Chapter 5

When I relayed General Li’s words to the eldest young lady, she said nothing. She merely had medicine brought in and tended the wound on my arm herself.

There was really no need. The cut was shallow and didn’t hurt at all.

Besides, the eldest young lady truly had no idea how to dress a wound. She dabbed at it once, then twice with her handkerchief, rubbing away the thin scab that had only just formed…

But when I saw the tears trembling at the corners of her eyes, I let her continue.

Oh well. I was tough. One night’s sleep and I would be fine.

The next day, the master summoned me to his study. He regarded me for a long time with much the same look he had worn when he first chose me for the household.

At last, he said, “In consideration of your sincere loyalty, I will not pursue the matter of your trespassing into the general’s estate. It must not happen again.”

I didn’t understand what he meant. Only after Madam called me over and carefully explained every detail did I realize what a terrible disaster I had caused.

The Jiang family appeared magnificent and prosperous, but magnificence was all it had left.

The Jiangs had no power, no influence, and few relatives, but they had money. In the emperor’s eyes, that made them the ideal family for General Li to marry into.

What the emperor hadn’t expected was that the Jiangs possessed far more wealth than he knew.

He couldn’t allow a commander of two hundred thousand troops to have an excessively wealthy wife. Otherwise, those two hundred thousand soldiers might one day answer to the name Li instead of the throne.

So he bestowed Princess Rouyi upon General Li. Once General Li became the emperor’s son-in-law, he could no longer command an army.

General Li loved the eldest young lady and refused to accept, but he was a subject. Whether he wished to accept or not was never his decision.

And that was how General Li ended up with his backside beaten bloody.

As for the Jiangs, they had neither power nor influence. They weren’t even allowed to consider refusing.

But because I had broken into the general’s estate at night, the Jiang family was accused of “attempting to defy an imperial decree.” To clear themselves of the charge, the master surrendered all the family’s holdings in the capital.

Madam said, “Xiaozhu, this truly isn’t your fault. What happened was merely a signal that the emperor intended to bleed the Jiang family. Even without your intrusion, he would have found some excuse to confiscate our wealth.”

The emperor was guarding against the Jiang and Li families conspiring together, so he meant to clip the Jiangs’ wings.

Yet it was still my moment of recklessness that had given him the opportunity.

I dropped to one knee and looked up at Madam. “But Xiaozhu still did wrong. Xiaozhu accepts whatever punishment you see fit.”

Madam gazed at me in silence, her eyes full of pain and guilt. She stroked my head and said, “Good child. From today onward, I want you to put your past behind you and protect Wanying well.”

I understood what she meant. Madam wanted me to abandon all thoughts of running away.

She wanted me to surrender my freedom.

I thought of the eldest young lady and of all the time we had spent together. I asked myself whether I wanted to stay.

I did.

We at the manor all cherished freedom. But in our hearts, being able to remain beside someone we treasured—that was freedom.