The Queen will definitely attend the
flower-viewing banquet held by her mother's family.
And Li Qingwu, as the Queen's daughter and a role model among noble ladies, naturally could not refuse.
The young ladies who were invited felt honored, after all, this represented their own, or their family's, status in the upper class circle.
- Besides, the young ladies of each family were imprisoned in the mansion on weekdays, and the scenery they saw throughout the year was less than that of the maids in the mansion. Such a rare event was something they looked forward to day and night.
Not to mention the invitation from the Duke's wife.
Li Qingwu took Fuling with him and went to the storehouse of the Princess's Mansion to pick out gifts.
Yuming took the list of the warehouse and checked them one by one. Li Qingwu chose for a long time, but still couldn't choose a satisfactory one.
Until Fuling took out one of the exquisitely packaged small boxes, and read out the small words on the box word by word in confusion: "Produced by Hongxiuzhao... must be a fine product?"
Li Qingwu tilted his head and felt that the name of Hongxiuzhao sounded familiar: "What is this?"
Yuming was also a little confused, and his face changed when he heard it: "Where did this come from...ah."
"What's wrong?"
"I remember it now, this is," Yuming stuttered for a rare time, "This is my master's. He put it here two days ago. He said he wouldn't need it..." As soon as he
finished speaking, Fuling said: "Then let me see if I can take it to the wife of the Duke..."
Yuming blurted out "No", but it was still a step too late.
Fuling had already opened the box, and looked at the things in the box in bewilderment, not recognizing each other.
Naturally, Li Qingwu could not recognize it. Seeing that her face was not right, he tentatively asked, "What happened?"
Yuming quickly snatched it from Fuling's hand and smiled guiltily, "It's just... something worthless. The master also said that His Highness doesn't need to bother to know..."
Fuling was confused: "But, Your Highness didn't see clearly what it was?"
Li Qingwu stared at Yuming for a moment.
After a long time, she looked away and said softly, "Forget it."
Since Qiu Che didn't want her to see it, she wouldn't look at it.
Yuming breathed a sigh of relief. She was holding the box and thinking about how to deal with it. Suddenly, she heard Li Qingwu ask, "Is it a gift from Yaotai?" Yuming responded subconsciously
.
She raised her eyes and saw Li Qingwu standing in front of her. He didn't turn around and spoke calmly.
It seemed like just a casual question.
After getting the answer, there was no reaction.
Yuming felt uncomfortable for some reason.
She thought for a moment, and cautiously added for her master: "It was a wedding gift from Miss Yaotai. The master saw it and felt it was not appropriate, so... he did not let you see it."
Whose wedding gift is two smooth and finely carved jade dildos and the art of sex?
She remembered that when Qiu Che opened the box and saw them, he was a little confused at first, then took the book and took a look, and immediately closed it, with a look of astonishment.
Probably didn't expect that even the gifts sent by Yaotai were so bold and unrestrained.
Thinking of this, Yu Ming couldn't help blushing for her master.
Li Qingwu nodded and didn't ask any more questions.
When Li Qingwu finally picked out the gift and left with the things, Yu Ming took the matter to report to Qiu Che.
Qiu Che's hand holding the book froze slightly: "Did you tell her what this is?"
Yu Ming hurriedly shook his head: "No. It's just that this gift is not suitable to be placed in the warehouse. Is it really going to be thrown away?"
Qiu Che had a slight headache. After a while, he said: "Give it to me."
Yu Ming handed the box to her with a weird look of "I knew it".
Qiu Che took it and said, "That's right."
"Li Qingwu is one of us now. If there is any news, there is no need to hide it from her."
"In a situation like today, if she really wants to know about this insignificant little thing, it's okay for you to tell her."
She thought for a moment and said, "But if you are unsure about something, you still need to tell me first."
Yu Ming knew what she meant by this and bowed to agree.
Qiu Che then raised his voice and said, "Did you hear that?"
A figure fell from the eaves outside the house in response, holding a dogtail grass in his mouth, and replied vaguely, "I know."
- It was Yu Yan.
She has recently reached a critical point in martial arts training. Every day, she is like a restless bird, flying here and there, and indulging in the game of hanging the golden rooster upside down.
She also imitated the cold-faced secret guard Fu Feng to show off, and likes to hold something in her mouth when she has nothing to do.
She said it was personality, and Yu Ming called it a disease.
The two sisters talked and laughed, Qiu Che just smiled and watched, and suddenly her right eyelid twitched.
She paused and looked up at the direction where Li Qingwu left.
But she only saw a cloudy sky with a storm coming.
Qiu Che was a little uneasy this afternoon.
But the people she sent to monitor the father and son of the Qiu family reported back that the two were still well behaved and did not do anything.
Thinking about it again, Fu Feng was with Li Qingwu this time, so nothing should happen.
So why was she so uneasy?
This premonition came true soon after dusk and heavy rain.
Fu Feng rushed back in the rain and knelt in front of her and said word by word: "Something happened in the Duke's Mansion."
When Qiu Che arrived, a group of young ladies were holding umbrellas, whispering in groups of two or three around a certain place in the backyard.
The queen and the Duke's wife sat together on the chair in the center of the corridor. The Duke's wife looked a little tired, but the queen's face was as black as the bottom of a pot.
In front of the two, Li Qingwu stood gracefully, but Yuan Fu, the commander of the Jinwu Guard, was disheveled and kept his head down without saying a word.
In the innermost room, Yaotai was sitting with only her coat on. She looked very embarrassed, but she was looking out with interest.
Qiu Che recognized at a glance that the coat she was wearing belonged to Li Qingwu.
