The palace where the banquet had been held stood quite a distance from the inner harem. Add to that the slick ground and encroaching darkness, and Yun Shu and Yun Chuhuan found themselves walking at a very slow pace.
After more than twenty minutes, they had barely reached the area near the Eastern Palace.
"It's way too dark here!" Yun Chu Huan whispered his complaint.
"Today is Father Emperor's Wanshou Festival. Even if something happened during the banquet, they wouldn't go so far as to snuff out all the lanterns along the paths, right?"
According to Tian Sheng custom, on the Wanshou Festival, even the most remote paths in the palace must have a lantern every three zhang, symbolizing long life and unending prosperity.
But now, not to mention every three zhang, it felt like there wasn't a single lantern within thirty.
"You think Crown Prince Royal Brother failed to marry his cousin and got so pissed off he had all the lights put out?"
The already slippery ground was even harder to walk on now that they could barely see where they were stepping.
Yun Chuhuan, now thoroughly annoyed, snatched the lantern from Xiao Anzi's hand and used it to light his own steps.
"Crown Prince Royal Brother is out of his mind. If Father Emperor finds out he dared to extinguish the lanterns—he definitely—"
"Shhh!"
At the first sign of something unusual, Yun Shu clapped a hand over Yun Chu Huan's mouth. She also snuffed out his lantern—and the one Ting Xue held.
Hunching down behind a rockery, she lowered her voice to a bare whisper.
"The Crown Prince is coming."
They had ended up just behind the Eastern Palace's side garden, shielded by the jagged rocks. As long as no one from the Eastern Palace deliberately turned and looked this way, they wouldn't be seen.
But Yun Shu, moving along this path, occasionally glanced through the gaps between the rocks—and that was when she caught a glimpse of the lit interior of the Eastern Palace, and a shadow rushing out.
The Crown Prince, who should have been holed up in his palace, had just slipped out the side entrance in a hurry. He hadn't even brought a single eunuch with him. Alone, he darted straight toward—
—those unlit woods ahead.
"What is he doing?"
Yun Chuhuan didn't understand what was happening, but he lowered his voice too and leaned close.
"Did Crown Prince Royal Brother get a message and sneak off to plead for the Empress Mother?"
"I doubt it," Yun Shu said softly.
He wasn't even headed in the right direction for that.
And the way he snuck off so furtively—it clearly screamed that he was up to something unseemly.
Last time, Yun Shu had only refused to take his side, and that alone had been enough to make the Empress go mad and conspire with the Eldest Prince of Bei Xiang to drug her.
If she got caught witnessing another scandal tonight, this would become a grudge with no end in sight.
Yun Shu had absolutely no intention of getting involved in such a ridiculous affair. She simply wanted to crouch behind the rocks, wait until the Crown Prince finished whatever shady thing he was doing, and then quietly slip away.
As for what he was up to?
She didn't care. She really didn't want to know.
But sometimes, even when she didn't chase after gossip, gossip chased her.
She was still quite far from where the Crown Prince had gone. But perhaps he felt the woods ahead weren't secure enough.
Maybe he thought this rock garden, with its single path in and out, offered better cover. If someone came by with a lantern, he could immediately spot them and duck into the rocks.
And so, just a few minutes later, while Yun Chuhuan was starting to fidget impatiently, the Crown Prince suddenly reappeared.
He was dragging someone along by the wrist, bringing them to a spot less than ten paces from where Yun Shu and Yun Chuhuan were hiding.
His voice was low, but it trembled with frustration and irritation.
"There's no one here now. You may speak. Why did you come here? Can't you tell that Father Emperor was furious just now? At a time like this, you leave your seat and sneak off to find me? Do you have any idea what kind of trouble you've put me in?"
"Your Highness, I did not come of my own will."
Despite the Crown Prince's scolding, Shen Jingshu, raised from birth by the Shen family to be the future Empress, remained composed.
Even now, she patiently waited for him to finish, then responded with just the right amount of worry and grievance in her voice.
"It was Grandfather who told me to come. He said I must inform Your Highness that Aunt's scheme with the Eldest Prince of Bei Xiang to drug the Sheng An Princess has already come to light. His Majesty is furious. I fear Aunt will not escape punishment."
"Empress Mother drugged Yun Shu?"
The Crown Prince hadn't known this. Hearing it now, he could only scoff in disbelief.
"She's just a lowly princess with no powerful maternal family. Why would Empress Mother waste her time targeting her?"
"That question no longer matters."
Shen Jingshu's tone remained grave.
"What matters is that His Majesty now harbors suspicion toward Your Highness. He is about to move against Aunt.
And what comes after that?
Will he begin unraveling Your Highness's power at court, piece by piece? Perhaps even strike directly at the Shen family?
These are the matters Your Highness should be pondering now."
"Impossible..."
The Crown Prince instinctively refuted her, like a man grasping for reassurance.
"The Eldest Prince has already tried to kill me before. He lacks brotherly affection, and though he's strong in arms, he's got no head for governance.
The Third Prince is a useless playboy. The Fourth Prince is too rigid. His head is filled with nothing but classical texts. He clearly isn't cut out to rule.
The Sixth Prince is still young, but even if he grows up, he'll probably end up like the Third.
If Father Emperor doesn't choose me, who else would He choose?"
Yun Shu: "..."
As someone with no particular interest in the throne, she normally couldn't be bothered with this sort of thing.
But really now. He'd taken the time to evaluate both the Third Prince and Yun Chuhuan, and still couldn't even be bothered to mention her?
Not even a single line?
How rude.
"This dynasty had produced a woman emperor before, you know."
Yun Shu grumbled silently to herself.
Then she heard Shen Jingshu suddenly ask,
"Your Highness, do you not wonder why Aunt would target the Sheng An Princess?"
She deliberately stressed the words "Sheng An," as if to remind him that the princess he so casually looked down on was, in fact, the only one of Emperor Xuanwu's children to be granted a title and her own fiefdom.
Sure enough, the Crown Prince's tone changed at once.
"That's impossible!"
"Why is it impossible?"
Shen Jingshu pressed gently.
"Because the Sheng An Princess has no powerful maternal relatives?
But what if—precisely that is what His Majesty favors?"
Sensing his emotions fluctuating, Shen Jingshu softened her tone and continued in a quiet, tender voice.
"Your Highness, the Right Minister's faction may be something His Majesty guards against—but right now, it is also Your greatest support."
The Crown Prince said nothing.
Of course he understood the importance of the Shen family.
If he didn't, he wouldn't have risked incurring Emperor Xuanwu's wrath at tonight's banquet, insisting on marrying Shen Jingshu.
But looking at things now, how difficult that marriage had suddenly become.