A night wind blew past. Cui Xuan felt his back slightly damp with sweat.

This was the first time in seventeen years that he had felt himself so close to death. Even in the past, when he went to war against the Di and they hacked at each other, he hadn’t felt this way.

He committed this to memory as a lesson: in the future, when encountering situations, he absolutely must never let himself be at such a disadvantage as tonight.

This feeling of powerlessness—of being dominated and at the mercy of others—was something he had experienced for the first time in his life, and had no wish to experience a second time.

He slowly let out a breath and looked at Pu Zhu.

She was still standing there in a daze, her face still bearing traces of tears.

He hesitated, then said quietly: “Are you all right? Did that frighten you? It’s my fault…”

Pu Zhu snapped out of it and managed a weak smile: “It’s fine—I’m not that timid.”

Cui Xuan saw her smile and relaxed, and turned to look in the direction of the relay station.

“Those people went inside. What background do they have? Did you hear the keeper mention anything?”

Pu Zhu immediately thought of A’Ju.

She had been out for quite a while now—A’Ju would come back to find her gone and worry.

She suppressed her somewhat unsettled feelings, shook her head: “I don’t know either. I have to go back—if A’mu can’t find me she’ll be anxious. Remember not to go join Liu Protector-General—I’ll recommend you to Uncle Yang!” Done speaking and about to leave, she suddenly remembered the hairpin he’d given her, and quickly held it back out: “I have no use for such a fine hairpin. Take it back and give it to someone else.”

Cui Xuan seemed somewhat awkward. He paused, waved it off, and said with an air of indifference: “If you don’t want it, throw it away—it’s not worth much anyway! I’m going!” The words had barely fallen when he bent down, retrieved his dagger that Pu Zhu had earlier snatched away and thrown to the ground, pushed it back into his boot, and turned and walked away.

Pu Zhu had no choice but to bundle the hairpin box and the gold together, cover them with her clothes, and make her way back to the relay station, walking to that unlocked rear gate and giving it a gentle push.

Quiet and still.

The rear courtyard showed not a single soul. Only the horses in the stable quietly chewed their fodder, making a soft rustling sound.

They must have returned to their lodgings.

Pu Zhu sneaked her way back to where the kitchen was, and fortunately A’Ju had not yet returned. Seeing the sweet rice A’Ju had left for her, she thought of Cui Xuan’s comment that he hadn’t eaten all day.

This late, who knew what that young man would have to eat when he returned to that bare home of his.

She sighed, sat down, picked up the sweet rice that still held some warmth, and ate it bite by bite. When she finished, she propped her chin in her hand and gazed absently at the lamplight.

Familiar footsteps came from outside.

They must have finished eating. A’Ju was coming back carrying the bowls and dishes.

Pu Zhu helped her tidy up, and then the two headed back together. Passing through the front hall, Xu Chong hurried to catch up, holding out some money, saying it was a reward from the distinguished guests.

“The distinguished guest said the food was good, and having summoned you here to work so late—this is his reward for you.”

Xu Chong was very pleased, and looked rather proud to share in the honor.

A’Ju was also pleasantly surprised. She accepted it and made a grateful expression.

Xu Chong waved it off: “Don’t, don’t—it’s the distinguished guest’s reward! If you’d like to go thank them in person, just wait—I’ll go ask on your behalf and take you over.”

A’Ju glanced at Pu Zhu.

Pu Zhu was startled and shook her head immediately: “The distinguished guests have been traveling hard—we dare not disturb them further. They certainly won’t receive us!”

Xu Chong thought it over and agreed, then told the two of them to go back and rest early.

Ye Xiao entered and reported: “Your Highness, the keeper says that Attendant Zhu and his party passed through this relay station four days ago. If they traveled at their usual pace, they should reach Yumen Pass tomorrow. If Your Highness is in a hurry, pressing hard we could catch up within two days—though I fear this would be tiring for Your Highness.”

The air in this room was ice-cold, without a single brazier in sight.

Not that Xu Chong dared to be remiss toward this master.

Though he had only seen Ye Xiao produce a prince’s household guard medallion and did not know this young man’s exact identity, after half a lifetime as a relay keeper he could certainly tell that this young man was the real principal. The true principal behind a prince’s household guard medallion—naturally a feudal prince.

