By the time Xiao Nanhui made her way back to the Sun Mansion, the guards had grown far denser than they had been that morning. It took considerable effort before she managed to climb back over the wall into the courtyard where Tian Wei’er had previously been staying.
The moment her feet touched the ground, Wu Xiaoliu’s voice rang out across the courtyard.
“Where did you go?”
Xiao Nanhui startled and looked back. Wu Xiaoliu was sitting on the stone bench where they had eaten pastries the night before, staring at her unblinkingly.
Before she could answer, he asked again: “Where did the young lady go?”
Xiao Nanhui was silent for a moment, then told the truth: “I sent her away.”
A flash of despair crossed Wu Xiaoliu’s face, replaced almost immediately by that faint, lingering sorrow of his. It seemed he needed no further explanation — he understood perfectly well what had happened.
Seeing his reaction, she said gently: “But I came back, didn’t I? If you have nowhere to go, you can come with me.”
“Go where?”
“Somewhere the Sun Family can’t find you.”
Wu Xiaoliu let out a short laugh at that, then shook his head. “No. The places you can go, I cannot. You’re skilled and come and go freely, while I’m just a fat man who’s too timid to slaughter a chicken.”
Xiao Nanhui looked at him, momentarily at a loss. She stepped forward, intending to persuade him.
“It was I who brought you here. I’ll find a way to keep you safe.”
Wu Xiaoliu didn’t respond. He simply picked up the teapot from the stone table, poured two cups of overnight tea, and handed one to Xiao Nanhui.
“Have some water first.”
Xiao Nanhui took the cup and drank as she shared her plans with him: “The Sun Family isn’t the best refuge right now. They look prosperous on the surface, but they’re hemmed in on all sides by the Bai Family. On top of that, most of their guards are hired outriders — numerous but scattered like loose sand. Sooner or later someone will swallow them whole. But that Pan Mei’er seems to have some backbone. I don’t know what her stronghold is like exactly. Perhaps we could go there first to get a feel for things.”
As she spoke, Xiao Nanhui suddenly felt her tongue growing sluggish. She paused, thinking something had gotten on her lips, and reached up to touch them — only to find they had gone numb.
By the time she realized what was happening, her gaze had already drifted up toward the blazing sky overhead.
The feng shui of Lingxi really was rotten. She’d been here barely half a month and had already fainted twice.
Indistinct sounds came to her in broken fragments. She seemed to see Wu Xiaoliu’s unusually calm eyes swaying back and forth above her head.
“I’m sorry. I just don’t think you can protect me for the rest of my life. In the end, the only one you can truly rely on is yourself. Don’t you agree?”
She opened her mouth, wanting to remark: you really can’t judge a person by their appearance.
These days, you couldn’t even trust a fat man.
Xiao Nanhui finally lost the battle to keep her eyes open and slipped into complete unconsciousness.
---
When Xiao Nanhui opened her eyes again, her hands and feet were immobile. The flat-bow spear and dagger she had concealed inside her clothing were both gone.
Beneath her was coarse, gritty sand, and the same rough texture surrounded her on all sides. Only near the ceiling was there a small air hole, roughly the size of a bowl, letting in a faint trickle of light.
This was a natural stone chamber, now being put to use as a natural prison cell — more secure and solid than any iron bar could be.
The only entrance to the stone chamber was a single person-height opening, sealed by an enormous wooden barrel that could only be pushed open from the outside. The moment her gaze landed on it, the barrel slowly rolled to one side, and a figure entered carrying a bowl. The instant he stepped through, the barrel was pushed shut behind him from outside.
Even without looking up, Xiao Nanhui knew who it was.
The porcelain bowl of water was set down on the ground directly in front of her eyes, and a voice followed.
“Drink some. After this, who knows whether they’ll give you water or not.”
She didn’t move, staring at the contents of the bowl in a daze.
“How do I know there isn’t poison in this water too?”
Those two stout legs standing before her bent at the knees, and Wu Xiaoliu settled down onto the ground, watching her quietly. After a long moment, he spoke with composure: “Actually, aside from being a spy for the Sun Family, I haven’t lied to you about anything else.”
Xiao Nanhui finally lifted her head, looking at this somewhat unfamiliar round face.
“Someone once told me that only fear makes people speak the truth. It seems our relationship was simply too amicable.”
Wu Xiaoliu paused, then picked up the bowl before him and drank it dry himself. “I’ve been longing to return to West City. They abandoned me in East City to fend for myself. I’m not clever — all these years and I couldn’t catch a single soul to bring back and report. You walked right into my hands. I can’t be entirely blamed.”
“Why didn’t you expose me when we first arrived at the Sun Mansion?”
“Back then you hadn’t done anything, and for a while I even thought it wasn’t so bad, having you to keep me company at the Sun Mansion. But then you let the young lady go. I—”
“Enough. Say no more.”
Xiao Nanhui suddenly lost all patience for listening.
They had never been the same kind of people from the very beginning. That they had walked the same path at all was the peculiarity, and discussing it now served no purpose whatsoever.
For a moment, only silence filled the stone chamber.
When Wu Xiaoliu finally rose and picked up the bowl to leave, the wooden barrel at the entrance suddenly shifted — and two people walked in.
The first was Sun Taishou, and behind him walked Pan Mei’er.
Wu Xiaoliu prostrated himself in the dust and stammered out a salute: “I — I pay my respects to the Lord, and to the Fortress Chief.”
Pan Mei’er stepped past Sun Taishou and moved forward, kicking the water bowl aside with one foot. Her voice remained as soft and coquettish as ever. “I heard that Lord Sun had caught himself a traitor, so I came to watch the excitement. But why is it so quiet? Not the least bit interesting.”
Sun Taishou said nothing. He gestured to the two servants behind him, who hauled Xiao Nanhui up from the ground and threw her onto a punishment chair to one side.
Her backside had already suffered the torment of the alkaline ground, and now being pressed down onto this bronze chair made her silently exhale.