The interior of the carriage was very quiet — clearly well-insulated and sealed against sound. It was clean and spare, without a single superfluous object in sight. Zhongli Jing sat on the left side, his eyes lightly closed. When he heard her enter, he did not say a single word more.
The carriage set off. Night was already falling, and they needed to reach the border of Huozhou before full darkness, so there would likely be no more stops along the way.
The light filtering through the window gradually shifted from warm to cold and faded away. The interior of the carriage fell into a quiet stillness. Sitting beside that person, Xiao Nanhui found the peculiar atmosphere a little uncomfortable.
A recollection of the scene when they had seized the secret seal flashed through her mind. She grasped for something to say.
“You — why didn’t you kill An Lu?”
Between them was a gap of about one cushion’s width. Though she could only see half of his profile, she could read in it that signature, utterly unruffled composure.
The question had come from nowhere, yet he answered swiftly — as though he had known all along she would ask this.
“Even a lone bee always finds its way back to the hive eventually.”
As she had thought — he had not truly let An Lu go. He was simply waiting for a larger fish to take the bait. An Lu was nothing more than a lure he had cast out.
Perhaps because that young man was, like herself, someone who had lost both parents and wandered the world alone for many years, she felt a certain reluctant compassion. “Well — actually — I think An Lu is only fifteen or sixteen years old. He may not have that many schemes in him. And besides, the item is already in our hands — the person who used him probably won’t bother with him anymore. And he’s here in Huozhou — if you go back to Quecheng and still need to keep an eye on him, that’s a great deal of trouble. Don’t you think?”
Zhongli Jing said nothing. He seemed too disinclined even to turn his neck — he only slid his gaze sideways to glance at her, sending a look that communicated something clearly.
Xiao Nanhui knew that look. It said: you understand nothing.
Hmph. Fine, don’t say it then — it has nothing to do with me anyway.
She had just turned away when she stopped and looked back again at the man beside her, feeling that something was off.
After that glance at her, Zhongli Jing had closed his eyes. His lips had gone somewhat pale, and the strands of hair at his temples were damp — he appeared to be perspiring.
“Hey?”
No response.
She instinctively reached out and touched his arm, and through the fabric felt an abnormal heat. When she touched his forehead and the back of his hand, both were burning.
Xiao Nanhui was startled, and was about to call for help.
“Ding—”
The last two syllables never made it out. A hand clamped over her mouth.
“What are you shouting for? I’m not dead yet.”
Xiao Nanhui turned her head with a trembling start and met a pair of pitch-black eyes.
Zhongli Jing’s scorching breath was right at her ear — close enough that she could see his eyelashes dampened by cold sweat.
No wonder he hadn’t moved at all since getting into the carriage. He was clearly suffering greatly, and must have caught a chill in the swamp. He’d had no chance to rest before this, and had been holding himself together the entire time — and now he simply couldn’t hold on any longer.
If she counted carefully — from the night before last when the Zhuming Ceremony ended, through yesterday when they had chased Zou Sifang into the swamp, to now as evening fell — they had gone nearly two full days and nights without closing their eyes.
This man — he truly could endure.
Zhongli Jing’s ice-cold fingers slowly moved away from Xiao Nanhui’s lips, and lightly pointed toward a corner of the carriage.
“There’s a box over there with several porcelain vials. Bring me the green one.”
Considering that he was a sick person, Xiao Nanhui let the near-imperial-decree tone slide without comment. She rummaged through the large trunk in the corner of the carriage until she finally turned it upside down, then placed the medicine in the man’s hand.
“In this state — why didn’t you say so earlier? We could at least have gone back into the city and found a physician. Why insist on suffering out here in the middle of nowhere?”
“We need to get back quickly.” Zhongli Jing opened the porcelain vial with practiced ease, tipped out two pills, and swallowed them without water. “Besides, suffering is preferable to dying.”
Xiao Nanhui fell silent.
He was not wrong. Right now, despite appearances, they had not truly won. There were still dangers all around them.
As long as they had not crossed out of Huozhou’s borders, nothing could be considered settled. The matter of An Lu might not be known only to them — and there was still that mysterious figure behind An Lu, who had never shown himself. Was that person even now watching them from some hidden vantage point?
At the thought, the drowsiness that had begun to creep over her was jolted away. She solemnly adopted a military meditative posture, and every few moments lifted the carriage curtain to check on the situation outside.
Yet the carriage’s steady rocking and the rhythmic noise it produced were the most potent lullabies in the world. Before Xiao Nanhui had maintained her vigil for even half an hour, she toppled over and was dead to the world.
The person beside her, who had been quietly resting since taking the medicine, slowly opened his eyes and glanced at the figure sprawled on the floor: her high-bound hair had come somewhat loose; her clothes were twisted and crumpled beneath her; the whole effect was that of a thoroughly drunk reveler. Only her sleeping face had softened, and without the sharp alertness of her waking hours, she no longer looked nearly so ferocious.
In truth, even at her most fierce, she could hardly be called ferocious. At best, she was bluffing. It was the bearing of someone who had never been truly wounded — striking out freely, but incapable of genuine ruthlessness.
Zhongli Jing regarded her for a moment, then abruptly reached over and pulled a blanket from nearby, tossing it onto the figure on the floor.
The blanket landed squarely over Xiao Nanhui’s head, covering it completely.
And with that, the carriage seemed to settle at last into genuine quiet. Zhongli Jing shifted into a more comfortable position, and gently closed his eyes.
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