Chapter 2
Chapter 2
“Everyone in the city is saying that my maid Chunwu has quite the air of a true scholar. First she splashed wine all over Yan Xuan’s face, then she sank my reward into the river.”
Such treasonous acts would have enraged anyone else, but the Governor just roared with laughter.
A ruthless brute who killed without blinking, yet he adored aping the elegant and refined.
After laughing, he asked me, “I never knew, among the common lot, there existed someone like you?”
I merely kept my expression cold and contemptuous. “I also didn’t know that so-called scholars had such proclivities.”
When the master held night banquets, those self-styled lofty scholars used to avoid them or attend begrudgingly. Now, the threshold of the Governor’s Mansion is nearly worn to pieces. Having a maid pour a goblet of wine over your head has become the latest elegant affair.
Yan Xuan came to the banquet again.
Unfortunately, my trick worked once, but might not a second time. I could certainly splash his face again, but if the audience tired of the same act, that sword would fall on my neck in an instant.
Cold sweat beaded on my back as I calculated how to begin tonight. But Yan Xuan had already raised his goblet and drunk it all in one gulp.
The Governor immediately found it dull. “Why did you drink it?”
“I have a favor to ask the Governor, so of course I must drink this cup.” Though he spoke of asking a favor, his attitude was as cold as water, his lashes lowered, as if he held no regard for the powerful.
The Governor’s interest was piqued, and he leaned forward slightly. “Oh? The world-famous Yan Xuan has a favor to ask of me?”
“I came to the banquet tonight solely to ask for Chunwu’s hand in marriage.”
My heart sank.
The Governor regarded gold and silver as so much dirt, but he was different with people. Women in the mansion-he’d rather hack them to pieces than hand them over. If anyone harbored disloyalty, their fate would be like Shuyi’s.
Besides, I was now nothing more than a palace lantern or a rare curio at the night banquet. Even if fine wine and delicacies were missing, my entertainment was indispensable.
Yan Xuan was no fool; he knew this perfectly well. He was merely using me-even if it pushed me onto a mountain of blades!
The assembled celebrities heard this and, sure enough, sighed in succession. “Yan Xuan, back when Chief Clerk Wang wanted to marry his daughter to you, you fled overnight to Hengzhou. Famous courtesans offered themselves, and you gave them cold stares. Now you actually seek to marry a maid-truly, you regard worldly customs and rites as nothing!”
Between their words, they were all praising his lofty purity and detachment.
He drank another cup, his expression cold and clear. “Yan’s actions are merely done on a whim.”
The hall immediately erupted with an exaggerated chorus of admiration. “Such a realm! We mere mortals truly cannot hope to catch even dust from behind!”
I nearly laughed out loud.
The Governor slammed the table and raised a hand to point at him. “This maid is someone I cherish greatly. How could I easily let you take her away? Chunwu, set him a betrothal gift, make him show some sincerity!”
With those words, his murky yellow eyes turned toward me, like a toad that seemed to be smiling yet not, eyeing me.
The Blindfolded Swordsman stirred slightly. Beneath the strip, those naturally blind eyes were unmistakably fixed on me as well.
Under the table, I pinched my trembling palm and said coolly,
“I’ve heard you, sir, are widely acquainted, keeping company only with men of letters and refinement. I don’t want the three letters and six rites, nor rare treasures-just a poem, the finest quatrain under heaven.”
Among the guests were no shortage of poetry fanatics, all eyes lighting up as they urged, “On what theme?”
I glanced down and said casually,
“Write about my master’s pair of brocade shoes.”
Men detached from the world have always kept company only with wind, flowers, snow, moon, high mountains, and flowing streams. To write a poem for a corrupt official, even to extol the thing beneath a corrupt official’s feet, was simply unheard of.
Yan Xuan slowly knitted his brows, the fingers holding the goblet already turning white.
The Governor was beside himself with glee. “Master Yan Xuan, why aren’t you drinking?”
He remained silent for a long moment, his Adam’s apple bobbing. At last he threw his head back and drank the third cup.
I watched coldly from the sidelines.
What, you can play the game of fishing for fame and compliments, and I can’t?