Ji Qingwu had stopped crying by now. Her eyelashes were still damp at the roots, making her eyes look as though they had just been washed with water.
They were like the surface of a lake after the rain—vast, misty, and shimring.
She stared at the Emperor’s robes, trying to find the spot her tears had supposedly dampened, but she couldn’t see it.
’Besides, there was still so distance between us just now. We weren’t even hugging. How could my tears have gotten on him?’
’Where on earth did they land? Why can’t I see it?’
"What are you muttering about in your head?" Emperor Wu Su’s voice was gentle, no longer as cold as when he had questioned her. In fact, it seed to hold a hint of amusent.
A great weight was finally lifted from Ji Qingwu’s heart.
She had confessed her past deeds, but it hadn’t brought about the cataclysm she’d expected. Instead, the man before her had received her confession gently, only to set it aside with nonchalance.
’It was as if the ti I drugged him to force him to give a child was just so insignificant, trivial matter.’
’But I rember it so clearly. That night, his expression was bone-chillingly cold. When he saw that it was parting the bed curtains, his piercing glare looked as if it could run through right then and there.’
’How could such a deep-seated "grudge" be resolved so easily? Why did his attitude change so quickly?’
’After all these years, now that he’s ascended to the throne, shouldn’t he be even colder and more ruthless?’
’Just a few simple questions, a few answers, and he’s letting off this easily?’
The more Ji Qingwu thought about it, the stranger it seed. But she couldn’t just ask him directly, saying sothing like, ’Your Majesty, I forced myself on you in the past. Aren’t you angry?’ Nor could she resort to fawning flattery, like, ’Your Majesty is truly magnanimous, to not even care about such a humiliating affair. You are a true model for all your subjects!’
She stole a quick glance at him, then timidly lowered her gaze.
She glanced up again, only to quickly look down once more.
After she did this several tis, how could Emperor Wu Su fail to notice that she was bursting with questions?
He said calmly, "What do you want to ask?"
But Ji Qingwu just shrank back and said timidly, "Nothing. It’s nothing."
Emperor Wu Su frowned, his gaze darkening. He had words prepared, but with Ji Qingwu withdrawing into herself again, he had no opportunity to say them.
She was like a little snail carrying its shell, tentatively probing the outside world with its two soft antennae, only to shrink back timidly at the slightest disturbance.
If he hadn’t sprinkled a little salt on her antennae today to rile her up, who knows when she would have ever crawled out of her shell.
But the mont he saw her tears, Emperor Wu Su’s resolve wavered. ’I have to be more patient,’ he told himself.
The mont Ji Qingwu saw the Emperor frown, she was certain she was dood. A shiver ran through her, sent by the cold wind.
Seeing her shoulders hunched and her body trembling in the wind, Emperor Wu Su gave a slight tug with his arm and pulled her against him, her slender back resting against his chest.
He clasped her waist, holding her in front of him in an embrace from behind.
This position did shield her from the wind, but they were hundreds of feet off the ground. Even with a railing, a glance down made Ji Qingwu’s head spin, and the heart she had just managed to calm imdiately tensed up again.
’Don’t tell the Emperor is just pretending to be good-natured, hiding a dagger behind his smile. Is he secretly so furious that he wants to throw off this tower?’
She gripped the arm he had wrapped around her waist.
She turned her head and said in an appeasing tone, "Your Majesty, the wind is too strong up here. Could we perhaps talk sowhere else?"
Ji Qingwu suddenly felt a weight on her shoulder. Emperor Wu Su had lowered his head to rest his chin in the crook of her neck. His lips brushed against her earlobe as he said, his voice laced with impatience, "No."
Ji Qingwu’s lips parted, as if to say more, but her breath caught in her throat.
He bit her earlobe. "Look into the distance," he said. "And don’t talk."
’Fine, I won’t talk. But why did he have to bite ? And my ear, of all places...’
After that, Ji Qingwu’s body relaxed considerably; she was no longer as tense and rigid as before. She discreetly began to lean most of her weight against him.
Atop the Star-Picking Tower.
The ethereal mist had mostly dissipated, revealing distant, verdant mountain ranges bathed in the golden sunlight.
A blazing red sun hung over the mountain peaks.
Ji Qingwu gazed at the scenery in a daze. Whether it was because of the warm, solid chest she leaned against, or the fiery sun slowly climbing into the sky, her gloomy, restless feelings began to dissipate bit by bit.
Her hollow heart was soon filled with a different, thrilling emotion.
In that mont, Ji Qingwu suddenly understood why scholars and poets of old left behind so many tiless masterpieces when they visited famous landscapes.
If she weren’t so ignorant of classical literature, she would have loved to recite a poem. But alas, with her limited learning, she could only use two simple words to summarize the scenery before her: magnificent beauty.
Gazing at the rolling mountain range, her own feelings of injustice and frustration suddenly seed insignificant, not worth dwelling on.
The sun, newly risen, cast a brilliant path of light, making her feel as though she, too, was being reborn.
Emperor Wu Su held her in his arms. At so point, his gaze had returned to her face—or perhaps it had never left it at all.
He tilted his head, nuzzling his cheek against hers. The mountain wind had cooled her skin, but he remained a source of constant warmth.
He murmured, "Viewed from afar, she is as radiant as the sun rising through morning clouds."
’Even if I’m not well-versed in poetry, I’ve heard that line before. But... is he talking about the scenery, or...?’
A shimr, like water and mist, blood in the depths of Ji Qingwu’s clear eyes.
Emperor Wu Su’s breath ghosted over her lips, his voice pouring directly into her ear.
"Viewed up close, she is as dazzling as a lotus erging from clear waters."
A blush blood on Ji Qingwu’s cheeks, brighter and more beautiful than the crimson clouds in the sky.
He pressed closer, lifting her chin.
He examined her, his gaze tracing her elegant coiffure and shapely brows, her crimson lips and pearly teeth.
How could he make this little lotus blossom create even more beautiful ripples?
Then, Ji Qingwu could no longer see the red sun. His broad shoulders blocked her view as, like a mountain, he pressed down...
*
When Ji Qingwu ca down from the Star-Picking Tower, her heart was still pounding. She sat in the carriage heading to the Princess Mansion.
This carriage had been prepared by Li Yuzong.
It was far more luxurious than the one she usually used. There was even a small vanity on the left, complete with hair ornants and accessories for a young woman’s toilette.
Ji Qingwu picked up a golden bronze mirror from the small table, one decorated with auspicious beasts and grapes, and looked at her reflection.
The woman in the mirror had rosy cheeks, a flush more vibrant than any rouge. ’I can still explain this away,’ she told herself. ’It’s just from the strong wind on the tower.’
’My eyes are glistening, not with their usual calm clarity, but like a spring pond stirred by faint ripples. Maybe I just got so dust in them,’ she rationalized.
As for her lips, aside from the spot she had bitten herself, they were noticeably swollen. She touched them; they were still warm. Clearly, they had been overused.
The woman in the bronze mirror wore an expression of languid tenderness.
Ji Qingwu let out a groan, tossing the mirror down in exasperation. She rubbed her face in a flurry of sha and annoyance, as if trying to scrub away that alluring expression, to knead it and disperse it until not a trace remained.
Since returning to Lin’an, events had deviated far from what she had imagined, and they were also far beyond her ability to control.
Her hand drifted to her chest, over her heart.
’The one thing I had left, the one thing I could still control... it seems that’s about to slip from my grasp as well.’
This was not good.
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