Yunchu’s Vengeance - Chapter 228
Chapter 228 - The Prince of Pingxi Is Injured
Seasonal night grew deeper and darker.
Yun Chu was consistently unable to fall asleep. She simply draped a garment over her shoulders and got up, picking up a book in the main hall to read.
Reading made her somewhat sleepy, leaving her mind feeling groogy and hazy.
She simply asked her maidservant to bring out the account books and began examining them intently, growing more and more alert as she read.
Meanwhile, the hour grew later and later. Soon, midnight had passed, and even the hour after midnight was almost drawing to a close.
The anxiety in her heart grew heavier and heavier.
She had thought that in this lifetime, apart from worrying about the Yun family and the two children, she would never care about anyone else ever again.
Yet because of a single person, she was finding it difficult to fall asleep.
She reasoned it was likely because she feared Yu'er and Changsheng would lose their father and be heartbroken—just like when they were without a mother in the beginning...
"Miss, there is activity next door!"
As soon as Ting Xue heard a sound, she hurried over to report.
Yun Chu set down the account book, stood up, and walked over to the doorway connecting the compounds. Soon, she heard the door of the adjacent courtyard being opened.
She saw two guards hastily carrying a stretcher into the inner chamber. The person on the stretcher was none other than the children's father, the Prince of Pingxi.
Her heart couldn't help but contract tightly.
She restrained herself and waited until only a few loyal servants were left inside to attend to him before she finally stepped through and walked over.
"Miss Yun."
Seeing her walk over, Chief Steward Cheng hastily bowed in greeting.
Before Yun Chu even had time to ask anything, Chu Yi's voice came from the inner chamber: "Chief Steward Cheng, who has arrived?"
Why did it seem as though he had heard Miss Yun's name?
Though this doorway had been open for so many days, apart from the day of the move when Yun Chu had come to his courtyard once, she had never set foot here again.
Moreover, at this hour, long past midnight, she and the two children should have been sound asleep long ago. How could she possibly have come to his quarters?
Chu Yi thought to himself that it was likely a delusion brought on by the medication he had taken just now.
"It is I."
A clear woman's voice sounded from outside.
Chu Yi sat straight up on the bed abruptly, but inadvertently pulled at his wound, gasping sharply from the pain.
Chief Steward Cheng felt anxious in his heart and directly pushed open the bedroom door.
Yun Chu saw Chu Yi lying on the couch just like that.
The man's upper body was bare of clothing, his chest wrapped in layer upon layer of gauze. The white cloth that had just been wrapped around him was already stained a bright crimson red.
She immediately pulled back her gaze, turned her body away, and inquired, "Is Your Highness alright?"
"It is nothing major." Chu Yi forced himself to sit up. "I have troubled Miss Yun to worry."
Chief Steward Cheng hurriedly supported him, saying, "Your Highness, the imperial physician said you cannot sit up. Quickly lie back down, do not let the wound tear open..."
"It does not matter."
Chu Yi sat up straight coldly.
He felt that he was truly somewhat disgraceful. If he wasn't getting beaten with planks, he was getting slapped on the face, and now he had even been stabbed by a bandit.
Yun Chu would surely think he was a useless man.
"Miss Yun, please persuade His Highness." Chief Steward Cheng's beard had almost turned white from worry. "The imperial physician said it was only a tiny fraction away from piercing his heart. If he does not lie down properly, his chest will ache in the future..."
Yun Chu felt a surge of alarm and fright in her heart. She immediately said, "Your Highness, you had best listen to the imperial physician. Rest well and recover early, otherwise Yu'er and Changsheng will be worried."
Her voice made it so that Chu Yi couldn't summon the slightest thought of resistance at all.
He lay back down exceedingly obediently.
"There is still a bowl of medicine here that His Highness was unwilling to drink just now." Chief Steward Cheng picked up a bowl of pitch-black medicinal broth sitting on a low table and handed it to Yun Chu. "This is medicine to ease the pain of the wound. His Highness deemed it unnecessary. Miss Yun, please persuade him a bit. This old servant must go to the front courtyard to check on Cheng Xu. That boy's injuries are not light either, and there is no one to care for him..."
As Chief Steward Cheng spoke, he left immediately, even thoughtfully closing the courtyard door behind him.
Yun Chu gazed at the medicinal bowl in her hand. After a moment's pause, she slowly turned her body, raised her head, and stepped onto the stairs with a composed expression, entering the room.
She handed the medicinal bowl over: "Since Your Highness is injured, you ought to rest properly. Drinking this medicine will allow you to fall asleep earlier."
