Chapter 18

Chapter 18

[Prince Consort, the Princess Has Been Beaten to Death – 17]

Anger rose in Madam Lü when her son threatened her this way. She raised a hand to slap him, but he neither flinched nor dodged. He merely stared at her with a pleading face. A mother’s tender heart turned several times and finally softened.

“You wretched son!” she sighed bitterly.

Lü Xiuzhen knew from her response that she had tacitly agreed. He breathed a great sigh of relief and kowtowed gratefully. “Your son thanks you, Mother!”

Madam Lü’s heart was crowded with worry. Glancing at the faint amber lamplight in the inner room, she pulled her son aside. “Which family does she come from? Explain everything carefully. If the worst happens, we need to know how to conceal it.”

At the mention of this, gloom covered Lü Xiuzhen’s features, mingled with faint pity. “Yanyan’s father was the former Earl of Xingqing…”

The title sounded both familiar and distant.

Madam Lü frowned and thought for a long while before saying, “Was he not also an old follower who helped His Majesty conquer the realm?”

“When the birds are gone, the fine bow is stored away. Sadly, he came to no good end.”

Lü Xiuzhen gave a cold, mocking laugh. “In the second year after His Majesty took the throne, he seized on a pretext to strip the Earl of Xingqing of his title and expel him from the capital. Half a year ago, he found another excuse to condemn the entire Gao Family. Yanyan escaped through untold hardship. A weak woman traveling alone-who knows what she suffered? If she had not encountered me, she might have died of illness or starvation beside the road…”

Madam Lü had no patience for this nonsense. She heard only that the Gao Family’s case had occurred half a year ago and judged that the matter must have faded by now. Sheltering Gao Yanyan was unlikely to cause a catastrophe. Her expression finally eased. “She saved your life, and you wish to keep her. I will accept that. But on one condition: as soon as her health recovers, send her away. The princess will marry you soon. How can you keep a young woman at your side?”

Lü Xiuzhen had only just found the person he had yearned for day and night. How could he remember his existing engagement? When his mother mentioned it, he said impatiently, “Even a princess cannot prevent me from repaying the woman who saved my life. Without Yanyan, how could I exist today? If the princess truly becomes my wife, she should regard Yanyan as her benefactor too.”

Madam Lü choked. There was no reasoning with him. Seeing his determined expression, she knew words would never move him. Several months remained before the wedding, so she could proceed gradually. In the end, she offered only a warning. “Today you knelt and begged me to keep her. If the princess learns of this later, she may tolerate it-but will the palace? If you truly care for Gao Yanyan, you should consider her future.”

Even though the sudden appearance of his savior had thrown Lü Xiuzhen’s mind into chaos, irritation now rose in him.

He knew his mother was right.

He was going to marry a princess, and the family he would face through marriage was the imperial family. If any conflict or dispute arose, the first person harmed could only be Yanyan.

He could not bear that.

Yanyan had already lost her parents and family. She was pitiful enough. If she suffered an undeserved disaster because of him, how could he live with himself?

After Madam Lü called Lü Xiuzhen outside, Gao Yanyan could no longer remain lying down. She forced herself upright and waited for judgment upon her future.

The door curtain lifted from outside. Light and shadow flickered, and Lü Xiuzhen appeared before her, handsome as a jade tree in the wind. His dark brows curved in a frown, and heaviness filled his expression as though a mountain had suddenly descended upon his shoulders. Half of Gao Yanyan’s fragile spirit collapsed at the sight.

“Young Master Lü, are you going to drive me away too?” Gao Yanyan asked mournfully before Lü Xiuzhen could speak.

Her hair had become slightly disordered as she sat up. She lifted a lovely oval face, her pointed chin pitifully thin.

Lü Xiuzhen’s heart ached. He slowly sat beside the bed, took her hand, and said gently, “Yanyan, I am doing this for your sake. You should know that I will soon take a wife…”

Gao Yanyan’s brows trembled. She asked bitterly, “Which family’s young lady?”

