As Yun Xi came out of the Martial Elegance Hall, a duty officer hurried over. “Captain Yun, are you finished with your business?” He added, “The third young master has been waiting for you for quite some time now.”

Yun Xi was taken aback. “The third young master’s waiting for me?”

“Yes. He arrived before noon, saying he had business with you. The staff in the outer office wanted to inform you right away, but the third young master stopped them, saying not to interrupt your work. So he’s been waiting well over an hour now.”

Yun Xi looked around. “Where is he?”

“Still in the outer office,” the duty officer said. “This official offered to bring him to the inner office, but he said there was no need.”

With that, he led Yun Xi outside.

But when they reached the reception room in the outer office, Cheng Chang was nowhere to be found. The clerk stationed outside the reception room said, “The third young master left about half an hour ago. He didn’t say where he was going, and this humble one didn’t dare ask.”

The Imperial Bodyguard Bureau was the Emperor’s own close guard, and its grounds were vast—the outer office alone had seven or eight training grounds. With Cheng Chang having wandered off like this, no one knew where to even begin looking. If he’d simply grown impatient and left, that would be one thing—but the worry was that he might still be somewhere within the compound. Since he’d come specifically to find Yun Xi, if he hadn’t left, then she couldn’t very well leave either—not on such a bitterly cold day, keeping someone stranded like this.

The duty officer said awkwardly, “Might I trouble Captain Yun to wait a little longer? This official will send someone to look for the third young master right away.”

Yun Xi nodded. “Much obliged.”

She sat down in the reception room, and a clerk nearby poured her tea, but the cold was so severe the tea cooled almost instantly, not even warm enough to hold for comfort. Yun Xi set the cup down. She’d left home in a hurry that morning, never expecting snow, and had worn only her ordinary captain’s uniform. Having finished reporting to the Ministry of War, she’d meant to head straight back to the Marquis’s mansion, but had run into Wei Jie’s men along the way and been summoned to the Bureau instead, delaying her for quite some time. Outside, the snow had already piled up deep—the cold was one thing, but the road home would surely be difficult going.

But none of that mattered right now.

Yun Xi thought she could probably guess why Cheng Chang had come looking for her. She’d heard at the Ministry of War that morning that the third young master had gone to question Luo Shu at the Ministry of Justice’s prison—surely he must have learned something new about the “Noble One” and had rushed over to discuss it with her.

Yun Xi felt a pang of regret. She’d known perfectly well that Emperor Zhaoyuan sending the Imperial Bodyguard Bureau to investigate the old Marquis’s wrongful case was merely for show, and yet some small, foolish hope in her heart still clung to the chance that her father’s name might truly be cleared through this. So when the general at the Martial Elegance Hall had asked about the circumstances before Yun Shuguang’s departure on campaign all those years ago, fearing she might leave something out, she’d repeated certain points over and over. She could have easily finished sooner.

If only she’d come out sooner, the third young master wouldn’t have made this trip in vain, wouldn’t have had to wait so long; if only she’d come out sooner, she could have seen him by now.

Yun Xi glanced out the window—still no sign of the duty officer who’d gone to find Cheng Chang.

A little downcast, she thought to herself that the third young master had probably grown too impatient and left already.

With a small sigh, she stood and said to the clerk nearby, “I’ll go for a walk outside.”

Outside lay the vast training grounds, with a raised platform, war drums, and banners planted about. Yun Xi looked at it all for a moment but didn’t go over—she couldn’t wander too far, so she confined herself to pacing back and forth along a nearby corridor. Unexpectedly, someone called out to her from not far off.

“Yun Xi.”

The voice was clear and cool.

Yun Xi turned sharply and found Cheng Chang standing there, holding an umbrella, amid the vast expanse of wind and snow.

His fur-lined cloak was the color of pale tea, the jade hairpin in his hair the faintest, most delicate shade of blue-green. Standing there beside the weapons and armaments, his frosty bearing seemed to strip away all trace of martial menace from the scene—the beacon-fires and battle-smoke of the training grounds, veiled beneath the snow, seemed transformed into an ink-wash landscape, complementing the cool, distant figure at its edge to form a truly striking sight.

