Feng Suige loosened his horse's reins and rode alongside Fu Yixiao in silence. He'd considered following her to witness the farewell but restrained himself. That moment belonged to her alone—he had no right to intrude upon such private grief.
In truth, he privately hoped she might choose to remain by his side. Yet he understood with painful clarity that Susha offered her no sanctuary—merely a different prison with gilded bars and softer chains.
He studied her profile as they rode: bright black eyes beneath sword-like eyebrows, pale in color, sweeping diagonally toward her temples. Below, a proud upturned nose and lips pressed into a bloodless line of determination.
In terms of conventional beauty, Fu Yixiao couldn't claim classical perfection. Her allure lay elsewhere—in her fierce, untamed intensity. In the occasional flashes of brilliance that escaped from her eyes, making observers' hearts tremble with a dangerous impulse.
What draws me to her? The question had haunted him since their first confrontation. Perhaps it was recognizing someone equally trapped by duty and circumstance. Perhaps it was admiration for her refusal to be broken despite possessing every reason to surrender. Or perhaps—and this thought disturbed him most—it was seeing in her the kind of strength his position demanded but circumstances had never allowed him to fully embrace.
During their days of verbal sparring and strategic maneuvering, he'd learned to read the calculations behind her eyes, to anticipate her moves. That intellectual challenge had evolved into something more complex—respect, certainly, but also an unexpected kinship. They were both pieces on a board controlled by others, both struggling to maintain agency within constraints neither had chosen.
"Is there something on my face?" Yixiao glanced at him with narrowed suspicion.
Feng Suige started, caught in his contemplation. "It's not that there's something on your face. You are a flower."
Yixiao snorted with derision. "Is that so? If I'm a flower, then what are you?"
"I'm a flower thief," Feng Suige replied with complete seriousness.
The absurdity of it struck her. Yixiao burst into laughter so forceful she nearly lost her seat. Feng Suige reached out to steady her. "Come here. Crying it out will make you feel better."
"You're insane!" Yet even as she cursed without heat, she allowed herself to be drawn close.
For the first time, she voluntarily wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her head against his chest. Within moments, Feng Suige felt wetness spreading across the fabric, accompanied by scorching heat—the release of grief she'd been containing since dawn.
He let out a long sigh, one hand coming up to rest protectively at her back.
"I thought for a long time yesterday." His voice emerged quiet, measured. "Light and darkness are cyclical, interdependent. As long as the bright moon remains, even darkness holds its own illumination..." He paused, choosing words carefully. "Fu Yixiao, we're accustomed to scheming against each other. What I'm saying now might be hard for you to believe, but remember this—I won't openly oppose my father. I cannot. However, I will do everything within my power to protect you."
Another pause, then brutal honesty. "I won't pretend altruism. I have my selfish reasons. I can't act without eventually expecting something in return. But that's a discussion for another day, when you're ready to hear it."
Yixiao, her head still buried against him, cursed hoarsely. "You are insane."
Perhaps, he thought. But so are you, for staying.
By now, the sun had climbed to its zenith, though clouds obscured it, scattering fragmented light across the landscape. Ahead loomed the dark gray city walls—imposing, inescapable, casting long shadows that seemed to swallow the road.
Feng Qishan closed his eyes tiredly and leaned into the cushioned throne. He knew Feng Suige was escorting Fu Yixiao alone to bid farewell to her companions, yet he felt no concern that she might attempt escape.
He couldn't fully articulate why he trusted her word—only that he recognized in her a peculiar form of integrity. If she declared she would stay, she would stay. Her defiance manifested in what she said and how she said it, never in breaking explicit agreements. That kind of honor, perverse as it seemed, was something he understood.
Initially, he'd intended merely to keep her under house arrest for several years—long enough for Xiyang to bear an heir and secure her position as Xia Jingshi's primary wife. Then he would release her back to Jinxiu with diplomatic courtesies, the matter closed with everyone's interests preserved.
But the wedding banquet had revealed complications he couldn't ignore.
