Chapter 7
1161 Words
By the time Yue returned to her quarters, Han Jue was already cross-legged on her own bed, folding sheets that had absolutely not been assigned to her.
“Do you want the truth,” she asked as Yue entered, “or the ‘I’m pretending to respect your privacy’ version?”
Yue dropped her case on the floor with a thud. “Neither. I want peace, quiet, and plausible deniability.”
“So it was dramatic,” Han Jue said, eyebrows lifting. “Spill.”
Yue untied her sash, threw it onto the cabinet hook, and collapsed onto the nearest cushion. “He fell. I treated him. There was blood. There was silence. There were no wedding vows.”
Han Jue narrowed her eyes. “Hmm.”
“Don’t hmm me.”
“I’m not hmm-ing. I’m observing.”
“You’re judging.”
“Same thing,” Han Jue said cheerfully. “Did he flinch?”
“No.”
“Did he speak?”
“Barely.”
“Did you touch him?”
Yue hesitated for half a second too long.
Han Jue gasped. “Scandalous!”
“It was medical,” Yue snapped, grabbing a linen sheet and aggressively folding it into a near-perfect rectangle.
Han Jue scooted closer. “You’re folding angry.”
“I’m folding efficiently.”
“You’re folding like you just had a deeply intimate moment with someone who thinks words are for peasants.”
Yue pointed the sheet at her. “He let me touch him. That’s all.”
Han Jue raised her brows. “In prince-speak, that’s basically a proposal.”
Yue groaned and dropped the sheet on Han Jue’s head.
Han Jue peeled it off with dramatic slowness. “Okay, okay. But seriously. He’s not the type to accept help. The fact that he didn’t shove you away or threaten exile says something.”
“It says he’s tired of bleeding.”
Han Jue gave her a look. “And it also says that he trusts you.”
Yue didn’t reply.
She stared down at her hands instead—still faintly stained with drying blood beneath the nails.
She rubbed at them absently.
Han Jue went quiet for a while. Then, softly: “He’s not easy, Yue. He wasn’t trained to trust people. Especially not anyone who touches him.”
Yue nodded once.
“I know.”
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Yue had prepared bath mixtures before.
She had brewed tonics in open flame basins, balanced pungent herbs with delicate roots, even boiled tiger bone twice during exam season just to prove a point to Bai Song.
But she had never done it like this.
In silence. In moonlight. Alone.
The attendants bowed without speaking and left without question, clearly having been told she’d handle it alone.
The space was quiet — unnaturally so.
Stone tiles ran along the floor in cool gray-blue shades, and curved pools of mineral water shimmered faintly beneath flickering lanternlight. The fragrance of dried herbs still clung faintly to the wooden panels near the boiling brazier.
She stood there for a moment, looking into the calm surface of the bath.
It always surprised her how peaceful this place looked, even when she knew how many unspoken rules echoed off its walls.
Yue rolled up her sleeves.
From the side table, she took a stack of dried bundles — mugwort, chrysanthemum, a bit of safflower root — and unwrapped them with practiced fingers. The scent drifted upward like smoke memory: warm, sharp, grounding.
She mixed in precise amounts. No more than a handful of each. Just enough to reduce tension in the blood vessels and allow the muscles to loosen gradually in hot water. Ji An preferred heat that bordered on pain.
She didn’t know how she knew that.
She just did.
As she stirred the herbs into the steaming water with the long wooden ladle, a thin film of fog curled around her ankles.
She wasn’t supposed to stay this long.
It was protocol to exit before the Crown Prince arrived.
She had every intention to leave—
Until the door slid open.
A footstep. Soft. Controlled.
She didn’t turn.
She didn’t have to.
She already knew who it was.
The door slid shut with a soft, final click behind him.
The sound echoed faintly off the stone, followed by silence—the kind that didn’t settle so much as press.
Yue didn’t turn.
She dipped the ladle one more time, letting the infusion blend fully, watching the steam rise in swirls from the water’s surface. The oils from the mugwort were already threading into the top layer of the bath, their sheen catching faint reflections from the lanternlight.
She could feel him watching her.
Not aggressively.
Not confused.
Just… watching.
She set the ladle back in its stand with deliberate care, then slowly turned to face him.
Crown Prince Ji An stood at the threshold of the bath space, his expression unreadable beneath the thin veil of steam that now hung between them. His outer robe was still on, but slightly loosened—his posture relaxed, but not casual.
His hair was tied in a looser knot than usual.
His eyes were on her.
Yue didn’t blink.
“I wasn’t finished when the servants left,” she said, her voice calm. Matter-of-fact. “I thought I had a few more minutes.”
He said nothing.
Didn’t nod. Didn’t frown.
Just stood there, as though deciding whether to enter the space or vanish back through the mist like he’d never been there at all.
The air between them shimmered with heat.
Water lapped faintly against the stone rim of the bath.
Yue held his gaze, then gestured toward the tub. “The temperature’s near perfect. Mugwort, safflower root, and sweet flag. You’ll feel it in the joints by the time you finish.”
Ji An’s eyes didn’t flick away.
Not even to the water.
Only then did she realize—he wasn’t surprised to see her here.
He had expected her.
Or, at the very least, had prepared for the possibility.
Still, he said nothing.
So she returned her attention to the satchel at her side, gathering the loose leaves and empty gauze wrappers. Her sleeves brushed the damp stone as she worked. The silence remained—not awkward, not hesitant.
Just weighted.
She stood slowly, brushing her damp palms down the front of her robe, trying to pretend her fingers weren’t shaking.
She turned to walk past him—only to find him closer than she expected.
Much closer.
Their sleeves brushed.
The contact was feather-light, but it sent heat crawling up her spine, a flush she couldn’t blame on the steam.
He didn’t move.
Didn’t apologize.
Just… waited.
She bowed slightly and kept walking, not looking back.
Not yet.
But her pulse told a different story.
Behind her, she heard the rustle of fabric as he moved toward the water. The soft click of the ladle being set aside.
- Writer
