Still waiting for Zhaoyang

Chapter 41
一
On the third day, the whole city of the imperial capital was wrapped in vegetarian food, and the emperor personally led a group of officials to greet Xu Jingye's coffin outside the city.

Shang Rui, who came down from the imperial chariot, was dressed in a black robe with dark patterns and a white jade crown on his hair. His whole body was plain and his face was handsome but deep.

When Xu Zizhang and his party saw Yu Jia, they dismounted from the horse at a distance. Everyone was not wearing military uniforms, only wearing filial piety.

The team came slowly.

Seeing Shang Rui coming in person, Xu Zizhang knelt down and kowtowed: "Your Majesty came to express condolences in person, minister... minister..." With tears in his eyes, he choked up for a long while without saying anything.

Shang Rui took a step forward and supported him: "Uncle has been a soldier all his life, so he can finally rest for a while, Zizhang, you don't need to be too sad."

Several courtiers next to him also stepped forward to comfort Xu Zizhang.

Afterwards, Shang Rui walked directly to the side of the carriage in the middle of the convoy, opened the white gauze curtain, saw the coffin inside, he couldn't help reaching out his hand to touch it, and then sighed quietly.

After Xu Zizhang and his party were arranged, Shang Rui received a report from the Western Regions when he returned to the palace.

"The Wusun Kingdom is ready to move at the border. Last month, a group of refugees were caught in Anzhou. After investigation, they turned out to be Wusun spies who had sneaked into our dynasty. One of them also explained that they went in groups. They didn't know each other. They only knew to go There may be hundreds of people in the imperial capital rendezvous." He Lanxun reported with a worried face, paused, and then said, "Maybe Wusun saw that my army is now in the south and intended to sneak attack."

Tian Yuan sneered and said, "Wusun Kingdom is so big, even if I, David, don't have General Hong's hundreds of thousands of troops, I am not afraid of it."

Shang Rui pondered: "This matter is neither big nor small, especially the one hundred or so people should not be underestimated. Didn't you find out about the stronghold in the Imperial Capital?"

He Lan made a round trip and said, "They headed east in batches, and only the leader of each team knew the exact location. When Anzhou caught that team, the leader took poison and committed suicide on the spot."

As he was talking about this, Minglian came back from the outside with a strange expression on his face. Seeing that Shang Rui was discussing with foreign ministers, he dared not interrupt rashly.

Shang Rui noticed: "What's wrong?"

Ming Lian knelt down on his knees, leaned over and pleaded guilty: "Just now, someone from the Punishment Department said that He Xiang committed suicide in prison this morning."

Shang Rui squinted his eyes with a cold light, staring at the top of Minglian's head, restrained his emotions and asked, "How do they do things?"

"After she explained those things the day before yesterday, the people in the Punishment Department were afraid that she would commit suicide, so they ordered people to guard her all night for two consecutive days. Last night, nothing happened, and the person on duty breathed a sigh of relief. Pay attention, she just bit her tongue and killed herself..." Ming Lian said while putting his hands on the ground, not daring to wipe the cold sweat on his forehead.

He Lanxun couldn't interrupt, so he had to watch.

Tian Yuan glanced at Shang Rui, then at Minglian.

Shang Rui naturally weighed the importance of state affairs and private affairs, and said lightly to Minglian: "This matter should be punished, and you can do the rest." He dismissed Minglian and continued to discuss Wusun's detailed work. .

Xia Yue in Zhou's house is still praying that He Xiang can return safely.

Zijin told her that she could leave tomorrow: "When you get out of the city safely, when I make an appointment with Uncle Jiu, I will definitely ask him for lotus incense. Yue'er, don't worry too much."

Xia Yue hesitated and asked: "Before I left, He Xiang was at Li Ji's place, why did he get involved with the current emperor, and..." She said the question in her heart, "I don't understand why I ran away, they Even if Hong Wu is the commander of the imperial army, he would be so bold to seal off the city and arrest me?"

Zijin stared at her, and after a while, he was ready to tell her the truth, so he asked, "Since Yue'er knows that Hongwu is in command of the forbidden army, how can you know who the imperial court will send to lead the army now that King Huai is rebelling?"

