At that moment, Qin Yunuan became curious about the name suddenly mentioned by Elder Princess. She moved closer to her slowly and whispered by Elder Princess’s ear, “Your Highness, why are you calling Jinzhi?”
“Dressing me up, of course,” Elder Princess tilted her head to one side, and her tone was quite natural, “Jinzhi, what’s wrong with you? You’ve been my personal maid for so many years. Yet you didn’t know your responsibility?” While saying, Elder Princess sighed to herself, “Alas, it must be difficult for you. Donghua sends you and the nanny into the valley, bothering you to live a hard life with me.”
On their way there, Leng Changxi had actually told Qin Yunuan all he had seen and heard in the fairyland. Qin Yunuan remembered that Leng Changxi had mentioned that at first Jing Donghua sent two people to serve Elder Princess. One of them was the nanny who later betrayed, but the other wasn’t mentioned. Well, she must be the servant girl named Jinzhi.
“I’m sorry to make you go through all this,” Elder Princess sighed, “Mother said that you look like me when we are young. Later, we even look like twin sisters. So she likes you very much, too. She used to think that after you’re 25, she will ask you to leave the palace and marry a good man.”
They looked like twin sisters?
Something touched Qin Yunuan’s heart. At that moment, Leng Changxi happened to push the door and come in. He said that the water was ready, and Elder Princess could be dressed up now. The way Elder Princess looked at Leng Changxi was still weird, in which there was a little vigilance, some affection, but most of it was curiosity.
Yes. Two people without any ties of blood like Su Chenghai and Leng Changxi could resemble each other so much. Having grown up together with Elder Princess, Jinzhi must be like her in words and facial expressions. So the one returned to Weiyang Palace was very likely to be…
“Oh, yes, Jinzhi,” Elder Princess walked to the door and suddenly turned her head to Qin Yunuan, “Didn’t I ask you to take my child and follow Zhongyi back to Qi? Why do you come back! Why, is that because the fact that I asked you to pretend as I was found out by my mother and brother?” then, she shook her head, “No. When we were young and changed our clothes, my mother and brother never recognized me. It’s impossible. Or, are they bad for you?”
Qin Yunuan didn’t know how to answer. Leng Changxi bowed his fists and moved forward, “Your Highness, the water for your bath is ready. Please have a bath and change your clothes.”
Elder Princess was originally in a trance. Sometimes she was well, but sometimes she acted as if she were living in the time 20 years ago. She hesitated and nodded, saying “alright” and stepped into the compartment covered by the curtain.
Leng Changxi heard Elder Princess’s words clearly. He sighed, “Perhaps it’s better to let her think it as a game and never wake her up. Don’t let her know the man she missed so many years has already been the emperor of a country with so many beauties in his court. Don’t let her know the servant girl who grew up with her was burned to death in the Weiyang Palace by the evil after disguising as her and returning to the motherland. Don’t let her know her son has now become a heartless and cruel man.”
“Changxi,” Qin Yunuan hurried to hold Leng Changxi’s trembling hands, “Don’t think like that. Many things we have done are forced to do. If we don’t fight back, the dead will be us. If they don’t drive us up the wall, they won’t end up like that. For most of the time, it’s not what we want to do, but what we have to do.”
Leng Changxi looked like he regained his calmness, “I get it.”
Qin Yunuan went behind the curtain to help Elder Princess have a bath. Leng Changxi used the soil hearth outside the house which hadn’t been used for a long time to boil water. The bottom of the pot had rusted. No matter how hard it was cleaned, the water boiled by it still looked a little yellow. However, it didn’t affect Elder Princess’s happiness to have a bath. It remained a mystery how long it was since the last time she had had a bath. She soaked in the hot water. Before long there was much dirt.
Qin Yunuan rubbed the sludge on Elder Princess without complaint. This was the biological mother of Leng Changxi. There was nothing for her to dislike.
After the sludge was washed away, Elder Princess’s skin was exposed, white and delicate like coagulated fat. A woman near 40 as she was, her skin was as soft and delicate as the one of the girls at the age of 17 or 18. It was said that the emperor and Queen Mother used to love Elder Princess very much. They selected the thickest ewe’s milk for her to have baths. That was why she had such perfect skin.
“Jinzhi, what are you looking at? Put on the clothes for me.”
While she was absent-minded, Qin Yunuan thought something else. Why did Jing Donghua, the emperor of West Xia, want to do something bad on such a beauty? If he worried about her identity, he could use other methods. Besides, West Xia didn’t value so much about the status of generations in families as Qi. Qin Yunuan remembered what she had read in the book of West Xia, recording that a son married his father’s concubine as his empress after the father’s death.
Jing Donghua, what kind of person was he?
