Chapter 7 Goji berries add warmth
Xu Shu looked at the indifference on her face, and his anger was like a punctured skin bag, leaking out with a hiss.
He snorted heavily, picked up the cup of tea poured by Shen Zhiwei, and without blowing on it, took a big gulp, gasping for air from the heat.
Xu Shu glanced at Shen Zhiwei's still pale face. The light red color brought by the warmth of the fox fur disappeared in an instant. The deeper fatigue and weakness were like cracks hidden under the white porcelain body, silent but a constant reminder.
Every bowl of medicine over the years had been weighed, prepared, and presented to her personally by Xu Shu. With a nod from the Crown Prince, he would brew that bowl of elixir that would melt the bones and seduce the soul. He had watched this girl grow from a child to her present beauty, watched her convulse with pain after drinking her first bowl of poison, and watched her calmly accept each subsequent bowl as if it were a cup of tea.
The two kept this secret tacitly. One pretended to be confused and handed over the deadly decoction as the crown prince requested; the other knew the truth but never asked why.
"Calm down..." Xu Shu's throat felt like it was filled with gravel, his voice dry. "I'm just a doctor, how dare I get angry? It's just..." He put down the teacup, his eyes fell on the wooden box that Shen Zhiwei was holding in his arms, and the hint of mischief turned into heaviness. "I'm afraid that this broken jar of yours will fall without a sound."
He hunched his back and turned to clean up the mess on the medicine table, and dipped the blood-stained silver needles that had been used on Xiao Wangqing into the cold medicine soup.
Shen Zhiwei could smell the faint smell of blood rust mixed with the strong smell of medicine. He tapped lightly with his fingertips on the armrest and stretched out his tone in a nonchalant manner: "Teacher..."
"This thing," Xu Shu said, his back to her, his voice muffled by the muffled thud of the pestle as he pressed several raw herbs into the mortar, "is called 'Burning Love Paste', and it's extremely sinister and overbearing. With your body, even the slightest whiff of it would trigger a deep-seated illness within you, which would be extremely dangerous. Your heart meridians... can't withstand such a strain. Tell His Highness that I've tested it and found it to be a vile, low-grade substance used in brothels to flatter people. It's not worthy of being in the hands of a noble, let alone a nobleman. So, let's get rid of it."
He paused while grinding the medicine, turned his head, and glanced at Shen Zhiwei from the corner of his cloudy eyes: "And that little bit of coldness in your wrist pulse, don't take off your underwear just because the weather is warm. Hold the ginseng slices like candy, don't be lazy. If you really get anxious in Jianghuai and can't find this authentic ginseng for a while, then it will be really..."
He couldn't continue speaking and impatiently increased his strength to grind the herbs in the bowl, making a harsh friction sound.
"I understand," Shen Zhiwei stood up leisurely, "I thank you on behalf of His Highness. I'll leave the Third Prince's affairs to you."
"I'll take care of it myself," Xu Shu said in a tone that left no room for argument, with a hint of exhortation, "You won't die. You should go back. The smell of this medicine will damage your energy if you stay in it for too long."
"Okay," Shen Zhiwei responded straightforwardly. He looked around, picked up the small bowl that was warmed beside the judge, and drank the sticky liquid medicine inside. "Then I will go back and report. Don't worry too much."
After saying this, she nodded slightly to Xu Shu, turned around, lifted the bead curtain and stepped into the wind and snow.
Xu Shu only hummed an incomprehensible syllable from his nose and continued to struggle with the pestle with the old bone.
In reality, it hadn't been long since she entered, but the heavy snow had already piled up to an inch thick, leaving the palace path like a spread of white silk. A biting wind blew the snow foam against her neck, but Shen Zhiwei didn't feel cold at all. She felt only that the foul air from the medicine hall clung to her body, unable to be shaken off or washed away.
Seventeen came up to her silently, took the umbrella and held it over her head.
