Chapter 56: Change In Feelings

Shen Yu had rarely been sick since childhood, but this time the illness hit like a landslide. She lay unconscious for a full day and two nights, and when she woke she didn’t say a word, only staring blankly at the ceiling.

Everyone said Shen Yu’s fever had fried her brain. Old Master Shen came to see her after she woke. He glanced at Shen Yu and only relaxed when he saw she was out of danger.

After sending everyone else away, Old Master Shen sat in his wheelchair and looked at the autumn chrysanthemum painting hanging opposite in the anteroom, sighing, “It’s not easy being an official. You’re after all a young lady. If you cannot continue, resign and stay home to properly educate the next generation.” Having heard that Shen Yu had been ambushed on Bozi Mountain, Old Master Shen thought long and hard and decided to have Shen Yu resign her post. She was his own grandchild after all and he didn’t want her to suffer like this.

Just recovering from a serious illness, Shen Yu was weak. As she sat on the bed and leaned against the headboard, she suddenly gave him a bitter smile. “Grandfather, your granddaughter cannot resign.”

Hearing this, Old Master Shen turned his wheelchair toward the bed and looked at Shen Yu, frowning with confusion. “Yu’er, what do you mean by that?”

Shen Yu raised her hand to support her forehead, not in the mood to say much to Old Master Shen, and weakly said, “Grandfather, I will handle these matters, you needn’t worry. I’m tired and need to rest.”

Shen Yu looked troubled, and the old man, having weathered many storms himself, could see something was amiss. Knowing something must have happened, he did not press her but said instead, “Rest well.”

He then called the steward outside by name, and as he left he said one more thing to Shen Yu, “Don’t force yourself too much.”

The room was left with only Shen Yu, who hugged her knees and fell into thought.

The shock from yesterday was overwhelming. Her mind was full of charges of treason and extermination of her entire household. She didn’t care about her own death, but she didn’t want the Grand Guardian’s house to be implicated. Her grandparents were elderly, her mother was frail and sickly, and she didn’t want the servants of the whole household, who had committed no grave wrongs, to suffer consequences because of her.

After clearing her head today, that worry lessened. If His Majesty had known she was a woman from the start and was angered by that fact, he would not have waited until now to make any moves against the Grand Guardian’s house.

Fang Rui’s words from last night kept circling in Shen Yu’s mind. He said he had taken a liking to her before he knew she was female. How could she believe such an absurd claim?!

She buried her head between her knees, her eyes slightly red. Why would Jia Ming be His Majesty? Why couldn’t Jia Ming just be Jia Ming?

…

At the General’s mansion, Lei Shengda’s eighth concubine had lost a white cat and had her servants search the entire mansion without finding it, even sending someone over to ask the Grand Guardian’s residence whether it had wandered there. But since Lei Shengda stormed into Shen Yu’s chamber last time, Old Master Shen had ordered special vigilance toward anyone from the General’s mansion’s and did not allow anyone from there to come in.

The concubine who lost her cat didn’t dare lead people over to search. After all, Shen Yu’s identity, Old Master Shen’s status, and her own lowly position made it unwise.

Cuizhi and Xiuluan, who often returned the cat to the General’s mansion, were puzzled when they heard that next door had come to look for the cat. Cuizhi said puzzledly, “They usually don’t pay attention to the cat and often don’t feed it. Only now that it’s missing do they seem anxious.”

Xiuluan sighed and worried, “I heard it went missing the night before last. Who knows where it ran off to?”

Shen Yu had only intended to step out into the courtyard for some air, but upon hearing the two maids say the General’s mansion’s white cat was missing, she halted the foot she had lifted to leave, standing in the doorway and lost in thought.

Missing the night before last…

Could it be that His Majesty stole it?

Shen Yu thought this was very likely: even if she didn’t truly know His Majesty, she had dealt with the man impersonating as Jia Ming, and with Jia Ming’s temperament, stealing a cat would be perfectly ordinary.

Standing in the doorway, Shen Yu did not step out. Thinking of Jia Ming, she clasped her chest, feeling a heaviness in her heart she couldn’t explain.

Cuizhi’s eyes flicked and she couldn’t help but notice the hem at the doorway. She tapped Xiuluan and signaled that the Young Master was standing just behind the door.

The two hurriedly stood up and faced the doorway. There stood Shen Yu, draped in a rather thick garment. They both bowed in unison and respectfully exclaimed, “Young Master.”

Shen Yu still bore the pallor of illness. After coughing twice she said to the two maids, “You may go.”

Just as Shen Yu coughed, Hengniang arrived carrying a soup bowl. The two maids withdrew, and Hengniang hurried over with a worried expression. “Young Master, you’ve only just recovered from a serious illness. You should rest well in your room and not be exposed to drafts.”

Shen Yu’s gaze fell on Hengniang. She raised a hand to cover her mouth, coughed twice more, then turned and walked into the room, saying as she went, “Come in. I have something to ask you.”

Upon hearing that the Young Master wanted to speak to her, Hengniang showed a nervous expression. The Young Master normally ignored her, treating her like air. Why would he suddenly say he had something to ask her?

