In a daze, Jin Yang seemed to hear the voice of the queen mother talking to the imperial doctor, but he was unable to open his eyes and could not see the face of the queen mother.
Before he fell asleep again, he heard a clear voice comforting the queen mother, and he didn't know which girl it was...
When he opened his eyes again, it was already evening, and the red sunset shone into the house through the window, making the house reddish orange. The queen mother was standing beside the bed. become gorgeous.
"The emperor is awake?" Seeing him open his eyes, the Queen Mother Zhou turned to look out the window and said calmly, "How do you feel?"
The maid serving in the house helped Jin Yang to sit against the head of the bed, and exited the house with Bai Xian, the eunuch chief, so only Jin Yang and the queen mother were left in the quiet room.
"The son worries the mother, the son is unfilial." Jin Yang covered the corners of his mouth and coughed.
"The sunset on the day when Aijia's son died was as beautiful as it is now," the Queen Mother Zhou looked at the sky indifferently, where the clouds were like fire, "Aijia cried all day and night, but unfortunately the deceased child also It can't be resurrected."
Jin Yang grabbed the quilt under him, looked at the queen mother like this, and didn't speak. This was the first time he heard the queen mother calling herself "Aijia" in private.
"I received your mother's favor back then, so I chose you among several children, because I think her children must have something special." Although she did not like some people in the Sima family, but Jin Yang's biological mother, the Sima Shi, was an extremely good daughter from a noble family, but it was a pity that the gods were jealous of her beauty, so she died early.
Unexpectedly, Empress Dowager Zhou would mention her mother, Jin Yang stared blankly at the woman standing by the window, trying to distinguish whether what she said was true or false.
"An emperor without real power is just a tool for courtiers to fight for power and profit." The Queen Mother Zhou walked to the bedside, pulled up the corner of the quilt and pressed it lightly, "The first thing you have to learn is to look at people carefully and act cautiously. ."
After saying this, Empress Dowager Zhou stood up straight, "Although the emperor's fever has subsided, he still needs to rest for two days, and there is no need to go to the court meeting tomorrow."
Jin Yang lay flat on the bed and pulled up the quilt to cover the top of his head, but what the Queen Mother said in his mind was the words.
Is he really just a tool for the courtiers to fight for power
None of his teachers treated him with great care, and some even vaguely reminded him not to become the empress dowager's puppet emperor. But is the person who said this really loyal to him, or... something else
"Your Majesty." When Bai Xian came in, he saw that the emperor was covered in the quilt, worried that he would suffocate himself, and he didn't dare to reach out to lift the quilt, so he could only whisper to him.
Jin Yang lifted the quilt covering his face, and there was no sense of disappointment on his face. If it wasn't for the redness of his cheeks, it would have been impossible for people to see that there was anything wrong with him.
"When I fainted, was Prime Minister Zhang the Empress Dowager who asked people to tell him?" Zhang Zhonghan was teaching him today, so apart from him in the entire Qiankun Palace, only Zhang Zhonghan had the highest grade.
"Yes," Bai Xian hesitated for a moment, and then said, "It's just that Prime Minister Zhang was so worried about you, the emperor, that after the imperial doctor came to check your pulse, he thought of asking someone to report to the Queen Mother."
Zhang Zhonghan was born in a poor family. When he was a child, he became a disciple of famous people and entered the court with filial piety. Now he is the right prime minister in the court. Although the Prime Minister of the Right is not as powerful as the Prime Minister of the Left, but he was able to win such a position in the court of the aristocratic family with his humble background, which shows that he is not an impatient person.
Jin Yang was silent for a long time and said, "Prime Minister Zhang has a lot of affairs in the court. In the future, Mr. Gu will share some of the content he will teach, so as not to overwork him."
Bai Xian lowered his head and listened silently.
"By the way, when the queen mother came over today, was there anyone else around?" Jin Yang drank the medicine under the service of the palace maid, and suddenly remembered the little girl's voice he heard when he was confused.
"Today, the queen mother called the second lady of the Gu family to enter the palace. Because she was worried that the queen mother would be too anxious to hurt her body, so the second lady of the Gu family came with the queen mother. She just saluted you through the curtain and left."
Jin Yang nodded when he heard the words. In the past six months, the queen mother called the second lady of the Gu family to enter the palace several times, so he had heard about this woman.
Since it is Mr. Gu's daughter, it should be a good idea.
Jin Yang didn't ask any more questions, and Bai Xian naturally didn't talk much. He just sighed in his heart that the father and daughter of the Gu family are really capable. The father is respected by the emperor, and the daughter is favored by the queen mother. If the empress dowager does not get along with the emperor in the future, I don't know how their father and daughter will deal with themselves.
In the past few days, Gu Changling has been a little leisurely. Because the emperor was ill, his imperial teacher also took sick leave, so when he had nothing to do, he took his son and daughter to the suburbs to check on the guards he kept at home.
Aristocratic families in the capital, as long as they are not too down and out, will keep some guards for their own farming or to look after other villages. As many as tens of thousands of people, as few as tens of hundreds of people. These guards do not have ordinary citizenship, but are the "private property" of aristocratic families.
