Lu Yan enunciated every word.
“As imperial envoy and official of the Supreme Court, this official wishes to make a deal with the superintendent.”
Nie Yuan’s pupils shrunk at once. He swallowed with difficulty.
“T-The Supreme Court?”
Nie Yuan could not but be shocked. Pang Shu on the other hand was horrified. He gasped for breath, trying to desperately wriggle out of his restraints. How could he ever have expected that an extravagant young merchant would actually be a public servant?!
Nie Yuan frowned as he examined Lu Yan, unwilling to believe him.
“Are you truly from the imperial court?”
Lu Yan did not hesitate to curl his lip in a most arrogant fashion and look at his interlocutor with supreme disdain. Very much like a high-ranked official giving his instructions to a subaltern.
“So it seems.”
Nie Yuan could not stop muttering under his breath, his hands buried in his hair.
“Impossible. This is … impossible.”
Lu Yan had morphed from a frivolous, amorous little merchant into the embodiment of intransigence and incorruptibility.
“The Emperor’s hand is far-reaching. His Majesty has ordered that those of His servants who wallow in ill-earned money and corruption shall be judged most severely. Any one of them who dared to take his illicit share in stolen goods is to be condemned according to the strictest reading of the law. Does Lord Nie think the Emperor a blind phoenix? Or does Lord Nie feel mistakenly secure, taking into account his own part in this Yangzhou affair?”
Nie Yuan’s heart was beating wildly at that point. For a long time, he could not muster the energy to reply.
“Did you not wish to make a deal with me?”, he finally stuttered out with trembling lips.
Lu Yan, quite at leisure, picked his teacup up, squeezing its rim with a certain force.
Lu Yan had been surprised by Zhao Chong’s ability to control Yangzhou to perfection. There was no greater corruption than among the corrupted, and yet the same officials who were willing to turn their backs on the Emperor pandered to Zhao Chong with a touching loyalty. Lu Yan had been quite impressed. Until Zhao Chong had sent Fu Man to feed him poison, that is. That is when he had realized it was not Zhao Chong’s generosity and bonhomie that had made his servants devoted, but rather the knife he had held against their throats.
Lu Yan had not hesitated in exposing his identity when he had captured Nie Yuan. For a very simple reason. He was looking for Bai Daonian. The fact his own spies and servants had been unable to find the smallest trace of this heavenly doctor spoke its own tale. And then appeared this Nie Yuan. A man who dared betray Zhao Chong though he must also have been poisoned.
This Nie Yuan had had access to the antidote. There was no other explanation to his boldness. And Zhao Chong was not a kind-hearted man. Why would he ever have given that Nie Yuan the antidote? There was no reason for the charming Governor to willingly lose control over one of his minions.
Nie Yuan knew were Bai Daonian was. Lu Yan was sure of it.
“Answer a few questions, and this official promises you shall come to no harm”, Lu Yan stated, as cold as a mountain stream.
“What are the questions?”
“Where is Bai Daonian?”
Pang Shu, who had been seated on the side, exhausted and broken, started wriggling around once more.
“Nie Yuan, if you dare utter would it be one word, His Lordship will have your life! He will chop your wife and children into pieces and sprinkle the Shouxi Lake with their flesh and bones!”
Hearing such curses, Nie Yuan started trembling like a leaf in the wind. Lu Yan for his part curled his lips in disdain. There was a reason he had not given Pang Shu too much medicine. He had wanted him to betray himself. There was much to be said about people based on their reactions. Lu Yan had been lurking around Zhao Chong long enough to get a feel of the people that surrounded the dear Governor. This Pang Shu was as rough as he was heavy. He had no sense of meticulousness.
Tilting his head, a frighteningly sweet smile etched on his lips, Lu Yan sarcastically purred:
“Manager Pang is getting too restless for a man who might lose his life every instant. You are in no position to threaten anyone.”
Pang Shu grimace in an ugly manner.
“I don’t care whether you are the Wei family’s Wei Xun or an official of the Supreme Court. I tell you I will never betray Lord Zhao. Try to cut my head off with a blunt knife and see whether I speak!”
Cutting one’s head of with a blunt knife? Lu Yan clicked his tongue in disgust. The methods of these rough people, truly …
Raising an eyebrows, he pleasantly continued:
“Not long ago you accused that one”, Lu Yan pointed at Nie Yuan with his chin.
“You accused that one of having no thought for his wife and children. But what about yourself? Do you not care about your wife and children? The Emperor may be more merciful than Zhao Chong, however this official is not.”
