntie Xue.
She began her education at age six, following an old tutor who had taught Mother Shen to study the classics. She was exceptionally brilliant, and the old tutor often told Mother Shen, “I believe this child will surpass you sooner or later.”
At that time, Mother Shen was only a Senior Secretary in the Ministry of Rites. She would pull Shen Zhishu to her side, pat her fuzzy head, and smile, “That all depends on her own destiny.”
Mother Shen’s name was Shen Hantan.
Shen Zhishu studied under the old tutor until she was twelve.
That year, Shen Hantan welcomed a new concubine into the house.
Having “three wives and four concubines” was common in the Southern Kingdom. Before marriage, both parties had to decide on their roles: who would be the “marrying” party and who would be the “taking” party.
After the wedding, the marrying party moved into the home of the taking party, and the taking party had to provide a substantial dowry to the marrying party’s family.
Afterward, the taking party managed external affairs while the marrying party managed the household. If the taking party had the desire and the means, they could take more concubines, though they needed to consult the marrying party first.
There were also those who didn’t want to distinguish between marrying and taking roles, promising to be a pair for a lifetime and sharing economic responsibilities after marriage. This was called a “flat marriage.”
Shen Hantan and Mother He did not have a flat marriage. Mother He’s family was not well-off, so when Shen Hantan married her, she provided a hundred taels of silver, sixty-six bolts of cloth, sixty-six bolts of silk, and promised the He family a lifetime of prosperity.
The task of bearing children was usually handled by the marrying party. However, Shen Hantan felt sorry for Mother He’s frail health, so she took the burden upon herself. She carried the child for ten months and gave birth to Shen Zhishu, taking a six-month leave from the Ministry of Rites.
Therefore, one could never say Shen Hantan was unkind to Lady He. But as for being “good,” Shen Hantan already had five concubines.
Auntie Xue was the sixth.
Auntie Xue was an outsider from a nomadic tribe whom Shen Hantan had brought back while accompanying the Emperor on a tour of the North. Nomads had fiery temperaments, and she could wield a red-tasseled spear with such vigor that it seemed to create wind. Her eyes and brows carried the reckless, free spirit of the wilderness.
When Shen Zhishu asked what the grasslands looked like, Auntie Xue winked and said brightly, “I’ll mention it to Hantan and take you to see for yourself.”
After that one look, Shen Zhishu’s heart was set on the back of a horse and never came back.
Her thoughts returned to the present as she looked at the heavy iron gates opening in front of her, suddenly feeling a headache coming on.
It wasn’t for any other reason, it was just that…
In her memory, Shen Hantan’s concubines were far too rowdy!
Ever since she could remember, the Shen residence was always filled with waves of laughter that never seemed to stop. The first auntie loved climbing trees, the second was obsessed with learning opera, the third wanted to tear off the roof to watch the stars at night, and the fourth wanted to go catch carp in the frozen pond in the middle of winter.
Not to mention, every time they saw her, the aunties acted as if they had spotted a long-haired calico cat. They would pounce with shining eyes and wouldn’t stop until they had rubbed and squeezed her like a ball of dough.
Mother He was quiet and didn’t join their antics, but would sit wrapped in a blanket under the grape trellis, smiling as she chatted with the new, “not yet corrupted” concubines.
The servant at the door was an unfamiliar face, and the servant was equally unfamiliar with the young General Shen who was wearing a face mask. She had likely rarely seen someone with such an outstanding aura who didn’t announce their name upon arriving at the Shen Estate. She was dazed for a moment before asking:
“Who are you? What is your business at the Shen Estate?”
Shen Zhishu cleared her throat and pretended to be confused, “Is this the Shen Estate? I must have taken a wrong turn.”
“You’re lying through your teeth, is the Shen Estate a place where you can just wander around?” The servant glared at her and suddenly reached out, pulling off her mask, “And wearing a mask, as if you’re afraid we’ll recognize… wait, Young General Shen??!!!”
Shen Zhishu said, “…No, you have the wrong person.”
“My eyes have never failed me! Your portraits are sold from the south to the north of the city, I’ve seen them ten thousand times!” The servant thought she was seeing a living legend and howled with a volume that could crack glass, “Young General Shen! It’s Young General Shen! Young General Shen has personally come to the door!”
That shout was like poking a hornet’s nest, and a crowd of people swarmed out from the surroundings like an overwhelming tide.
Shen Zhishu was speechless.
The good news was that the rowdiest aunties didn’t seem to be among them.
The bad news was that there were many new faces she didn’t recognize. And as for personality, those who stay near vermilion become red, and those near ink become black.
Shen Zhishu fled in a panic.
In the twenty-two years of her life, she had never been this embarrassed.
It wasn’t until she had hastily untied her horse’s rope, scrambled onto its back, and fled halfway down the road like a refugee that she suddenly remembered something.
A certain attendant had been left behind by her for over an hour.
The attendant was currently gloomily drinking meat soup in a nearby shop.
She had never served the young General Shen before and couldn’t quite grasp her temperament. After all, the language was very broad and deep. “Talk to you later” usually meant “never mention it again,” and “I’ll treat you to a meal another day” meant “I’m just being polite.”
So, what did “Stay here and take a break, let me wander around alone for a bit” mean? Did it mean “I’m slipping away, you can get lost”?
The attendant thought for a long time without a clue, so she smacked her lips and waved for the waiter, “Another bowl of meat soup!”
The meat soup was steaming, with four or five meatballs the size of half a fist bobbing inside. The color was fresh, the meat was firm, and one bite was enough to make one’s tongue melt from the flavor.
The attendant was halfway through slurping it down when a gust of wind suddenly blew past her, and a sheathed sword appeared on the table.
Startled, the attendant looked up with her bowl in hand and saw that the newcomer was Shen Zhishu.
She smacked her lips, pulled out a handkerchief to wipe the grease, and smiled, “Young General, you come and go so silently, you gave me quite a fright.”
Shen Zhishu untied her cloak, sat down on the long bench, and tilted her head toward the attendant, “You may head back now.”
“To where?”
“The General’s Mansion.”
“And what about you?”
“I’m going to sit here for a while.”
The attendant advised, “You should come back too. If Lady He sees me return alone without you, she’ll be worried.”
“She won’t be. We haven’t seen each other in eight years, what’s another moment?”
The attendant was left speechless, stared for a moment, and said dryly, “I’m afraid you might run into some trouble…”
“Enough,” Shen Zhishu waved her hand, “if someone really wants to harm me, you being here would only get in the way, and I’d have to distract myself to protect you.”
The attendant was silenced.
Having been declared “in the way,” the attendant decisively left.
Shen Zhishu settled the bill for her and sat at the table for a while. She didn’t have much of an appetite for food or drink, mainly because taking off her mask would draw too much attention. So, she picked up her sword, donned her cloak, and headed south on her horse.
The sky had grown quite dark, and the silhouettes of the distant mountains were no longer clear, hidden in the gloom of the horizon. The lanterns were beginning to be lit, and the streets in the south of the city were glowing with orange-yellow light. Since it was nearly the New Year festival, no one intended to save on candles, and the fires burned brightly, looking very festive.
Shen Zhishu wandered along, setting her sights on a three-story restaurant at the end of the street. she planned to get a private room and find something to eat in peace.
There were several intersections along the street leading to other small alleys. Unexpectedly, after riding just a few steps, a shadow suddenly darted out of an alley, reckless and hurried, nearly colliding with her horse.
The horse and the shadow brushed past each other, crying out in unison.
Startled, Shen Zhishu quickly brought the horse to a halt and looked down carefully.
It was a girl.
Support Wind And Snow On The Jade Steps
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