Seeing it was Cheng Chang, Yun Xi paid no mind to the heavy snow and hurried toward him, bowing with cupped hands. “Third young master.” Then she asked, “Do you have business with me, third young master?”

Cheng Chang tilted the umbrella slightly to shield her as well, and asked, “Have you finished your business?”

“All finished.”

Cheng Chang made a soft sound of acknowledgment, then handed her the hand warmer. “Let’s go, then.”

In truth, he hadn’t actually gone anywhere—he’d simply grown tired of waiting and gone out for a stroll, then, finding the hand warmer had gone cold, had gone looking for a woodshed to add fresh coals, and wandered farther than intended in the process.

Taking the hand warmer, Yun Xi found it pleasantly warm—the gentle heat seeping through her fingertips and palm into her veins, driving away the chill that had settled into her whole body at once.

Yun Xi had assumed Cheng Chang handing her the hand warmer meant he had some business to attend to, but seeing him simply holding the umbrella and waiting for her to walk with him, she followed along. As the two of them passed the reception room, Cheng Chang exchanged a word with the clerk from before, then left the Imperial Bodyguard Bureau together with Yun Xi.

With no pavilion to block the wind and snow, the whole world felt bitterly, bone-deep cold.

Yun Xi noticed the knuckles of Cheng Chang’s hand holding the umbrella had gone slightly red, likely from the cold, and thinking to return the hand warmer, she said, “Third young master, let me hold the umbrella instead.”

But Cheng Chang didn’t respond to this. He glanced at her and said instead, “The day we got back to the capital, I meant to see you home to the Marquis’s mansion once I’d finished with my duties. But by the time I asked around, you’d already left.”

She’d heard that the mansion’s steward hadn’t even offered her a proper meal, just a cup of tea and a gold teaspoon as a parting gift.

“It’s fine,” Yun Xi said, smiling. “You’d just survived such an ordeal and finally made it back to the mansion, third young master—of course you should spend more time with the prince and princess consort. Besides, I’d been away from home for over two months myself, and was eager to get back to the Marquis’s mansion to see my sister-in-law.”

As she spoke, remembering that Cheng Chang’s visit today was likely about Luo Shu, she asked, “Third young master, have you already been to the Ministry of Justice to question Luo Shu?”

“Mm.”

“Then…” Yun Xi hesitated slightly. “Is she the informant within the Marquis’s household?”

Cheng Chang was silent for a moment, then said, “No.”

Yun Xi froze, then let out an “Oh” and fell quiet.

She actually felt a little sad. All along, she’d hoped that the informant within the Marquis’s household really would turn out to be Luo Shu.

Her blood relatives were all gone now—the only family she had left in this world was her sister-in-law. So she’d come to regard everyone within the Marquis of Zhongyong’s household as her own family.

She knew every one of these people well, and each of them treated her kindly. If she had to investigate them one by one, each investigation would feel like tearing open a fresh wound in her own heart.

A cold desolation settled in Yun Xi’s chest, but she quickly nodded and said, “All right then, I’ll pay closer attention these days—I’ll be sure to find this person.”

She thought for a moment, then added, “As for that scarred man—before I left Jinling, I told Ke Yong to leave someone keeping watch for him. Yesterday, Ke Yong told me his man spotted the scarred man’s trail somewhere in Jinling about a month ago, but that happened to be the day the Western Region dancers arrived in the capital for the Grand Empress Dowager’s birthday celebrations, and they lost him in the crowd.”

“I’ve been thinking,” Yun Xi said, pressing her lips together, “if we can find the scarred man soon, find… the informant within the Marquis’s household, we’ll be able to uncover who the ‘Noble One’ harming you truly is that much sooner.”

Hearing this, Cheng Chang said nothing in response.

He glanced at her, saw the gloom in her expression, the slightly lost look about her, and decided not to bring up the matter of the informant again. He looked up at the falling snow instead, and said with a faint smile, “The snow in Jinling is lovely. Back where I’m from, it’s rare to see snow fall so quietly like this.”

Yun Xi, hearing this, was puzzled.