“Not the young lady of any family. She is…” Lü Xiuzhen hesitated for several moments before finally saying, “She is the Reigning Emperor’s eldest daughter, Princess Qinghe.”

Princess Qinghe?

Luan Jingrou?

Why did it have to be her?!

Gao Yanyan’s fingers tightened, and for an instant her eyes twisted with malice.

Once, she and Luan Jingrou had been close.

She was a concubine-born daughter, and so was Luan Jingrou. She had thought they could huddle together for warmth. Later, she discovered that she and Luan Jingrou were nothing alike.

Luan Jingrou’s birth mother might have been weak and mild, but she never used her daughter as a stepping-stone to win favor. Instead, she loved and protected the girl with her whole heart.

Luan Jingrou’s legitimate mother might have been born to no lofty family, but she never dragged the girl before her to enforce petty rules. She was gentle and loving, always considering Jingrou’s food, clothing, and every daily need.

More important, Luan Jingrou’s father and Gao Yanyan’s father had both begun as wandering bandits. The former was courageous and skilled in war and soon became a regional hegemon. Her own father could only attach himself to Luan Zhenghuan, use their old association to obtain an official post, and then lose his title not long afterward for breaking the law…

At seven or eight, the two girls had been intimate companions. Who could have imagined that their circumstances would diverge so dramatically after all these years?

One was a lofty Grand Princess, about to carry a lifetime of honor into an illustrious scholarly house in a glorious wedding. The other was a convicted official’s daughter, fleeing in terror like a rat in the street!

And then there was Lü Xiuzhen-Lü Xiuzhen, who believed she had saved his life…

The urge to sneer suddenly rose in Gao Yanyan. Beneath the quilt, her hand slowly clenched. She feigned panic and cried in apparent shock, “Princess Qinghe? How could it be her?! Why her, of all people…”

As though realizing she had misspoken, Gao Yanyan raised a hand to cover her mouth.

Suspicion rose in Lü Xiuzhen. “What is wrong with her? Is there something improper about Princess Qinghe?”

“What a cursed fate!” Gao Yanyan smiled bitterly. “Young Master Lü, do not ask. I will say nothing.”

Her shifting behavior aroused Lü Xiuzhen’s defiance and curiosity. After he pressed her repeatedly, Gao Yanyan gazed at him through misty eyes. “Young Master Lü, do you remember the first time you and I met?”

Lü Xiuzhen’s expression grew solemn. Holding her hand, he said softly, “I will remember it forever.”
“I had grown stifled inside the carriage that day and wanted to open the window for air. By coincidence, I saw someone collapsed beside the road and was badly frightened. I was preparing to save you, but the girl traveling with me stopped me. She said we should not meddle in strangers’ affairs while away from home, and since we did not know the man’s identity, recklessly helping him might create endless complications…”

Lü Xiuzhen remembered hearing those words dimly before he lost consciousness. Then he recalled the sharp-tongued girl who had clashed with him several times while he was blind, and his expression darkened in an instant.

Gao Yanyan appeared not to notice. She smiled like a lotus opening, gentle and serene. “I thought saving one life was a greater virtue than building a seven-story pagoda. I could not leave you to die, so I descended from the carriage. What a strange work of fate: of the two people who saved you that day, one is now before you, while the other will soon become your wife.”

Lü Xiuzhen’s expression changed repeatedly, first bewildered, then suddenly enlightened. “So it was her. It was actually her! Of course-I was foolish. Your honored father was an old follower of the Reigning Emperor. It was only natural that you knew her as a child.”

Then he turned to Gao Yanyan and said solemnly, “What do you mean, the two of you saved me together? I recognize only you as my benefactor. As for Princess Qinghe…”

Lü Xiuzhen gave a cold laugh. “If she possessed genuine kindness, she would never have spoken those words in the first place, much less repeatedly mocked and provoked me while I could not see. And if the two of you were close friends from childhood, why did she say not one word when disaster struck the Gao Family? Clearly, friendship has never meant anything in her heart!”

