Marrying The Imperial Elder Chapter 3

Zhen Tingyun had no idea her grandmother was already worrying over her marriage. At that moment she was discussing matters with Steward Lin. “Uncle Lin, Grandmother and I thought it over upstairs just now, and I still feel this horse thief matter shouldn’t simply be let go. Don’t you think we should report it to the authorities or something?”

Father Zhen came from a poor background. Even after entering officialdom through the imperial examinations, he was unlike the great aristocratic families who possessed their own networks and retainers. He had very few truly capable people at his disposal. This time, worried that his elderly mother and young daughter might encounter difficulties on the road, he had specifically sent Steward Lin, one of his trusted aides, along with them. Steward Lin had served beside Father Zhen for many years and was extremely capable, with considerable merit and standing. Zhen Tingyun therefore simply called him “Uncle Lin,” speaking with notable closeness.

The horse had also been personally delivered by Steward Lin, so he naturally knew what an exceptionally fine horse it was. He had also witnessed how carefully Zhen Tingyun had tended it all along the journey. Now that a horse thief had suddenly appeared, even Steward Lin felt deeply distressed on behalf of the family, and inwardly lamented his young lady’s terrible luck. Still, since they were traveling far from home, Steward Lin did not wish to stir up additional trouble. Though they had hired an escort agency, they still consisted only of an elderly lady and a young girl, a vulnerable group of old and young alike. How could they recklessly provoke trouble?

“Young Lady, even if we report it to the authorities, leaving aside whether the horse can actually be recovered, the first issue is that it will delay our journey. The master and the others are still waiting in the capital for the old madam and for you…” Steward Lin tried to persuade her gently. Then he lowered his voice and quietly added, “Furthermore, nowadays even beggars outside form gangs and divide territories among themselves. A horse thief this brazen, daring to steal a horse directly from an inn, must surely have someone backing him. We’re only passing through and still need to hurry onward. It wouldn’t be wise to offend the local powers over this matter. Young Lady, while away from home, caution should come first.”

Though Zhen Tingyun knew his reasoning made sense, she still felt unwilling to swallow the matter. She said aloud, “Uncle Lin, you said yourself this horse thief acted outrageously. Perhaps he’s already stirred up public anger long ago, and people are only waiting for someone to take the lead! Besides, these people bully travelers like us precisely because we’re outsiders in a hurry, unwilling to waste time tangling with them, which is why they dare behave this way. If we simply let it go today, wouldn’t that only encourage those thieves and make them even more smug? I just can’t swallow this anger!”

Steward Lin thought to himself: You’re just a little girl, where does such a terrible temper come from, saying things like “I just can’t swallow this anger”?!

As she spoke, Zhen Tingyun lifted her eyes to look at Steward Lin and said solemnly, “Uncle Lin, this was a horse Father personally selected, and Elder Sister kindly had it sent to me. If it’s simply lost like this, wouldn’t that disappoint Father’s and Elder Sister’s heartfelt intentions?”

She had a tender, youthful face still carrying a trace of baby fat. At this moment, anger burned within her, making her eyes seem lit by firelight, bright and gleaming. A flush lingered at her pink cheeks, making her appearance strikingly beautiful.

Even Steward Lin, who had watched her all along the journey and long since grown used to her looks, could not help but be momentarily stunned. Since Zhen Tingyun had already spoken this far and even brought up Father Zhen and the eldest young lady, he could only compromise somewhat.

“How about this? It’s raining heavily outside right now, so it’s not convenient to go out. Once the rain stops tomorrow, we’ll ask around outside and see what we can learn.”

Though he had not agreed to report the matter to the authorities, neither did it mean he intended to ignore it entirely.

Hearing this, Zhen Tingyun felt rather satisfied and nodded with a radiant smile. Her words turned sweet as honey: “Grandmother asked me to bring supper upstairs. Uncle Lin, you all should eat early too, don’t go hungry. Since it’s raining anyway, we can’t continue traveling tonight. You should all rest early. Grandmother and I ride in the carriage, so we don’t suffer much, but you all have been exposed to wind and sun the whole journey and must surely be exhausted. You really ought to take good care of yourselves…”

In any case, kind words cost nothing. Zhen Tingyun casually rattled off a whole string of them, leaving Steward Lin deeply touched.

Only after speaking did Zhen Tingyun turn to have the servants prepare dinner so she could personally carry it upstairs to attend to Old Lady Zhen during the meal.

