Winter nights in the Yan Capital were always calm and still. The cold silenced most of the animals and kept its people indoors except for the guards and night watchmen that patrolled the city. Out in the mountains, things were even quieter.
Chu Yexuan finished downing a cup of hot tea with a rueful sigh. "I'd probably stay warm longer with a goblet of wine down my throat."
"Yes, until you run into a tree and knock yourself out cold," Ling Fengxiao's expression was wooden as he poured him more tea.
"Oi, oi! Try to spare my feelings here, I'm doing you a favor!"
After it had been settled that Chu Yexuan would play Follow the Spy, the prince had whiled after the rest of the afternoon at Ling Fengxiao's estate, splitting his time before practicing moves in the courtyard and pilfering his friend's snacks. They were now wrapping up an early dinner so Chu Yexuan could tail his target on a full stomach.
"You're also eating up all the meat of the estate for the rest of the week," Ling Fengxiao observed. While his estate had plenty of food, the limitations of the winter meant that supplies weren't inexhaustible. Even the imperial family had limits to how much fresh meat and vegetables they could eat per month and favored salted, preserved varieties to get through the winter.
"My compliments to the storehouse," Chu Yexuan praised grandly. "I couldn't stop once I tasted the salted pork!"
In a season where preserved food was king, each family had their own pickling, salting, and freezing methods to keep meat edible. Chu Yexuan was quite partial to the Ling Estate's meats, finding them more flavorful and gamey than the palace varieties.
"I'm beginning to suspect you volunteered for the mission just to eat my food," Ling Fengxiao narrowed his eyes, but the stern expression did nothing to deter Chu Yexuan's good humor.
"If you're not going to finish your share, I'll have the rest!"
--
When night finally fell, the moon shone upon a lone figure making their way through the forests. His silver-lined white robes blended into the snowscape since he'd opted to leave the fur-lined cloak back at the Ling Estate. His steps against the snow were silent and left no trace, a clear sign of his superior lightness techniques.
In the series of a few seconds he had ducked behind multiple trees to track the elusive figure fleeing through the branches above him.
Heh, he's a slowpoke! Chu Yexuan grinned.
The figure above didn't seem to notice Chu Yexuan's presence---or if he did, he didn't show it. As he headed towards the capital city, his pursuer kept close, their shadows weaving through the woods in intricate twists and turns. By the time Chu Yexuan came to rest above the city walls, the moon was already high in the sky. He jumped to a nearby building and flattened himself against the roof as two night patrols passed by, then quickly hurried after the other man from a parallel distance behind him.
He's heading towards the southeast, Chu Yexuan observed. That's where the Ministry of Works' official has his estate.
But they soon passed by the sprawling estate of the minister and headed more towards the districts bordering the civilian homes. Ling Fengxiao hadn't told Chu Yexuan anything beyond the fact that the man had been spying on his gates, so the prince had no idea where they were going. When he saw the man slow down, he slowed down to match him, expecting that they were approaching their destination.
But as he settled down to hide behind another roof, the man he was tailing vanished!
Chu Yexuan blinked. He was certain he had seen the man there one second before he disappeared in the next! He crept as close as he dared to the target's last known position and stared incredulously at the empty, undisturbed roof.
Where did he go?!
Chu Yexuan wondered if his eyes had been playing tricks on him. He spent the next bit of time fruitlessly searching around the roofs, hoping to catch another glimpse of the man. In the end, all he was left with were cold ears and the distinct memory of the figure simply winking out of sight.
....winking?
A sudden thought occurred to Chu Yexuan before he made a beeline for the palace. For now, he would have to head home and give the failure further thought.
--
Much later in the night, Ling Fengxiao was interrupted from his reading by a nighthawk that flew to his window with a piece of paper tied to its leg. He unfurled the paper to see two horizontal lines drawn near the top, followed by the words: southeast, shadow arts.
Two horizontal lines meant failure; Shuyang hadn't been able to follow the man to the end. But the written words changed Ling Fengxiao's surprise into puzzlement, then caution. In his youth, Chu Yexuan had been declared a top talent by a martial arts master, who had taken him away to train for a few years. He was a genius at fighting and came back with a formidable set of skills. Speed and lightness techniques were his forte, but there was one area that he had never been able to master.
