Chapter 41 Golden Cage
After being carried onto the horse's back by Li Siyan, I quickly fell asleep.
But within a day, I fell from the clouds into hell. The huge impact made me confused and unable to tell whether this was a terrible nightmare or something that really happened.
Before I could calm down, my body reacted first - I fell seriously ill.
Maybe it was because I didn’t have enough survival instinct, so Doctor Fan’s secret medicine had no effect at all when I put it in my mouth.
Who says young people are in good health? In the past two years, I have tortured myself into a consumptive patient. I have almost no foundation left.
I spent five days in a daze, waking and sleeping at times. I had many bad dreams during these five days and woke up countless times. But when I opened my eyes, I felt that I might as well drown in the nightmare. The real world is more despairing than a nightmare.
Li Siyan first put me back in the female official's room where I used to live, but later he felt that the room was not ventilated, so he carried me into his bedroom.
I somehow slept on his dragon couch while in a coma, but I didn't find the emperor's bed comfortable at all.
Under Doctor Fan's tireless treatment, my fever gradually subsided. Five days later, I felt a little better and could at least see the surrounding furnishings clearly.
The emperor's bed curtains were a rich golden red, made of the finest gauze and satin, embroidered with round peonies, every branch and leaf exquisite. Exquisite hollow incense balls hung at the four corners of the curtains, emitting the scent of agarwood and storax.
But I remember that Li Siyan doesn't like incense, so it must have been prepared by someone else.
I had been having a fever for so long that my mouth was dry. I just wanted to drink a glass of water. I stretched out my weak hands, opened the curtain and looked outside. I saw a screen placed neatly in front of the bed. There was a vague figure on it. The person should be drying medicine for me. As his hands moved the screen, a faint bitter smell drifted through my nose.
I moved my throat and called out tentatively, "Suxi?"
The sound was like pulling a rusty wood saw, extremely unpleasant.
The shadowy figure stopped moving, quickly walked around the screen, and came to my side. Then, a pair of dry, soft hands supported the back of my neck and carefully put me back in place.
"Sister Huiyue..." I called her in a low voice.
She was silent for a long time, probably thinking about how to address me, and after a while she politely saluted me: "Greetings, Madam Shen."
I opened my mouth and found that my voice was hoarse. When I spoke a long sentence, it felt like being scratched by a knife. I could only make a gesture of drinking water.
Huiyue understood, poured me a glass of warm water, and carefully fed me to drink.
"His Majesty ordered me to serve Madam Shen..." After I finished drinking the water, Huiyue lowered her head, covered me with the quilt, and said, "You are very ill. The fever just subsided this morning. Doctor Fan said that if you wake up, you will survive. You just need to take good care of yourself from now on."
She never mentioned the long series of ridiculous things that happened to me, nor did she mention Li Siyan's condition. She just reminded me obscurely and cautiously: "Madam, take more rest. First, you need to recover your health before you can think about the future."
I remembered that when I was extremely ill, Li Siyan said the exact same thing to me. However, after he finished speaking, he whispered viciously in my ear: "If you dare to die of illness like this, I will throw your good brother to the Epidemic Hospital and let him die with you!"
I leaned against the bed and dazed for a moment. Gradually, I remembered what had happened five days ago and asked Huiyue, "Has my brother returned home? Where's Meng Xu? Has he been pardoned? Has he been reinstated or has he been given another job?"
Hui Yue shook her head: "Madam Shen, please don't ask. I am only doing my job in Zichen Palace and I don't know anything about what is happening outside the palace."
She silently brought a bowl of medicine, which was placed in an elegant lotus leaf ladle. The medicine was dark in color, like the mud on the flowers.
I frowned slightly.
Hui Yue lowered her eyebrows and said, "Doctor Fan and His Majesty have both instructed that you must help Madam use this medicine."
I said, "Where is His Majesty?"
"His Majesty is still in the court."
I glanced at the shadow on the screen. It was already noon. It seemed that Li Siyan's insistence was not without cost. The fact that he had snatched my wife was so appalling that he must have been criticized by the censors for it.
There was no point in saying more, so I drank the medicine and fell into a deep sleep again.
