Mrs. Yuan originally intended to stay, but Yun Jinnian insisted.
"If you need anything, just call the nanny," she said.
Mrs. Yuan carefully exited the room, closed the door,
and Yun Jinnian slowly sat up, kneading the quilt.
Everything about today’s strategic suffering was calculated; after today, she thought, there should be no one daring to trample upon her at will.
After all, making a spectacle would do no one any good.
This much was evident from today’s events.
Alone, Yun Jinnian quietly contemplated, and without reason, her thoughts wandered to Momo from her dreams.
That child who couldn’t speak, who had no thoughts of his own.
But in the beginning, the child wasn’t like that.
He was lively and cheerful, intelligent and sensible; it was only after too many things had happened that Momo changed.
Was he frightened into silence?
Yun Jinnian massaged her temples.
She didn’t want to live as suffocatingly, as devoid of dignity as she did in her dreams.
A figure slipped into the room, soundlessly; Yun Jinnian didn’t notice at all.
Under the dim yellow glow of the oil lamp,
Chu Yu approached the bedside step by step, and upon seeing Yun Jinnian’s pale face with transparent ointment on her forehead, the injury was clearly visible.
"Having not seen you for just a day, how did you manage to torment yourself !" Chu Yu spoke.
Yun Jinnian suddenly looked up, towards Chu Yu who was very close.
She was momentarily stunned, then composed herself, "When did you get here?"
"I’ve been here for a while, watching you. But honestly, you don’t look like a ten-year-old at all!" said Chu Yu, sitting down beside the bed.
He took out a handkerchief from his embrace and gently wiped Yun Jinnian’s forehead.
Yun Jinnian didn’t struggle, just watched him indifferently.
After cleaning the ointment off her forehead, he applied the ointment he brought, "Well, apply it three times a day, avoid getting it wet, and in three days the wound will heal, and in half a month it will be completely healed, without even a scar left. Of course, you must avoid certain foods!"
"Why are you so good to me?" Yun Jinnian asked.
He said she didn’t look like a ten-year-old, but what about him?
He didn’t seem like the him from her dreams, not so cold-hearted, not so ruthless.
"Because I’m still waiting for you to cure the poison!"
That reason was a good one.
Yun Jinnian believed him.
"Let’s wait until after the New Year; after that, I will request to go to Yingci’an!"
"Why choose Yingci’an out of all the temples? It’s so small there, and there are only a few nuns, plus it’s an austere life!"
"It’s peaceful there!"
That was just one reason; another was that the abbess of Yingci’an, Hui Ling, was an Imperial Physician with profound medical skills who had traveled throughout the Great Chu Country. If she could receive guidance from her, or accompany her on travels, her own medical skills would undoubtedly make great progress.
"Oh, then I’ll immediately have a thatched cottage built next to Yingci’an, and I’ll trouble you at that time!"
Chu Yu did not leave.
Instead, he sat at the edge of the bed.
Yun Jinnian was young and had never been taught about the propriety between men and women; in the dreams, her encounters with men were limited, and she didn’t understand why she suddenly lost Chu Liange’s heart.
She didn’t send Chu Yu away; the two of them just sat and leaned there, each lost in their thoughts.
Outside the window, the snow fell heavier and heavier.
In the courtyard, on the rooftops, it was already piled very deep.
After a long while, Chu Yu finally asked, "What happened today?"
"Nothing much, just being wronged and then punished a bit!" she said nonchalantly, indifferently.
Because everything was within her calculations.
"Why didn’t you cry?"
Upon hearing this, Yun Jinnian looked at Chu Yu in surprise and after a long while, spoke faintly, "I’ve already cried; why should I cry again?"