Xie Yu paced in circles around the small round table in the main hall, her restlessness obvious on her face.
Shen Changyin sat quietly at the table, resting her head on one hand.
"Why aren't you nervous at all?" Xie Yu asked as she walked.
"The wedding is tomorrow, and the two of us know absolutely nothing about the process."
Shen Changyin remained calm. "Little Xie, I don't think Attendant Zhang is willing to risk her official hat just to ruin the wedding of two royal heirs."
"And besides," she added suddenly, "on the wedding day, the most important thing is the relationship between the newlyweds. That's something we still haven't sorted out. The ceremony shouldn't be what we're most worried about, right?"
Xie Yu stopped walking. "I knew you'd say that."
"Little Xie truly predicts everything," Shen Changyin tilted her head, smiling at her. "Then may I ask—Your Highness, who has been entangled with me for days now—what exactly is our relationship?"
Xie Yu opened her mouth, but before she could answer, the sound of footsteps announced Attendant Zhang's arrival.
This official, who had handled nearly every aspect of their wedding, was even more nervous and busier than the brides themselves.
"Do the two of you have any instructions? If not, I still need to supervise the cooks preparing the dishes."
Her face was full of resentment from overwork.
"Uh… we came to ask about the wedding process and how we need to cooperate," Xie Yu said hesitantly.
Attendant Zhang relaxed. "I almost forgot. You two have been keeping the doors closed these past few days—I haven't had a chance to explain the process."
Xie Yu rubbed her nose and looked away, a flush rising to the tip of her nose.
Shen Changyin calmly poured herself a cup of tea.
"I've arranged everything else. Crown Princess, you can stay here at ease. Minister Shen, you'll need to tidy up—we're returning to your residence tonight."
"That way, tomorrow morning you can dress and prepare at your own home, then ride the wedding carriage back here at noon."
Before Shen Changyin could speak, Xie Yu frowned. "Hasn't her residence already been given to her subordinates to live in? How is that her home?"
Attendant Zhang froze. "We can't exactly have Minister Shen marry from the northern military camp."
Xie Yu found it even stranger. "She's right here. She can dress and change in her own room—what's wrong with that?"
Attendant Zhang spoke gently. "Crown Princess, this residence is already your home."
"It's hers too."
"But… there still has to be an 'entering the residence' ceremony. The red carpet at the gate is already laid out."
"We'll change clothes, go out the back gate, wait in a carriage, and when it's time for the entrance ceremony, we'll walk the red carpet together through the front gate."
Xie Yu laid it all out clearly and efficiently.
Shen Changyin sipped her tea, lifting her eyes to watch Xie Yu's back, a barely noticeable smile tugging at her lips.
When Xie Yu wanted to persuade someone, she often succeeded. Attendant Zhang quickly gave in, agreeing that each of them would depart from her own bedroom.
But she had one condition.
"From tonight onward, the two of you are absolutely not allowed to see each other."
"The next time you meet must be when you're both dressed beautifully in wedding robes, standing on the red carpet at the residence gate."
Attendant Zhang was unusually serious. "Especially no more sneaking around in the bedroom wasting time like the past few days."
At that, Xie Yu's face flushed again.
She forced a laugh. "Our rooms are so close. How are you going to stop us from sneaking over?"
Attendant Zhang let out a breath. "You don't need to worry about that. I have my own methods."
That afternoon, she summoned a group of artisans and used folding screens to create a long barrier, splitting everything from the main hall to the courtyard to the front gate cleanly in half.
She also informed everyone in the residence that the two royal heirs were strictly forbidden from private entanglements.
As she lectured the maids and guards outside, Xie Yu and Shen Changyin stood on opposite sides of a thin screen.
Xie Yu looked at the two-meter-tall barrier with disdain. "She actually thinks this thing can stop me."
Shen Changyin laughed softly from the other side of the gauze screen, her figure blurred and indistinct. "Give her a little dignity. Don't bully Attendant Zhang too much."
Xie Yu immediately felt that what she had just said was wrong.
"Me bullying her? Wasn't it you who bullied her? Back then, wasn't it you who used your position to pressure her into apologizing to me?"
"But hasn't Attendant Zhang been coming these past few days to discuss matters with us, only to be personally turned away by you, Crown Princess?"
Xie Yu sneered. "Now you're calling me Crown Princess. You're not calling me Little Xie or Little Fish anymore. I'd like to have someone else reject her too—if only you could get out of bed."
