Chapter 94:
Lu Xiyao only came to the family temple once, accompanying Xie Wanning to play chess and talk heart-to-heart.
Although she had repeatedly apologized for her previous coldness toward her, she did not explain why her attitude had suddenly changed so drastically.
The intimacy and openness between the two was no longer there as before.
This was not only felt by the two parties involved, but even Lu Ziyan nearby sensed it clearly.
His gaze was fixed on his younger sister, judging whether her intentions were really that simple.
After two rounds of go, when the atmosphere finally eased a bit, Lu Xiyao took out a brocade box from her sleeve and opened it.
Inside was a finely carved gemstone jade bracelet.
She smiled and said, “All the previous wrongs were my fault. Let this bracelet serve as my apology to Sister-in-law.”
The jade bracelet looked valuable. Xie Wanning hesitated on whether to accept it, but then she heard her say, “If Sister-in-law truly forgives me, you must not refuse it.”
As she spoke, Lu Xiyao noticed her wrist was bare, so she took her hand and personally put it on for her.
Her slender white wrist matched with the lustrous gemstone bracelet was dazzlingly beautiful.
“Sister-in-law’s hands would be a pity without a bracelet.” Lu Xiyao smiled. “Wear it like this and do not take it off. Next time we meet, I want to see it still on your hand.”
Before marrying into the Lu Family, the two were handkerchief friends who shared everything, and privately exchanging gifts was common. Xie Wanning no longer refused. She got up and fetched a pearl hairpin from the inner chamber as a return gift.
Lu Xiyao did not refuse either and accepted it with a smiling face.
Before leaving, she said, “Elder Brother does not allow us to come to the family temple to see you. This time I came secretly while Ming Jian was away. When he returns, Sister-in-law, you must not tell him.”
Hearing that Lu Ziyan did not allow people to come to the family temple, Xie Wanning lowered her eyes, not wanting to see pity for herself in others’ eyes.
She pursed her lips and softly hummed, “I won’t say anything.”
How laughable. Who could she tell anyway?
When Ming Jian came to collect the Buddhist scriptures, should she report to him that the eldest young lady of the estate had specially come to see her today?
Or when Lu Ziyan returned, should she run to him and say, you wouldn’t let others come see me, but your younger sister came secretly?
How pitiful…
She was truly pitiful.
In the days that followed, Lu Xiyao no longer came.
Xie Wanning neither particularly liked nor disliked the bracelet she had given.
But it was the first gift from Lu Xiyao after she married into the Lu Family.
After all, it held different meaning, so she still did not take it off.
This was the fourth month since Lu Ziyan left the capital, and she began hoping for his return.
She was truly fed up with staying in the family temple.
Every day when she saw Ming Jian, she would ask if Lu Ziyan had sent any letter back and when he would return to the capital.
But the answer was always disappointing.
She always remembered his words, waiting for him to come pick her up.
Yet in the end, when the family temple gates opened, it was Ming Jian who came to take her out.
Perhaps it should not be called picking up, but rather releasing.
It was Ming Jian who released her.
Lu Ziyan had returned, but he did not come to pick her up.
She returned to Shao Guang Courtyard. After several months of being unoccupied, it seemed even the sweeping servants had grown lax. The flowers and plants in the courtyard were untended, making the place even more desolate.
The autumn wind was chilly, the scenery bleak, but a blazing fire ignited in her heart. Xie Wanning waited three days in Shao Guang Courtyard, yet Lu Ziyan still did not come.
Until the afternoon of the third day, the serene young lady who had been composing lyrics to a painting as usual suddenly slammed down her brush in her hand. She could no longer endure it.
The anger in her heart had been suppressed to the extreme, burning and clawing at her. If not vented, it would suffocate her.
In the nearly two years since marrying in, this was the first time she did not obediently listen and wait.
Ignoring the rule that women of the Lu Family must not step into the front courtyard, she went straight to Lu Ziyan’s study.
This was a place she could enter before marriage, but after marrying in, she had been confined by the rule barring inner chamber women from the front courtyard and had never set foot there again.
A surge of evil fire drove her. She did not have to wait obediently anymore; she could take the initiative to demand an explanation from him.
She absolutely had to get an explanation!
Why, why toy with her feelings, play with her affection and expectations like this.
Lu Ziyan’s study was large, divided into front hall and inner hall. She was stopped in the front hall.
“Make way!”
Ming Jian looked troubled. “Madam, please return. The Marquis…”
“Since I’ve come, I must see him today.” Xie Wanning’s expression was icy. “Where is he?”
“…Madam, please wait a moment.”
Ming Jian turned and entered the inner hall. After a long wait, when he came out, his face looked even worse.
He said, “The Marquis says he sees no one.”