In the Li imperial dynasty up to now, there had been four emperors. The enfeoffed royals who could be called princes numbered no more than ten or twenty. This young man must be one of the princely royals. Though he didn’t know which household, having his remote border relay station receive a feudal royal was something he would naturally do his utmost for.

They had just arrived at their lodgings for the evening, and Xu Chong had sent a charcoal brazier to this room for warmth—but it had been refused by Ye Xiao, who told him to send it to his own room instead.

It wasn’t that Ye Xiao dared to fight with Li Xuandu over a brazier. It was that ever since the Prince of Qin had been imprisoned in Wuyou Palace at sixteen, he had gradually developed a strange ailment—a blazing internal fire in his body.

In ordinary people, a blazing internal fire—eat some cooling medicines, regulate the diet, wait for yin and yang to come back into balance, and it would slowly dissipate.

For him, medicines had no effect. By the time he moved to Changling’s Wanshou Guan to keep vigil at the mausoleum two years later, the internal fire had grown even more intense. In the dead of winter he could not be in a heated room. At its worst, he had run barefoot through the snow in a single layer of clothing. If he stayed in a heated room too long, he would feel a burning sensation in his heart-fire, and then his whole body would grow restlessly hot and extremely uncomfortable. Over the past two years in Xihai commandery, it was the same. After winter came, while those like Ye Xiao and the ordinary people of the prince’s household all burned under-floor heating, he alone had an ice-cold bed in his room, keeping warm only with fur blankets.

It was the same now. Li Xuandu had already removed his outer clothing. He wore only a pale white inner robe, a black fur cloak loosely draped over his shoulders as the sole defense against the cold. By the corner of the table, the light of a single candle burned. He lowered his head, studying the western territories map in his hand. Hearing Ye Xiao come in and report, without raising his head he said: “No matter—the sooner the better. Nothing more for me to deal with here. You all go rest as well—five o’clock start tomorrow.”

Sixteen years ago, Great Princess Jinxi, who had gone beyond the pass in a peace alliance marriage to the western Di, had sent back her young son—named A’Shibi, also known as Huaiwei—to his home country. That group of people should still be somewhere on the road outside the pass.

In light of certain movements and intelligence Li Xuandu had been gathering over the past year, he had judged that He Xi might face imminent upheaval. Half a month ago, he had sent a warning ahead to the court.

Upon hearing the news, Grand Empress Dowager Jiang became worried about the young prince’s safety and feared the road might hold unexpected dangers. She also considered that the Honglu Temple party previously sent to receive the young prince had originally planned only to wait inside Yumen Pass—if they were suddenly reordered to go out through the pass, their numbers might be insufficient to handle sudden changes. Therefore, she gave a special verbal decree ordering Li Xuandu to catch up with the Honglu Temple party, personally lead them out through the pass, go and receive the young prince, and make certain to bring him safely to the capital as quickly as possible.

This was why Li Xuandu and his party had been traveling westward, and why they appeared here today.

Ye Xiao obeyed, and looked at the Prince of Qin, whose gaze had never left the map, then continued: “Your Highness said just now that the sweet rice was quite palatable—it had the flavor of something from the old days in the capital? I was following Your Highness’s command just now—I told the keeper to send out the reward money, and the keeper said…”

The words left his mouth, and he immediately regretted it and stopped.

Li Xuandu finally raised his head.

Candlelight flickered, illuminating a man’s face—sword-sharp brows, a straight nose, skin white as snow, handsome to the extreme.

The carefree days of golden whips and jade saddles were long gone, but between his brows and eyes there still faintly remained a trace of the crystalline brilliance of his youth.

He raised an eyebrow.

Ye Xiao, helpless, could only say: “The keeper says, the person who made the food for Your Highness was…”

He stopped again.

Li Xuandu now frowned slightly.

Ye Xiao knew what the Prince of Qin of those days was like—his temper had been the most impatient. When he was small, Grand Empress Dowager Jiang had once laughed and scolded him, calling him “Quick-tempered Zhang Fei,” for like that bird with such a fiery nature, it would peck at food and drink alongside other birds at the fastest possible pace, and could not bear to be kept in a cage—shut it in and it would squawk and hop about without a moment’s peace. After the age of sixteen, through the great upheavals of his life, counting it out, a full five or six years had been spent in confinement and house arrest. Over these past two years, nominally pacifying Xihai, he still had an unknown number of prying eyes watching him from behind. His temperament had naturally long since changed entirely.

But at this moment, this small expression once again faintly brought out a shadow of his youthful character.

