Chapter 23 To make Mother Shen more comfortable, Brother Zhao prepared a carriage…
To make Shen's mother comfortable, the carriage was lined with thick blankets. Liu Hu and Xiao Zheng were the ones who took them back.
Zhao Linzhang originally wanted to personally escort her, but Shen Yunrong refused.
The neighbors were all astonished. It turned out that the distant relatives of Shen's mother were so important that they even had guards escorting them.
Pushing open the rotten wooden door, one finds a house that has been uninhabited for almost two years, with cobwebs covering all four walls.
Seeing that the roof was about to collapse, Liu Hu grabbed Shen Yunrong, who was about to enter, and said, "It's too dangerous here, we can't stay here!"
"I've lived here since I was a child, so it's nothing. I can just clean it up. You guys wait for me outside." Shen Yunrong looked at her familiar home, rolled up her sleeves, and started cleaning.
"Don't move. This roof needs to be renovated. I'm good at this. You and your aunt go outside and wait." Liu Hu pushed Shen Yunrong out without saying another word.
Xiao Zheng and two guards went to purchase materials, while Liu Hu and the others worked together to demolish almost all the old and dilapidated structures. In less than half a day, the entire courtyard was transformed.
Shen Yunrong helped her mother in, who was walking unsteadily. Liu Hugang had just helped them move the new bedding to the bed.
"This is our home?" Mother Shen touched the old family belongings, somewhat incredulous.
"Brother Liu, we don't know how to thank you enough for bringing us back and helping us repair the house."
"This is what the Prince ordered, Miss Shen, you don't need to be so polite." Liu Hu scratched the back of his head. He never dreamed that Nini was actually the Prince's daughter.
The girl who saved the prince on the mountain that day was this Miss Shen. How dare he, a toad, dream of eating swan meat!
Fortunately, he only thought about it and didn't say it out loud, otherwise he would have been too ashamed to face anyone.
After Liu Hu finished making arrangements for them, he unloaded many boxes from the carriage. Before Shen Yunrong could even open them, Liu Hu left after saying that they were all ordered by the Prince.
Shen Yunrong opened one of the boxes, which contained rice, flour, and cooking oil. The other boxes contained various kinds of clothing and fabrics for all four seasons, three or four thin and thick mattresses, and half a box was filled with copper coins.
He even thought of the fact that they couldn't use money in the countryside.
He skillfully started a fire, cooked porridge for himself and his mother, and then helped his mother take her medicine and go to sleep.
Shen Yunrong felt a void in her heart. She listened to the chirping of unknown insects in the yard and wondered if her daughter and mother had cried after leaving her.
The more she thought about it, the more it seemed as if the chirping of the insects had turned into her daughter's crying. Startled, Shen Yunrong hurriedly pushed open the newly made wooden door. Liu Hu had also put up a fence around their little house, and a figure stood prominently at the fence entrance. The clear moonlight shone on his moon-white brocade robe, making him look like a dream.
"You, Your Highness, how did you get here?" Shen Yunrong wondered if she was hallucinating.
"Ruoyu keeps crying and wants to find you!" Zhao Linzhang handed her the child who had cried herself to sleep.
After looking around the simple courtyard, he said, "The child is young, so I think she should stay with her mother. I will visit her more often in the future."
Fearing she wouldn't be able to hold back her emotions, she didn't dare say goodbye to her daughter as she left, and regretted not going to see her daughter one last time along the way.
Hearing Zhao Linzhang say this, she was overjoyed; he was actually willing to let her daughter live with her.
"Your Highness, it's so late, would you like to come in and have a drink of water?" It would take a whole day to travel from the capital to Shenjiazhuang by fast horse, but they had taken two days by carriage with frequent stops and starts.
"How is Madam Shen's health?"
"I'm so happy to be home. I just got some rest." My mother's illness is mostly caused by worry and anxiety. She's back in her familiar hometown and ate an extra bowl of porridge tonight.
"Then I won't disturb Madam Shen any longer. You must be tired. Get some rest early today!" Zhao Linzhang said, giving the mother and daughter a deep look before leaving.
Even knowing that he might be traveling with a troop of guards, Shen Yunrong couldn't help but remind him, "Your Highness, please be careful on the road!"
Zhao Linzhang didn't turn around, but nodded: "Go in!"
When Shen's mother, who had a shallow sense of smell, saw her daughter come in carrying the child, she was startled: "Why is the child back?"
"The prince said the child is still young and cannot be separated from her mother, and asked me to take care of her for a while longer." Shen Yunrong kissed her sleeping daughter's face, and the empty space she had just left was now completely filled.
"Did Liu Hu bring the child back?"
"It's Your Highness!"
"The Prince personally escorted it back?" Madam Shen's voice rose, then she fell silent.
"Mom, you go to sleep. I'm taking the child back to the room to sleep."
Shen Yunrong put the child in her little house, the house she had lived in since she was a child. She never expected that one day her child would also live in this house.
The next day, Shen Yunrong woke up to the sound of birds chirping. Behind their courtyard was a small bamboo grove. When her father was alive, he often cut bamboo into strips and used them as paper to write on.
When I woke up, I saw that my daughter was also awake, staring at me with her bright eyes. When she saw that I was awake, she smiled and showed her two little teeth.
"My dearest, you're awake!" Shen Yunrong picked her up. The tears of that night of suffering seemed like they came from a past life. Now that her daughter was by her side for even a day, it was the happiest and most content moment for her.
The sudden appearance of a child in the house prompted curious neighbors to come over under the guise of delivering groceries to sound them out.
Shen Yunrong readily admitted that the child was hers, but she vaguely glossed over the question of who the father was.