With a fluttering heart, she followed Shen Yu into the room.

Shen Yu sat down behind the table and, looking at Hengniang who kept her head bowed, calmly asked, “Do you like wealth and glory, or do you like me?”

At Shen Yu’s words, Hengniang’s hand trembled. She failed to steady the tray she held and it clattered to the floor with a bang. The tray and soup bowl fell, and while the bowl didn’t break, all the soup spilled onto the floor.

Hengniang panicked and knelt on the ground, using a handkerchief to wipe up the spills while saying as she trembled, “This maid is clumsy, please don’t punish me, Young Master.”

Shen Yu’s expression remained calm and cool. “Don’t bother cleaning it up. Stand up and answer my question.”

At these words, Hengniang froze, hesitated a moment, then knelt and bowed her head. “This maid is by no means one who craves wealth and glory!”

“Then what is it you like about me?” Shen Yu truly couldn’t understand. Why was Hengniang like this, and Princess De’an likewise? And even His Majesty had said he liked her. What sort of charm did she possess to make people so infatuated?

The room was filled only with the strong scent of ginseng soup and was very quiet.

After a while, Hengniang, head bowed, spoke softly, “The first time I saw the Young Master, you rescued me from trouble and gave me money without asking for anything in return so I could bury my father. Your appearance was like an immortal that had come down from heaven to save me from a terrible fire. From that moment I could not let go.”

Hearing this, Shen Yu let out a self-deprecating laugh. It was those same words, “could not let go”. It wasn’t as if she was covered in glue, so why did everyone stick to her like this?

After that laugh, Shen Yu looked at the kneeling Hengniang and asked again, “Do you know what it means to like someone?”

Shen Yu liked the refined elegance of chrysanthemums and orchids, honeyed floral tea, and osmanthus pastries. Though she liked them, she could restrain herself. No matter how much she liked them, she wouldn’t show it before others. She rarely touched such girlish treats in public.

Shen Yu believed that liking someone required restraint. If there was someone or something that they should not like, they should let go. There was no need to cling on stubbornly.

But it seemed these people could not restrain themselves.

“To like…to like someone is that when you see them, no matter how bad your mood, it immediately brightens; when you don’t see them, you think of them for no reason; you often hear and see things that aren’t there; if they hurt you, your heart feels like it’s being cut with a knife.” Last time the Young Master told her to never think about what she shouldn’t and Hengniang understood exactly what that meant. Back in her room, she pulled the covers up and cried her heart out.

After hearing Hengniang’s words, Shen Yu’s lips trembled slightly. She pressed a hand to her chest and felt an increasing heaviness.

With one hand over her chest, the other supporting her forehead, her voice was hoarse as she said, “You don’t need to clean up the things, leave now.”

Hengniang took a long moment to climb from the floor. She looked up at Shen Yu, her eyes full of lingering affection, then withdrew her gaze and slowly left the room.

Shen Yu held her forehead and let out a long sigh. If what Hengniang said was true, had she fallen in love with Jia Ming?

It was Jia Ming, not His Majesty.

Seeing him could brighten even her worst moods. Though he could anger her terribly, she would forget her troubles. When apart, she would think of him from time to time and had kept watch for him many nights. Learning Jia Ming’s true identity cut her to the bone. She couldn’t accept the truth.

They had spent nearly half a month together at the Court of Judicial Review, which was the longest she had ever been with a man. The first time she got drunk, he kissed her and she felt aggrieved by it. But if she truly held it against him she would have forbidden him from entering her room again.

In front of Jia Ming she could be a genuine young woman without any disguise. She could let down her guard and drink herself senseless in his presence.

It seemed she had really trusted in the man called Jia Ming.

She trusted him and was deceived so cruelly.

But if Shen Yu was asked whether she blamed Fang Rui, she couldn’t bring herself to blame him. He was the Emperor, and she was also a deceiver herself. She had no reason to resent him.

Blame His Majesty for toying with her feelings?

But His Majesty said he was sincere.

He approached her under the pretense of being serious, and she too entered the court and became a civil official under circumstances beyond her control.

At night, Shen Yu sat on the bed, her gaze fixed on the window.

Before long she saw a shadow at the window. It stood outside for a while, then gently pushed the window open.

The window opened only a bowl’s width. No one climbed in, but a white, fluffy thing squeezed through.

That white, fluffy thing was none other than the ungrateful cat that had gone missing from the neighboring mansion.

The cat jumped down from the window, something clutched in its mouth. It walked to Shen Yu’s bedside and suddenly leapt onto the bed.

Shen Yu shifted her gaze from the shadow at the window to the cat, who loosened its jaws and placed the item it had been holding onto Shen Yu’s quilt.

Shen Yu glanced and saw it was a small bamboo slip.

Shen Yu had no intention of opening it. After a quick look at the cat, she lay down and pulled the covers over herself.

Not hearing the sound of the bamboo slip being opened, Fang Rui knew Shen Yu had not unsealed it. He glanced up at the moon on the horizon and sighed softly.

When, he wondered, would Shen Yu be able to treat him as she had Jia Ming? He thought that seemed unlikely.