…Sees no one.
Xie Wanning’s heart tightened. Forcing a smile, she said, “What if I insist on seeing him?”
Ming Jian stood in front of her. “Please do not make things difficult for me.”
Behind him stood a team of Lu Ziyan’s personal soldiers. The front courtyard had no maidservants, only Lu Ziyan’s personal soldiers and deputy generals.
His study was heavily guarded. Without his permission, forcing entry was simply a pipe dream.
No matter how angry she was, it was useless. As long as Lu Ziyan did not agree, she could not see him.
She could only stay in her courtyard, waiting day after day for his visit.
When he was in a good mood and thought of her, he would come to Shao Guang Courtyard to see her.
When in a bad mood, he would leave her aside.
Her joys and sorrows were all unimportant.
So what if she was the main wife carried in with great ceremony? She was not even as good as a favored concubine.
At least if Liu Manrou came holding her child, he certainly would not avoid seeing her.
After being blocked at the study door and unable to enter no matter what, the fury in Xie Wanning’s eyes gradually cooled.
Something that had been stubbornly burning went out.
Her heart turned to dead ashes.
She finally understood that in his heart, she was perhaps just an ornament placed in the back courtyard.
Of noble birth, decent appearance, barely matching him.
Nothing more.
No childhood sweethearts bond, no husband-wife affection.
It was all her self-deception.
On the way back to Shao Guang Courtyard, she encountered many servants along the way.
They greeted her very respectfully.
But Xie Wanning seemed to hear their inner thoughts.
Look, she is after all the eldest legitimate daughter raised in the illustrious Wuyuan Marquis’s Estate. How did she become such a resentful woman?
How did she become such a resentful woman?
Xie Wanning bit her lip hard, a massive sense of humiliation surging to her heart, nearly making her faint.
Fortunately, fortunately, after this reckless intrusion into the front courtyard, apart from making people laugh at her overreaching, she had finally recognized what she was.
It was not until she returned to her courtyard that the tears she had held back all the way finally fell.
Xie Wanning had never cried like this before.
Curled up, tears streaming down her face, yet without making a sound.
Er Qing cried heartbrokenly. “If Master and Madam knew of the grievances Young Lady has suffered…”
Hearing of her father and mother, Xie Wanning’s eyelashes trembled, a string of teardrops sliding down.
“How could I be so stupid…”
How could she believe him time and again, be deceived by him time and again.
He had not even done anything, just given her an extra smile when in a good mood, and she foolishly offered up her true heart, letting him knead and flatten it, letting him trample it.
And Lu Ziyan, who had always stayed by her side, had also reddened his eyes.
He did not know what state he was in now. If it was a soul state, then it was his soul in pain.
He doubled over in pain, reaching out to hug the weeping young lady on the couch, yet it was all in vain.
A desire to destroy rushed straight to his head. If he could, Lu Ziyan wished to destroy everything before his eyes.
Everyone die.
But he could do nothing; he could only watch helplessly.
Watch as the young lady he wished to cherish in his hands slowly lost heart toward him bit by bit, rapidly withering in this vast estate.
The matter of her intruding into the front courtyard study became known to several Madams of the Lu Family.
The next day, Old Madam Lu specially sent someone to summon her for morning greetings.
The Lu Family was a military general prominent family with not many rules.
The morning and evening greetings of great clans, the various rules set by mothers-in-law for new daughters-in-law—Xie Wanning had not experienced any of them.
Instead, because Lu Ziyan had taken in a concubine shortly after their new marriage, and later the concubine became pregnant first and was raised to main wife, through a series of such actions, the several Lu Family madams felt deeply guilty and were especially lenient toward Xie Wanning.
This was the first time Xie Wanning had been reprimanded since marrying into the Lu Residence.
On the second day after she went to the study to find Lu Ziyan to no avail.
In the inner hall, the three Lu Family madams were all present. Liu Manrou, as Young Madam of the Second Wife, was also there, along with Lu Xiyao, the Lu Family’s eldest young lady.
In addition, several collateral madams of the Lu Family were sitting by.
Under everyone’s gaze, Xie Wanning kowtowed to Old Madam Lu to pay respects, and for a long time was not told to rise.
It was a collateral madam who spoke up to remind, before Old Madam Lu feigned realization. After telling her to rise, she did not invite her to sit.
The old lady narrowed her eyes, looking at the granddaughter-in-law standing gracefully, and said indifferently, “You are not unaware of the Lu Family rules. It’s nearly two years since you married into the estate, yet you still act so recklessly?”
The hall instantly fell silent.
Seeing Old Madam Lu’s displeasure toward this granddaughter-in-law and intending to reprimand her, everyone’s expressions became subtly varied.
