Chapter 5
Chapter 5
The Crimson Feather Order is in my hands, and Chu Xingzhi is within my grasp.
Now, it is time to take the third thing.
The fief I want is Dingzhou.
It is the ancestral land of my mother’s maternal family, the Song Clan.
Located a thousand miles from the Imperial Capital, the people there are fierce, and the climate is as harsh and cold as a blade.
Accompanied by the Crimson Feather Guard and five hundred personal soldiers, I set out for Dingzhou.
Hooves thundered against the snow as we headed north.
Along the way, Chu Xingzhi tried to escape with dogged persistence.
The first time, he was captured and brought back.
The second time, he was captured and brought back.
The third time-
I lost all patience.
In front of everyone, I ordered his saddle removed and his horse taken away, then I had one of his legs broken.
The crack of the bone was clean and crisp.
Cold sweat soaked his temples from the pain, yet he refused to utter a single plea for mercy.
When he could no longer run, he went on a hunger strike.
He put on an air of choosing death over dishonor.
Better to break than to bend?
How interesting.
If Jingping and I had been so ‘unbending’ back in the Cold Palace, we would have been ground to dust long ago, with not even our names remaining.
I wanted to take Chu Xingzhi to Dingzhou for more than just his appearance.
The Yong’an Marquis Estate had raised him for twenty years, and the Hanlin Academy had tempered him for several more.
When it came to the ways of officialdom and the schemes of civil ministers, he was already a master.
To cast such a person aside would be like locking a precious blade in a high tower-a total waste of talent.
However…
If I wanted him to be my blade willingly, I first had to break that proud spirit of his.
By the day Chu Xingzhi was at death’s door from starvation, his eyes had lost their focus.
I gripped his chin and trickled warm water into his mouth bit by bit.
“Chu Xingzhi.”
“If you agree to eat, I will let you go once your leg has healed.”
He looked at me with half-belief and half-doubt, his eyes filled with struggle.
Without another word, I turned and walked out the door.
A month later, the gates of Dingzhou were before us.
Wind and sand lashed our faces, and banners snapped in the gale.
I kept my word.
I unlocked the golden chain around his ankle and tossed him a bag of silver coins.
I also prepared a horse for him-one that wasn’t particularly fast.
“Go, Chu Xingzhi.”
I sat atop my horse amidst the swirling sand, smiling with airy indifference.
“Go back to your Imperial Capital.”
“Go back to your Zhaoyang.”
Chu Xingzhi hesitated for a moment, but eventually, he mounted the horse and rode away without looking back.
My lips curled into a smirk.
Chu Xingzhi.
When you return to the Imperial Capital…
Will there still be a place for you there?
The road back to the capital was one I had paved for him.
It wasn’t long.
But it was hidden with thorns at every step, drawing blood with every inch.
He used to be a Tanhua, a young lord, the cleanest speck of snow in a crowd.
Now, draped in a tattered cloak with an unhealed leg injury, he looked like a stray dog wherever he went.
Beaten, insulted, and driven away.
Such is the way of the world; it is only natural.
I only left a single sliver of a chance on that road so that he could make it back to the capital alive.
As for his dignity, I left not a shred of it.
Two months later, dragging his broken body, he finally stepped through the gates of the Imperial Capital.
As chance would have it, Zhaoyang’s carriage was passing through the street, its brocade curtains lowered amidst a solemn procession.
He had barely moved half a step forward when the tip of a whip lashed through the air.
“Where did this mad beggar come from?!”
“Scram! Do not defile the Princess’s carriage!”
As the words fell, he was kicked by the toe of a boot, sending him tumbling into a filthy gutter by the roadside.
The carriage wheels rumbled on without a backward glance, heading straight for the Yong’an Marquis Estate.
That should have been his home.
In the brief moment the curtains parted, he caught sight of someone’s back.
That person was actually wearing the white robes he usually wore.
Zhaoyang leaned against the man’s chest, her eyes curved in a smile.
When the rain began to fall, I arrived with an umbrella and stood before him.
“Will you come to Dingzhou with me?”
He looked up at me, his eyes dark and heavy.
Brilliant as he was, how could he not know?
The one who had pushed him to this point was me.
But now…
Chu Xingzhi’s career was ruined.
Disowned by his clan, abandoned by his lover.
The Imperial Capital was as prosperous as a tapestry, yet there was no longer a place for him to stand.
The only person in the world who would take him was me.
After a long silence, he grabbed the hem of my skirt as if clutching his last lifeline.
“Take me away…”
“Anping, take me away.”
I reached out and pulled him from the mud into my arms.
I suddenly remembered the year I first met Chu Xingzhi.
Back then, I looked at him as if he were the bright moon in the sky.
Clean, cold, and unreachable.
Now.
The bright moon has finally been dragged down from its altar by me.
Falling into the mud, and falling into my arms.