A Poetry Contest

Everyone voiced their agreement.

Zhao Huiluan walked toward the pond and stood where Wen Nihe had stood earlier, resting a hand on the white jade balustrade.

Wen Nihe could not help stealing a look at the young woman before her. With no veiled hat to obscure her face, the young woman's radiant beauty was on full display, making even the colors of spring seem dull by comparison.

To her surprise, she suddenly met Zhao Huiluan's gaze.

Zhao Huiluan smiled and asked her, "Are you curious about the Jade Forest Banquet over there?"

Wen Nihe lowered her eyes and answered, "I am."

All the ladies were a little startled by her bluntness.

"My grandfather told me that the old Hanlin Academician, Great Scholar Shen, is attending the banquet today. I imagine the poetry contest among the newly minted jinshi will be most entertaining. I cannot help longing to see it."

"Aren't you curious too, Your Highness?"

As Wen Nihe spoke, she raised her eyes to Zhao Huiluan, who stood surrounded like the moon amid a host of stars.

In all fairness, Wen Nihe had a lovely pair of eyes, bright and lively as a fawn's.

No one had expected Wen Nihe to turn the tables on the princess, and they all clicked their tongues inwardly. As expected of a young lady raised by the Wen household—she had courage.

Zhao Huiluan, however, knew that Wen Nihe was showing her resentment. She had been the same in their previous life, yet Zhao Huiluan had foolishly taken her for forthright and bold.

Zhao Huiluan smiled without answering and walked past her, leaving her no face at all.

"I'm tired. I'll go rest for a while."

Everyone exchanged glances. She was tired already, when she had only just arrived?

Wen Nihe's face went stiff. Her Highness must have been angry with her for competing over the private room the day before yesterday, or she would not have slighted her.

After a moment's thought, she put on a dignified air and followed Zhao Huiluan to the upper floor.

"Your Highness."

Zhao Huiluan stood by the window, looking down from above, with a faint view of the Jade Forest Banquet across the way.

Hearing a woman's soft voice behind her, she looked back and watched with interest as Wen Nihe curtsied to her.

"Your Highness, I did not know who you were the day before yesterday and greatly offended you. I hope Your Highness will be understanding and forgive my unintentional mistake."

"Had I known it was Your Highness, I would certainly have yielded the private room to you with both hands."

She had been the one to rudely compete for the private room, yet she made it sound as though Zhao Huiluan and Zhang Yunchi had tried to take her room from her.

She certainly had a way with words.

And she said nothing at all about striking someone in the busy street.

Zhao Huiluan sat down, accepted the tea Xichun offered, and took a leisurely sip before speaking to Wen Nihe, who was still holding her curtsy, her face respectful without a trace of impatience.

"Is this how your grandfather taught you to apologize to me?"

"What?"

Wen Nihe looked up in shock and met her teasing eyes.

"It seems the Wen household's upbringing is nothing remarkable."

Wen Nihe understood.

She swallowed her resentment, dropped to both knees, placed her hands together before her brow, and bowed respectfully to the ground.

"Your Highness, I was wrong. I am willing to accept punishment."

Zhao Huiluan looked at the familiar posture, but what welled up in her heart was not pleasure.

It was an inexpressible sense of regret.

In her previous life, she had regarded Wen Nihe as her closest confidante and had never humiliated her like this.

When she had knelt prostrate in the boundless sea of snow, her heart full of despair, Wen Nihe's appearance had made her think she had seen a glimmer of hope.

But Wen Nihe had gripped her chin, stepped on her fingers, and told her viciously:

"Zhao Huiluan, you disgust me! You were merely better at choosing whose womb to be born from. What gives you the right to be above me in everything?"

"Look at yourself now. Without your status as a princess, you're worse than a pig or a dog."

"You don't know yet, do you? His Majesty has betrothed me to the crown prince as his consort. One day, I will be the mother of the realm."

"And you can only be the lowest kind of wretch, just like that short-lived younger brother of yours."

So beneath the respect had lain hatred, and affection had worn a cloak of hypocrisy.

Zhao Huiluan sighed silently.

Footsteps sounded at the top of the stairs.

"Jianjian, I'd only just returned from my travels when you sent me an invitation, and I..."

The voice stopped abruptly upon seeing the figure kneeling on the floor.

The newcomer wore a water-green skirt and jacket, her hair arranged in a rising-cloud, near-fragrance bun with a jade hairpin set at an angle. Perhaps to suit the occasion, she had also tucked a fresh peony into her hair.

She composed her expression and said gently, "Your Highness."

The moment Zhao Huiluan saw her, she held out her hand, and the two linked arms affectionately.

"Do you want to see the poetry contest at the Jade Forest Banquet?"

"Yes!"

The woman's eyes lit up.

Wen Nihe's claim to be interested in the poetry contest was not necessarily true. But Shen Zhiyun, the imperial capital's foremost talented woman and Great Scholar Shen's granddaughter, truly did want to see it.

"Come on! I'll take you!"

Zhao Huiluan pulled Shen Zhiyun along, the latter quite unable to suppress the smile at the corners of her mouth. Just as they were about to leave, Zhao Huiluan remembered Wen Nihe and said:

"Didn't you want to see it too? Come with me."

With that, she went downstairs with Shen Zhiyun ahead of her.

Chapter 15: A Poetry Contest

Shen Zhiyun called Consort Jing "Aunt," and she and Zhao Huiluan had known each other since childhood.

In her previous life, Wen Nihe's involvement had caused her and Shen Zhiyun to drift apart. Later, she had also learned from Wen Nihe that the new emperor, wishing to make use of Great Scholar Shen's standing among the scholars of the realm, had forcibly taken Shen Zhiyun as a consort. Shen Zhiyun had hanged herself in her bedchamber with a length of white silk.

"Ah-Your Highness, why are you squeezing my hand so hard?"

Zhao Huiluan came to herself, but instead of letting go, she held on even tighter.

"I haven't seen you for so long, Wanwan. I missed you terribly."

Shen Zhiyun clicked her tongue in disdain.

At the Spring Exploration Banquet, the ladies appeared to be sitting about chatting and drinking tea, but they could not help glancing toward the Green Willow Embankment.

With the banquet so close by, who could help being curious?

"I hear the procession of the top three scholars through the streets the day before yesterday was quite a spectacle."

Zhao Huiluan started the conversation, and the young ladies who had specifically booked private rooms to watch the procession were too embarrassed to say so. Instead, they described the grand occasion to her under the pretext that they had heard about it from their fathers and brothers.

Zhao Huiluan listened with an expression of longing.

"It is such a pity that I couldn't witness the spectacle myself."

Wen Nihe could not help stealing a glance at her.

Zhao Huiluan pretended the idea had just struck her and suggested, "Why don't you all come with me to the Jade Forest Banquet across the way?"