Chu Yi braced his hands against the bed, intending to sit up.
Yun Chu frowned: "The imperial physician said you cannot sit up."
Chu Yi looked at her and said, "If I do not sit up, how am I to drink the medicine?"
Lying down meant he could only be fed by someone else.
There was only Yun Chu here... certain things were beyond what he dared to dream.
If he simply tilted his head back, he could drink it down himself, which wouldn't actually affect much.
He continued to sit up with difficulty.
Yun Chu: "..."
After a brief internal struggle, she sat down on a small stool beside the bed.
First, this courtyard shared a doorway with hers, and there were only a few servants who could come here to attend to him, none of whom could come at the moment.
Second, this was the children's father; she couldn't stand by and watch the children's father suffer with her eyes open.
Finally, he had suffered such a severe injury for the sake of protecting the common people. Someone with the common folk in his heart was worthy of respect. Feeding him medicine was nothing more than a simple act.
After constructing such a series of psychological justifications, she felt it was no longer a big deal.
Yun Chu scooped up a spoonful of the pitch-black medicinal broth with a spoon. Fortunately, the medicine was not hot and did not need blowing on, or else she truly might have felt somewhat unable to hold her composure.
She held the spoon to the man's lips.
Chu Yi was completely dazed.
If not for the pain on his body reminding him, he truly would have thought he was in a wonderful dream.
"Your Highness, open your mouth."
Yun Chu reminded him.
Chu Yi suddenly snapped back to his senses, opened his mouth, and drank the medicinal broth down.
It was a very bitter medicine.
Yet for some unknown reason, he tasted a sense of sweetness in it.
His gaze moved to rest upon Yun Chu.
In the candlelight, her entire being appeared all the more gentle, making one unable to resist wanting to draw closer.
He gazed at Yun Chu without the slightest reservation like this.
Yun Chu felt increasingly uncomfortable.
Although she had long been a married woman, to tell the truth, she and Xie Jingyu had never been this intimate.
On the contrary...
Yun Chu inexplicably recalled that night five years ago.
Although she couldn't remember anything clearly, she still had a vague sensation...
She immediately bit her tongue.
She was truly going mad; at a time like this, how could she think of such a thing?
"Your Highness, the last mouthful."
After feeding him the medicine, Yun Chu let out a heavy sigh of relief, set down the medicinal bowl, and stood up.
Chu Yi was reluctant to let her leave.
Yet he had no reason to keep her behind.
Yun Chu gently pulled the door shut, turned around, and departed.
Just as she left, Chief Steward Cheng returned. He walked inside and said in a low voice, "Your Highness, when Miss Yun and the two young masters went to the hot spring manor today, they ran into a bit of trouble..."
A murderous aura surfaced between Chu Yi's brows.
A night of north wind blew up. When she woke up the next morning, Yun Chu truly felt that winter had arrived.
She hurriedly had someone bring out thicker clothing for the two children to put on.
Chu Hongyu disliked that the clothes were too thick and inconvenient for running and jumping about, twisting his body constantly and refusing to wear them.
With great difficulty, the little fellow was finally settled. Once he was escorted to the doorway on the other side, someone naturally accompanied him to the Imperial Academy to study.
Once Yun Chu had also tidied up her young daughter neatly, she finally learned why the Prince of Pingxi had suffered such a severe injury last night.
Qiu Tong reported: "Not long after Your Highness took command of the Yun Family Army, the Emperor took away eight thousand elite bandit-suppression troops. Thus, for this encirclement and suppression of the bandit king, His Highness only took Master Cheng along. It was the two of them who captured the bandit king Yang Hedong alive."
Yun Chu knew that after the Yun Family Army returned to the court, their duty was to guard the imperial city, awaiting dispatch at any time, and they could not be assigned elsewhere.
Therefore, even if the Prince of Pingxi had taken command of the three thousand Yun Family Army soldiers, without an imperial decree from the Emperor, the Yun Family Army could not follow him to suppress bandits.
And after the Prince of Pingxi moved out of the Prince's Manor, he had also sent several hundred manor guards back to the imperial palace, truly becoming a prince in name only, with only Cheng Xu remaining by his side.
The bandit king, Yang Hedong, relying on eighteen subordinates, had become a fierce bandit famous across the north and south of the river. She found it somewhat hard to believe—did the Prince of Pingxi truly dare to go suppress bandits with only Cheng Xu at his side?
That this man could return alive with his life intact could only be said to be the protection of the royal ancestors.