The way his son looked at her—not with mere fascination but with protective instinct that overrode political calculation. The way Xia Jingshi's carefully maintained composure had cracked, revealing emotions the prince usually suppressed so masterfully. The way even Xiyang—beloved, cherished Xiyang—had positioned herself as defender, willing to share her husband to protect this outsider.
Such a woman, commanding the loyalty and protection of so many powerful figures, represented a threat that transcended her individual capabilities. She was a catalyst, a focal point around which alliances shifted and loyalties fractured.
His intent to eliminate her had grown stronger with each passing hour since the banquet's conclusion.
Yet he couldn't kill her. Not yet. Multiple factors stayed his hand—his daughter's obvious regard for her, his son's protective stance, the political implications of executing Jinxiu's military officer after claiming hospitality. He exhaled forcefully, acknowledging the restraint circumstances demanded.
The bitter irony was that such a formidable woman had emerged from common origins. Susha, unlike many kingdoms, didn't discriminate between men and women when selecting heirs based on merit and capability. If she and Xiyang had both been born into the royal family, if circumstances had positioned them as rivals rather than...
Feng Qishan's eyelids twitched. He silently rebuked himself for the thought—for comparing Xiyang to this dangerous outsider, for seeing in Fu Yixiao the qualities that might have made her a worthy successor where his beloved daughter, for all her virtues, lacked the necessary steel.
Memory pulled him backward, unbidden.
Xiyang's mother—Imperial Consort Chen—had possessed that steel. He remembered her passion, her absolute devotion. The first time she'd demanded to accompany his army, he'd refused outright.
"If you want to leave your concubine behind," she'd declared with fierce determination, "you'll have to step over my dead body!" She'd pulled a gold hairpin from her hair and pressed it against her throat—jade-pale skin dimpling under the point.
Anger and anxiety had warred within him. "The battlefield is peril incarnate. You're just a woman. If you're captured, you'll suffer unspeakable torments." He'd hoped to frighten her into compliance.
"The King won't let your concubine be captured." Her certainty had been absolute, unshakeable.
"What about death? Aren't you afraid of dying?" The question emerged almost helpless.
Imperial Consort Chen had smiled with radiant confidence. "What's there to fear? I love following you, so I'll die following you as well."
From that day forward, no matter what campaign he waged, Consort Chen had accompanied him—defenseless yet determined—until the day everything changed.
During that particularly brutal campaign, exhaustion and worry had triggered premature labor. Due to harsh conditions and inadequate medical care, he could only watch helplessly as Consort Chen's life ebbed away moment by moment, her hand growing cold in his despite his desperate grip.
After her death, Susha's hundred thousand soldiers had tied white mourning cloth around their arms and charged into enemy ranks with unprecedented fury. After days of savage battle, they'd finally repelled the invasion. All thirty thousand prisoners of war had been beheaded—a river of blood offered to appease Consort Chen's spirit.
On the day of his victorious return to the capital, by his side had been one less gently speaking flower, and one more tiny swaddled infant crying with newborn fury at a world that had already stolen her mother.
That was Feng Xiyang.
Xiyang embodied the continuation of Consort Chen's life, the extension of his love for her. Every time he looked at his daughter, he saw echoes of the woman he'd lost—which perhaps explained the intensity of his protection, the extremity of his actions on her behalf.
He'd executed his beloved Consort Shu because pastries she'd made caused Xiyang to suffer vomiting and diarrhea for two days. When Consort Zhao, who'd been close friends with Consort Shu, had confronted him angrily in court about the excessive punishment, she too had been sentenced to death. After that, none of the imperial consorts dared cause the slightest trouble where Xiyang was concerned.
When Xiyang had heard of grand celebrations planned among Jinxiu's common people for the new emperor's ascension, she'd pestered him relentlessly to attend the ceremonies. He'd agreed, indulgent of her curiosity about the wider world—never imagining that single encounter would cause his daughter to fall irreversibly in love with Xia Jingshi, who was being formally conferred as Prince of Zhen Nan.
Xia Jingshi...
The man remained an enigma. Originally, he'd been the most likely candidate among Jinxiu's several princes to be named heir—the most capable, most strategic, most naturally suited to rule. But for some inexplicable reason, he'd suddenly announced his withdrawal from succession struggles. Shortly thereafter, news had spread that the legitimate son of the Emperor and Empress had been formally established as Crown Prince.
