New Song Dynasty: My Wife is an Imperial Princess

"Should I deliver this letter back to Youzhou?"

Upon hearing the request from the young lady in early summer, Tang Xiaoqi shook her head vigorously, "No, the young master said that I don't need to go back. I need to take care of things in Guangling first."

In the two days since arriving in Guangling, Tang Xiaoqi has been busy, all to complete Tang Qian's secret plan. He needs to separate the materials he stole from the Taoist temple and keep the number of people who know about them to a minimum. This requires him to do many things personally, and he even politely declined the Qiu family's offer to help.

"What should we do then? My young lady is still waiting for her husband's reply. If something goes wrong, who will take responsibility?"

Hearing that if this second young lady of the Ye family went mad, she could really recklessly charge into Youzhou, Tang Xiaoqi couldn't help but look at Ling'er on the other side with a hint of fear: "Is this second young lady of the Ye family really so capricious?"

Ling'er closed her eyes and nodded with great sympathy for Chu Xia, which was her silent response.

Tang Xiaoqi was stunned for a moment, then immediately became interested: "Then tell me, how did our young master offend this evil star? You've been with the second young lady since you were little, so you must know the ins and outs."

Ling'er rolled her eyes at Tang Xiaoqi: "These are all the master's family matters. How can we servants make irresponsible comments?"

She really wanted to brush it off, but the two people opposite her were staring straight at her, and even Chu Xia seemed to be listening attentively. Ling'er couldn't help but laugh out loud, "You guys... fine, don't blame me for not warning you when you get punished after you go back."

The story is quite simple. In the seventh year of the Zhenghe era, Tang Huan was appointed as the Vice Prefect of Yangzhou. Because the wives of the two families were distant relatives, they visited each other frequently. On one occasion, when Tang Huan attended a gathering of the Ye family with his whole family, nine-year-old Tang Qian accidentally drank a few cups of rice wine. As a result, he got drunk and randomly found a room to sleep soundly.

"Wait a minute, let me guess." Hearing this, Tang Xiaoqi couldn't help but interject, "Could it be that this room is the second young lady of the Ye family's boudoir, and our young master slept directly in her bed?"

"If it were just a matter of sleeping in someone else's bed, there wouldn't have been so much trouble afterwards. When the elders in the hall saw that our young master was missing, they gathered all the servants to look for him. As it turned out, the eldest young master of the Tang family and the second young lady of the Ye family were sleeping soundly together."

Nine-year-old Tang Qian and eight-year-old Ye Qingmiao were both immature children and naturally could not have done anything disgraceful to the family. However, too many servants were disturbed that night, and almost the entire Ye family knew that their young lady had slept in the same bed with the eldest son of the Tang family. Although the head of the family, Ye Shuo, issued a gag order at the time, with so many servants in the mansion, it was inevitable that some would speak out and spread the news. How could Ye Qingmiao face people after that?

"Because the two families have some connections, the two are of similar age, our master is a high-ranking official in charge of a region, and the Ye family is a powerful clan in Guangling City, so their marriage was a natural outcome."

"I see." Tang Xiaoqi stroked her chin like Tang Qian, looking quite smug. "It seems our young master has quite a few romantic affairs. There are two princesses in Youzhou, the second young lady of the Ye family in Guangling, and a little jasmine in Dongjing. It's truly enviable."

"Little Jasmine?" Ling'er and Chu Xia exchanged a glance, their eyes full of doubt. "We haven't even sorted out the matter of the second young lady of the Ye family yet, how come another one has appeared?"

Realizing she had said the wrong thing, Tang Xiaoqi tried to run away, but Ling'er grabbed her arm and said, "No, I've told you everything I know, so you have to tell me everything you know too."

"Little Jasmine is indeed Little Jasmine. But please rest assured, this Miss Jasmine and our young master have only spent one night together, and both of them wore masks the whole time. Even if they were standing face to face now, they would probably have a hard time recognizing each other. There shouldn't be any trouble... right?"

Hearing that the young master had only met him once on the night of Qixi Festival last year, Ling'er and Chu Xia did not press the matter further, and Tang Xiaoqi secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

Although he didn't know the specific details of the two's interactions, as Tang Qian's personal servant, Tang Xiaoqi knew perfectly well how his young master couldn't forget that little jasmine.

If it weren't for Master Tang Huanqiang escorting his son into the delegation sent to Youzhou, Tang Qian would probably have posted missing person notices all over the capital city of Tokyo.

"Let's discuss what to do next." After a brief silence, Chu Xia steered the conversation away from Tang Qian's romantic history. "I know my young lady's personality very well. If this matter isn't resolved properly, she will definitely not let it go. If something really happens, who will be responsible?"

"That sounds familiar. Chu Xia, didn't you just say that?"

“That’s not the point,” Chu Xia interrupted Ling’er’s rant. “The point is how to put my young lady at ease and wait for the young master to appear.”

Once Tang Qian returns to Guangling, she can consider her mission accomplished and retire without having to worry about these messy things anymore.

"Since your young lady is waiting for my young master's reply, rather than meeting him in person, wouldn't it be perfect to just send her a letter?"

"You mean, forgery?" Chu Xia pondered for only a moment before immediately agreeing with A Tang Xiao Qi's plan. "This is a good idea. As long as we time it right and deliver a letter to my young lady, we can appease her. As long as she doesn't run away, I'll be thankful."

Although Ye Qingmiao did save her from the fire, Chu Xia felt exhausted after encountering such a young lady who acted without any regard for the consequences.

"How should we reply? Why don't we take a look at what your young lady wrote first?"

"No way!" Before Tang Xiaoqi could finish speaking, Chu Xia immediately stuffed the letter into her sleeve. "This is a secret between my young lady and her husband. How can we let outsiders know? As for how to reply, don't worry about it. I'll handle it myself."

As for the content of the reply, it certainly couldn't be a letter of severing ties or anything like that; otherwise, Ye Qingmiao would definitely go to the capital to file a complaint with the emperor.

It seems there's also the problem of who should write this letter. I certainly can't do it myself. Not to mention that Chu Xia's current literacy skills were all taught by Ye Qingmiao, my young lady can tell it's a forgery just by looking at the handwriting. With her current literary talent, she can't write anything that would make Ye Qingmiao willingly become a waiting-for-husband stone in Guangling.

After racking her brains, Chu Xia put her arm around Ling'er's slender waist and said, "How about we ask your young lady for help?"