Part 2
Zhao Yiyi had taken a short nap. Having gotten up, she was half-leaning on the couch looking at the list for the reward feast, occasionally eating some of the candied fruit she had just bought.
“The taste is still the same as before.” She tasted a green plum, shivering from the sourness.
Yunzhu poured a cup of tea, smiling helplessly. “Your Ladyship should eat less; be careful of a toothache tonight.”
Seeing that Yunzhu was about to take them away, Zhao Yiyi hurriedly leaned over to protect them, looking up at her: “I just bought them back; I haven’t eaten them in so long. Let me eat a few more bites.”
Yunzhu couldn’t win against her. After wrestling for a while, she had to let her be, admonishing, “Then Your Ladyship must not eat too many. This servant will count them later.”
Zhao Yiyi muttered a few words and continued to look down at the list.
A cool breeze blew in from the half-open window, mixed with the scent of flowers, refreshing the atmosphere of the entire inner hall.
Zhao Yiyi placed the list on her knees, covering it with her hand. She turned her head and stared blankly at the pear blossoms outside the window, lost in thought.
She remembered the pear grove in the ancestral home in Chang’an. Every spring, clusters of pear blossoms filled the branches—goose-yellow stamens, snow-white petals. Looking from a distance, it seemed as if fresh snow had fallen.
That day on the cliff in the western suburbs, when she told him she wanted to see what it looked like outside Luoyang, she wasn’t just saying it.
She really wanted to see—to see what kind of scene lay outside this flower-filled capital city.
“Why are you leaning here? What if you catch a cold?”
A low, mellow voice entered the room. Zhao Yiyi withdrew her gaze from the pear blossoms and turned her head sharply. After a moment of daze, she stood up abruptly to get off the couch and greet him.
But he stepped forward quickly and held her down.
“Your body hasn’t fully recovered yet; why fuss over these empty rituals?” Gu Zhen asked her with a frown.
Zhao Yiyi lowered her eyes and didn’t answer, simply asking softly, “Why has Your Majesty come?”
Compared to the morning, the makeup on that lotus face was completely removed, carrying the laziness of having just woken up, her cheeks flushed with a rosy hue.
Being looked at by his burning gaze, Zhao Yiyi felt slightly uncomfortable. She gently turned her face away, avoiding his scorching sight.
Watching a strand of hair moving gently with the wind in front of her, Gu Zhen reached out, wanting to tuck it behind her ear, but his hand paused in mid-air.
He wanted to ask her why she took the south side when she knew he was at the north street intersection. He wanted to ask if she did it on purpose. In the end, it only turned into a sentence: “Zhen waited for you at the north of the street for a long time today, wanting to wait for you to return to the palace for lunch.”
Zhao Yiyi turned back to look at him, her voice light and shallow. “I didn’t know Your Majesty was waiting outside. This consort already ate at the Marquis Manor.” She smiled. “This consort saw carriages and ceremonial guards at the north intersection and wondered about it, but didn’t pay it mind, so I went south to buy candied fruit. So, that person was actually Your Majesty.”
She smiled, and Gu Zhen smiled along with her. But his heart felt as if it had been slit by a knife, dripping blood continuously. Bright red blood gurgled out, throbbing with pain.
The pain made his heart constrict violently, and a chill spread through his fingertips.
So, this is what it tastes like to be ignored and disregarded.
It feels very bad, and very painful.
But Yiyi had experienced countless scenes like this in the past. She never said it was hard to bear—or perhaps she did, but he hadn’t cared, nor taken it to heart.
“Returning today, did you suffer any grievances?” After a long while, Gu Zhen asked her softly.
Even though he had learned the answer from Wu Nan, he still wanted to ask her personally, to hear her answer with his own ears, to be at ease.
Zhao Yiyi didn’t react immediately. Only after a moment did she understand what he was asking.
“Many thanks for Your Majesty’s concern.” Glancing at him, she quickly lowered her eyes again and replied softly, “Everything in the manor is fine. It was a homecoming; how could this consort suffer grievances?”
Since she had just risen from the couch, she only wore a lotus-root colored shirt on her upper body. The bird patterns appeared indistinctly in the light.
Staring at those slightly thin shoulders, Gu Zhen wanted to reach out and embrace her. But as soon as he extended his hand, he paused because of her subconscious retreating movement. He clenched his hand into a fist in mid-air, a bitter smile on his face, and slowly retracted it.
“It is Zhen who was wrong, never thinking on your behalf,” he said in a low voice. “I already know about the matters in your manor. In the past… you suffered too many grievances. Zhen has already issued a decree forbidding the Imperial College from accepting illegitimate children.”
Just some remedial measures after the fact, that’s all.
Zhao Yiyi pulled the corners of her lips into a smile and said respectfully, “Many thanks, Your Majesty. This consort is endlessly grateful.”
Suffered many grievances?
Indeed, quite a few.
Her father’s indifference, Madam Xu’s fake kindness and hidden cruelty, the stepsister who always played dirty tricks, and the lawlessly spoiled Zhao Sanlang, Zhao Shunnian.
Fortunately, there were still old servants left by her grandparents at home, as well as the money and silk her grandparents had secretly divided into portions and left for them. Although her mother’s family had declined, there was at least a Grand Princess to hold up the façade.
Long ago, when her mother was still alive, she knew her father treated other people’s children much better than he treated her.
She had asked why, and she had been unwilling to accept it. But the answer the elders gave her was that Miss Zuo had lost her father, so her father would treat her better. She foolishly asked, “If I lose my father, will I get this much love? Then I don’t want a father anymore.”
She almost got a beating from her mother.
Her brother told her to run fast or she’d be beaten by Mom. She wandered outside all afternoon, only kicking stones back home when it was dark. Mom hugged her and cried. She cried in a way Yiyi couldn’t quite understand, but Yiyi still stuck to her idea: she would rather not have a father.
At that time, she thought that maybe if she didn’t have a father, there would be another father who would treat her well.
Later, she became certain that her father simply truly liked others more, was biased towards others, and everything else was just an excuse.
Those people in the Marquis Manor… they weren’t people she cared about. They only made her feel annoyed and disgusted, at most a bit angry. To say she felt aggrieved or sad? Not really.
Seeing her refuse to speak, Gu Zhen couldn’t help calling softly, “Yiyi…”
He felt somewhat at a loss. He suddenly realized that for nearly three years, Yiyi had spent her time in the palace. Almost all her grievances had been given by him.
The fact that everyone in the palace disregarded her, the Empress Dowager’s difficulties, Linchuan’s disrespect—all stemmed from him, the husband, not taking her to heart and not giving her enough dignity.
His fingertips curled slightly. Gu Zhen softened his voice and said, “Zhen came today to ask you: are you willing to have your younger brother come to the Hongwen Hall (Palace School) to study? The masters at Hongwen Hall are all great Confucian scholars, and since it is in the palace, you can see him often.”
The Palace’s Hongwen Hall specifically recruited the relatives of the Empress Dowager, the Emperor, and the Empress. As the Empress’s full brother, it was perfectly normal for Zhao Chen to enter Hongwen Hall.
Zhao Yiyi’s fingertips turned white as she pinched the list. After a moment of silence, she said, “Many thanks for Your Majesty’s kindness, but Ah Chen’s status is not what it used to be. It is better not to go. The Imperial College is already… enough.”
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ah yes having her brother as a hostage I’m sure he would be thrilled