Sang Luo, the Dragon Maiden - Chapter 2

The next morning, I got up early to cook.

Now that I knew the truth, even lying in the same bed as him felt uncomfortable.

When he woke to find the steaming food, he smiled and placed a morsel in my bowl before serving himself. “You’ve worked hard, Luo’er.”

“We’re family. There’s no need to thank me.” I smiled back and put some food in his bowl.

He paused at the sight of it. His expression stiffened for an instant before he picked it up and ate as naturally as ever.

We had put food in each other’s bowls countless times in our year of marriage. This was the first time I had noticed how much he disliked anything I gave him.

I had to admit, he hid it well.

“Don’t wait for me at lunch, Luo’er. I’m discussing policy essays with an old friend today,” he told me as he cleared the dishes.

In the past, I wouldn’t have questioned that. Whether as a village healer or a spirit from the mountains, I knew very little about the books he studied.

But this time, I wanted to follow him and see.

“All right. I need to gather some herbs today, too. The apothecary wants some sanqi to stop bleeding.”

“Take care on the mountain, then.” He sounded just as he always had, betraying nothing.

Soon after he left, I cast an illusion to conceal myself and followed at a careful distance, all the way to the largest restaurant in town.

I stayed in the ground-floor dining hall. He went to a private room on the third floor.

You see, once you spot a clue, people’s stories seem to develop holes everywhere.

The third floor was reserved by the owner for important guests. How could a poor scholar who needed to work off his medicine bill afford to go there? Sadly, I had never paid attention before.

A storyteller was performing in the hall.

“Now, our Sixth Prince is a man of remarkable gifts and striking looks. Countless young ladies from official families in the capital have lost their hearts to him—even Miss Liu of the Chancellor’s household, the capital’s greatest beauty. However…”

The storyteller changed his tone.

“Our Sixth Prince is a devoted man. He spares not a glance for all those beauties. His heart belongs solely to his cousin, Commandery Princess Mingyue.

“Alas, the princess, Chu Qingyue, suffers from a strange affliction. Pain torments her heart day and night. And so the Sixth Prince has journeyed countless miles to the Western Regions in search of a skilled physician.”

The audience sighed in admiration. “What a loving couple! The Sixth Prince is a man of true devotion!”

No one noticed the handsome scholar in coarse clothes by the entrance, gazing longingly after a departing woman in pink who wore a veiled hat.

Nor did anyone know that the scholar and the woman were the very subjects of the story.

All anyone could say was what a perfect couple they made.

What a loyal and devoted Sixth Prince!

Well, who could have imagined that the pampered Sixth Prince, Yan Chengjun, had never gone to the Western Regions at all? Instead, he had disguised himself as the sickly scholar Chen Jun and condescended to marry me, a healer from a little mountain village.

Very well. Let me give the two of you a helping hand.