The so-called 'shadow arts' was a collective name for the highest realm of lightness techniques, whose users were so quick that they could seemingly vanish into thin air. Nothing short of that could have eluded Chu Yexuan's own skills. But the number of shadow arts users were rare in the jianghu, so for a common spy to exhibit such skills seemed like a laughable idea.
But Shuyang would know, Ling Fengxiao thought uneasily, If he had seen the real thing.
And according to the paper, the prince had lost their little intruder in the southeastern part of the capital---which matched the previous reports of his scouts that had tracked the spy to an area that included the Mei Estate.
A complicated expression flickered past Ling Fengxiao's eyes before he burned the message over a candle flame.
--
"He didn't come out today, either?"
In her room, Mei Yanran was casually chatting with the scout who'd just returned from spying on Ling Fengxiao's front gates. She hugged a pillow to herself as she curled up in the covers, biting the corner of her lip.
"I never knew he was such a homebody," she muttered to herself. "Do his servants do all the work for him?"
The scout at the window remained silent. Incidentally, this one shared an uncanny resemblance to another Chinese actor---Lin Zhiying, or Jimmy Lin.
"Anything else worth mentioning, Xiao Lin?" Mei Yanran asked. Like Little Chen, Little Lin was another favorite of hers---though his baby face made him less suited to be head guard like Chen Xiao. Appearances were important in this line of work, after all!
"Third prince Chu Yexuan came to visit," Lin Zhiying replied simply. "And...he tried to follow me back, but I lost his tail."
"He did? Wait---how did you lose him? When and where?" Mei Yanran sat bolt upright. Chu Yexuan isn't an easy person to shake off!
Lin Zhiying blinked. "With the shadow arts that you had us learn, young Miss. I was getting close to the estate, so I made use of it to cover the final distance."
Mei Yanran leaned forward and poked him in the forehead. "You used the shadow arts in front of Chu Yexuan?! Why did you do that?!" It was an uncommon technique in the Conspiracies of the Northern Court world, but one she'd given to her guards during the setup period as added security measures. The Goddess of Fates had said that introducing too many anachronisms would affect the stability of the novelverse and its original characters, which was why Mei Yanran had defaulted to using what was available.
"Because young Miss said we were not to expose ourselves under any circumstances," Lin Zhiying replied. "The shadow arts was the only viable move to escape him when he was catching up. All of the other methods I tried failed."
"I should've given you guys more common sense when I made you!" Mei Yanran bemoaned as she clutched her head. "Alright, uhm, okay, let me think."
If Chu Yexuan was following Xiao Lin, it won't be long before he tells Ling Fengxiao about this. Actually, who knows---maybe Ling Fengxiao already knows everything!
"Tell Xiao Chen," Mei Yanran said next, "To call off watching Ling Fengxiao's estate. Immediately!"
Lin Zhiying murmured an assent before he hesitated. "Young Miss, my apologies."
"No need, you were just following orders," Mei Yanran waved him off distractedly. "I should've thought it through before sending spies on my crush. Urk, at least ones that wouldn't be caught."
"My apologies again, young Miss."
"Don't wear that expression, your kicked-puppy face is too strong," Mei Yanran held up her pillow to block Lin Zhiying from sight. "It's fine now, so just go to bed."
Looking a little lost, Lin Zhiying nevertheless dipped his head a final time. "Should I report to Head Guard Chen first before bed, young Miss?"
"Yeah, do that first, then bed, then whatever he says," Mei Yanran felt herself sweating in embarrassment. When she asked the Goddess of Fates to make her a bodyguard unit, she'd emphasized wanting 'strong and capable fighters' who could face off against all the different martial arts types both in and out of the novel. While most of the guards at the Mei Estate were stock NPC-type characters, she'd had fun customizing character traits for a select few. Chen Xiao was the 'worldly-wise, levelheaded leader type that's super dependable,' while Lin Zhiying was the 'baby of the group, simple and easy to tease.'
But 'innocent' and 'simple-minded' mean two different things, ahh!
With a frustrated noise, she dove into her covers and curled up into a ball.
Fine then, I'll just focus on the female lead until it's time to visit Ling Fengxiao! All roads lead to the protagonist, so I refuse to believe that she can't bring us all together somehow!
The bright moon outside her window glimmered peacefully as she fell asleep.
--
Author's Note: Oh yeah, the header drawing is supposed to be Chu Yexuan, btw. Young, confident, and great with smiles, ahaha~
