Chapter 37: His Questions

"Miss." Guyu and Jingzhe stepped in front of her, wary. Shouting would be vulgar—and the boy in brocade was too fine, too pretty; identity guessed at once. Still a stranger. Maids feared accident.
"Guyu, Jingzhe—guard the grove mouth."
"But miss—"
"Go." A slight frown—and command landed with weight no one could refuse.
They retreated to the edge.
"You're interesting." He leaned on the trunk, studying her. Golden young master on the outside; eyes like blood-edge steel from a real field. Flat tone, winter in it. He had killed before.
"What does the young marquis want?" Shen Miao asked. He had not dropped from a tree for small talk. Young, but his own man—the old marquis could not leash him—so his paths were harder to read.
"Prince Yu's house still lacks a princess consort. The cripple seems to fancy you. Congratulations."
Calling Prince Yu *cripple* was brazen. From Xie Jingxing it sounded contempt—as if Yu were filth in a gutter.
Pride sat very high in this one.
She thought behind a calm face—forgetting calm might read as signal. He stepped in. Height swallowed her. Shadow, then bend, breath at her ear: "You knew all along."
Cold bamboo scent. Voice low, almost intimate. She looked up—beautiful face close, smile knowing and wicked.
She was not a true fifteen-year-old girl. Eyes lowered. "Know or not—what changes?"
Bored with the playboy act, he shoved her aside without courtesy and lifted a paper packet, grin slack. "You knew—and instead of your own trouble, you fuss over the Jing Diagnostician's second son?"
Her gaze snapped. "Young Marquis—too much curiosity?"
"One sheet and you shake." Back to lounging mask. "What affair with Gao Yan that you help him? Or—Shen girl—what game are you running?"
Face like still water. She stared at the thin paper in his hand—light page, stone in her chest.
She had written it herself, long labor: *On Conduct and Law*. Last life Pei Lang rode this essay into Fu Xiuyi's eye, into the tent, into the throne's counsel.
This life Pei had not yet shown the blade. She meant to cut the path before he could. Better still—Pei never serving the palace at all.
Gao Yan of the Jing Diagnostician house belonged to the new nobility the throne was raising while it cut the old trees. Among the fresh lines, that house stood tall. Elder brother Gao Jin was true talent—later heavily lifted when Fu Xiuyi ruled. The house grew bold. Younger Gao Yan… had once looked at Wanyu with hunger.
Had she not still been empress, had Fu Xiuyi not yet moved on the Shens, Wanyu might have been taken. Yan was less gifted than his brother, vain, always wearing Jin's deeds as his own. Small grudges, narrow chest—a stirring stick. Last life Yan never entered office. This life the house was not yet peak; Jin had only begun. Why not push Yan onto the open road?
She knew Yan's habit: every review, his boy bought a prepared answer outside. Today Guyu's man swapped the packet. Fu Xiuyi's *cherish talent* would swallow Yan whole. Yan's vanity would never admit the work was not his. Put such a man in court… she wanted to see dog eat dog with Fu Xiuyi.
Cut the prince's sharp arm; swap in an empty head. A clean plan—until Xie Jingxing walked out of the trees and broke it.
Her eyes flickered—child-clear surface, depths underneath.
He smiled lazy. "Don't hate me so. My people copied this. The original still sits in the Gao boy's hands."
She blinked. Not what she expected. Silence, then: "Young Marquis is generous."
"Not generous. I have a virtue people praise." Eyes cold. "I hate meddling."
She opened her mouth—
"Now tell me why you wrote to the Jing Diagnostician."
Inward sigh. She wanted Shen and Xie on one rope someday—not today. Bad blood was old; knots do not untie in a day. Slow work—and now this purple storm had tangled everything.
She trusted no one. Her road was hers. Xie, the Xie house—pieces on the board. No player explains moves to the piece.
"I thought maybe you help him for love—pretty face, help your man shine." Teasing look up and down. "Then I thought—Gao's second is trash, but his taste in women isn't bad." Pretty features on her—and desert wind in the eyes.
"Also—you lift the house, but you lift Yan not Jin. Looks malicious." Smile unkind, arrow true.
"Shen girl—does the Jing Diagnostician house owe you blood?"