Pang Shu snorted in scorn.
“Lord Zhao and I are like brothers. If something were to happen to me, he would take care of my wife and children! As for you! You can kill me as much as you please, but you yourself will not make it alive out of Yangzhou! This is not the capital. The moment I disappear, you will be the first suspected by Lord Zhao!”
Lu Yan observed Pang Shu with mild interest, smiling at once in a blinding fashion. No wonder women were going crazy for Young Master Wei!
“And what would happen if Manager Pang were to be promoted?”
Pang Shu, who was not clever the least bit, frowned and suspiciously squinted at Lu Yan, trying to understand his train of thought. Abandoning, he spat:
“What do you mean?!”
“I mean that you shall be sent out of Yangzhou tonight, in Lord Nie’s company. Within seven days, your promotion decree will reach Zhao Chong’s ears. I wonder what will happen to your wife and children then …”
Understanding exactly how dark this Supreme Court official’s heart was, Pang Shu blanched. With shaking legs, he stood up, planning on throwing his whole body onto Lu Yan as the only way to alleviate his irritation.
“You swine”, Pang Shu howled.
Before he had the time to stagger forward, the small shopkeeper picked up the sword that had been left lying around, pressing it against Pang Shu’s shoulder. A gush of blood burst out. Being nothing but a little civil servant, Nie Yuan had never seen blood flow. How could he not be terrified?! Even that little shopkeeper knew how to wield a sword in this hellhole!
Lu Yan for his part did not budge, relishing in his bad tea.
“Tell me where Bai Daonian is.”
Nie Yuan’s eyes were glued on the bleeding Pang Shu. Then, they slid towards Lu Yan.
“Can Your Lordship guarantee I shall come to no harm?”
Lu Yan slowly drew a dagger from his waist and seductively caressed Nie Yuan’s throat with its point. Truly a sinful man. A sinful man who had had a very displeasing evening and was more than willing to make the world pay for his own discomfort.
“Do you have a choice?”
Killing a chicken to frighten a monkey was truly the best of moves. Nie Yuan was ready to uncover all of Zhao Chong’s secrets.
“They are hiding that Bai Daonian in the Zhao Mansion … I-In the Madam’s bedchambers! There is a secret room in the Madam’s courtyard where they keep him.”
The bedchambers?!
The Madam’s bedchambers?!
Lu Yan’s eyes darkened at once.
“How would you know?!”
Nie Yuan hesitated. There were some thing that were difficult to admit, even when one’s life was at stake. He licked his pale, chapped lips. He took in a quivering breath before letting go of himself and his secrets.
“I had an affair with Lord Zhao’s wife.”
Lu Yan slowly removed the knife from Nie Yuan’s throat. He was an official of the Supreme Court. He had heard and seen things that were so ridiculous one could not believe they actually happened. And yet …
Grand Madams keeping young, tender men for their pleasure while their husbands were away on business trips. Men climbing over the residence walls of widows. Every other man wore a green hat in Chang’an.
Ah, yes, the green hat and Lu Yan’s supposed past life …
Lu Yan frowned in anger, making him seem all the more threatening, if that were possible. After a stick of incense had been burned, two more people appeared in the desolate teahouse. Two of Lu Yan’s spies, Fu Qi and Fu Ba. They bowed in respect.
“Young Master.”
Lu Yan waved an impatient hand.
“Take these people to Chang’an and hand them over to Zhou Shu’an at the Central Judicial Office.”
The two spies immediately tied Nie Yuan and Pang Shu up into a bundle. A cloth was shoved into their mouths to prevent them from chewing their tongues off on the way. And thus, they were pulled out. After Fu Qi and Fu Ba had departed, the small shopkeeper had approached Lu Yan, whispering:
“Your Lordship, when are we going to act?”
Lu Yan’s eyes stared at a point on the wall. He was lost in his thoughts, rehashing disagreeable memories.
“On the Lantern Festival.”
The Lantern Festival would see all of Yangzhou flood the streets. Zhao Chong would naturally be busy organizing a feast to honor his partners, which in turn would keep his henchmen busy with the preparations. He would not have the manpower at hand to thwart their plans.
“Spread some rumors about today. Say that have I have spent the night at the Twenty-Four Bridges with a handful of beauties.”
Speaking these words, he grabbed onto Shen Zhen, carrying her up the stairs.
