Purple Tenuity Palace, the Imperial Garden.
Still dressed in mourning clothes, the third prince, Zhao Run, followed a Junior Eunuch through the heavily guarded Covered Passage and bowed as he entered the Waterside Pavilion.
Inside the Waterside Pavilion, Zhao Hong sat behind a banquet table in a round-collared everyday robe embroidered with dragons. He had been waiting for some time.
The moment Zhao Run stepped inside, he bowed with his hands clasped, trembling with fear. "Your subject, Zhao Run, pays his respects to Your Majesty. Long live the emperor, ten thousand years, ten thousand times ten thousand years!"
"Rise."
Zhao Hong lifted a hand and sighed. "I would still rather hear you call me Imperial Brother."
Zhao Run had already straightened, but those words frightened him into hastily bowing again. "Your subject would not dare overstep..."
Just then, Zhao Miao, also dressed in mourning, slowly entered the Waterside Pavilion under a Junior Eunuch's guidance.
She glanced at Zhao Hong, sitting as steadily as a fisherman on his platform, then at the trembling, stooped Zhao Run, and asked hoarsely with feigned puzzlement, "What are you two brothers talking about?"
In just one month, her face had grown much more haggard, and she had lost so much weight that even her baby fat was gone.
The moment she spoke, the oppressive atmosphere inside the Waterside Pavilion eased.
Zhao Hong looked at her, a faint, warm smile rising to his face, and spread his hands. "I told our third brother to keep calling me Imperial Brother. He said he wouldn't dare."
"Aren't you just bullying an honest man?"
Zhao Miao feigned anger. "Don't you know how little courage he has?"
Zhao Hong chuckled. "He has plenty of courage!"
"If nothing else will do..."
Zhao Miao stepped forward angrily and pulled Zhao Run up.