Xiao Lan had no desire to stay and watch the fish, or watch how people floated up.
“Then Lord Shen, please carry on with your business. This princess will take her leave now.” She did not spare so much as a glance at the pond, and left the waterside pavilion with her maids in tow.
“Your Highness, do you think Lord Shen was just trying to scare you?”
Xiao Lan halted her steps, turned her head, and cast a look back. The man on the pavilion stood with his hands behind his back, his gaze lowered at the water’s surface. She curved her lips into a thin, mocking smile. “True or false, we’ll find out soon enough.”
Shen Zilan watched Xiao Lan’s smile with a deep frown. The moment she left, he rushed toward the pavilion. “Uncle, what’s going on between you and the princess?”
Shen Xiabai glanced at him from the corner of his eye. “The official selection is in three days. Has the Ministry of Personnel nothing to do?”
“Don’t change the subject. Is there something between you and the princess, or not?”
Those words made Shen Xiabai’s face darken.
Shen Zilan pressed on. “She came right to our doorstep, dropping hints left and right to Grandmother that she’s practically family. Is she the reason you fought with Sister Peach Blossom?”
Shen Xiabai turned to leave the pavilion, but Shen Zilan grabbed hold of him. “You’re feeling guilty, aren’t you? You talk about how I could never truly love her, and yet what about how you treated her?”
“I can’t explain myself to you,” Shen Xiabai said with a furrowed brow.
“Then who can you explain yourself to? Not to me, not to Sister Peach Blossom—only to the Second Princess, is that it?”
“How do you know I can’t explain myself to her?” Shen Xiabai’s voice was ice cold.
Shen Zilan wore the expression of someone who had finally caught the truth. “So she’s the only one who understands you, is she? Uncle, I never thought you’d be such a fickle man. The Second Princess is obviously not a good person.”
“...”
“And now that you’ve called off the marriage with the Chen family, it’s such a shame. Two such alike families joining together—it’s better they don’t harm anyone else.”
“So you regret it too, Uncle. Because if you hadn’t called it off, you couldn’t have asked to marry Sister Peach Blossom. Unless you wanted both?”
Shen Xiabai slapped Shen Zilan on the head.
Still unsatisfied, he kicked him as well.
Why did they fight? How would he know why she fought with him?
“You skip the banquet, you don’t accept the invitations—what exactly are you trying to do? What do you want? Listening to your father, are you? Is that what you’re doing, listening to your father?”
Shen Zilan had been kicked off the pavilion by Shen Xiabai, but the older man still wasn’t done with him. Shen Zilan could only retreat step by step, blocking with his hands—covering his chest, then his legs.
“What banquet? What invitations? Whose orders have I been following?”
Shen Zilan limped his way to the Ministry of Personnel, and the officials there all stared at him in shock.
“Oh my, Young Master Shen, which blind fool dared to lay a hand on you?”
“My uncle,” Shen Zilan said, and those three words alone made the man shut his mouth and scurry off to work.
No one even asked him why. Shen Zilan stewed in his frustration all the way until he left the office.
He had barely taken a few steps when he saw Chen Miaohe waiting for him. His head drooped, and he walked straight over. “If you want to hit me or curse at me, hurry up. I don’t have time to bicker with you today.”
Chen Miaohe, who had already raised her hand to slap him, slowly lowered it, eyeing his leg. “What’s with you? Bitten by a dog?”
“Bitten by my uncle.”
“...” She glared at him, then immediately glanced left and right before scolding, “You unfilial little brat—how can you call your uncle a dog?”
Shen Zilan rolled his eyes. “Drop the act. My uncle isn’t here.”
“Why did that dog of a Shen hit you?” Chen Miaohe asked in a low voice.
He couldn't exactly badmouth his own uncle in front of an outsider. “I’m hungry. Are you coming to Wangyue Tower or not?
Chen Miaohe nodded. “I’m ordering the most expensive thing on the menu.”
The two went to Wangyue Tower together and booked a private room. Shen Zilan ordered several jugs of wine. Chen Miaohe, watching him, could tell he was nursing some serious wounds.