The little shopkeeper bowed his head, doing his best not to see any of his master’s displays of affection towards this particular beauty of his. Thinking of their recently fabricated rumors about Master Wei, the shopkeeper could not but feel ashamed.
Young Master, your romantic exploits are reaching new levels. You are said to have had an innumerable amount of women. You are said to have serviced multiple women simultaneously. You are said to sleep with a new woman every day. If we are to inflate these stories any more, your adventures might be recorded in history books!
Lu Yan carried Shen Zhen to the second floor and into a small room, where he placed her on a narrow bed. That little shopkeeper had followed on his steps, doing his best to make himself useful.
“Your Lordship, we have some fans. Would you want some?”
Those fans had been dipped in medicinal potions and should have been of some utility in the present situation. However, Lu Yan looking down into Shen Zhen’s sleeping face judged better to go without them.
“No need.”
Seeing as the atmosphere was not right, the little shopkeeper knew better than to linger. He quickly stepped back, bowed and disappeared into oblivion. The night had been getting thicker and a strange, suffocating mist had fallen over the city.
Lu Yan’s eyes roamed like wolves over the plain of Shen Zhen’s body, hungrily resting on her fine, willowy eyebrows, her translucent eyelids, her nose as if sculpted in alabaster and her full lips, demanding a man’s kiss.
Observing her, a fire was ignited in his heart. His throat closed up, making it impossible for him to breathe.
He sat like that, immobile, possessed by the image of her. He would have wished to look at her indifferently, with disgust, with arrogance. Yet, he could not bring himself to, as if his callousness would damage her in the present state. This woman stretched out in front of him was no different from a perfect porcelain doll.
Fragile, breakable, delicate. If she were to be torn from his side, if she were to be cut off from him, pulled out of his sphere of influence, how could she survive?!
A sarcastic laugh escaped the depth of his tightening throat. He seemed to be laughing at her insouciance at believing she could leave unscathed. At her whimsy deciding so easily to disappear out of his life when she pleased. And yet, the corners of his mouth froze in place.
Their surroundings were as silent as themselves.
And he continued to stare at her in silence, a strange light hiding in the midst of his eyes. This was not the official of the Supreme Court, in perfect control of himself, never letting himself be carried away with his emotions, if he felt any, that is. Gone was that self-sufficient, arrogant, shrewd expression that was his main characteristic.
He did not know. He was not aware of his own appearance. He did not know that his own sarcastic laughter was aimed at himself. That it was not Shen Zhen who could not live without him, but rather he who could not live without her. In the previous life, had he been killed by some wild poison or had it been her absence that had driven him into his grave?!
After a long while, he awkwardly reached out, not even noticing how his fingers trembled. Grabbing onto a long strand of her silky hair, rolling it around his fingers, he felt its softness penetrate his every pore and wallowed in the sensation.
At some point, Shen Zhen’s long eyelashes shuddered faintly, akin to small butterfly wings. She frowned before slowly turning around. Leaving him nothing but her back to look at. The strand of her around his fingers unraveled and slipped from his grasp. Lu Yan dropped his hand, feeling a strange pang in his heart.
The wind blew through the dense forest before seeping through the window, running along Lu Yan’s spine. He fully retracted his hand, knowing there was no place where the sleeping woman would have wanted his touch to land.
Closing his eyes, he did not sleep for an instant during the night.
Early the next morning, Shen Zhen slowly woke up … As soon as the faint morning light reached her eyes, she heard a deep voice behind her back.
“Do you even realize how long you have slept?”
Such a bad tone could belong to no one but him. Shen Zhen sat up immediately, dishevelled and tired as she was. She looked at the sun that cast its rays through the window. Jumping to the ground, she looked like a child who had been caught red-handed.
“Why did Your Lordship not wake me up?”
Lu Yan sneered.
“I called you more than once. But you ignored me to sweetly sleep on.”
Shen Zhen blushed, mortified. How could she have slept in such a fashion?! She was a light sleeper after all! The smallest of creaks could wake her up in an instant. She did not remember herself being particularly tired the day before. In fact, she could not remember much of what had happened the day before. Where she was, she did not know either.
“Your Lordship, where are we?”
Shen Zhen raised her eyes, observing him innocently, as if she was not the woman of yesterday who had so coldly determined she would leave him as soon as the first occasion presented itself. Not only did Lu Yan not answer, he even raised his hand and admonishingly patted Shen Zhen at the back of her head.
He impatiently turned on his heels and left the room. Shen Zhen followed in a pitter-patter of hurried footsteps, her tongue wedged between her teeth.
