My King of Flowers
9. Wěn

CHAPTER NINE

Earth, rain, and peonies all invaded the moment their eyes met again. Her heart tapped at the base of her throat, resisting the urge to reach out—to call out, and still, she did not do any of these things. Sitting in the edging cold that tapered around her wrist and neckline, her cheeks burned against the chill.

“Prince Cuilin?” she whispered.

“Are you all right now?” he asked, lifting his eyes to her. She nodded her head slowly, taking him in for another moment. Tracing the strands of hair that clung to the contours of his cheek and chin with her gaze, she felt a surge of tenderness. Yinuo would take a thousand moments with him, even if the truth broke the dream. He wiped the slick from his hair and smiled softly towards her as he approached. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

Again, she nodded.

“Are you angry with me?” he asked her. She shook her head. “Then please, speak openly with me.”

“I’m not angry,” she spoke up, “I just don’t know what to say. I feel as if I have learned something deeply personal, and it wasn’t my right to know.”

He touched his cheek. “This scar, you mean?”

“I apologize, I didn’t mean to make you—”

“Stop,” he replied quietly. “You don’t make me uncomfortable, and I know you have good intent.” Before speaking again, Prince Cuilin closed his fist and eyes to take a breath. “Those women were right. You shouldn’t jeopardize your reputation by defending me. Please refrain from doing so—”

A crash of thunder boomed. “I will not!” Yinuo shouted. “Those women had no right makes those horrendous claims. They treated you like you weren’t a person and made assumption of your character based on a life they have never lived! What if you were they’re son? Trapped in another world away from everything and everyone who has ever loved you? They would not bare an ounce of that pain! They are fat and spoiled, and I am ashamed on them. I couldn’t let them continue! You are a person and deserve to be treated like such with compassion!”

He stilled. “Miss Yan.”

“I will defend anyone who is treated so miserably. It sickens me to my core that I even have a connection to them now. I don’t know your story, my prince, but it cannot be easy to live so far from home and have so much expected of you. So, I decline. Let me worry about my own reputation, I will say what I want to whom I want.”

“You’re too kind to me,” he awed. “Your act of kindness should not go unrewarded, but I am afraid that I do not have the assets to properly do so. If I were home, gold and precious jade would be finer, but as I have none...” he walked towards the garden, kneeling at the peonies.

Yinuo tilted her head, her eyes catching the glint of a concealed knife within his sleeve. With practiced ease, he deftly selected and clipped a stem from the bush, meticulously removing the leaves with a few skilled twists. Rising with grace, he discreetly tucked the knife away and moved out of the rain’s embrace. Approaching her, he knelt by her chair and revealed the perfectly prepared red peony from behind his back.

Misted in dew, fragrantly sweet, the sudden crash of thunder caused her to spring to her feet, covering her ears involuntarily. “Take it,” he whispered, unphased by the loud, resounding boom of thunder or the crack of lightning so close. Alone in the torrent, Yinuo’s heart thrummed at the base of her neck. It cannot be. Slowly, she reached towards his cheek, drawing him close to her and pressing her lips to his soft ones. The warmth of his breath heats her own as she invades his space and lifts him towards her. A hand caresses her back, tracing her spine with gentle pressure as the peony lies lifelessly on the ground.

Caught in the softness, the dance of pressure and heat. The warmth that flushes her face and the base of her neck. She pulled up for air and found more of him ready and eager to hold her close to his icy form. A sweetness of flowers and musk at his skin, pulling her close and in. It felt right.

It felt like it should be. The other part of her heart beating in the chest pressed to hers. Instead of pulling away, she wanted more; he wanted more than the gentle taps of the rain on the roof. She knew this man. She knew every caress, every feel of his lips against hers. She’d tasted him before, like maltose sweets.

She broke her latest kiss, cupping his face and searching his eyes once more. Whoever he was, she was his, and he hers, and in the rain, she vowed she’d never lose him again. “Cuilin,” she whispered.

He did not respond to the name, but he did not pull back from her either, captured in an embrace intimate and forbidden. It did not matter to the couple, whose whole world was only rain and each other. Yinuo shook her head. “I know you,” she crooned.

He nodded, “I—”

“What is the meaning of this!” shouted a blurred image rapidly approaching the pavilion. Anxiety spiraled within Yinuo, her hold on him tightening as fear overwhelmed her.

“Run!” Yinuo implored, shoving against Prince Cuilin with all her might.

“Please, run! Don’t let them take you—not again, Dehai!”

He firmed his stance, gripping her hand. “I will not run.”

“No, not like this! Go, you fool!” she pleaded, her voice cracking. She ripped herself away from him, only for her leg to betray her, sending her tumbling to the ground.

“Yinuo!” he shouted, reaching out and catching her arm—a loud tear screeched through the air. Yinuo clutched her shoulder, knocked to her knees; her chest was nearly exposed, and her sleeve was torn. The shadows that breached the entrance of the pavilion froze as dread captured Prince Cuilin’s face.

“What is the meaning of this!” Lei Yinzhe hissed! “Miss Yan, are you all right!”