I don't know how long I slept when I heard some unusual noises around me. A deliberately low voice asked, "...Is she awake?"
"Your Majesty, Madam Shen was awake for half an hour at noon, drank the medicine and then went to bed."
There was another noise, and Li Siyan sent Huiyue away, walked around the screen, and sat in front of the couch.
After staring at me for a while, he asked, "Awake?"
I forced my eyes open a crack and said gloomily, "What are you doing here?"
His expression was gentle, and he was not angry at my rudeness. Instead, he looked at his dragon bed.
Suddenly, his nose wrinkled slightly, his eyes showed disgust, and he reached out to pull down all the scent balls hanging in the tent.
Seeing that I didn't react, he paused and said awkwardly, "Did you ask them to hang it? Do you like incense?"
I still didn't react, and watched him quietly as he hung the incense balls back and brought over an incense burner.
This is completely treating me like a canary.
I didn't have the energy to delve into it, so I asked tiredly, "Where's my brother?"
"Asking about him as soon as I woke up, you really have a deep brother-sister relationship." He gently stroked my dull hair and said calmly, "I sent him back to the Imperial College. If you want to see him, I'll summon him to the palace when he recovers."
I wanted to ask how Meng Xu was doing, but when the words came to my lips, I swallowed them back.
He probably thought I looked lifeless lying there, so he lifted me up effortlessly and stuffed two soft bird down pillows behind my back.
This soft pillow is a treasure imported from the Western Regions. It is light and soft, and is most suitable for raising delicate pets.
"You haven't had a proper meal in five days. You're as thin as a deer, just bones." He looked at my skinny body under my underwear with dissatisfaction and called Huiyue loudly: "...Go to the kitchen and make her a bowl of meat soup."
Huiyue took the order and left, leaving only Li Siyan and I in the hall.
He was surprisingly amiable today and even had the mood to feed me fruit.
The fruit was cloyingly sweet, and it crumbed when I picked it up. I didn't like it, so I tilted my head and said, "I can't eat anything."
Li Siyan was rejected by me once, but he still didn't get angry. He just put down the plate and said indifferently: "Didn't you enjoy eating fruit in the East Market that day?"
The air suddenly froze.
The windows and doors of the bedroom were clearly closed because I was sick, but I still felt a chill like a draft for no reason.
"If I were you, I would be more obedient." He said, "What did you want to say just now? You wanted to ask how Meng Xu was doing, right?"
After thinking for a moment, I readily admitted, "Yes."
Li Siyan tapped my forehead and said lazily, "He has nothing to do. I've been very busy these past few days. The censors' memorials have been sent to me like snowflakes, but I burned them all. As for Meng Xu, I've instructed the Ministry of Personnel to reserve a good position for him so he can take up the position next year."
"What? Are you still not satisfied?" He looked at me and said, "I only spared Meng Xu for your sake. Otherwise, I would have thrown him into a mass grave to feed the dogs."
I thought to myself, this is not for my face, it is clearly for my body.
Arresting officials in the street, ruining people's marriages, tearing up old decrees, and forcibly abducting women into the palace... These are all horrific scandals that only a mad dog like Li Siyan could do.
He said it lightly, but in fact, no one knew how much effort it took to settle this matter. He was the emperor, and the censors could not do anything to him, but the Shen and Meng families would inevitably be cursed in the future.
Thinking of this, I suddenly felt that the compensation he gave was too little. It was the same back then. He killed three historians in a row, but in the end he only gave them some pension and allowed them to be buried with super-standard rites. It was not a big deal, but he still thought it was a great blessing.
"I'm not satisfied." I whispered, "The Meng family has been a family of integrity for generations, and they value their reputation above all else. You've slandered Meng Xu for no reason, ruining their century-old reputation. No matter how much you try to make amends, it's impossible to undo this."
Li Siyan smiled and said, "You're the only one who cares about something as vain as reputation. You say they value reputation, but I don't think so. It was me who robbed you, yet they only dare to vent their anger on the women and children of the Shen family. How can such a spineless family expect to have a reputation?"
He paused for a moment and added, "But if you insist that they have been wronged, I can later award the Meng family a few honorary titles. You can choose the names."