Some raised their brows slightly, as if enjoying the show.
Some covered their lips in barely concealed delight, pretending to stifle laughter.
Others propped their chins, openly looking toward Xie Wanning being publicly reprimanded by the elder.
The person involved stood ramrod straight, her posture steady. Only Lu Ziyan by her side could see her hands trembling slightly inside her sleeves.
Old Madam Lu was still speaking.
“The Xie Clan is a century-old marquis family, with poetry and books as its heritage. The daughters it raises should not be rule-breaking. You ignored Lu Residence rules and intruded into the front courtyard where men conduct official business. Do you know your wrong?”
All color drained from Xie Wanning’s face, her lips trembled, but she said nothing.
Being questioned so publicly was humiliation enough.
No one spoke up for her. Even First Madam Lu, who had always claimed to regard her as her own daughter, said nothing.
Lu Xiyao, with whom she had reconciled, watched her with keen interest, her eyes full of undisguised malice.
Liu Manrou covered her lips with a handkerchief and fake-smiled. “Grandmother, do not be angry. Perhaps Eldest Sister has not seen the young master for too long and could not hold back for a moment. It is understandable.”
“You still speak for her,” Old Madam Lu said indifferently. “She entered the estate before you. Now Pei Ge’er is nearly a year old, yet she has not conceived once.”
Xie Wanning had been in the Lu Residence nearly two years without offspring, and the several Lu Family madams had long had words about it.
This time they seized her mistake to suppress her.
So what if of noble lady birth? Childless was the gravest sin for a woman.
But the Xie Family name stood there, and Xie Wanning’s father and brother had renown in the imperial court. Not everyone dared to watch the Xie Family daughter’s joke.
Old Madam Lu wanted to reprimand her daughter-in-law on the spot, but the other collateral madams dared not watch further.
They all spoke up to take leave.
Xie Wanning stood in the courtyard braving the late autumn chill for two hours, serving Old Madam Lu her midday meal before returning to Shao Guang Courtyard.
That very night she developed a fever and burned in a daze for three days without improvement.
Lu Ziyan kept vigil bedside. In his soul state, he did not even need sleep, watching the young lady on the couch unblinkingly.
The estate doctor came to check, prescribing one dose of medicine after another. She finally awoke at dawn on the fourth day.
The first thing upon waking was to remove the jade bracelet from her wrist.
She forced herself out of bed and personally wrote a letter, instructing Er Qing to deliver it to Xie Yanyu.
Er Qing ground ink beside her and, seeing the contents of the letter, burst into tears.
Xie Wanning dried the ink, saw her appearance, and smiled faintly. “Don’t cry. It is I who am unfilial, causing family to worry for me even after marriage.”
“It is good to have no child,” she coughed softly a few times before continuing. “Think about it: if I had a daughter who, like me, was so spineless for a man, that would truly break one’s heart.”
Lu Ziyan nearby had bloodshot eyes, staring deathly at the words ‘divorce’ on the letter in her hand, as if weeping blood.
But hearing her words, his reddened eyes trembled slightly.
Yes, if they had a daughter who suffered such hardship after marriage…
Lu Ziyan hated his own powerlessness, hated everything in this world.
She had such dreams too, had she not?
Or was all this her personal experience.
So, she no longer wanted him.
She wanted to divorce this world’s him. Even if everything started over, she would not repeat the mistakes.
The letter was brought back intact by Er Qing.
Xie Yanyu had been sent by the Emperor to investigate a case in South City a few days prior and left in a hurry without sending word to his sister at Wuyuan Marquis’s Estate. He might not return until before the New Year.
Xie Wanning took the letter and burned it under candlelight, without writing another to her parents.
Compared to her aging parents, she preferred to consult her elder brother first.
Her Elder Brother was steadier and more sensible than her, loved and protected her, and would think of ways for her.
It was now deep autumn, with not many days until the New Year.
She had endured two years; what were a few more days.
She thought, once Elder Brother returned to the capital, everything would be fine.
But she fell ill.
What was just an ordinary cold lingered without full recovery. She lacked energy, lay sickly on the sickbed day after day, with incessant coughing.
The estate doctor checked several times. Nourishing medicines were taken, her spirits improved for a few days, but relapsed after stopping.
She had quietly coughed blood a few times hiding from Er Qing, scaring Lu Ziyan beside her nearly out of his wits.
But he was powerless to stop anything.
The scene flashed to the day of Liu Manrou’s eldest son’s first birthday.
Er Qing worried over her master’s body not improving and, taking advantage of the lively crowd in the front courtyard, secretly fetched a doctor from outside to diagnose her pulse.
When the diagnosis ‘internal stagnation, spiritual injury leading to short life’ came out, the despair was not limited to Er Qing alone.