“I am—”

“How dare you attack her!” he shouted, “Under my authority as the Minister of Justice, I am compelled to detain you, Prince Cuilin of Zhuo!”

“No!” Yinuo cried.

“Take me to Lord Yan,” Cuilin demanded, standing between him and Yinuo. Yinuo attempted to hoist herself up using the chair, but lost her grip on the smooth surface and stumbled.

“Ah!” she exclaimed, her hand smacking hard against the floor.

“Are you all right?” Prince Cuilin’s head swiveled.

“What are you waiting for! Arrest Prince Cuilin!” Lei Yingzhe demanded. Two of the wedding guests pushed forward, latching onto Cuilin’s arm. He resisted, yanking his arm free.

“Let me see that she’s all right!”

“She is not your concern! Take him away! Find her maid; don’t just stand there! Can’t you see she’s indecent!” Lei Yingzhe shouted.

“This is all a misunderstanding!” Yinuo cried. She pushed through Lei Yingzhe and bullied her way in front. “Don’t do this, Young Master Lei! He is not—”

“That is Magistrate Lei,” he interjected.

“Arrest me too! I—”

“You are distraught; for heaven’s sake, bring someone to take care of Young Miss Yan!” he bellowed. A strange woman grabbed her upper arm to prevent her from approaching.

“No! Prince Cuilin!” she cried.

“Yinuo, it wasn’t your fault!” he called. “None of this is your fault, Yinuo!” Prince Cuilin stressed as the men pushed her away, followed by Lei Yingzhe, who gave her a disgusted look before turning his attention back to the prince.

How? How could he say that? Yinuo contemplated internally. It’d been her fault. Everything had been her fault. She pressed the uncomfortable feeling down, but vividly heard and saw her memories interrupting the moment.

“Here,” Dehai cooed. Holding out the delicate pink peony to her youthful self. Her leg pain only a faint reminder of the weeks he’d spent nursing her back to health. Of all the moments where she searched for his smile and played with him in the garden, Yinuo cherished this one the most. The whole world was bright, it lingered in the corner of his smile, and made the adult standing vigilant feel every weight of the innocence.

It mocked her with each lash that crashed against his skin. Yinuo bit into the flesh of her lips, regretting every moment, every stolen kiss, every ‘I like you, Dehai.’ She would take it all back if it meant she could watch him quietly grow. Quietly marry another. Quietly linger over her form.

Yinuo couldn’t hear the words from the woman besides her, whether they were meant in comfort or concern with her ripped sleeve. She focused on the back of Prince Cuilin and how the blurring rain stole her from him.

Dehai had been the same, swallowed by a storm on another day. Tears threatened her eyes, but even though the adult did not cry, her inner child wept in a screeching pain. It reached for Prince Cuilin, clinging to his shirt, begging for him. “Dehai is dead,” she whispered to herself. You cannot have him back. You cannot have so much hope, Yinuo. She chided herself, feeling the tears even though she did not shed a single one.

In that moment, shadowed by her inner child, she was guided back to her deepest regret—a peony. The air was warm, the spring breeze gentle, swaying the cherry blossoms and wafting the scent of chūnbǐng through the air. Her Dehai had only dirt beneath his nails, yet the delicate and expertly prepared peony became her source of warmth. “Here,” he whispered, his cheek flushed and awkward. A joy sprouted from her impulsiveness, and in response, she pulled him to her lips, kissing him as a child does—quickly and briefly, without deeper meaning or intent.

“I like you, Dehai. I will always like you,” she confessed, her cheeks burning and beaming in his presence. He turned his eyes away, but his hand reached out to her to clutch tightly. She wanted to stay in the warmth, but a rustle of leaves betrayed her. Yinuo always denied she knew which brother had informed her father, but each tap of his retreating footstep stabbed her heart, sealing it with the betrayal she could never amend.

She recoiled her hand too late.

She denied her father too late.

She protested too late.

Yinuo grasped her ears, but she could still hear the lash, see the bruises, and watch in horror as her brother held her to his placket to prevent her from seeing her family’s punishment. A servant crossed the line, his father was flogged along with him and expelled from the household.

And she left to kneel in the mud, bearing the agony of her bent leg, not yet fully healed from the break. Yinuo spent hours in the garden. The rain unleashed a torrent of storms around her, yet she could still hear him screaming. What else could she do but call out to drown out the noise, the torrent taking all her senses?

“I kissed him,” she whispered. “Don’t hurt him anymore. Don’t! Let him go. I did it. I hurt him. I kissed him. Please, Father! Big brother! I am the one—” A hand rasped against her face, a streak she still felt from the signet ring at her cheek.

Yinuo traced it with her fingertips and felt the aunt trying to maneuver her away from the groups, but she held firm, still reflecting on her childhood. She broke free, shoving the person away from herself and running towards the great hall. Rain impeded her steps, and pain lingered in her bad leg. No! She wouldn’t be late this time. She wouldn’t be blind to what her actions meant. She made a promise when she kissed him.