Old Lady Zhen had waited for quite a while for her granddaughter to return. At noon she had only drunk a little tea, so she was naturally hungry. At long last, when Zhen Tingyun finally came upstairs, her temper flared at once. “Other people’s granddaughters are obedient and filial, they do whatever they’re told without complaint. Only I have such rotten luck as to end up with a disobedient one like you! I merely asked you to bring up dinner, and you still managed to dawdle away nearly half an hour! Ai-yo, thank goodness I live off my son and grandson, not off my granddaughter, otherwise I’d surely have starved to death by now!”

Well, that was simply Old Lady Zhen’s temperament. Her mouth was sharp enough to stir up trouble even when there was none. No wonder Madam Pei, as her daughter-in-law, still harbored resentment after all these years.

Zhen Tingyun, however, had long since grown accustomed to it. Hearing this, she did not get angry. Instead, she laughed. “Since Grandmother doesn’t eat her granddaughter’s food, then I’ll just eat it myself.”

As she spoke, she really did move to pick up the bowl and start eating.

Old Lady Zhen became somewhat anxious upon hearing this, though she refused to soften her words. She could only glare at her granddaughter in irritation.

Seeing the stifled expression on Old Lady Zhen’s face, Zhen Tingyun finally could not hold back and burst into laughter. After laughing, she handed over the bowl and chopsticks herself, voluntarily giving her grandmother a way out. “I was only joking. Grandmother is the head of our household. If you haven’t eaten yet, how would I dare begin?”

Old Lady Zhen awkwardly accepted the bowl and chopsticks. Inwardly, she also knew that her earlier words had been too harsh, so she muttered vaguely, “You should eat too.”

Only then did grandmother and granddaughter sit facing each other and finish dinner together.

This inn had been built beside the official road, not far from a courier station, and many traveling merchants stayed there. The cook’s skills were unexpectedly quite good. Especially tonight’s roasted fish, the fish skin had been rubbed with salt before roasting until it turned golden and curled slightly. When one used chopsticks to peel back the skin, the salt crystals sprinkled down in soft little showers, revealing the snowy white fish meat beneath, fresh and tender beyond compare. There was also a small dish of sauce served alongside it for dipping, in case one found the fish itself too lightly flavored.

Old Lady Zhen was getting older, and Zhen Tingyun knew a bit of medicine, so she often advised her grandmother to avoid heavily salted and oily foods. This time she did not let Old Lady Zhen touch much of the dipping sauce, instead picking out plenty of the white fish meat for her and urging her to drink a small bowl of radish soup as well.

After the meal, Old Lady Zhen grew sleepy. She leaned by the window with narrowed eyes, drifting drowsily toward sleep.

Meanwhile, Zhen Tingyun carried the bowls and dishes downstairs to clean up, wiped the table, then took out paper and brushes. Grinding ink herself, she sat before the table and began practicing calligraphy.

The Great Xi dynasty valued literary cultivation. Young ladies from aristocratic families generally studied literature and writing, and once they came of age, they could even take examinations to enter women’s academies.

The concept of women’s academies had first been established by the founding empress herself. As a result, two of the empire’s ten great women’s academies were located in the capital: the Capital Women’s Academy and Yuhua Women’s Academy. In past years, the competition for first place among the ten academies was almost always contested between those two.

Unfortunately, Zhen Tingyun had poor luck and grew up in the countryside with Old Lady Zhen.

In rural households, even educating sons in reading and writing was a costly burden that consumed family savings. Many families pooled resources among several brothers just to support one child’s education. Back then, Father Zhen had only succeeded because he himself was gifted and fortunate enough to encounter an excellent teacher. Thus, although Great Xi valued scholarship, for countryside girls, simply recognizing a few characters was already considered good enough. Naturally, Old Lady Zhen had never thought about hiring a tutor for her granddaughter. She had only wanted Zhen Tingyun to learn sewing, cooking, and similar practical skills so that she would at least possess a trade and be able to manage a household after marriage.

Yet from childhood, Zhen Tingyun had been somewhat delicate. She refused farm work, did housework poorly, and mostly muddled through sewing and cooking just enough to placate Old Lady Zhen. She worried her grandmother half to death. In the end, it was Zhen Tingyun herself who proposed hiring a female tutor to teach her.

Old Lady Zhen despised such “empty accomplishments” the most. But since her granddaughter seemed incapable of anything else and appeared suited only for these scholarly pursuits, Old Lady Zhen could only grit her teeth and spend some of her private savings to hire a female tutor to teach Zhen Tingyun reading and writing. Otherwise, she truly might have raised her into a completely illiterate fool. Of course, in a rural place like theirs, a female tutor hired with Old Lady Zhen’s private savings could not be particularly impressive either. At most she could teach basic literacy and reading. After all, one got what one paid for.