There are not many guards registered under Gu Changling's name, only about 800 people, plus the 200 guards brought by Yang's dowry, the total guards of their family are only 1,000, compared with the big families such as the Sima family and the Li family. Come on, this figure is only a fraction.
When Gu Rujiu first learned that his family actually kept "private soldiers", he was stunned. Later, he slowly learned that noble families would keep such guards, and when the world was peaceful, they would help the master's family to farm and guard the house. When the world is in chaos, it becomes the master's armed force.
This is also one of the reasons why the family is still standing even if the dynasty is replaced. The iron-clad family, the flowing dynasty, it is no wonder that families such as the Sima family and the Li family are arrogant in their bones.
In the history of her previous life, there was also a period when the family was prosperous, but later because of the gradual concentration of imperial power, the family gradually lost their former status, and finally dissipated in the torrent of history, becoming an empty name but no real power. 's famous door.
Although it is still called an aristocratic family, the rise and fall of honor and disgrace is tied to the emperor, and it will never regain its former glory.
In Gu Rujiu's view, the Dafeng Dynasty she is now in is already a period of decline of the family, because the royal family has mastered the main military power, although the family can still maintain guards, but the number has to be registered and reported to the court. , and even iron and bronze wares, etc., there are restrictions on the quantity, and it is easy to not exceed the amount, otherwise it will be "the crime of treason."
The royal family was boiling frogs in warm water, but the aristocratic families fell into the cauldron of boiling frogs for glory and wealth, but they were still unaware.
Gu Rujiu knew in her heart that this was an inevitable evolution of history, and she couldn't be the person who pushed the wheel backwards.
What's more, with the status of the Gu family in Beijing, whether the family is prosperous or the rise of the royal family, it doesn't have much impact on them.
To put it a bit harsher, the Gu family is nothing but a new rich in the shell of an aristocratic family. Nearly a hundred years ago, the Gu family was almost kicked out of the aristocratic family because of its decline. Later, when the former emperor rearranged the family tree, the Gu family just had two capable people who were reused by the emperor, and barely squeezed into the ranks of the second-class last-class family.
Since then, the influence of the aristocratic family in the court began to decrease unknowingly, while the royal status gradually increased. Although it is wrong to say that it is wrong to slander the ancestors, Gu Rujiu has reason to suspect that the incident that caused the family to gradually decline was the work of the two ancestors of their family.
Every time she thinks of this, Gu Rujiu takes a long breath, then turns her head to do her happy Miss Gui, such a profound and ideal thing, she is as delicate as a flower, so don't worry about it.
Anyway, as long as her relatives are safe, she doesn't care about the others.
After arriving at Bie Zhuang, Gu Rujiu and her party received the most warm reception. After she rode with her two brothers for a while, she hid in the house because the heat was unbearable.
Gu Changling, who was listening to Zhuangtou's report, saw the children walk in, and said with a smile, "I know the three of you will be unbearably hot, so go and drink the Qushu soup."
After drinking the Qushu soup, Gu Rujiu rubbed up to the eldest brother and the second brother, wanting them to talk about the lace gossip of the court.
Gu Zhiyu had just entered the court two years ago and is now working in Honglu Temple. This place is relatively leisurely on weekdays, equivalent to the emperor's private foreign secretary department. When small neighboring countries pay tribute to Dafeng, the first person who cannot offend is the officials of Honglu Temple.
"Is there anything interesting?" Gu Zhiyu smiled, "After the emperor ascended the throne, several small countries have sent envoys to Beijing to pay tribute, and some are still on the way. However, these are some poor and backward people. Land, there is nothing worth talking about.”
Gu Rujiu held her face and said, "You can't be blindly arrogant. Only by knowing yourself and knowing your enemy can you win a hundred battles, right?"
Seeing her sister's appearance like this, Gu Zhiyu smiled and wiped her head: "Don't worry, there are quite a few in the center of the court." Naturally, it is impossible for the court to really trust these small states, but some things will not be placed on the Just saying it outright.
Fortunately, after seeing that he didn't say anything, his sister didn't insist on asking again, and Gu Zhiyu breathed a sigh of relief.
Seeing the relieved look of the elder brother, Gu Rujiu smiled secretly, and walked into the yard with a few maids. After going out, she saw a few children secretly looking in at the gate of the courtyard. She asked Baolu to send some cakes to these children.
Today's weather is particularly sultry, and she has no appetite to eat at all. In this weather, pastries are easy to break if left uneaten, so it is better to give them to these children to satiate their stomachs.
"Girl," Baolu came back after delivering the cakes, and was about to speak, when she saw several gray-black mice suddenly sprang from the corner, which made her complexion change, and she hurriedly stood in front of Gu Rujiu.
Fortunately, these mice did not jump on the person, but rushed out of the courtyard door in a hurry, and several nursing homes outside the door chased and beat them.
"What's going on these two days, I just heard from those children that mice have been running out of the corners of the wall in the past two days, and the dogs in Zhuangzi are often barking," Baolu said, looking up. Tian, "It's so hot that even the beasts can't stand it."
Hearing Baolu's complaint, Gu Rujiu's heart skipped a beat, faintly feeling that something was wrong.