I just feel like we are talking to a deaf person, playing the lute to a cow. We can understand every word the other person says, but we cannot communicate normally because of the gap in our values.
What could I do about this? After this absurd incident, I truly understood the power of imperial authority. As my useless arrogance was shattered, I finally ushered in my belated maturity: I knew I was afraid.
In Li Siyan's deliberately gentle attitude, I sat obediently and cautiously - a posture that was too tense for a patient.
Then he whispered, "Okay."
At this moment, Hui Yue came over with a bowl of minced meat porridge, bowed to Li Si Yan, and wanted to come forward to feed me, but unexpectedly, the emperor naturally took the soup from her hand, waved his hand casually and said: "I will feed her, you go down."
Hui Yue was well-known in Zichen Palace for her carefulness and steady hands, but when she handed over the bowl, her slender white fingers clearly trembled.
Li Siyan knocked the bowl with a jade spoon and said nonchalantly, "I haven't served anyone for a long time, so I'm not very experienced. You better behave yourself, or I won't hurt you."
His thinking is very strange. A few days ago, he locked me up in the dungeon and humiliated me at will, but today he can feed me porridge with a pleasant face. He pampers and indulges me with all his heart. Even the empress dowager doesn't get this kind of treatment.
He pulled me up and fed me mouthful by mouthful, and I felt like a little puppet being manipulated at will - the kind that would be buried with him after he was done playing with me.
"I can't eat anymore."
When there was only half a bowl left, my throat started to feel blocked - a patient never has much appetite.
Li Siyan's eyes turned cold, and he said sarcastically, "You're not good at eating raw food. Do you plan to be a consumptive for the rest of your life? I'd rather you agree than not, but I'd think it's unlucky. I went through so much trouble to get you back, do you think it was just to see you lying in bed pretending to be dead?"
He threw a purse with his name embroidered on it next to my pillow and said coldly, "Chen Ying, I told you yesterday that I can make your brother a disciple of the emperor and bring honor to our family, or I can break his finger bones and send him to feed horses in Hibiscus Garden. I know you're reluctant, so I have to use some means to restrain you. Only if you obey me can your family live a peaceful life. Do you understand?"
When I saw the words "Chenchuan" clearly written on the purse, my face turned pale. This was made by my aunt for Xiaochuan, and he never leaves it.
After threatening me fiercely, Li Siyan changed his expression surprisingly quickly. He put on a gentle smile as if nothing had happened and tapped my lips with a spoon: "Don't be so angry. Finish this porridge."
I stared at the purse, suppressed the discomfort in my stomach and heart, and whispered, "Okay."
He was extremely satisfied, and even had a faint, genuine smile on his face.
While feeding him, he said, "That's good. Follow me well from now on, and I won't treat you unfairly."
Li Siyan was happy feeding me, but I didn't sleep well for most of the afternoon because I drank half a bowl of meat porridge. I had stomach cramps and was sweating profusely.
Doctor Fan felt my pulse and sighed continuously.
"...I haven't eaten a single grain of rice in days, and now I'm eating so much indigestible food. It's strange that my spleen and stomach aren't upset." He said, "It's not that I can't drink minced meat porridge, but who would drink a whole bowl at once?"
I said gloomily, "Go talk to your beloved Majesty. He forced me to drink it."
Doctor Fan remained silent.
My throat felt sore again, and I picked up the small spittoon and vomited uncomfortably.
When Li Siyan walked in, he happened to see me vomiting violently. His sharp fox eyes were filled with anger as he looked at Doctor Fan. Doctor Fan had no words to say and could only lower his head and say, "Mrs. Shen's foundation is too weak and she cannot take supplements. She took too much food that is difficult to digest today, and her spleen and stomach can't take it..."
As I was vomiting, I felt that this scene was familiar. Half a year ago, I was also sick and was called to the city wall by Li Siyan. After being exposed to the cold wind, my condition worsened significantly. The same thing happened this time.
He always has a way of making my already poor health even worse.
In order to clear himself, Doctor Fan rattled off a long list of my symptoms, such as blood stasis and meridian disharmony. He didn't say a single good word. I listened blankly with the small spittoon in my arms, as if I were listening to an old sailor describing a wreck that was about to fail.
