Chapter 3: A Bow to the River

In the morning of the second day, the light of day has not yet arrived, the mist drifting in the depression, last night’s moon has been moved to the opposite side of the square field above, the Fan House of several carriages did not alarm anyone in the field, to the direction of Kyoto to drive, behind the door of the small courtyard, Fuji Zi Jing crutches and his wife stood leaning against the door to send each other off, the two beside the little girl is rubbing her eyes, does not seem to be awake.

Car again to the Kyoto city gates, but this time is different from the day of arrival, the Fan House carriage on the marking of the eye-catching, just opened the gates of the city patrol officers and soldiers a little inspection, and then let a few carriages into the city. After all, Jiao Ziheng, the former chief of the city patrol division, is because of the assassination of the eldest son of the Fan family, was taken away from his post, and nowadays the officials and soldiers of the city patrol division look at the round and square markings on the carriages of the Fan family and avoid it, which dares to make things difficult for them.

The car to the Fan House, Fan Si Zhe yawned out of the car, to welcome up the subordinate commanded: “The car has wax goods, first get to the back of the collection, can not steal food, that is the big brother prepared for the favor!” Then a glare roared: “If tomorrow the Lin family sister to eat suede found suede only three legs, beware of my hands to your legs hack a payback!” The subordinates have long been accustomed to this young master’s overbearing temper, how dare they squeak, and honestly unloaded the mountain goods from the car.

The guards also came down from the back of the carriage, Wang Qinian walked to the side of the carriage, waiting for Fan Xian to come down, but unexpectedly after half a day, he found that there was no movement in the car, and opened the curtains to take a look, but he was shocked, only to see that the carriage was empty, and Fan Xian and Fan Ruo Ruo didn’t know where they had gone. He hurriedly ran behind Fan Si Zhe and asked, “Young Duke, may I ask where Lord Fan is?”

Fan Si Zhe looked back at him twice and lectured, “Look at your nervous energy, my brother and sister got off the bus on the way, probably went on a picnic, don’t like to see you guys following around all the time.”

Wang Qinian scared half to death, this time to return to the Supervisory Yuan all thanks to this Lord Fan, Chen Pingping Dean personally received his own, but also a thousand instructions must ensure that Lord Fan’s personal safety, can not be out of sight, where do you think Lord Fan out of the city a trip, but secretly will be their own line of people left behind. Fan Si Zhe looked at his nervous expression and said with a frown, “He said he would be back in the afternoon. You guys don’t need to be too nervous.” He actually didn’t know the true identity of Wang Qinian’s men, and at first thought that they were the experts that his father had sent to Fan Xian, but then he vaguely sensed that something was wrong, but he didn’t bother to think deeper.

Wang Qinian also no longer pay attention to the second son, to the subordinate made a wink, then got into the carriage, to the outside of the city.

The summer is so hot that even the sound of cicadas is a little breathless. Fan Xian led Ruo Ruo for a walk along the banks of the Liujing River on the outskirts of the capital. The good thing was that it was early in the day, and there were always green trees along the river, so it was still bearable. Fan Xian at this time has long been unbuttoned lapel, revealing a large area of skin in front of the chest, but Ruoruo did not have this kind of welfare, so she had to take a good handkerchief to fan the wind. Fan Xian saw her hard work and with a slight smile took the handkerchief and soaked it in the flowing crystal river before handing it to her to let her cool down.

“Do you know why this river is called the Flowing Crystal River?”

“According to the records of the capital, this name should have existed before this dynasty, it seems to say that the river traveled around Kyoto and entered the Cangshan Mountains in the west, the terrain had ups and downs from time to time, and some places flowed extremely fast, while some places were as quiet and incomparable as a mirror, and also looked like static crystals in general, so it got the name of Liujing River.”

Fan Xian nodded, thinking of a certain calm section of the river beside him, sometimes there was a flower boat swimming on it, then thought of that Si Li Li girl who was still locked up in the Heavenly Prison, and didn’t know what would be the final result of welcoming that woman. And walked a cut, finally can see far across the river bank among the green trees, hidden a residential, is a fresh and elegant small courtyard, the courtyard wall at the outstretched a few branches of bamboo, to the sky and stand, in this hot summer, actually exudes a child proudly standing in the world of the cold air.

“That’s the Taiping Special Courtyard?” Fan Xian frowned and asked softly.

Fan Ruo Ruo responded, “Yes, I heard that many years ago, the master of the Ye family lived here, and later, when the Ye family’s properties were returned to the inner treasury, this courtyard became the royal courtyard, but from time to time, when I chatted with Roujia, I hadn’t heard of any of the Empresses who had come to live here.”

Fan Xian gave a hmmm and nodded, suddenly a smile blossomed on his face, so this was the place where mom used to work and fight and live. Seeing the smile on her brother’s face, Ruo Ruo was somehow in a very happy mood and asked, “What’s so happy?” Fan Xian handful of some sweaty fingertips, shook his head, did not say anything, he brought his sister here today, already an extremely bold thing, although what he saw when he entered the capital, the Ye family does not seem to be such a big taboo, but since his father and Wuzhu are that cautious, he himself is still a little more careful, for the time being, did not say anything.