"It was Xu Jingye before, I've heard of it," Xia Yue replied, "But you said Xu Jingye is dead, I don't know who it is now."

Zijin held her hand and said softly, "It's Hong Wu."

He felt the slender fingers rubbed in his palm move uneasily, and his heart shrank accordingly.

Since the afternoon, the showers have stopped and stopped, and now it's raining again, falling on the roof tiles with a tinkle, but he didn't feel it at all.

He also said: "Huaizhou is thousands of miles away from the imperial capital, how can one person order the entire city to search you in the imperial capital at the same time?" He paused, "Yue'er, do you know who he is?" He lowered his eyes and avoided Her gaze, without the courage to look into her eyes again.

He was afraid to see any nostalgia for that person or other emotions in her expression.

Seeing that Zijin was avoiding her eyes on purpose, Xia Yue didn't look up at all, she already had the answer in her heart, her mind was in a mess, and finally she stretched out her finger and wrote the word "who" in his palm.

When he saw this word, he seemed to muster up his courage, raised his eyes, reached out and stroked her cheek, and said word by word: "If I guess correctly, he is my ninth uncle. Today, Wei Shangrui .” After saying this, his clear and gentle eyes turned out to be very calm.

Hearing these words, Xia Yue felt as if a hole had been poked open in her chest by a sharp weapon. She watched his lips open and close expressionlessly, and then went to the hole in her heart. Yes, it was empty.

There was neither surprise nor resentment in her heart, as if she was hearing someone talking about an irrelevant person.

Seeing that she was silent, Zijin tightly closed the hand holding her.

It was still raining outside, and the damp coolness drifted in through the cracks in the window.Her fingertips were a little cold, but his palm was warm.

After a while, Xia Yue's heart seemed to be softened by the warm warmth. Facing his eyes, the corners of her mouth slightly raised, and she pretended to be relaxed and said, "I'm so stupid, I should have thought that you guys look a little bit different." picture."

Zijin tilted her head: "Where does it look like?"

Xia Yue frowned, shortened the distance between the two of them, brought her face closer, and pondered for a while.After a long while, she surrendered and said, "But after a few more comparisons, it doesn't look like it anymore."

Zijin seemed dissatisfied with the answer, and frowned seriously, but finally couldn't help laughing and said: "You are so perfunctory." The smiling face looked particularly handsome and moving.

"Where did I perfunctory you?" Xia Yue glared at him.

"I don't know you yet?" Zijin asked back.

"Yes, yes, of course it's because you look a hundred times better, so you don't look like one." Since childhood, Zijin didn't like others to make fun of him with his appearance, only Xia Yue could tease him at will.Halfway through talking, Xia Yue changed the subject, "I just don't know if your ninth uncle was just like you when he was young. He obviously lacked a row of front teeth, but insisted on pestering his sister for candy." She changed her teeth later than other children of the same age, and she loved to eat sweets. I don't know how many interesting things happened.

Xia Yue thought that he would continue to refute her, but he didn't expect that he directly sealed her mouth with his lips.

She was stunned, and her heartbeat slowed down by half a beat.

He still kissed her cautiously, cautiously and reservedly, the same as last time, his lips pressed together, without aggressively attacking her, just caressing her gently.

She blushed, didn't dare to breathe, felt that she had no place to put her hands and feet, it took her a long time to calm down, and carefully put a little distance between the two of them with her elbow, slightly annoyed, "Are you a dog?"

He couldn't help laughing: "If you make fun of me when you were a child next time, I will still be like this."

"It's against you." Xia Yue said seriously.

He laughed and took her into his arms: "I'll send you out of the city tomorrow, and I'll go find you and grandma after I finish the things at hand."

She raised her head and said to him, "Let's go together if we want to go."

"Yeah. But I still have to come back with King Liang. I have to give Uncle Jiu an account of the matter in the Southern Region, and my father, Queen Mother, and the Yu family are involved." He said, "Although Uncle Jiu can definitely guess I'm with you, but it's always about saving face."

"You're not taking revenge anymore?" Xia Yue grabbed his skirt.