Shen Zhiwei walked in silence until he returned to the warm room of the East Palace. Just as he took off his fox fur coat and handed it to the waiting guard, the eunuch who announced the incident approached with small steps, bowed his head and said respectfully, "Sir, His Highness is waiting for you in the study."
The door of the study was ajar. Shen Zhiwei raised his hand and tapped the door twice with his knuckles.
"Come in." Xiao Lingjun's voice came through the door, as clear and smooth as usual.
Shen Zhiwei adjusted his collar and walked in, with a smile on his face.
The crown prince stood at his desk, painting, his wrist suspended. Light filtered through the window paper, gently falling on his downcast brows, casting a small, quiet shadow. On the sandalwood screen, a splash-ink painting of a winter plum blossom had begun to take shape, its twisted branches entwined, new buds weighed down by the remnant of snow. Hearing the door open, he looked up. "You're back so soon. Regarding Third Prince's injury..."
The smile froze the moment it touched Shen Zhiwei's expression, and he slowly put down the brush in his hand.
No one understood her better than Xiao Lingjun. Shen Zhiwei rarely got truly angry, and when she did, her emotions would become even more outward…even giving people the illusion that she was in a good mood.
"Why are you so angry?" He stood up, walked around the desk, and took her to sit down. His voice, accompanied by laughter, became slower and lower. "Go to the Imperial Hospital, and you're like a bird with its feathers plucked out, flying back with fangs and claws bared."
Shen Zhiwei could never get angry in front of him. He slowly took out the wooden box from his sleeve, but did not hand it to Xiao Lingjun. Instead, he threw it directly onto the screen with a clang.
The wooden box then rolled to the ground.
The lid of the box swung open, and the brown pill rolled out, stained with dripping ink and sawdust scraped from the screen, and stopped an inch away from Xiao Lingjun's feet.
The ink on it had not dried yet and was rubbed by the wooden box and stained on the plum blossoms. The originally elegant winter plum blossom painting instantly became dirty.
Shen Zhiwei regretted it the moment she threw it away. She had never been on guard against the crown prince. Her face was filled with guilt, and her fingertips in her sleeves were trembling belatedly. She was so angry that her blood was rushing up, and she didn't care whether the screen was dry or not.
Xiao Lingjun lowered his head to glance at the mess at his feet, then walked forward slowly. He didn't look at the stained screen, but naturally took the hand that Shen Zhiwei had just thrown the medicine box on, and gently stroked her slightly cold wrist bone with his fingertips, his movements as gentle as if he was checking a fragile piece of porcelain.
"Why is it so cold? Your hand must be hurt by the shock. Are you hurt?" He asked in a low voice, his eyes falling on her wrist, where Xiao Wangqing had bitten through it. Now there was only a deep scar left, half covered by her sleeve.
Shen Zhiwei was choked by his reaction. The frustration in his heart seemed to have hit a ball of cotton, which could not be dispersed, but instead made his heart full of it.
She pulled her hand away, but it didn't budge, so she simply let him hold it. Turning her head away, she spoke with a hint of suppressed anger, "Court Judge Xu has examined it. The good stuff sent by Prince Xiang is called Burning Love Paste, and it's a toy used by prostitutes in brothels."
As she spoke, Shen Zhiwei herself felt something was wrong. There was always a lot of gossip about the Eastern Palace, and she always listened to it as a topic of conversation after dinner, and she had never been so angry.
Perhaps it was because the medicinal properties were so strong that she walked around with it for a whole day, and the slightest trace of the medicinal aroma penetrated into her lungs, causing this indescribable depression.
"...dirty words that are hard to hear." She added in a low voice.
With some ideas of diverting the trouble away.
Xiao Lingjun was not at all annoyed by her angry explanation. Instead, he took the hand that she had used to smash the wooden box, and gently rubbed her tense wrist bones with his fingertips. The force was gentle but did not allow her to break free.
