Qiu Ling shook her head.
"I don't know about that," she said.
Zhao Luoning frowned deeply.
She summoned Feixing.
"I'll write a letter. You find a way to deliver it for me," she said.
"Okay. To whom?"
"To the eldest young mistress of the Ji family."
Zhao Luoning finished writing the letter and gave it to Feixing.
Feixing put away the letter. Just as he was about to fly out of the door, Zhao Luoning called him back.
"Feixing, after you're done with this task, go back to Buda," she said.
Feixing was stunned for a moment and asked, "Miss, aren't you going to Buda anymore?"
Zhao Luoning shook her head.
Since she had already let Zixin leak the news that she was going to Buda, she definitely wouldn't go.
Zhao Luoning had made up her mind.
After Ji Shisu left, she would go to the capital to find Aunt Lu.
Stay away from the Ji family and the Zhao family.
Stay away from all the strife.
Feixing didn't say much. He clasped his fists in salute and withdrew.
While delivering Zhao Luoning's letter, he thought for a while and wrote a letter of his own, then handed it to the post station.
He had to let Caixue know about Zhao Luoning's decision.
...
In the Kingdom of Buda,
"The king is coming. Quick, hide!"
In Princess Nuobu's bedroom, a group of maidservants were nervously guarding the door.
When they saw Yang Ming's carriage, they quickly informed the people inside.
Two senior maidservants were in the room. One hid under the quilt, covering her head, while the other stood by the bed, tucking in the quilt corner for her and then adjusting the bed curtain.
Princess Nuobu's sudden departure had caused a lot of trouble for her servants.
They had no choice but to send people out to look for her while using the excuse that the princess had caught a cold to decline the palace gatherings on her behalf.
Just at this time, the king had been thinking about Princess Nuobu's marriage recently. He invited foreign princes and young masters to the palace every now and then and held grand feasts.
There was a pile of imperial edicts and picture albums in the princess's mansion.
Even if the princess came back in the future, these imperial edicts would be a big problem.
They had served Princess Nuobu for quite some time and knew a bit about her temper.
Not to mention asking her to look at the picture albums, just mentioning the matter of the national marriage would make her fly into a rage.
This so - called princess was sometimes really hard to handle.
"The king has arrived!"
The king finally came. The maid looked inside. After making sure everything was in order, she opened the door.
Yang Ming walked into the room in a dark blue informal robe. He saw that the windows were tightly shut and even the bamboo curtains were all drawn. Even in broad daylight, the room was rather dim.
"Why are the doors and windows closed?"
Keeping the doors and windows closed like this, even if one was not sick, they might get ill from being stuffy.
"Your Majesty, the princess has caught a cold. The imperial doctor specifically told us not to let her catch the wind or get cold. So we've closed the doors and windows," the maid replied.
Actually, they were afraid that the bright light would make it obvious to the king that the person in the bed was not the princess.
A dimmer light would give them more chances to deceive him.
Yang Ming didn't say anything. He walked straight up to Caixue's bed curtain. He wanted to pull away the quilt but was firmly held back by the person inside. So he just asked with concern,
"Sister, are you feeling better?"
The person under the quilt originally nodded, but then thought that if she was better, they wouldn't have an excuse to avoid the feasts. So she shook her head instead. Yang Ming didn't ask any more questions. He turned to the maid standing by the bed.
"Have you seen Feixing? I don't know why, but since the princess got sick, Feixing has been missing for several days."
The maid's heart was pounding. They had calculated everything but missed Feixing.
The princess could claim to be ill, but what about Feixing?
"Feixing saw that the princess wasn't getting better, so he went to look for a prescription for her," the smart maid said.
The other maids quickly echoed,
"Yes, Feixing went to look for a prescription."
"Look for a prescription? There are so many imperial doctors in my Buda palace. Does he still need to do it himself?"
As he was speaking, he took advantage of everyone's inattention and suddenly pulled away the quilt. The maid hiding under the quilt was exposed. She quickly rolled out of the bed trembling.
All the maids knelt down in unison.
"Tell me! Where is the princess?"
"Your Majesty, please forgive us. The princess... left the palace without permission," they said.
Yang Ming had already guessed the result. In fact, he had suspected something was wrong when the maid reported that Caixue had caught a cold.
But he was busy with state affairs and had never had the chance to come and find out the truth.
Although he hadn't communicated much with his sister Caixue, he still knew a bit about her temper.
When Ji Shisu's army was still in Panzhou, Caixue had been trying to contact Zhao Luoning. Yang Ming was well aware of this.
He just thought that Caixue might not be used to it yet and it was inevitable for her to rely on Zhao Luoning.
So he turned a blind eye and didn't interfere.
Since the news of the cease - fire on the front line came, he had always had a bad feeling. He always thought that Caixue wasn't the kind of person who would stay at home quietly.
So he had arranged so many blind dates for her, hoping to win her heart back soon.
Who would have thought that his speed was far slower than that girl's thoughts.
She slipped out under his nose.
"When did this happen?"
There was no anger in his tone, but there was a chilling majesty.
The maids were intimidated by his royal aura and kept trembling.
They spoke in a stuttering manner.
"It's... been a few days."
A few days? That meant that even if he wanted to chase Caixue back now, it was almost impossible.
These maids were really bold. They were supposed to watch over Caixue, but now they had helped her deceive him.
If he hadn't noticed something was wrong, he didn't know when he would have found out that Caixue had left the palace.
"Why didn't you report it earlier?"
If he hadn't discovered it in time, how long were they going to hide it from him?
"We thought the princess... was just bored and wanted to go out for a walk. We've sent people to look for her outside the palace. We thought that if we were lucky enough to find the princess, we wouldn't have to trouble Your Majesty," the maid said.
This maid was an old hand in the palace and knew how to make her words sound reasonable.
Her words were flawless.
But if Yang Ming could be so easily deceived by their words, he wouldn't be worthy of being the king.
Hiding the truth was the real trouble for him.
Caixue wasn't just going out for a stroll.
She had never had any feelings for the Kingdom of Buda.
She wouldn't be willing to relax in Buda.
All she could think about was that unknown town called Huangcheng in the Kingdom of Chen, and the Miss Zhao in that town whom she missed so much and couldn't bear to forget - Zhao Luoning!
"Come on, take them to the prison and wait for my decision," Yang Ming ordered.
The maids were crying and being dragged away by the guards. The eunuch standing beside Yang Ming couldn't help but ask,
"Your Majesty, do you want this servant to send people to look for the princess?"
"You? She has Feixing with her. Sending more people would be useless. For now, I have to go myself and bring her back."