Zijin smiled indifferently: "The dead cannot be brought back to life, isn't it more important to be alive?"

She asked with a complicated mood: "Wei Shangrui, did he use me to threaten you?"

Zijin was taken aback for a moment, then shook her head: "...No."

Xia Yue stared at him firmly, trying to catch clues from his face: "Really?"

He turned his head: "If you stare at me like this again, I can't help but kiss you again."

At this time, Chu Qin came and said that other people were waiting for Zijin to discuss tomorrow's matters in the front hall.

Zijin heard this and followed him to the front hall.

After he left, Xia Yue turned on all the lights, and the room suddenly became bright.In the entire Zhou residence, only her room has a secret room. Just in case, she insisted on asking Zijin to live with her.

Therefore, she slept on the bed for these two nights, and he slept on the soft couch outside.

Zhou's mansion is no different than other places, everyone who can enter and leave the mansion must be treated with caution, so there are no extra maids, everything must be done by Xia Yue herself.Fortunately, she was used to being free and easy, and because Zijin was here, she felt unrestrained and seemed at ease.

Not knowing how late they'd be talking, she helped him make his bed first.

Unexpectedly, he shook out a longevity lock from the quilt he slept in last night.She picked it up, held it in her hand and recalled it carefully, and then remembered that it was something she had been wearing around her neck when she was a child.

After losing the golden lock in Linlangfang, my mother asked someone to make another pair in Jinluo.Later, after Jiji, she never wore it again, and she didn't know where to throw it over time, but she didn't want to be with Zijin.

Xia Yue thought for a while, and gave him the longevity lock to take away.

At night, when Zijin went back to the room, Xia Yue had already washed up.

But she didn't sleep, she lit the lamp, and while her memory was still deep, she sat at the table and wrote down what Li Ji taught before.

Seeing that she was concentrating on writing, Zijin didn't dare to disturb her by making a noise, and quietly went to Chu Zhong's place to wash up before returning to the room.

After Zijin tidied herself up, when she came back to sleep, she found that the longevity lock was gone.

He searched quietly by himself, but after failing, he was a little anxious.He had no choice but to walk up to Xia Yue and ask, "Have you seen my things?"

Xia Yue was looking back at the medical case she had written before, when she heard the movement, she raised her head and saw his appearance, and replied slyly: "I only see my things, not yours."

"Then you give it back to me." He said.

"It's obviously mine."

"Daddy gave it to me long ago."

"Impossible." She retorted him.

"Father said that when you get married in the future, I will back up the dowry for you, and I will handle the rest of the family. In my eyes, the longevity lock is naturally the rest."

Xia Yue was dumbfounded: "Who did you learn from these days, and your mouth has changed so much." Before he could answer, she blurted out, "Then what are you going to give me as a dowry?"

After asking this sentence, both of them were taken aback.

He said slowly, "You are not allowed to marry anywhere."

She lowered her voice: "I won't marry anywhere, I said I would..."

Unexpectedly, before she finished speaking, she was pulled up by Zijin, and interrupted what she was about to say with a hug.

He frowned, and hugged her to his chest: "Don't say it, Yue'er, don't say anything later." His expression was slightly hurt, and his tone was low: "Every time I think about it, I wish I could kill myself. Blame me."

Xia Yue pulled out her hands and held his face: "I told you I'm fine, Wang Gan and the others didn't do anything to me, I just never thought about getting married." She was an orphan girl, without father or mother, No brothers or sisters, even a fake surname, and marrying into a stranger's house, what is the meaning of the rest of your life.

It's just that these words can't be said to Zijin, otherwise he will blame himself even more.

Thinking of this, Xia Yue withdrew her arm and hugged him comfortingly.She noticed that he was really much longer and stronger than she remembered, with long limbs, straight and stretched, with a man's arms.

They have not distinguished each other since they were young, and they even use the same kind of incense on their bodies.It's just that when she was in Li Ji's mansion, she kept things simple and didn't have the mind to use incense. Now that she has been with him for two or three days, her body is stained with his smell again.

