"A personal bodyguard? Please, brothers, you're giving this lowly servant far too much credit!" Chen Xuan waved his hands repeatedly, adopting an exceedingly humble manner. "I was just lucky enough to survive under that mad horse's hooves yesterday. The third young lady was kind enough to transfer me to sweep outside Listening to Rain Pavilion and watch the courtyard gate, that's all. It's no different from tending livestock in the stables."
"You can't put it that way! What sort of place is Listening to Rain Pavilion? It's the third young lady's private quarters! Every maid and serving woman there is as fresh and tender as the white of a spring onion, and their monthly silver allowance is more than three times what we get in the rear courtyard!" Li Si rubbed his hands, greed gleaming in his eyes, and leaned closer, lowering his voice. "Brother Chen, when you strike it rich, don't forget us! I heard the first madam rewarded you this morning with ten taels of pure gold and a priceless Blood-Gathering Pill. You've reached the heavens in a single step, lad. Shouldn't you treat your brothers to drinks with some courtesans outside and let us share in your good fortune?"
"Oh, my dear brothers, who's been spreading this nonsense to you?" Chen Xuan pulled a miserable face, deliberately patting the flat front of his robe as he sighed. "It's true the first madam gave me a pill, but after freezing in the stables for three years, my body was already completely depleted. I swallowed it back in my room just now, and aside from three bouts of black, watery diarrhea, it didn't make so much as a splash! As for the reward money, before I could even warm it in my hands, the eunuch who brought the message from the front courtyard and the managing serving woman carved it all up as 'celebration money.' My pockets are cleaner than my face now!"
"Huh? The people from the front courtyard took it all? Even the Blood-Gathering Pill went down the privy?" Most of the warmth instantly drained from Li Si's face. He curled his lip and stepped back half a pace in distaste. "Tsk, and here I thought you'd stumbled into some grand fortune. So you're just going to the inner courtyard to be a gate guardian in name only! All right, all right, we've still got swill to empty. We won't hold up the great Bodyguard Chen from taking up his lofty post!"
"Exactly. Rotten mud can't be plastered onto a wall. What a waste of a good pill!"
Watching the two men shoulder their swill buckets and walk away, cursing and grumbling, Chen Xuan remained where he stood, a flicker of icy mockery crossing his eyes.
You want to get your hands on my gold and pill? Let Liu San and Zhao De take their time digging through horse dung in the stables!
He delayed no longer. Following the gravel path along the eastern side of the marquis's estate, he passed through flowers and brushed past willows, soon arriving at the residence of the third young lady, Xiao Ling'er-Listening to Rain Pavilion.
A secluded courtyard that the first madam had spent half a year selecting and renovating especially for her beloved daughter, Listening to Rain Pavilion lacked the imposing grandeur of the front courtyard's main hall, but every corner displayed the exquisite craftsmanship of a Jiangnan garden. Emerald bamboo surrounded its vermilion gates. Through carved lattice windows, he could faintly glimpse layered greenery on artificial mountains and a winding stream for floating wine cups within. A small training ground covered in white sand had even been set aside in the southeastern corner.
Just as Chen Xuan reached the vermilion gates, the two pretty maids chatting and cracking melon seeds on the steps stopped talking at the same time and cast sidelong looks at him.
"Stop! Which courtyard did a menial boy like you crawl out of? Do you even know where you are? Is the third young lady's Listening to Rain Pavilion somewhere an outer-courtyard odd-job servant like you can barge into? Get lost!"
The maid who snapped at him was about fifteen or sixteen, dressed in a delicate peach-pink, chest-high ruqun, her hair arranged in twin spiral buns. She was rather pretty, but her upturned eyes were filled with the mean arrogance of a dog looking down on others.
Chen Xuan halted and obediently stood below the steps, cupping his hands in a salute, his tone respectful and mild.
"Please don't be angry, elder sister. This lowly servant's name is Chen Xuan. I used to work in the rear courtyard's stables. Today, by the grace of the first madam and the third young lady, I was specially transferred to serve at Listening to Rain Pavilion, with orders to report to the third young lady before a quarter to one."
"Chen Xuan?!"
Chun Tao, the maid in pink, exchanged a glance with the older maid beside her, who wore a lake-green ruqun and had gentle, refined features. Surprise appeared on both their faces.
"Oh, I wondered who you were. So you're the horse-feeding slave who stumbled into dog-shit luck at the training ground yesterday and used stopping the horse as an excuse to offend our third young lady?"
Chun Tao lightly tossed the handful of melon-seed shells in her hand down the steps in front of Chen Xuan's toes. Folding her arms across her chest, she tilted her nostrils toward him and sneered. "When I heard the message from the front courtyard this morning, I thought the personal bodyguard the third young lady had asked for would be some martial arts master with three heads and six arms! After all that fuss, it's just a shabby wretch like you? Listen, you stinking horse feeder, I'm warning you: everyone in Listening to Rain Pavilion is clean and respectable. Have you washed that horse-piss stink off yourself? A useless good-for-nothing who practiced the Boulder Art for three years without even reaching the threshold of Ming Jin thinks he deserves to be our third young lady's personal bodyguard? Don't turn out to be worse than a watchdog and make a laughingstock of yourself!"
Faced with this barrage of humiliation, Chen Xuan lowered his head deeply without offering so much as half a word in rebuttal. He merely stared quietly at the few saliva-stained melon-seed shells on his feet.
But deep beneath his lowered eyelids, a chilling glint flashed and vanished.
The King of Hell is easy to meet; it's the little ghosts who are hard to deal with. A household-born maid who serves others actually thinks she's half a mistress of the marquis's estate? No hurry. I'll remember this. Once I've gained a firm foothold in Listening to Rain Pavilion, trash like her won't even deserve to wash my feet or warm my bed!
"Chun Tao! Stop talking nonsense!"
The older maid in the lake-green ruqun frowned slightly and reached out to tug Chun Tao, rebuking her in a stern, low voice. "Chen Xuan is the bodyguard whom the first madam personally approved in the main hall this morning and whom the third young lady specifically requested. Aren't you slapping the first madam and the third young lady in the face by standing here making snide remarks about him? Watch yourself, or the young lady might hear you and tear your mouth apart!"
"Elder Sister Qiu Yue, I'm only speaking up for our young lady! He's just a mud-legged peasant who crawled out of the stables. The heir has even threatened to deal with him. Who knows how many days he'll survive in our courtyard..." Chun Tao curled her lip resentfully, but she was wary of Qiu Yue's authority as a senior maid and did not dare continue her insolence.
Qiu Yue shook her head helplessly, then turned and gave Chen Xuan a gentle, appraising look. Though his clothes were plain, he stood straight, his expression neither servile nor overbearing. She could not help nodding inwardly before speaking.
"Bodyguard Chen, Chun Tao is young and doesn't know any better. She has no gatekeeper on her tongue, so please don't take it to heart. My name is Qiu Yue. I'm the senior maid in charge of the third young lady's rooms. Please wait outside the gate for a moment. I'll go in and announce you."
"Not at all. Miss Chun Tao is only concerned for the third young lady. How would this lowly servant dare bear a grudge? Sorry to trouble you to make the trip for me, Elder Sister Qiu Yue." Chen Xuan raised his head and gave Qiu Yue an honest, grateful smile, then bowed with proper decorum.
Qiu Yue nodded slightly, then turned, lifted her skirts, and walked briskly through the courtyard gate.