Chapter 16
Edward Quan ·
I bowed to the floor, my voice calm and clear.
“I thank you for your great kindness.”
“I will go to the fief with Prince Yan.”
The emperor seemed unsurprised.
He only sighed softly.
“Foolish girl.”
Three days later, the decree came.
Prince Yan, Xiao Jingyan, had failed in word and deed and managed his household poorly.
Stripped of every capital office, he was to depart immediately for Yunzhou, never returning without an imperial decree.
Liu Ruyue, a female guest who neglected her duties and fomented discord, was to be sent to Jing’an Temple outside the capital.
She would practice with her hair unshorn and pray day and night for the imperial family, never leaving for the rest of her life.
For involvement in Liu Qian’s old embezzlement case, the entire Liu clan was exiled three thousand li, forbidden to return to the capital for generations.
When the decree reached us, I was packing.
Xiao Jingyan stood behind me, watching me fold plain garments carefully into a wooden chest.
His lips moved. No words came.
On the day Liu Ruyue was escorted away, she cried heartrendingly.
She tried to beg him, but his cold look drove her back.
She tried to beg me, but Shen Yi barred her from my courtyard.
Her venomous cries carried from far away even after she was dragged into the carriage.
Xiao Jingyan never looked at her again.
His eyes stayed on me.
Only when the residence was quiet did he approach, his voice hoarse.
“Why?”
“Why didn’t you choose divorce? Father gave you the chance.”
Still packing, I answered lightly.
“I wrote the agreement myself. I don’t want it to become a stain on my life.”
“And because”—I looked him in the eye—“Father is fighting for the country in the north. I cannot desert now.”
“I want to see the land he protects with his life.”
“I want to see what Xiao Jingyan is without all his glory.”
He stared, his eyes slowly reddening.
He raised a hand toward my cheek, stopped in the air, then lowered it.
“Qingning.”
Head bowed, voice thick, he said, “I’m sorry.”
His first apology.
I didn’t say it was all right.
Some wounds can never be erased.
I only said, “The road ahead is long. Please take care, Your Highness.”
11
The journey to Yunzhou was long and hard.
No ceremonial procession. No crowds of attendants.
Only a simple carriage and more than ten utterly loyal guards.
Shen Yi and Chunhe stayed with me.
Xiao Jingyan took off his princely silk robes and wore coarse cloth like me.
No longer a lofty prince.
A man sent away in disgrace.
At first, he struggled terribly.
He couldn’t light a fire, carry water, or even work out what to do when the carriage wheel sank in mud.
I neither helped nor mocked him.
I watched quietly.
His helplessness became gritted endurance.
Blisters rose on his hands and hardened into calluses.
Wind and sand darkened and roughened his pale face.
We still spoke little.
But something was changing quietly.
On difficult mountain roads, he jumped down and scouted ahead.
In rain, he silently put our only rain cape around me.
If an inn had only one room, he gave me the bed and slept on the floor with a blanket.
He no longer called me Qingning or Consort.
He worked silently, atoning through actions.