He suddenly lowered his head and said, "Do you remember the words I carved on Mr. Qi's academy desk?"

Xia Yue sighed softly in her heart, how could she not remember.

"Originally, that fire would have killed me, but it was God who pityed me and made me survive. In the past ten years or so, I have two wishes, one is to clear my father's name and clear him of being a traitor, Repay his innocence, the other is you. I didn’t say these words to repay my father and mother’s upbringing, nor did I feel that you were lonely and pitiful. I don’t know when this feeling started, but I am I will make up my mind on your day." His voice came slowly, and there seemed to be dazzling starlight in his eyes, "Yue'er, if you have no one else in your heart, then marry me, okay? Let me be a man come to love you."

Xia Yue raised her eyes to look at him, and felt more and more that the person in front of her was strange and familiar.

The last time I talked about this topic was in Jinluo. At that time, he was drunk, his eyes were full of tears, and he didn't even dare to look directly into her eyes. Now he hasn't seen her for more than a year. What has changed is not only his arms and height, but also his He also slowly grew into a resolute and courageous man, and the heart for her in his chest became more and more firm as a rock.

She put her hands on his face, first across his forehead, across his eyebrows, then his eyes.Xia Yue felt that something was about to come out of her eye sockets, and she didn't know how to speak for a while.

He hurriedly said: "Don't answer right away, I'm afraid you'll use one or another reason to prevaricate me again."

Xia Yue nodded, and was afraid that he would misunderstand that she had agreed to what he said earlier, so she quickly shook her head instead, and tears flowed out when her face shook like this.

He wiped her teardrops with his fingertips, and said: "Actually, I wanted to wait for the matter in Dijing to be over before telling you these words, but I couldn't wait any longer."

She didn't continue to cry, turned around and walked to the bed, took out the longevity lock from under the pillow and handed it to him: "If I pick it up again next time, I won't give it to you."

Seeing that she really took the initiative to return it to him, Zijin felt embarrassed when she took it, her face turned red, as if she had turned back into the shy and reserved boy in Xia Yue's impression.

The lights were turned off at night, and neither of them fell asleep for a long time.

She heard him turn over on the soft couch outside, he probably put her longevity lock next to her, and three bells the size of mung beans hung from the bottom of the lock.At this moment, following his movements, those bells rang slightly in such a silent night.

The voice is crisp and provocative.

"Zijin." She called him softly.

It was dark inside.

As she expected, he didn't notice her call at all.

"Do you know?" She turned over and looked in the direction where he was sleeping, "There is no one more important to me than you in this world, but I almost fell in love with someone else."

two

Early in the morning of the second day, a group of people disguised themselves as the servants and servants of the Zhou family and went out with the carriage.When they arrived at the city gate, Xia Yue's portrait was still attached, but the city gate was already wide open, and the checkpoint would occasionally spot-check passers-by.

She was originally taller than ordinary women, but now she was wearing men's clothes with a bit of heroism, walking among several men, she didn't look awkward.

Because the city was closed for several days in a row, and it was already afternoon when the city gate opened yesterday, there were especially many people coming and going in the morning. The soldiers on duty took a quick look at them and let them go without seeing anything suspicious.

Zijin walked in front of her.

Just as he was about to leave the city gate, Zijin paused slightly, and his eyes fell on a young woman who was entering the city head-on.

The woman immediately noticed Zijin's gaze, looked back at him, but there was no wave in her eyes, and she smiled at him.

Zijin has also been modified, and the skin on his face has been smeared a lot by Xia Yue. It stands to reason that people who are not particularly familiar with him should not recognize him.

Xia Yue looked at each other suspiciously.

Unexpectedly, the woman's gaze flicked past Zijin, scanned the people around him, and finally stopped on Xia Yue.

Xia Yue was afraid of accidents, so she didn't dare to look too much, so she turned sideways and hid behind the others.

In the end, the two sides passed by under the city gate without saying anything.

After the group left the city, they did not stop and continued on their way.

Seeing that he was worried, Xia Yue asked, "What's the matter?"

"Seeing an old friend."

"That girl?" Xia Yue asked, "Who is she?"

(End of this chapter)