Even now, Feng Qishan couldn't fathom why Xia Jingshi would surrender the throne that had been within his grasp.
At the wedding banquet, when faced with Xun Xiang's provocations, Xia Jingshi had revealed his true nature—innate nobility and commanding presence, his cold gaze sweeping the assembly with a predator's assessment of prey. That man was born to rule, naturally possessing the magnetism that made others want to follow.
Yet he'd given up the world.
Feng Qishan's frown deepened. What makes a man surrender absolute power? Love? Duty? Some weakness I haven't yet identified?
The question troubled him because understanding Xia Jingshi's motivations might provide insight into managing the complex web his daughter now inhabited.
Perhaps because he remained occupied with prosecuting the series of corrupt officials implicated in the Xun Xiang case, or perhaps because he'd achieved his primary objective and saw no immediate need for further action, Feng Qishan hadn't inquired extensively about Fu Yixiao's life at Water Painting Garden.
Feng Suige was profoundly grateful not to address this potentially explosive topic with his father.
Fu Yixiao's days at the Water Painting Garden passed with deceptive tranquility. She continued residing in the same pavilion where she'd initially been imprisoned—the only difference being the absence of guards. Her confinement had transformed from explicit captivity to implicit understanding.
Each day, she would recline on the soft couch, gazing through the window at an endless succession of natural phenomena—sunrise and moonset, drifting clouds, sudden rain, scattered starlight. To observers, she appeared almost meditative, peaceful even.
But Feng Suige, who visited her pavilion each evening, recognized the stillness for what it truly was—the quiet of a caged predator conserving strength, studying patterns, waiting for circumstances to shift.
Their interactions had evolved considerably since the wedding's tumultuous conclusion. Occasionally, Yixiao would joke with him, her sharp wit emerging in unexpected flashes. They both consciously avoided topics relating to Xia Jingshi and Feng Xiyang—subjects too fraught with complications neither was prepared to address.
Sometimes, seized by whimsy or perhaps desperate to see genuine emotion cross her carefully neutral features, Feng Suige would sneak past servants to the kitchen. He'd boil eggs himself, grimacing as he blew on the hot shells and peeled them with clumsy fingers before presenting them to her with mock ceremony.
She would always accept them with a faint smile, cradling each egg carefully in her palm as if afraid it might slip away. She'd eat slowly, bite by bite, while listening to his stories about sneaking into the imperial kitchen as a child to steal treats—stories that made her laugh despite herself.
The days passed cautiously, tentatively, but Feng Suige found himself content with these small victories. At least he could provide her some measure of peace, some respite from the additional burdens circumstances kept threatening to impose upon her already heavy heart.
The fragile peace endured until this morning's court session.
Feng Qishan had, as usual, briefly addressed several unresolved administrative matters and was preparing to dismiss the assembly when a scholar-official rose from his position. "Your subject has a matter to report."
Feng Qishan raised an eyebrow in mild surprise. Most governmental affairs had already been transferred to Feng Suige's authority as regent prince. Unless addressing some major crisis, ministers rarely presented memorials during formal court sessions.
Feng Suige's expression immediately darkened. He knew precisely what was coming. These pedantic old ministers, so proud of their classical education and established status, had been muttering criticisms for days. After he'd rebuked two of them sharply for overstepping, they'd evidently decided to escalate the matter by bringing it directly before the king.
"...Although that woman from Jinxiu Kingdom remains Your Majesty's noble guest, she is nevertheless an outsider." The scholar-official's voice carried the particular condescension of those who believe moral righteousness shields them from consequences. "The Prince Regent bears grave responsibilities and inevitably brings confidential state documents to his private residence for review. Therefore, we believe it inappropriate for her to continue residing at Water Painting Garden. We humbly request Your Majesty issue an edict relocating her to alternative accommodation and deploying imperial guards to maintain proper surveillance..."
The official continued his petition, nodding and gesturing with scholarly affectation, deliberately ignoring Feng Suige's increasingly murderous glare.
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