…

As the day of Princess Qinghe’s and Princess Zhaoyang’s weddings approached, the palace grew ever more festive.

The wedding robes had long since been completed. Palace attendants from the Shanggong Bureau delivered them to Fengyi Palace. Empress Miao and Han Zhaoyi waited in the hall for a short while before the pearl curtain lifted and two attending female officials emerged with smiles. “The two princesses have come to pay their respects to Her Majesty.”

Both young women wore brilliant red wedding robes. Princess Qinghe was gentle and quietly beautiful; Princess Zhaoyang was vivid and radiant. Their charms differed, but both were equally moving.

Emperor Gaozu arrived at Fengyi Palace after court. At the sight, he could not help saying, “The daughters of my house have just come of age, and both are so beautiful. Your father can hardly bear to marry you off!”

Everyone in the hall laughed. Only the two brides-to-be lowered their heads without speaking. Even Princess Zhaoyang, lively and forthright as she was, blushed faintly at that moment.

The young women went to the inner hall to change out of their wedding robes. Empress Miao helped Emperor Gaozu change into informal clothes in a side chamber. Once the jade belt was fastened at his waist, he sighed. “They truly are grown. When We issued the marriage edicts last year, the weddings seemed far away. Now We look again, and the day is directly before Us.”

Empress Miao smiled and sighed with him. “Is that not the truth?”

After everyone changed and returned to the main hall, Emperor Gaozu took his seat in good spirits. He told the Empress and consort, “In ten days, the two children will marry. Their Princess Manors are complete. Find a time to leave the palace and inspect them. See whether anything needs to be altered or added. A daughter marries only once. It is right to be meticulous.”

Ordinary palace consorts were not permitted to leave the palace casually, and even the Empress rarely could. Han Zhaoyi had heard that the Princess Manor was beautifully built but had never imagined she might inspect it herself. Tears rose in her eyes. Taking her daughter’s hand, she stood and thanked the emperor for his grace.

Emperor Gaozu smiled and told them to rise. “This is a joyful occasion. There is no need for that.”

Then he turned to his two daughters and spoke earnestly. “Your father is the Son of Heaven and has always been occupied with affairs of state. We seldom even speak together, much less travel and play as ordinary fathers do with their daughters. But Your father’s love for you is no less than any ordinary father’s.”

Princess Qinghe and Princess Zhaoyang heard the gravity in his voice. They hurried forward, knelt before him, and answered solemnly, “Affairs of state come first. Your daughters understand.”

Emperor Gaozu stroked the crowns of their heads and instructed them with great care. “You are princesses of the imperial family, golden branches and jade leaves. Jingrou is gentle and virtuous. Jiaojiao may be more lively, but she knows the proper limits of her actions. Once you enter your husbands’ families, do not use your power to bully others-but do not meekly endure every wrong either. Your father is the Son of Heaven and cannot bear to see you mistreated. Does any husband’s family dare set itself above the Imperial House?”

At this point, his brows sharpened with an unmistakable edge. “The palace will appoint female officials to your Princess Manors. They will help manage your daily affairs and watch the Prince Consorts and their families for anyone who dares disrespect a princess. The Empress may choose the women. Your father will also grant each of you three hundred household guards: first, to protect your residences; second, to strengthen the spirit of a Daughter of the Emperor. If you quarrel with your Prince Consort, do not waste time shouting. Have your people hold him down and beat him first…”

Empress Miao coughed beside him when his words became too outrageous. “Your Majesty, if this spreads outside…”

“Be quiet!” Emperor Gaozu shot her a sidelong glance and snapped, “Beat him first and worry later. What damned use is reputation?!”

Empress Miao stopped with a headache. Emperor Gaozu continued addressing his daughters. “Listen to your father and you will not go wrong! The princess is the highest master in a Princess Manor. If the Prince Consort misbehaves, order the household guards to beat him. If that fails, come into the palace and find your father. Your father will cut off his head!”