The moment she finished saying that, she regretted it.
She covered her mouth, eyes widening.
She could now say something like that so naturally, so bluntly.
She wasn't innocent anymore.
It was all Shen Changyin's fault.
She simply buried her entire face in her hands, overwhelmed with shame and indignation.
Shen Changyin had no idea what was wrong with her again. From the other side of the screen, she gently comforted her, "It's fine. I believe that no matter which one of us is bullying Attendant Zhang, when she hates us, she hates us both together."
Such a powerless kind of comfort.
But Xie Yu still lifted her head.
Everyone in the courtyard was outside receiving Attendant Zhang's training. The room was completely empty and extremely quiet.
It was just like the days that had just passed—doors and windows tightly shut.
There seemed to be no clear boundary between different periods of time. Just like now: the two of them were already fully dressed, prepared to properly and respectfully complete a political marriage ceremony, yet the night rain from that day still seemed to carry lingering force.
Time solidified on a person's body, like fog that takes a very long time to dissipate.
Xie Yu said seriously, "It suddenly feels so real. You and I are getting married."
From the other side of the screen, Shen Changyin softly answered, "Mm."
Xie Yu let out a long breath, swallowed, and said, "You wanted my answer just now, didn't you?"
Shen Changyin smiled. "You know I was teasing you. You don't need to be so nervous about it. Relax."
"Our time is still very long. There are still many things that can change…" she said vaguely, drifting off.
Xie Yu didn't hear a single word.
She dragged over a stool, stepped on it, rested her hands on top of the screen, and lightly flipped over. She landed on the carpet without making a sound.
She kissed Shen Changyin on the cheek.
Then footsteps sounded at the courtyard gate.
"I—I'll flip back first," she stammered, completely incoherent.
Shen Changyin covered the place that had just been kissed, still a little stunned. "Mm, mm, hurry back, or you'll get caught."
Xie Yu lightly flipped back, straightened her clothes, and just in time greeted Attendant Zhang as she walked in.
Meanwhile, Shen Changyin covered her cheek, as if brushed by flower petals. Her eyelashes fluttered, her heart racing.
Even during the most absurd moments of the past three days, her heart had never beaten this violently. It was almost painful, crashing around inside her chest.
—
On the other side of the screen, Xie Yu was like an early-romance student who instantly lets go of a hand when the discipline director shows up. She casually changed the subject.
"Oh right, what dishes did we decide on for the banquet?" she asked, smiling far too warmly.
Attendant Zhang looked at her suspiciously, glanced again toward the other side of the screen, but found nothing unusual and could only answer:
"We used some of the palace's imperial chefs, mixed with some master chefs invited from the marketplace. The flavors are fairly diverse—mainly light dishes and rich, heavy sauces. Paired together on the tables, they complement each other well."
"The dishes you liked when you tasted them at the engagement banquet were all added back in."
Xie Yu wasn't listening at all. She just kept saying "mm-hmm, mm-hmm, okay, okay," nodding furiously.
As long as she could pull Attendant Zhang's attention away from Shen Changyin, she would say anything.
In the end, Attendant Zhang was completely placated, smiling broadly, feeling that everything she had done had been fully acknowledged and appreciated by the Crown Princess. She left in a very good mood.
Only then did Xie Yu let out a long sigh of relief.
She looked up at the bright blue sky above the courtyard and realized that there was still a long stretch of daylight ahead. For a moment, she couldn't think of anything else to pass the time besides things in bed.
After all, for the past three days, she and Shen Changyin had either been entangled together or sleeping through the day.
After thinking for a long time, she finally returned to her room, washed her face again, and cleared her mind.
She sat at the desk, pulled out a sheet of paper, and first wrote one line:
"To Shen Changyin:"
Then she sat there blankly for a long time, unable to write a second line.
That was, of course, very normal. Even her own heart didn't have an answer yet—how could she write one down?
Gradually, she began to review everything that had happened since she and Shen Changyin first met.
In just three or four short months, so many things had already occurred. Thinking back on it now was exhausting.
If someone else had written those three or four months into a long post and shared it on social media, she would definitely be the first person in the comments yelling, "Break up. Cut it clean."
She used to think relationships between people were very simple. A good relationship should be smooth sailing all the way. Even if there were bumps, they should be nothing more than gentle ripples.