From childhood, Zhen Tingyun had always possessed ideas of her own. She knew her mother, Madam Pei, had once been a student at a women’s academy and was praised by others as a talented lady. As her daughter, she felt she too should work hard. Perhaps someday she might even pass the examinations for a women’s academy herself.

Since the women’s academies of Great Xi generally tested the Six Arts, “rites, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy, and mathematics”, Zhen Tingyun tried learning them one by one. Though conditions in the countryside were limited and Old Lady Zhen kept strict watch over her, she still regularly bought copybooks and practiced calligraphy daily. Whenever she encountered someone selling old books, she bought volumes such as The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Arts and studied them on her own to build foundations. By the age of ten, she had even gone next door to the old xiucai who ran the village school and bought one of his discarded old zithers. Thick-skinned as ever, she borrowed sheet music from him and pestered him relentlessly until he taught her a little qin music as well.

As a result, before coming to the capital, Zhen Tingyun had yet another dream. Afterward, she became even more convinced that parents and family could not truly be relied upon, and that it was best to depend on oneself. Naturally, she applied herself even more diligently in private. Though the journey was exhausting, she absolutely refused to skip her daily pages of large-character calligraphy practice, for in the art of calligraphy, only perseverance could produce results.

Because she practiced so earnestly, by the time she stopped, night had already fallen.

Before she could finish writing several sheets in one go, she suddenly heard someone pounding up the stairs from below. A voice urgently knocked at the door. “Miss Zhen! Miss Zhen! Something terrible has happened!”

Zhen Tingyun calmly finished the character she was writing before setting down the brush and going to open the door. “What happened?”

The inn servant was panting heavily, his face drenched in sweat. After catching his breath, he said, “Your horse… your horse came back on its own!”

Zhen Tingyun was overjoyed. “Really?!”

“That’s wonderful!” She spun in a circle inside the room in delight, speaking rapidly. “I knew it! I fed it carrots and apples all along the journey with such sincerity. If it still ran off with someone else, wouldn’t that make it stupid?”

The servant thought silently: Since when are horses stupid or not?

But he had more to say. After another breath, he continued awkwardly, “Not only did the horse come back on its own, it also… also…”

“And also what?” Seeing him continue panting without finishing, Zhen Tingyun grew impatient and was already eager to rush downstairs to see the horse.

Only then did the servant blurt out, “It also carried the horse thief back with it.”

Before he even finished speaking, Zhen Tingyun let out a cold laugh. “Good! I was just about to see what b*stard dared steal my horse!” As she spoke, she rolled up her sleeves as though preparing for a fight and dashed downstairs toward the stable.

Rushing down in a flurry, Zhen Tingyun indeed saw Malantou standing inside the stable.

On the horse’s back lay a man dressed in black, the very horse thief she had glimpsed earlier. Yet for some unknown reason, he was now unconscious, lying motionless atop the horse without making a sound.

Several inn workers surrounded Malantou, cautiously reaching out in an attempt to pull the thief off the horse’s back.

However, Malantou had quite a fierce temperament and refused to let strangers approach. It stomped its hooves irritably, preventing anyone from getting near.

During the journey, Zhen Tingyun had become very close to Malantou. Seeing the horse now was like a mother reunited with her kidnapped daughter. She hurried forward and called, “Malantou!”

Malantou was equally affectionate toward her. It immediately lowered its head to nuzzle against her and even licked her palm.

As a result, Zhen Tingyun was able to get closer than anyone else and finally saw the horse thief’s face clearly.

Truthfully, the rain outside had still not stopped, and dark clouds continued to blanket the night sky. Everything outside remained cold, damp, and pitch-black. The stable itself was lit by only a single oil lamp, the light dim and weak. Clutter was piled everywhere, rainwater dripped across the muddy floor, and the whole place was messy, filthy, and chaotic.

Yet the moment this man’s face was revealed, it was as though bright moonlight had swept aside dark clouds. A radiant brilliance instantly illuminated the entire stable.

“A humble hut made glorious,” “pearls and jade dazzling the eye”, nothing less could describe it.

Zhen Tingyun had only read a few books and could hardly be called a true talented lady. At this moment, gazing at the man’s face, only one sentence surfaced in her mind:

“You are clearly such a beautiful man, why become a thief?!”