I scratched my chin and asked him curiously, "Since I'm in this state, why don't you tell me how long I can live?"
At this moment, a cold air flew towards me from the direction of Li Siyan and firmly nailed me.
Doctor Fan was so frightened by me that his face turned pale and his lips trembled. "I am only a doctor, how can I say anything about your lifespan? Although you are weak, you are not at the point where you have to count your days. As long as you take good care of yourself and don't get any underlying illness, you will be no different from an ordinary person.
I said "oh" and felt quite regretful.
There was a cold shadow in front of me, and Li Siyan had walked to my bed without me noticing.
He changed into a jet-black brocade robe with a long-legged crane embroidered on the edge. At this moment, the crane and Li Siyan were looking at me with expressionless faces.
It was only when I was stared at by this cold gaze that I realized that I had said the wrong thing again.
Damn occupational disease, this lousy mouth just won’t listen to me.
"I'm just asking," I said, trying to make amends. "...I don't mean anything else."
His chin was pinched and lifted up by him. Li Siyan's voice was mixed with a hint of anger: "No other intention? I think you can't wait for Fan Qisheng to punish you to death."
Faced with the irritable emperor with fire blazing out of his nostrils, Doctor Fan probably felt that if he didn't run away now it would be too late, so he quietly picked up the medicine box and fled at a pace that was too agile for a middle-aged man.
Li Siyan pinched my chin. Although it didn't hurt much, the feeling of humiliation was really uncomfortable. I tried my best to endure it and didn't turn my head to avoid his shackles.
"Do you think you can escape like this? Don't be silly. The rules of the game are set by me. Your life is in my hands now. You will never see the King of Hell until I get tired of playing with you." He said coldly.
A surge of resentment washed over me, and I suddenly tore his hand away, saying, "...You're just a king of the human world, yet you still think you can control the will of heaven and the lifespan of others? You've locked me up here, unable to live or die. Is this how I'm supposed to just accept it?"
Li Siyan said, "What's wrong with that? I'm the emperor, and the Purple Palace is the most precious cage in the world. I can give you everything except freedom. Do you want to leave and live with Meng Xu? Fine, come on, kill me, and you'll get what you want."
I laughed. "Your Majesty, you're joking. How dare I touch the most noble person in the world? Regicide is a grave crime. If I did it, the lives of all ten clans would be in danger. You know I wouldn't dare, so what's the point of saying these things?"
After saying that, my stomach started to ache and I quickly picked up the spittoon and started vomiting again.
The sour rice porridge burned my esophagus, and a bad smell spread across the fragrant and soft bed.
"You are so soft-hearted and pedantic." He looked down on me and mocked me in a cold voice.
I spat out a mouthful of sour water, and my eyes were blurred by physiological tears. Li Siyan pulled me up, and regardless of the smell of filth all over my body, he just wiped my dirty face with a handkerchief.
After doing all this, he straightened my face and said, "It's time for you to come out of your idyllic paradise of benevolence and morality, Chen Ying. There are no gods or retribution in this world. All people can rely on are their own means and ambitions. Since you have neither, there's no need to think about escaping. Today, you're sick, so I won't pursue the matter with you, but I don't want to hear the word death from you again. Do you understand?"
His words cut my heart and lungs like a knife, making me extremely angry at my own incompetence and cowardice. I longed for the decisive and ruthless female strategists in the picture book legends, but I couldn't become them, so I could only be trapped in Li Siyan's bed, unable to move.
He was right about being soft-hearted and pedantic. I am indeed a person who looks strong on the outside but is weak on the inside.
Seeing my gloomy expression, Li Siyan knew that he had gone too far. He kissed the tip of my nose and whispered in my ear, "You didn't satisfy me that day. I still remember it and I will get it back in the future. You better be prepared and learn some tricks."
My fingers suddenly clenched the quilt, and I was shaking with anger: Even if I was unable to resist, could he treat me like a girl from the music school and abuse me at will?
I was so angry that my eyes almost turned red. He looked at me with an expression that seemed to indicate that I had suffered a great insult, and revealed a look of pleasure as if he had me in his hands, as if it was only at this moment that he finally had me firmly in his grasp. As for whether I loved him or hated him, he didn't care. He just wanted to see my emotions aroused by him.