Shen Yunrong and the child tidied up the courtyard from top to bottom. Xiao Ruoyu quietly followed her grandmother, watching her busy herself.
In the afternoon, both mother and daughter fell asleep. She squinted halfway through her sleep and heard someone calling her from outside the fence: "Sister Yunrong!"
Shen Yunrong came out; it was Tie Niu, the neighbor from next door, a year older than her. If it weren't for that accident that day, she might have married him.
"Brother Tie Niu!" Shen Yunrong, holding the child, was stunned for a moment before she remembered who this burly, dark-skinned man was.
"Sister Yunrong, where have you been these past two years? They say you got married and had a child?" Shen Tieniu saw the child in Shen Yunrong's arms and knew that what they said was true, but he still asked again, unwilling to give up.
"Hmm!" Shen Yunrong lowered her eyes. Her mother and daughter were well, and she didn't care what the villagers said about her.
"Where is the child's father?" Why did she suddenly come back? Shouldn't she be with the child's father after getting married?
"Him!" Not knowing how to say it, she couldn't say she was widowed now. She brushed a stray hair behind her ear and said helplessly, "There is a huge difference in our social status. When the child is older, he will take the child away."
That day, with her remaining willpower, she tried to push him away, but her body, like vines clinging to a tree, willingly yielded to his insatiable demands.
There was no right or wrong, and she didn't blame him.
"You two got divorced?" Shen Tieniu was very surprised that such a good girl would also be divorced.
"I suppose so!" Shen Yunrong gave a bitter smile. She had never even been with him, so how could there be any talk of separation?
Shen Tieniu stopped asking questions, as this was not a good thing for a girl.
He turned back, and as it was getting dark, Shen Tieniu came over carrying a large piece of wild boar meat: "Sister Yunrong, this is a wild boar I just hunted. It's to nourish you and your aunt."
"No, no, Brother Tie Niu, I have meat at home." Shen Yunrong wasn't lying. She was afraid the meat would spoil, so she cooked and dried it. Zhao Linzhang didn't know who had prepared this food for them, but the two of them couldn't finish it even after a month.
"You've taken such good care of my mother before, this isn't even a token of your gratitude!"
Like her, Shen Tieniu lost his father when he was young. His father was a hunter who was said to have been eaten by a tiger and was never seen again.
Like his own mother, his mother was often ill. Since they had no money for medical treatment, Shen Yunrong would go up the mountain to collect herbs from the medical books left by his father, and he gave many of them to Shen Tieniu's mother.
Shen Tieniu followed in his father's footsteps, spending his years running around in the mountains. He grew up strong and tall, and many thugs who coveted Shen Yunrong were beaten up by him.
If it weren't for Zhao Linzhang, she would probably have married the man in front of her who was so eager to give her half a pig.
Unfortunately, nothing is permanent.
"Thank you so much, Brother Tie Niu!" Shen Yunrong accepted the pork slice. She assumed he was already married, since there were plenty of girls who wanted to marry him.
She said goodbye to him when she left, only saying that her aunt had found her a marriage partner.
Shen Tieniu presented the pork, grinning from ear to ear: "Don't mention it. My mother was very happy to hear you were back. She fell before the New Year, otherwise she would have come herself."
"Auntie fell? Is it serious?"
"It's nothing serious, just a bone injury that takes a hundred days to heal, so I'll need to rest for a while!"
As Zhao Linzhang approached from afar, he saw Shen Yunrong chatting happily with a man. He had already changed out of his brocade robe and was now wearing a coarse gray cloth shirt. The white horse beneath him had a glossy coat, making it clear that he was no ordinary person.
Shen Yunrong also saw him, and she quickly said to Shen Tieniu, "I have guests at my home, I'll visit your aunt another day!"
Shen Tieniu looked back, and the man on horseback was also staring at him.
"Okay, I'll go back first!" Shen Tieniu quickly withdrew his gaze. The man had a dignified expression and exuded an air of nobility. He could tell and guess that this must be the father of Shen Yunrong's daughter.
Feeling a sense of loss, he thought, "This kind of man, let alone Shen Yunrong, he himself would yearn for him. I just don't know why he would divorce such a good girl, and then come back to find her again."
However, these are all other people's family matters. He is just a neighbor and has no right to interfere, not even to say hello.
"Your Highness, why have you come here?" I just left last night, and you've already rushed over this morning.
“When we’re out and about, you don’t need to call me Your Highness,” Zhao Linzhang said, looking at her expectantly.
If she didn't call him "Your Highness," was she supposed to call him by his full name? That would be utterly disrespectful, and she wouldn't dare.
"king…"
"You can call me Brother Zhao!" Knowing she wouldn't dare, Zhao Linzhang spoke up to help her.
"King Zhao..." This title was really strange, and Shen Yunrong opened her mouth but couldn't say it.
Just then, the child's crying began. Shen Yunrong rushed into the house before Zhao Linzhang could, and put the meat on the table. It turned out that her daughter had woken up, and perhaps because of the unfamiliar environment and her grandmother whom she hadn't seen for many days, her little mouth twitched and she started to cry.
"This child, she never used to cry when she woke up!" Mother Shen said to her daughter, unable to soothe her child.
Shen Yunrong naturally knew that even if the child cried before, the mother was alone and busy with her own things, so she wouldn't hold her. Naturally, her daughter didn't like to cry. But now it's different. She's by her daughter's side, so her daughter can cry whenever she feels uncomfortable.
She was holding her daughter when Zhao Linzhang, standing at the door, reached out his hand to her: "Ruoyu, Daddy's here!"
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