In January of the first year of Qianfeng, Shengjia led thousands of guards of honor, sent from Fenggao.
Fenggao Palace fell into a quiet and long deep winter.
The door of the side courtyard was closed all day long, and only the little medical girl with a medicine bowl came in and out occasionally, leaving a series of winding and slender footprints in the snow, which was soon covered by the wind and snow.
Ming Chongyan came every three days to diagnose the pulse and prescribe prescriptions to check the situation. The time of stay became shorter and shorter, which showed that Xie Yun had passed the most dangerous period.
Occasionally, when Ming Chongyan left, he would see Shan Chao sitting on a ginkgo tree branch outside the courtyard, repeatedly wiping Longyuan's three-foot green tip. He used silk cloth soaked in ice and snow. From Ming Chongyan's bottom-up perspective, he could occasionally glimpse a string of ebony beads on his wrist, pressed one by one on a dark red ribbon.
Once Ming Chongyan stood still, raised his head and said, "Hello!"
Shan Chao stopped.
"Aren't you going in?"
"..."
"Go in and have a look?" Ming Chongyan gestured towards the courtyard: "I'm already awake, sitting alone!"
However, Shan Chao was stunned for a moment, and Fu turned the blade over again, and continued to wipe with his head buried in it, as if he hadn't heard anything.
Ming Chongyan let out a long sigh, white steam curled up from his lips, and disappeared in the wind wrapped in fine snow in an instant.
Sometimes when Shan is overjoyed, he will find a bamboo flute to play, babbling and babbling for a long time, often out of tune. There are very few people in the palace now, except for the occasional rustling sound of the palace people sweeping the snow, and the distant and empty echoes in the middle of the night, the only thing that can be heard in the palace is the intermittent bamboo flute.
One late night, Xie Yun was blowing out the candles and was sitting by the couch when suddenly the sound of the flute outside stopped. He thought that Shan Chao was gone, but unexpectedly, the bamboo flute rang again after a while, and changed the usual tone, becoming vigorous, desolate and coherent, vaguely like a tune passed down by horse herdsmen in the northern desert.
Xie Yunyi listened for a long time by the window, put on his clothes and lay down on the bed, and opened the door.
Shan Chao sat on a tall tree branch outside the courtyard gate, and suddenly raised his head when he heard the movement.
The courtyard suddenly returned to silence, the snow under the eaves and porch shrouded in moon veils, and a cold gleam appeared on the bluestone pillars; it took a long time to hear Shan Chao muttering: "Did you bother?"
Xie Yun didn't answer.
"..." Shan Chao finally moved after a long time, and said in a low voice, "...I'm leaving now."
When he got up, a cloud of snow fell off his shoulders, and he was about to turn around when he suddenly heard Xie Yun say from behind: "You don't have to do this."
Shan Chao stopped, thinking for a moment that something was wrong with his ears, and then a trembling electric current rushed to the limbs along the blood.
"You..." He turned back hesitantly: "What did you say?"
"You don't have to do this," Xie Yun repeated, without changing his flat tone: "In the martial arts arena, everyone depends on life and death. Swords have no eyes, so don't mind."
This was their first conversation in this long and harsh winter. Shan Chao opened his mouth, but it was difficult to make a sound in his throat. After a while, he said with difficulty: "But I don't want to hurt you..."
Xie Yun asked: "Why?"
Shan Chao jumped to the ground, stepping on the thick snow, making a slight creaking sound.
Xie Yun was standing on the porch, and Shan Chao was standing in the courtyard. The distance between the two was no more than ten steps, but it seemed that they were separated by the ends of the earth. Shan Chao took a few deep breaths, feeling that his lungs seemed to be filled with knife-like icy air, the pain made him lucid, with a kind of masochistic and almost cruel calmness.
"...because I love you," he said hoarsely.
"Qingqing Zijin, take a long time in my heart. If I don't see you for a day, it's like March..."
The wind suddenly picked up, and the smoky snow-like pieces of snow lifted the skirt and sleeves of the robe, revealing the hair band wrapped around Shan Chao's wrist with fluttering ends.
"...Qingqing Zijin," Xie Yun read without any meaning.
Each syllable of these four short words is so long, as if it has soaked between the lips and teeth for a long time before drifting away with the wind, and then he seemed to suddenly become interested, and asked, "Do you know what this poem means?"
"..."
"Qingqingzijin, leisurely my heart; Qingqingzipei, leisurely I think. Zijin is the robe of a scholar, and Zipei is a ribbon worn by a man; some people say that Zheng Guo was in chaos and did not repair schools, scholars scattered, or went to or Therefore, Chen Qi said that those who stay hate those who leave, and it is a poem for students to miss their classmates; but I don’t think that’s the case.”
"This is clearly a love poem. This man is full of admiration and courtship towards his classmate."
Shan Chao's Adam's apple suddenly slipped.
He clenched his fists tightly, and his extremely short nails dug deep into the flesh of his palm.
"—Then," Xie Yun said slowly: "What kind of thoughts do you have for your love for your teacher?"
Shan Chao trembled and opened his mouth. Although he tried his best to suppress it, there was still a rapid and broken gasp in his voice: "It's...that poem where the man woos his classmate..."
"I want you to be my wife..."
Xie Yun closed his eyes.