Yaotai, as the top performer of Hongxiuzhao who only performed but not her body, had always been sought after by dignitaries. It was not surprising that she appeared at the flower-viewing banquet and danced and played the piano for the ladies. But
how could she be with the leader of the Jinwu Guard...
But the news Fufeng told her only said that this was the situation when Li Qingwu saw Yaotai, and the two rolled together naked.
She was the first to discover it, but before she could make any arrangements, someone came with the queen and a group of young ladies.
When the two sides met, the scene was immediately awkward.
Li Qingwu could only ask Fufeng to go back to the princess's mansion first and inform Qiu Che.
Although in fact, it would be useless to inform Qiu Che - Qiu Che was now a man, and it would not be good for him to suddenly enter the banquet in the middle of the night.
But she understood Li Qingwu's thoughts.
It was a good flower-viewing banquet, but the leader of the Jinwu Guard suddenly got together with a prostitute and was caught in bed. It was really a scandal.
Li Qingwu was not familiar with Yaotai now, and probably because she was Qiu Che's ally, his first reaction was to protect her.
Yuan Fu, the leader of the Jinwu Guard, had an affair with the Queen, and Yaotai was just a brothel girl.
If the Queen wanted to protect her lover and put all the charges on Yaotai, Li Qingwu was not sure that he could really save her.
So he could only pin his hopes on Qiu Che.
But before he figured out the situation, there was not much Qiu Che could do.
She calmly met Li Qingwu's eyes in the crowd, gave him a reassuring look to make her feel at ease, then lowered her head and shrank into the corner.
Prepare to listen to what was going on.
- She was wearing a maid's outfit at this time, and her eyebrows and eyes were no longer deliberately painted to look masculine, which was completely different from her usual appearance.
Even if her own mother, Wang, came, she would be stunned for a while when standing in front of her.
Li Qingwu probably saw her as well, and was stunned for a moment, until the Queen scolded him, and then he came back to his senses.
"You said this woman is innocent, which means that the blame is all on Commander Yuan?" The queen said coldly, "Then you should explain why you are here?"
Li Qingwu bowed slowly and said calmly: "Lehe didn't mean it, it's just the fact - after all, if a man has intentions, a woman is powerless to resist."
"You said it so clearly, as if she has experienced it."
"Don't say that, didn't she marry a young and handsome champion? I heard that they are very loving, maybe they really have experienced it..."
Li Qingwu obviously heard the whispers of these women, and his ears blushed slightly, but he still looked calm: "As for why I am here, it is because Yingyu, the queen's personal maid, told me: the queen has been waiting here for a long time."
At the flower viewing banquet, everyone did not gather in one place. Li Qingwu only met the queen at the beginning, and heard that the queen was waiting for her here, so he came over.
At this time, there was indeed no shadow of Yingyu beside the queen.
"My son's maid can testify for me."
Fuling stood up and nodded hurriedly, saying, "Your Highness is telling the truth! Your Majesty..."
But the Queen frowned and was impatient to listen any longer.
She waved her hand to interrupt Fuling and said, "Since you have nothing to do with this matter, why do you have to speak for a brothel girl? She is right here, why not let her answer herself!"
Yaotai just stood up, thinking that it was finally her turn, but just as she was about to go out with a smile, she saw Li Qingwu bowed again and said, "Mother, a weak woman has just experienced this kind of thing... Please don't push her too much."
The Queen snorted with a cold face.
Yaotai also understood the meaning of her words, rolled her eyes, and immediately pretended to be a pitiful, ravaged little white flower, sobbing and moving out of the door.
"Your Majesty, I am innocent!" As soon as she came out, she knelt on the ground miserably, sobbing, "I just felt that it was raining and cold, so I came to the backyard to put on more clothes, but I didn't expect this villain to suddenly appear. I was powerless to resist, so--"
"Don't talk nonsense!" Yuan Fu widened his eyes and was furious, "It was obviously you who deliberately seduced--"
At this point, he was suddenly stuck, glanced at the queen with a dark face, and lowered his head in frustration.
Yaotai started to cry again, and in her words, she was just saying that she was forced.
When the two of them insisted on their own opinions and could not reach a consensus, Li Qingwu listened for a moment and suddenly felt that this situation was familiar.
She glanced at the crowd-Qiu Che was already hidden among them, and she could not see him.
But as long as she thought that Qiu Che was here, she felt inexplicably at ease.
Li Qingwu breathed a sigh of relief in her heart, and before the queen was about to get angry, she interrupted softly, "You two."
"Did you all feel a little hot inside when you entered the wing room?"
She said this vaguely, but the parties involved immediately reacted and said in unison, "Yes."
Yuan Fu looked at her in surprise, "How did His Highness Lehe know?"
Li Qingwu smiled and said nothing.
The queen also reacted, sat up straight, frowned and waved, asking another maid Lianyi to go to the room to check.
Soon, Lianyi came out with an incense burner and saluted, "My lady, it is indeed rosemary."
Just when the ladies and ladies present were wondering what rosemary was, the queen's face became solemn.
Qiu Che quietly raised her head and her eyes fell on the incense burner.
The same way... a familiar scene.
Could it be that this was also the work of Prime Minister Wu?
But why did he do this?
While thinking, she noticed that Li Qingwu seemed to shake his body slightly when he approached the incense burner in Lianyi's hand.
Before she could think about it, a sudden scream came from outside the yard, startling everyone present.
"Oh no!"
A maid stumbled in, looking horrified. In the pouring rain, she pointed in the direction of the garden and stammered, "Someone's dead!"