His gaze scanned the old scar on her wrist from a bite, then slid across her chest, which rose and fell slightly with anger. His smile was like a stream breaking through the thin ice in early spring, carrying a kind of clear and warm understanding: "I know."
"That kid from the Xie family has always been out of tune. The things he gave me were filthy, and the person who sent them was also inconsiderate. I will give Prince Xiang's Mansion a warning."
"This thing is vicious. If you're not careful, you'll lose your temper. Ah Wei was so angry just now." Xiao Lingjun tapped her heart with his fingertips, the movement very light, with a warm reminder, "Do you feel anxious and short of breath?"
Shen Zhiwei felt it, and although the blocked air in his chest was dissipated a lot by his comfort, the remaining stuffiness in his heart was still clear.
The mind that was previously exhausted by Xiao Wangqing's grab and needle at the Imperial Hospital, coupled with this burst of anger, now relaxed, and the fatigue and discomfort hidden in the bones quietly spread over him.
She didn't say anything, just lowered her eyes, which was considered as her consent.
But her heart was disturbed by his words, and she felt a little strange, as if her violent emotional fluctuations just now were just a manifestation of an internal illness in his eyes.
"So," Xiao Lingjun held the pen closer, his warm fingertips brushing against her cold, trembling fingertips, and without further ado, he pressed the pen into her palm. "Anger harms your health. Next time you encounter something like this, or someone dares to mess with you, don't do it yourself. Just call Seventeen."
He took her hand and guided her to pick up the pen, looking with a smile at the screen that had been stained but most of the ink was still good.
"I can't paint this screen well. Ah Wei has already pointed out my flaws," he said, his voice soft and gentle, his breath warming my ear. "How about you personally create a new scene for me?"
His hand held the back of her hand loosely, with a guiding meaning far more than control, pointing to the center of the messy ink ball.
Shen Zhiwei lowered his eyes and watched the ink slowly sliding down the screen. The inexplicable anxiety he had felt before had dissipated, leaving only a sense of empty fatigue and an inexplicable sense of absurdity.
She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, she turned her wrist slightly, and the tip of the pen did not fall on the center of the ink ball, but on the edge of the dirty ball, following the original texture of the wooden frame of the screen, leading out a rugged branch.
The pen tip suddenly turned, outlining a curled and withered leaf on the abrupt branch, with dark ink color.
“…”
It must be said that Shen Zhiwei was stunned for a moment. She actually didn't want to paint it so sadly, but it seemed as if her brushstrokes were out of her control. When she came to her senses, it already looked like this.
"Your Highness..." Shen Zhiwei looked up at him with a sense of shame, thinking about how to make amends. Not only had she destroyed his screen, she had also changed its meaning.
Xiao Lingjun was looking down at the dead leaves, but he turned his gaze away when he heard someone calling him. The candlelight cast a golden shadow on his long, crow-feather eyelashes, making him look focused and gentle.
"Um."
Xiao Lingjun responded, his voice steady and unmoved. He didn't comment on the withered leaf, but simply held her wrist and guided the ink-soaked brush tip to clean it in the brush washer.
He dipped some red cinnabar in it and gently dotted it on the clean blank silk cloth next to the dead leaf.
The pen starts to fall.
After a few strokes of the brush, a few spots of cinnabar, as red as blood, quietly bloomed under the dead leaves.
It's neither a plum nor a flower.
Instead, it was a few plump and translucent wolfberries.
The bright red color is heavily embellished on the silk of the screen, making the tattered dead leaves look even more lonely, yet it also carries the ordinary scent of a street medicine shop and warm winter soup, forcefully and abruptly embedded in this picture of winter plum blossoms, which should be elegant.
Before Shen Zhiwei could come to her senses, her cold fingertips were already wrapped in his palm.
"Add some warmth."
The author has something to say:
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Ying Shiqi was originally Xiao Lingjun's personal guard. After Shen Zhiwei rescued Xiao Wangqing, he was assigned to his side. His first mission was to protect Master Shen.
The second task is to stay away from Mr. Shen
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