Ye Xiao dared not test his patience further, and immediately said: “I heard the keeper say—the one who made the food for Your Highness was the granddaughter and her attendant of the late Grand Tutor Pu…”

He spoke as he carefully watched Li Xuandu, inwardly regretting that he had let himself get carried away just now and opened this thread.

The Crown Prince Liang affair eight years ago had swept countless people in, leaving them with ruined families and shattered homes, cast down from the clouds into the mud. Among them was the very person standing before him now.

He had always been very careful, and had not in these past years let half a word about that old matter slip in front of him.

But just now, he had been too startled—and had failed to hold back and had raised the topic.

Sure enough, Li Xuandu fell silent, gazed at the lamplight for a moment, and said: “The Pu family’s young lady should not be so young anymore. I recall her father at the time held the position of Left Senior Palace General, and perished on his mission to the Silver Moon City. If I remember correctly, it was the thirty-eighth year of the Xuanning reign—I was barely fifteen at the time. He lies buried to this day in foreign soil, unable to return to his homeland.”

He looked over.

“Since that is so, send more money over—give it all to her. We can keep what we need for the road. Their lives must be hard enough that they came to work at a relay station…”

He seemed to remember something, and gestured for Ye Xiao to wait a moment. He removed a warm jade pendant from his waist, then took the black fur cloak from his shoulders—it still held his body heat—and pushed them both across the table.

“Take them both. The fur cloak can serve as clothing. Have her take the jade pendant to the prefectural city to exchange—don’t let it go for less than five hundred gold.”

Ye Xiao gave a soft cough, and his expression still carried something unusual.

“What is it? Why haven’t you gone yet?” Li Xuandu raised an eyebrow again.

“When the keeper sent out the reward money just now, Your Subordinate caught a glimpse of the Pu family’s young lady…”

He hesitated, faltering.

“That is to say… that was the young girl on the hillside just now, with the ruffian boy.”

Li Xuandu had just picked up a teacup from the table and was drinking water. At these words he paused, then suddenly set the teacup down and seemed to choke slightly—he turned his face away and coughed several times. After suppressing the cough, he turned back, brows furrowed.

“You’re certain?”

“Yes, certain—it was that young girl.”

Before Li Xuandu’s eyes floated the image from just moments ago: the young girl, pretending to scold her sweetheart—and then weeping, shedding tears to play for sympathy.

Such tricks—fooling Ye Xiao was one thing, but how could they fool his pair of eyes?

Her grandfather had been a literary giant of an age, upright and pure. Her father had possessed great ambitions—a truly outstanding man of the world. He had heard that her mother, in those days, had also been a renowned talent among the women of the capital.

He had thought the Pu family’s young lady would naturally follow her family’s distinguished tradition—with a fine character and a delicate, orchid-like heart.

Who would have imagined she would turn out to be such a young girl?!

Li Xuandu also thought back to when he passed by her side just now—she had turned her face toward him, both hands pressed over it, as if wiping her tears, yet her fingers were slightly parted, clearly peeking out at him. Probably afraid he might not let her young man go, he thought. He couldn’t help but give a soft inward snort.

Clever enough, to be sure—but too clever by half, which made it cunning. And she had actually been keeping company with ruffian boys, meeting secretly at night, exchanging keepsakes—if Ye Xiao hadn’t kicked that stone to interrupt them, who knew what else the two might have gotten up to.

So brazen—truly a lost cause, beyond saving.

Li Xuandu shook his head.

A pity—with that birth and background, and having wasted a fine appearance on top of it.

But however the Pu family’s young lady might be, it had little to do with him. After all, in those days, he and the Pu family had not had much of a connection to speak of.

Ye Xiao watched his master’s gaze drop to the candlelight, and for quite a while not a word came from him, his expression strange—not knowing what he was thinking. He waited a moment, then looked at the jade pendant and black fur cloak on the table that he had pushed over earlier, and reached out his hand to take them.

Before he could touch them, he heard Li Xuandu say: “Leave them.”

Ye Xiao’s hand stopped mid-air and he looked at him.

Li Xuandu unhurriedly put the fur cloak back on, pocketed the jade pendant, and said: “Send some money—that will be enough. Additionally, relay a message for me: a fine young lady maintains her dignity and keeps herself pure.”

Ye Xiao paused, then did as he was told, went out, and carried out the orders as instructed.