After Elder Princess finished dressing, she came out. When she saw Leng Changxi wait under the stairs of the small hut, she came towards him happily, “Hua, where are you going to take me? Hush. Don’t say it. Give me a surprise.”
Although she was the biological mother of Leng Changxi, Qin Yunuan felt bitterness in her heart when she saw Elder Princess act intimately like a little girl. It was said that the relationship between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law was the most difficult relationship in the world. The previous Princess Ning was demanding already. Now there was a mother-in-law whose intelligence was close to a little girl. How hard it was!
“I’ll take you out,” Leng Changxi smiled at Elder Princess, “What about leaving this place?”
Elder Princess thought that Leng Changxi was the “Hua” whom she had missed day and night. Qin Yunuan walked behind her and kept silent until Leng Changxi came towards her and took her hand, “What happened?”
Qin Yunuan shook her head. She used to think that she was the most magnanimous and calmest woman in the world, capable of handling so much danger. However, she was a little woman in the end.
Leng Changxi understood Qin Yunuan immediately. Smiling, he pointed at Elder Princess walking ahead of them, “She is my biological mother.”
“I know,” Qin Yunuan mumbled, “but in her mind, you’re her husband.”
Mentioning Jing Donghua, Leng Changxi’s face became tense at once. To the so-called father, his feeling was rather weird. He didn’t believe him. Either did he trust him.
Since there were three people, whoever Leng Changxi took to go up, the one left was not safe. He sent a signal to Cha waiting up there. Soon the five people, including Cha, dragged the vine and pulled up the three people separately. They were quite surprised when they saw Elder Princess, who had dressed up to be clean and beautiful.
Short-tempered as Cha was, he said directly, “Is she the wild woman we saw the other day?”
Seeing Elder Princess unhappy face, Qin Yunuan took the hint at once. She imitated the tone the nanny in the palace used to criticize the servant, “How dare you! How can you insult our princess like that?” After that, she tipped Cha the wink, Cha understood immediately and curtseyed well to Elder Princess. The other four followed him too.
The sun was setting. The twilight added some solitude and desolation to Yueya Mountain. There came the thud of birds and beasts from the forest now and then. Looking at the dense forest, Leng Changxi sighed deeply. Now they were totally helpless. They could rely on nobody but themselves.
“Let’s go.” While walking, Leng Changxi asked Cha and the others to pick up some branches thick enough to be made into simple torches at night. However, a more serious problem showed up. That was food.
Fortunately, they had Elder Princess here. Having been in Yueya Mountain for 20 years, she must know how to fill the stomach and satisfy the hunger here.
Elder Princess always appeared like a little girl. However, the moment people asked her where the food was, she trembled suddenly, hid behind Leng Changxi, and said to him in a shaking voice, “Hua, are you going to eat in this forest? No! You can eat in the previous forest, but now you are here, don’t you know? There is will-o’-the-wisp in this forest at night. You need to be careful while walking. If those ghosts know that you are eating at their territory, they will kill you.”
As soon as she finished her words, a chilly wind passed the forest. Cha was always courageous. He wanted to say that all of this was bullshit when a soldier beside him was pointing at the blue fire in front of them with trembling legs, “Mr. Tuoba, do you see that? What is that?”
Another was shouting, “Will-o’-the-wisp! It’s the will-o’-the-wisp!”
Elder Princess was not scared. Instead, she said proudly, “You see. I don’t tell lies.”
Leng Changxi stared at the blue fire several meters away from them in silence. The fire was erratic, moving with the wind. However, staring at it seemed to make people’s minds flow with it. Nevertheless, people couldn’t help themselves touching the fire. Luckily, Leng Changxi’s willpower was strong enough to resist the temptation, but the other two soldiers had already been absorbed into the fire, unable to control themselves.
Leng Changxi dragged them with strength. The two people didn’t sober up until they were dragged directly to the ground. They looked as if they had a dream, and they kept asking what had happened just now.
Qin Yunuan winced slightly. Didn’t such a scene occur at the Yingguang Lake? The blue plankton in the Yingguang Lake could read and rob people’s mind. Was the blue fire similar to them?
Gradually, there were more and more fires giving out cold, blue light. It seemed that they were approaching Leng Changxi and his people slowly.
Elder Princess watched fire happily as if she were looking at fireflies, “Look! These are will-o’-the-wisp. There are so many of them. They’re all living in a lake at the top of the mountain, in which there’re all blue things shining like that. They’re so beautiful! Hua, you used to love taking me there. Do you remember?”
“A lake?” Qin Yunuan was a little surprised.
“Yes. A lake,” Elder Princess said to Qin Yunuan, “Jinzhi, didn’t you follow me there too? The water in the lake was giving out blue light, which rippled with the water. Beautiful.”
Was Elder Princess talking about Yingguang Lake? But wasn’t it at the foot of the hill?
