Chapter 5
Chapter 5
The vegetables in Jianxi’s courtyard looked sickly and wilted.
She had only one maid by her side, and that maid was now standing in front of the fence, twisting a handkerchief in her hands with worry.
“Your Highness, in the past, the Crown Princess always handled everything herself. She never allowed this servant to interfere…”
Fu Yanli’s heart sank.
He remembered when he had still lived in Jinren Palace, there had often been one meal with no guarantee of the next.
If the palace servants from the imperial kitchen came, then he was lucky that day.
If they were stopped on the road by one of his imperial brothers, elder or younger, then naturally, it meant his luck was bad.
After Jianxi was rescued, it seemed never to have occurred to her that an imperial prince could struggle just to keep himself fed and warm.
She had paced around that square little courtyard for several days.
At last, that afternoon, she had burst into laughter.
She said, “Soon, we’ll have our own little kitchen.”
Only then did Fu Yanli realize that over the past few days, she had not been agonizing over when they could leave.
She had been thinking about how to plant melons, fruits, and vegetables in that barren courtyard.
“Sow rapeseed in spring, reap fruit in autumn; plant peach, plant plum, plant the spring breeze.”
Jianxi had found a hoe from somewhere and tied it up again and again with discarded hemp rope.
Muttering to herself the whole time, she planted half the courtyard full of fruits and vegetables.
A place no better than the cold palace had, in a daze, begun to look even livelier than the Hundred Flowers Banquet in the Empress’s palace.
At that thought, Fu Yanli suddenly smiled.
He had never attended any Hundred Flowers Banquet.
Even last year’s autumn hunt had only been an opportunity because the Second Prince needed someone to take the fall.
Fu Yanli stood beneath the eaves for a while. In his ears, he seemed to hear Jianxi reciting poetry: “Father hoes beans east of the creek, while Jianxi weaves a chicken coop.”
Wrong.
It was clearly, “The eldest son hoes beans east of the creek; the middle son weaves a chicken coop…”
Jianxi could not read, but she was good at everything from growing vegetables to cooking meals.
She even knew a bit of crude, half-baked martial arts.
On the day Fu Yanli was framed by the Second Prince, the Second Prince’s mother had fixed every charge onto Fu Yanli with just a few casual words.
By the time Jianxi received the news, Fu Yanli’s back was already covered in blood.
She had practically flown there, running, stumbling, and crawling all the way to Consort Jin’s palace.
She had once saved the Ninth Prince from drowning, so Consort Jin had granted her one wish.
The steps of Yanxi Palace were high. Jianxi failed to watch her footing, and a chunk of flesh was knocked from her chin.
The person was saved.
And the scar remained.