The stars in the snowy night are extraordinarily bright, sprinkled on the Milky Way in the Nine Heavens, roaring towards the ancient and quiet distance. They are so far away facing each other under the starlight in the sky, as if time and space have been pulled away, and they have become silent silhouettes of each other.
"Impossible," Xie Yun said softly after a long time.
He turned around, gently pushed open the door, and disappeared into the red walls and blue tiles of the palace.
·
Winter passed day by day, and the snow fell and stopped. On the day when the ice broke in spring, Xie Yun went to a peach tree in a corner of the courtyard to break off a flowering branch, put it in a white jade vase, and put it on the corner of the window.
In March of the first year of Qianfeng, Shengjia arrived in Beijing and sealed the officials.
Empress Wu gave spring clothes from the capital to the commander of the Imperial Army, and sent them to Fenggao Palace on a fast ride of eight hundred miles. The accompanying eunuch also brought a simple and clear imperial decree: the single imperial guard has meritorious service in the Martial Arts Conference, and rewards the noble mansion, gold and silver maids, There must be no mistake in ordering him to return to Beijing immediately to accept his real job.
Shan Chao took the bright yellow hand letter to the side hall, Xie Yun was changing the water for the peach branches by the window, his snow-white fingertips lightly pressed against the mouth of the white jade bottle of suet, the peach branches suddenly floated down several petals, and landed on the boxwood window lattice superior.
"Understood." He said lightly: "Then go."
The wound on the side of his heart had healed, but Shan Chao knew that there should be scars running through the bottom of his clothes. The sword dragon Yuan Senhan's cold energy hurt Xie Yun's heart, coupled with the forced opening of the seal, his foundation was extremely damaged. In the beginning of spring, he still couldn't take off the thick winter fox fur, and his face was obviously pale and cold.
Before the beginning of spring, his injuries actually recurred for a while. One night, he suddenly had a high fever, and his body convulsed, causing the wound to burst and ooze blood. Ming Chongyan made people burn the earth dragon like a furnace, and called Shan Chao to wipe Xie Yun's whole body with spirits over and over again. They fought wildly until dawn, and managed to suppress the rising body temperature.
Afterwards, Xie Yun fell into a coma for several days with intermittent high fever, and it was difficult to drink water. After waking up, it was obvious that his whole body was not in the right mood.
But he didn't ask how his health was, and Ming Chongyan didn't say anything either. At Xie Yun's age, he is no longer a vigorous young man in his early twenties. Once the foundation of his body is worn out, it is extremely difficult to recover; after this severe winter, he does not know that he will have to take care of him for a few more years before he can barely recover to his original state. state.
He put the peach branch back into the white jade vase, and went to the other window to pour water into the pink glass jar with the white magnolia in it. The magnolia branch was completely withered, and as soon as it was taken out of the jar, it suddenly dropped yellow petals all over the ground.
Xie Yun shook his head, casually threw the bare flower branch into the glass jar, raised his eyes and asked, "What are you still doing here?"
Shan Chao fell silent.
It's cold outside, but inside it's warm enough to wear only unlined clothing. Xie Yun was standing in front of the window wearing a fur coat, Tai'a Jian was casually thrown behind a table not far away, one side of his temple hair slipped from his casually tied hair and fell down on the side of his neck.
"... When are you going back to Chang'an?" Shan Chao asked without looking away.
Xie Yun lazily said: "Let's see."
—According to Xie Yun's personality that likes to play power, it is not easy to hold back until the beginning of spring. When the weather gets warmer, he will definitely set off and return to Beijing immediately, returning to the highest point of power at the top of the empire.
Shan Chao stretched out his hand, as if he wanted to brush Xie Yun's hair on the side of his neck behind his ear, but with a snap, Xie Yun raised his hand to block it.
The two of them looked at each other for a moment, Shan Chao suddenly turned around, opened the door and strode out.
It's like a defeated army retreating helplessly.
·
If time flowed in such a heavy and peaceful way, then everything that happened in Fenggao Palace in the deep winter of that year would be silently lost in the flying years along with the melting snow.
However, neither Shan Chao nor Xie Yun expected that another accident would suddenly change the stalemate of the whole matter.
——It was late at night two days later, Shan Chao suddenly woke up from his sleep without warning, feeling flustered for no reason. He glanced at the head of the bed, Qixing Longyuan was buzzing and trembling in the scabbard, as if he was also extremely disturbed, as if something was happening.
Shan Chao's chest rose and fell for a moment, then suddenly turned over and lay down, grabbed the long sword and pushed out the window.
The moment he jumped up, he stretched out his hand, and picked up the magnolia branch that he deliberately folded back in the evening and put it in the water bottle.
The palace was empty and quiet in the middle of the night, and in the night, only the slight rustling sound of Qinggong passing over the treetops could be heard. It was not enough time for a cup of tea, and Shan Chao had already arrived outside the gate of the side hall. From a distance, the lights were dim, but the gate of the courtyard was half open.
Suspicion flashed across his mind, and he couldn't help but stop.
At this moment, the window of the side hall was opened from the inside, and then several black shadows jumped out of the sky, Shan Chao's pupils suddenly constricted—
Among them was a black shadow with a person in his arms, sleepy and not moving, it was Xie Yun!