Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Zhao Yunzhou remained in my courtyard to recover from his injuries.

He refused to let servants attend him and deliberately ordered me about instead.

“Is this not exactly what you wanted?” he sneered.

I had clearly been far too accommodating.

I sat quietly drinking tea and reading, then sent every maid out and ignored him no matter how loudly he shouted.

Only after he angrily flung all the pillows from the bed did I laugh coldly.

“You are right. I hope your wounds heal as slowly as possible so you can stay in my room forever. Then Song Lanzhen will have to kneel outside my courtyard, bowing and begging me to release you. I wonder whether she will suffer another miscarriage.”

His face turned scarlet with rage.

“You poisonous shrew!”

I ignored him and forbade anyone to retrieve the pillows.

That night, he slept without one.

Whenever he tried to turn over in anger, he pulled at his wounds and hissed in pain.

It was almost comical.

I slept soundly through the night.

After that, he behaved. He did not say another word to me or order me about. He wanted only to recover and leave as soon as possible.

Seven days later, Song Lanzhen could wait no longer. She came to collect him.

Standing at the entrance to my courtyard, she glanced at the threshold and smiled.

“Elder Sister, I am coming in.”

She stepped across.

The instant she entered, the matrons on either side slammed the gates shut, leaving her maid outside.

I kicked Song Lanzhen squarely in the backside. Her knees crashed onto the stone paving, and she toppled sideways with a cry of pain. She turned to stare at me in disbelief.

“Madam…”

“Li Suyi, have you lost your mind?”

Zhao Yunzhou limped out and shouted at me, his face livid at the sight.

I clapped my hands. A maid immediately unfurled a dress.

The color drained from Song Lanzhen’s face, and her lips began to tremble.

It was the dress she had worn on the day of her “miscarriage.”

She had ordered her maid to dispose of it.

But the fabric was fine, and the young maid could not bear to throw it away. She meant to wash it and keep it for herself.

My people intercepted it while she was washing. Several other physicians examined the stains and confirmed that the blood was chicken blood, not human blood.

I regarded Song Lanzhen calmly.

“This is the dress you wore on the day you miscarried. Your physician does not have the final say on whether these stains came from a chicken or a person. I will summon ten physicians from ten different clinics and ask each of them to identify the blood.”