She had always believed that if a relationship was like a roller coaster, constantly going up and down, then it was too exhausting to be worth keeping. People needed to learn to conserve their emotional energy.
But when it came to Shen Changyin, she always found new strength—making the relationship more complex, more subtle, and more enduring.
In the end, she still didn't write a single word.
As evening gradually fell, it was the first time she and Shen Changyin were in the same residence yet ate dinner separately. After finishing her meal, she couldn't help but grab a maid.
"Go move the iron tree out of Shen Changyin's half of the hall."
She would no longer give Shen Changyin any chance to pour out her medicine.
The sky grew darker, the moon brighter. Tomorrow should be good weather.
But Xie Yu, freshly bathed, lay on her own bed and felt that her hands and arms were empty.
She had no way to hold another bear and hibernate together tonight—although when they did hold each other, she had complained that she couldn't sprawl out freely because of the other person's presence.
Tonight was especially long, but thankfully, dawn would always come.
After breakfast the next day, countless maids and palace matrons rushed separately into the two rooms to wash and dress them.
Shen Changyin was clear-minded and carried a naturally imposing presence. The matrons quietly did their work, arranged her hair, and quickly slipped away.
She sat on the edge of her bed. Several doors in front of her were open, leading to the screen, and on the other side of it was Xie Yu, shrieking noisily.
She was much more lively, joking around with the maids and matrons, chatting nonsense while being dressed.
Until the matrons began arranging her formal hairstyle.
The hairstyle for a wedding day was extremely complex—almost like weaving a delicate craft out of hair. To keep it from falling apart, it had to be pulled very tight.
This made Xie Yu miserable.
Her hair wasn't soft or the kind that could be bent easily. It was much stiffer.
So every now and then she let out a strange scream.
"My scalp! Don't pull my scalp!"
"It hurts, hurts, hurts, hurts!"
Shen Changyin sat on the bed edge, listening and silently laughing.
Xie Yu continued screaming like a pig being slaughtered. "It hurts! Be gentler, Granny! Do you even know what you're doing?"
One of the matrons replied loudly, "I've served who knows how many princesses. Of course my skills are good. Pain is unavoidable."
Xie Yu shouted back, "Who says so! When Shen Changyin combed my hair last time, it didn't hurt at all! I want Shen Changyin to do it!"
She shouted through the air, "Shen Changyin, save me!"
Shen Changyin laughed so hard that the hairpin on her head trembled nonstop.
Military Doctor Zhang walked in carrying the medicine she was supposed to drink today. Seeing her laughing like this, she hesitated mid-step.
Wasn't Lady Shen only ever expressionless or smiling with hidden blades? What was this supposed to be?
"You actually laugh?" she asked suspiciously.
Shen Changyin slightly restrained her smile, reached out, picked up the bowl of medicine, and drank it all in one go.
"I am about to marry the person I love. Why shouldn't I laugh?"
—
On the other side, Xie Yu's hairstyle was finally finished.
After the maids all withdrew, she took advantage of being alone and stood in front of the mirror, shaking her head as she examined her appearance for the day.
She pressed her lips together, trying not to smile, but the corners of her mouth wouldn't obey.
Jiang Fang saw her through the window from the courtyard and asked from outside, "What are you so happy about?"
Xie Yu said smugly, "Even though Shen Changyin is really pretty—really, really pretty, maybe too pretty—I'm not bad either."
"And then?" Jiang Fang didn't get it.
Xie Yu took a deep breath and pinched her thumb and index finger together, leaving only a tiny gap. "I like her a tiny bit. Really, just a tiny bit."
"And now I've realized that the two of us are a tiny bit compatible."
She was unexpectedly honest with Jiang Fang, then added, "You can't tell her this."
Jiang Fang, whose teeth were practically dissolved by the sweetness, said disdainfully, "You'd better not tell me either."
The sun climbed higher and higher. The auspicious hour approached.
Xie Yu took a deep breath, changed into her bright red wedding robes embroidered with gold thread, and followed the fenced path formed by the screens toward the outside of the residence.
Behind the hazy screens, Shen Changyin walked alongside her.
When it was time to part, they stopped.
Neither of them knew what the other looked like now. They hadn't seen each other for nearly a full day, yet it felt much longer.
Shen Changyin said, "Little Fish, see you soon."
Xie Yu replied, "See you at the wedding."
—
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