After Li Siyan left, I was so angry that I smashed the medicine bowl to pieces and threw all the incense balls away. The exquisite handicraft rolled to the ground and the expensive imperial spices inside fell out.
Huiyue remained silent and ordered her servants to clean up the mess.
When I woke up, I found the ground in front of me was as clean as new, and a new batch of scented balls were tied to the tent.
But after realizing that my emotions were fluctuating violently, Huiyue watched me even more closely, almost never leaving my side. At night, Suxi also joined in serving me. The two senior palace maids guarded the Zichen Hall so tightly that I felt like a precious egg.
They took great care of me without saying a word until late at night, when I woke up thirsty and went to look for water, only to hear them talking at the temple gate.
I walked over and heard Su Xi say, "...I don't think so. After spending so much effort to snatch someone in front of the whole city, why would they just keep him around like that? He will definitely be given a high position in the future..."
My footsteps soundlessly touched the soft carpet as I slowly approached. I heard Huiyue whisper, "How can she be kept in such a muddled state? She sleeps on the Emperor's bed, uses utensils personally selected by His Majesty from the treasury, and even drinks medicines from the Imperial Hospital. At this point, what's the point of being crowned or not? It's just a title. If His Majesty wants to give it, she doesn't have to accept it."
Su Xi sighed, "It's not up to her to decide whether to do it or not. I saw the signs two years ago on New Year's Eve. I asked you then, and you said anyone could become the Empress, except her. Obviously, you were wrong."
Hui Yue said, "I'm just a lowly palace maid, and I don't have the ability to guess at His Majesty's abilities. I thought that after she left the palace with the granted marriage, our fate was over. But I never thought that Your Majesty would snatch her away. That day, except for Grandpa Qingfu, who remained calm, everyone else was shocked."
Su Xi said, "Yeah, I just can't figure it out. If you want to get her back in the future, why did you let her go in the first place?"
When the two of them talked about the most crucial point, my heart lifted slightly and I took another step forward.
Hui Yue was silent for a moment and said, “I guess it was sincere to let her go, but it was also sincere to regret it later.
"Do you remember? The day before the Qiqiao Festival, His Majesty went to see Consort Shu. When he came back, he was holding two stacks of papers in his hands, his face was distraught. Then he called Grandpa Qingfu in..."
Su Xi exclaimed, "I know about this, but I was resting that day, and Hu Yue'er was on duty. He said that Grandpa Qingfu sent him to move all the legendary picture books to the imperial study that night, and he ran back and forth three times."
Hui Yue said, "It's about those legendary illustrated books. That night, after Her Majesty finished reading them, she locked herself in the imperial study. First, she threw things around in laughter and anger, then she sat quietly, flipping through the scraps of her daily journal that she hadn't sent out. She cut her finger with a page, and the paper dripped onto a book. When I went there the next day, the book had been split in half. Her Majesty ordered me to put it in the box where Shen Ying used to keep her manuscripts, and then I sent it to the Shen family. Then... you know what happened next."
Su Xi gasped: "Such a big thing, why didn't you tell me?"
Huiyue smiled bitterly, "Grandpa Qingfu instructed us not to tell anyone about what happened that night. I'm telling you this tonight so you can be on guard. Do you understand how much His Majesty loves that person? Since the two of us are responsible for taking care of her, we absolutely cannot let her make the slightest mistake."
As their voices gradually faded away, my feet felt as heavy as if they were filled with lead.
I didn't even want to drink the water anymore, so I moved mechanically and slowly returned to bed.
I originally thought I had calculated everything just right. First, I exposed his feelings for me, then I hid in Xuanwei Palace, and finally I asked for his permission to marry me. But in the end, I failed because of a tiny oversight.
That night, although I was extremely sleepy, I was still tormented by guilt and couldn't fall asleep, tossing and turning. As soon as I closed my eyes, I saw Meng Xu and my aunt sighing at me together. They didn't blame me, but silently paid the price for my willfulness.
I was so sad that my heart and lungs curled up. I have never hated myself so much.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