She wanted to ask—wasn’t the third young master’s home Jinling itself?

But the words caught in her throat, and something felt off.

All along, Yun Xi had held a strange, almost absurd instinct that the third young master before her didn’t seem like someone from this world.

Not from Jinling. Not even, perhaps, from Great Sui itself.

But what kind of place could possibly have given rise to someone as singular as the third young master?

So she asked instead, “Where is your home, third young master?”

Where was home?

The smile at the corners of Cheng Chang’s mouth faded slightly.

If he had to say, he was from Hangzhou, though he’d later studied and worked in Shanghai. Both cities rarely saw snow in winter, and even when it did snow, it hardly ever accumulated—at most a thin white layer would settle on the ground, only to be churned into a tangle of tire tracks by passing vehicles roaring by.

His hometown had endless streams of traffic, towering skyscrapers packed shoulder to shoulder, and in the dead of night, dazzling lights that never went dark.

Bright enough to outshine the stars and moon themselves.

Seeing Cheng Chang go quiet for so long, Yun Xi remembered something and said with a smile, “Actually, back when we couldn’t find you, I comforted myself by thinking, maybe the third young master simply went back to his hometown, maybe he just went somewhere very, very far away, and once he’d spent enough time there, he’d come back.”

At these words, Cheng Chang’s footsteps suddenly stopped.

His grip on the umbrella’s frame tightened slightly, and he couldn’t help but turn to look at Yun Xi again.

The smile at her lips was faint and light, her eyes clear and bright as a warm spring day—though she surely didn’t feel any warmth at all. With heavy snow blanketing the sky and her captain’s uniform far too thin for the weather, even clutching the hand warmer, the tip of her nose and the tips of her ears had already turned red with cold.

“Cold?” Cheng Chang asked.

Yun Xi blinked, then shook her head. “Not cold.”

Cheng Chang handed the umbrella to her. “Hold this for me.”

Then he undid his fur-lined cloak, shook it open, and draped it over her shoulders.

Yun Xi stood frozen in the snow, holding the umbrella, not daring to move, watching helplessly as he draped the cloak over her and tied its sash for her.

A gust of wind swept through the space between heaven and earth, blowing a few snowflakes in beneath the umbrella. One landed on his long lashes. Yun Xi glanced up, and beneath those lashes lay eyes like a mountain lake, gazing back like flowing water. As if sensing her look, his hands paused briefly, and he lifted his eyes slightly—his water-clear gaze meeting hers directly.

Yun Xi’s heart skipped, and she hastily looked away.

Cheng Chang said nothing more, lowered his eyes, and unhurriedly finished tying the sash. “There.” He took the umbrella back from her hand as he did.

They were already close to the main Vermilion Bird Gate by now. The two of them walked side by side, neither speaking further.

Yun Xi knew she shouldn’t have accepted Cheng Chang’s cloak—she should even return this hand warmer to him. He was of the imperial family, while she was merely a captain. If it came down to rank between them, he was lord, and she was subject.

But her mind was in far too much disarray right now. She didn’t know what Cheng Chang’s gesture just now had meant—was it simply gratitude for her having saved his life? Or did it carry some other implication?

She didn’t even know why he’d come to the Imperial Bodyguard Bureau to find her today.

Was it truly about Luo Shu’s case, or had he simply seen the snow falling and come to bring her a hand warmer, to hold an umbrella over her?

But the moment this thought surfaced, she hastily reminded herself to stop right there.

It wasn’t that there was no hope at all. But if she let herself hope for something unrealistic, gave rise to some wish she could yearn for but never reach, she suspected she’d spend the rest of her life regretting it.

Fortunately, the remaining stretch of road wasn’t long. They soon reached the side gate of the palace.

Sun Haiping had already been waiting outside the palace gate, and seeing Cheng Chang emerge together with Yun Xi—with both his cloak and his hand warmer now in her possession besides—exclaimed in astonishment, “Young Prince, how did you—”

But before he could finish, he remembered something else and said quickly, “Young Prince, the prince has been waiting for you.”

The moment he finished speaking, a stern voice sounded from behind them: “Mingying.”