The Double Life of the Heir's Consort - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

“Consort of the Heir Apparent, Lord Heir Apparent is waiting for you in the study.”

I nodded, lifted the hem of my skirt slightly, and made my way toward the study in small, measured steps.

Xiao Hanlin never sought me out of his own accord. Even when we accidentally crossed paths in the Marquis’s Mansion, he would only frown faintly. Why was he acting so unusually today?

Could it be that he had finally had enough and wanted to divorce me?

I suppressed the excitement bubbling in my chest and kept a serene, gentle smile on my face.

A line of maids approached from ahead. They were carrying newly purchased vases toward the rear courtyard.

When they saw me, they respectfully stepped aside.

The maid at the very end had her view blocked by the vase, which was too tall. She failed to notice the step beneath her feet, swayed, and started toppling to the side.

My gaze sharpened. I reached out, caught her by the waist, and pulled her steadily back.

After regaining her balance, the maid thanked me and apologized, still shaken.

I smiled and left with unhurried grace.

The little maid could not help turning to glance at me and murmured, “How strange. Since when did the Consort of the Heir Apparent become so strong…?”

The maid beside her burst out laughing. “You must have been scared silly! Our Consort of the Heir Apparent is a proper young lady from a noble family. I heard that before she married, she was delicately raised in Jiangnan for seventeen years. She’s as frail and graceful as a willow in the wind, and excels at both the qin and painting…”

My hearing was excellent.

Every word the two young maids said reached my ears.

I could not help curling my lips.

Wrong!

I was not delicately raised in Jiangnan for seventeen years. For the first seventeen years of my life, I had been at the border in Mobei.

I lived alongside the soldiers, with the sky for a blanket and the earth for a mat. I climbed mountains, crossed rivers, ate in the wind, and slept beneath the open sky. The words “delicately raised” could not have been farther from the truth.

As for why I had married into Marquis Zhennan’s Mansion and become this dull Consort of the Heir Apparent, well… that was a long story, and not one easily explained.

Chapter 2

To this day, I still remember the way my father looked at me when I led my squad back to camp after wiping out the remnants of the Tujue forces.

Pride. Relief. A great weight lifted from his shoulders.

I thought my battle achievements had moved him. But after pulling me into the command tent, the first thing he said was, “Shizhi, go back to the capital. Your father has already found a good marriage for you!”

It was like a bolt from the blue, leaving me scorched inside and out.

The corner of my mouth twitched. “Father, have you lost your mind?”

“I have not.” He held my hand and looked at the scars, large and small, that covered it. “The Tujue Khan has already sent envoys with a letter of surrender. Their strength is badly depleted now, and they will not invade Great Qi’s borders again for at least ten years. As for Great Qi, the treasury is empty, and we lack the strength to continue the war. The court has already decided to accept their surrender and formally make peace.”

He lifted his eyes to me, deep wrinkles gathering at their corners. “Shizhi, when you first begged to go into battle and avenge your mother, what did you promise me? Do you still remember?”

Of course I remembered.

Back then, I had knelt before him and begged him to let me enter the army as a woman and set foot on the battlefield.

The condition was that if the day ever came when Tujue was driven out of Great Qi, I would return to being the young lady of the Song Family and obey all of my father’s arrangements.

I simply had not expected that day to come so soon.

For a moment, I was at a loss. I stood there in a daze, unable to speak.

My father slowly walked to the desk and handed me the imperial edict from the box on top of it.

“An imperial edict arrived from the capital a few days ago. His Majesty is mindful of my years of hard service and achievements, and intends to summon me back to the capital to receive rewards. In addition, he wants to bestow a marriage between you and the Heir Apparent of the Marquis of Zhennan.”

“Shizhi, be good. Your father is old now. I fear that one day, I will no longer be able to protect you.”

“If you can settle down peacefully in the capital, then I will be able to rest easy.”

Since he had put it that way, what could I possibly say in protest?

Marriage had never been all that important to me…

On the day I left the border, I turned back and looked at the brilliant sunset burning at the edge of the sky.

After returning to the capital, I never again saw a sight so vivid and intense.

The capital was indeed prosperous. The women were elegant, the men handsome, and everywhere one looked there was luxury enough to bewitch the mind.

It was only after returning to the capital that I learned the people here had always believed that I, the eldest young lady of the Song Family, had been delicately raised in Jiangnan.

They even said I had studied the qin, chess, calligraphy, and painting since childhood; that I was beautiful enough to topple a nation; that I was as frail and graceful as a willow in the wind; and that my temperament was gentle and pleasing.

Shocked, I charged into my father’s study.

“Did you spread those rumors?”

My father guiltily rubbed his nose. “I have a little vanity too. Who doesn’t want their own daughter to be praised?”

So he had decided to trick me instead.

No wonder the Emperor had suddenly thought to bestow a marriage between me and Xiao Hanlin, the capital’s foremost young master, a man as pure and bright as a clear breeze beneath the moon.

So I had a reputation like that in the capital!

I was furious, but there was nothing I could do.

Thus, in the months before my wedding, I played the qin, learned chess, read books, and practiced painting during the day. At night, I sat in the ancestral hall with my eyes closed, cultivating patience and tempering my nature.

After smashing ten qins and overturning twenty chessboards, I finally achieved modest success.

At the very least, I could pass myself off as a young lady of a noble family.

My father also found me a prescription from the Valley of Divine Physicians. Every night, I soaked my entire body in medicinal decoctions, and the scars on me gradually disappeared.

He warned me, “You must never let anyone discover your identity in Mobei.”

First, the Emperor had granted my marriage to Xiao Hanlin because of my reputation as a noble young lady. If the truth were exposed, it would be the crime of deceiving the Emperor.

Second, the capital was full of shifting undercurrents, and quite a few Tujue spies were hidden within it.

If they discovered that I was General Zhaohua, the one who had slain countless Tujue people in Mobei, they would inevitably set their sights on me.

My father did not want me to be in danger.

I did not have many expectations for married life.

The only reason I endured so much with such patience was that my father was old.

He had me late in life, and after my mother was killed by Tujue spies, he collapsed almost overnight.

Then, for my sake, he pulled himself together again. After all these years, he truly could no longer withstand me putting him through more trouble.