He specifically came here today to take a look, mainly because he wanted to enter this courtyard to pay his respects, but since it has become the palace’s aliyah, it is naturally inconvenient to go. It was just that not knowing where exactly his mother’s grave was made him feel a little bad.

After coming to this world, he hadn’t met the woman who gave birth to this shell of his, but for no reason in his heart he recognized her as his mother. Maybe it was because in his previous life, his parents died early and left nothing behind, so it was too late for him to develop an attachment to his mother, but when he came to the Kingdom of Qing, no matter whether it was the escape at the beginning of his rebirth, or all the things that happened in Tanyuzhou, as well as the wonderful encounters he had after he came to the capital, all of them seemed to indicate the strength, power, and some kind of determination that that woman once had, and were reminding him that his mother was that woman! The woman called Ye Qingmei.

Ye Qingmei, who looked down on the world’s eyebrows.

Fan Xian even had a doubt, could it be that his mother was not dead at all, but was hiding in a corner, with a gentle but cold smile, silently watching his every move in this world, every struggle and every relief.

But Sinanbo interrupted all these fantasies in an extremely cold-blooded manner, and said that his mother’s grave was in an extremely hidden place in Kyoto, and that if the time was ripe, he would naturally be allowed to pay his respects.

Fan Xian sighed, knelt down, and kowtowed to that small courtyard on the other side of the river. Fan Ruo Ruo was slightly stunned, not understanding what her elder brother meant by this, but as icy smart as she was, she instantly guessed something, and could not help but turn slightly white with fear, but immediately but forcefully composed herself, kneeling down along with Fan Xian, and bowing down to the other side of the river.

There was a green tree to hide the scene, so even if there were people on the other bank, it must have been difficult to see that a pair of icy walled people were kneeling on the ground, worshipping from afar to this side, which was a somewhat interesting scene.

Fan Xian was a bit surprised, pulling her small hand to stand up, warmly asking, “Why kneel with me?”

Ruo Ruo forced a smile, “What should I call? Call auntie?”

Fan Xian smiled and said, “I know you can guess, I didn’t want to avoid you when I brought you here today, but it’s really a bitter thing when you only know some things and can’t talk about them outside.”

Fan Ruo Ruo sighed, “No wonder when I was little, my brother always lived in Tanyuzhou.”

Fan Xian said, “I only know that my mother is the one from the Ye family, didn’t you hear father or Aunt Liu mention this when you were young?”

Fan Ruo Ruo thought about it and shook her head helplessly. Fan Xian sighed, guessing that it was probably because the palace was disgusted with the Ye family having a descendant inside, which is why father had been hiding this matter, but …… with the court’s ability, if Sinanbo had been involved with the Ye family’s mistress in the first place, how could such a relationship have escaped the palace’s watchful eye? Unless the Supervisory Yuan had been hiding it for his father, but even if Chen Pingping respected his mother and wanted to preserve this little life of his, he should not have the ability to hide this matter in the slightest.

All kinds of incomprehension surged to his heart, making him unusually irritated. It was fine to be a motherless child, but to start suspecting that other part of himself, this mental trend was really quite unpleasant.

The two of them didn’t dare to get too close to the courtyard, and walked through the forest to the official road, following the road in the direction of Kyoto, ready to walk farther to find a stagecoach store and ask the second to pull a carriage over. After walking for a short while, he realized that there was a small path on the official road leading to the left hand direction, and every other step there was a side of green stone hidden in the grass, with moss on it, extremely difficult to find, it looked quite chic, and it should be seldom walked on.

Fan Xian’s eyesight was very good, he could see a small wooden bridge at the end of the path, and thought that it was leading to that Taiping Special Courtyard, he couldn’t help but sigh inwardly, forcibly turned his gaze, smiled and said, “The handkerchief is already dry, will it be too hot?”

Fan Ruo Ruo’s brows always had a coldness that seemed to melt away, but in front of Fan Xian there was no such feeling, at this time beads of sweat seeped out from between the green silk at the corners of her forehead, slowly dripping onto the slightly red cheeks, adding a flat point of luster, but making Fan Xian slightly stunned for a moment. She softly replied that she was fine, and then she and her elder brother continued to walk forward.

Not too far away, came to a tea store, store all built by green bamboo, through the wind and light is very cool, Fan Xian at first sight heart happy, pulling his sister’s hand will break into, shouted: “to two cups of tea.”

Answer him is a piece of the silence, not many people in the tea store, the most in the table stood beside a middle-aged man, heard Fan Xian’s voice slowly turned back, this person’s eyes are deep-set, the nose is like an eagle hook, although it is full of shadowy gas, but today it seems to be strong since the convergence of the. The middle-aged man looked at Fan Xian with a very unfavorable expression, as if he had seen a certain white rabbit.

Fan Xian was shocked, recognizing that the other party was none other than the leader of the guards who had exchanged palms with him outside the Temple of Celebration, shocking him to the point of vomiting blood, Lord Gong Dian. Wang Qinian had been kicked out of the Supervisory Court because the other party had been trying to work hard to catch himself!