She ate her expensive dish as she watched Shen Zilan drink alone in dejection.
“What’s really wrong with you?”
Shen Zilan looked at her, then asked, “How have you been these past days? Are your parents still giving you a hard time? Did they make you kneel in the ancestral hall again?”
Chen Miaohe said, “With all that history we have, you’re afraid I might forget?”
“.”
“I’m sorry,” Shen Zilan said. “I meant to take things slow, but I never expected my uncle would suddenly break off our engagement.”
Chen Miaohe wasn’t entirely unreasonable. She sighed and picked at her plate. “It’s not all your fault. If I hadn’t spoken nonsense within his hearing, it wouldn’t have come to this.”
They both sighed together.
“I just wonder when Sister Cui will finally get rid of your uncle, that scourge.”
Hearing that, Shen Zilan’s eyes turned red. “Sister Peach Blossom cannot marry my uncle.”
“...Why?” Chen Miaohe froze.
Shen Zilan opened his mouth, then finally only said, “My uncle has too many connections with women. He would ruin Eldest Miss Cui.”
As for that Second Princess—she smiled slyly, all shadow and cunning. She and his uncle fit each other perfectly.
“What?” Chen Miaohe looked as if she’d just heard earth-shattering news. “Your uncle is that kind of man?”
“Don’t spread that around,” Shen Zilan said hurriedly. “My uncle, though he is fickle, still has decent character.”
Chen Miaohe curled her lips. “Black heart, vicious tongue, and now he’s a womanizer too. Aside from that face, what’s decent about him?”
Shen Zilan wanted to argue back, but in the end, nothing came out.
Chen Miaohe chewed her food and asked with confusion, “If your uncle is a womanizer, why are you so upset? It’s not you who wronged some girl.”
Shen Zilan gulped down some wine. “You wouldn’t understand. I had planned to give up... but now, I just can’t let go.”
Chen Miaohe was utterly lost.
“Miss Chen, answer me this,” he said. “If the man you loved fell for a faithless woman, being deceived without realizing it—what would you do?”
Chen Miaohe’s mind seemed to short-circuit for a moment.
She sat there staring at Shen Zilan.
“Miss Chen?” When silence stretched on, Shen Zilan frowned and looked up—just in time for a pink, soft fist to smash directly into his nose.
Shen Zilan took the hit full in the face. Then the fists rained down on him like hail, each one carrying all her strength.
“Miss Chen, what are you doing?”
“You despicable, shameless little rat!” Chen Miaohe shouted. “You dare to covet your own aunt! There’s not a single good person in your Shen family—the two of you, uncle and nephew, are both garbage. Trying to steal my sister-in-law, and carrying on with other women besides!”
“All the shameless, incestuous deeds in the world have been committed by you Shen relatives, yet you still had the nerve to act noble and break off my engagement. Pah!”
Chen Miaohe’s blows weren’t hard—she lacked the strength to hurt much—but they stung. Grasping that he was in the wrong, Shen Zilan covered his head and said nothing.
Unsatisfied, but too tired to keep swinging, Chen Miaohe bent down and pinched the softest flesh she could find on him, twisting hard. Shen Zilan nearly jumped out of his skin, his eyes brimming with tears.
“You uncle and you nephew are both bastards!”
Suddenly, the scene froze. Chen Miaohe heard footsteps approaching from behind. She paused mid-motion, turned around, and looked toward the doorway.
Two tall figures stood there, as if passing by by chance, both looking into the room at the same time. Prince An smiled as he glanced at the grim-faced Shen Xiabai beside him. "The one being beaten in there—isn't that Lord Shen's nephew?"
Shen Xiabai's face darkened, and he said nothing.
Prince An added, "Then this young lady's mention of 'that pair of uncle-and-nephew bastards'—would that also be referring to Lord Shen?"
Shen Xiabai remained silent.
Chen Miaohe immediately straightened up, sweat beading on her forehead.
Prince An chuckled, "They are engaged, aren't they? Since when did the capital develop this habit of bickering as a form of flirtation?"
"His Majesty and I merely passed by by chance. Do continue, both of you."
