Li-Rong escorted himself out of the room, licking his lips and cracking his neck. He felt inundated. With anger. Rage and frustration and the highest of them all was there was no outlet for such feelings.
While he walked out of the chambers and into the grounds of the palace checking if he could see something to take his mind off things, he thought back to her and everything and why she'd run out from his father's chambers.
He groaned knowing he couldn't talk about such matters with his father knowing how it disgusted him. Another emotion burst in his heart and he stopped in his tracks mulling over the matter.
He could do nothing and everything bad would happen to her and his father would make him sit and watch while it went on. A function was coming and no one knew but his father was planning something big and that could be disastrous.
The function was just three days away, by the end of the week. Starting tomorrow the palace would be filled with nobles and princesses and princes with their kings and governors.
The palace was already decorated and baked in shimmering designs and flying ribbons. Everyone was bent on it. Head maids leading the maids and eunuchs and court ladies thinking about clothing and accessories to adorn their masters and mistresses.
Anything might happen after that…marriage and…he straightened his robe when the sound of jingles caught his attention, he dipped his hand, pulled out a hairpin, gazing at it he didn't feel the presence that had come to stand in front of him but continued scrutinizing the hairpin.
"That buyao cost a lot and I know that because I have a wife who loves jewels, especially rare gems like gold, Fourth brother. Where did you get that from?"
Li-Rong sighed, tucking it back into his robe as he took a glance at his first brother. Prince Lengxiao, son of the empress and the real crown prince. But now a mere prince who didn't know what to do with his existence but picked a woman every week for a concubine and chased them thereafter.
"Nothing you should concern yourself with First brother" he shifted to leave when his voice turned to the usual tone he used with him. The revulsion underneath the voice and words, the bitterness laced into the letters of his words but it didn't faze him.
It did before but not now. He had no time to play house with him, exchanging glares and harsh words in the grounds of the palace and anywhere they saw themselves.
He had no time for that. Many important things required his time which he couldn't give and the little spare wasn't for wastage.
"Sure nothing I should concern myself with?" He darkly laughed, a smirk slinging his lips in a long line as he tapped his chin with his index finger "ohhh sorry. My bad but I think I saw that hairpin on one of the maid's hair?"
Li-Rong stiffened, his blood icing and his veins almost protruded out on his body but he stood unruffled with those words. It wasn't a question but a statement. They both knew it. Everyone would've seen it, definitely. Anyone could see the hairpin on her hair.
Words might've reached his father's ears about it. Prince Lengxiao had tattled to his mother, the empress. Sure enough. Whispers perhaps flirted amongst the maids, eunuchs, court ladies, and even the noble consorts.
It wasn't a piece, a palace maid with wages that could do nothing but buy simple clothing and the lowest type of Jade would afford or have in her possessions. Gold was out of the context and for people that knew genuine gold when they saw it would know it was authentic.
Everyone, probably.
His heart sped like the waterfall he frequented that no one knew about. Fast and harsh. The current could kill and have no mercy for anyone. Which was happening now.
"Nothing you should concern yourself with Prince Lengxiao. That's the order of the crown prince" and a shocked glower featured his brother's face but he stood, his hands clasped behind him, his voice hardened in a low command "Don't concern yourself with what the maids put on their body Prince Lengxiao. I might take it the wrong way and put it to the Emperor"
His brother backpedaled and a small laugh left his lips, the headpiece in his hair glinting in the evening sun, a normal headpiece for a prince. Formal and simple.
He shouldn't feel remorse but he did, he'd been calm all throughout his life but couldn't conform to what his father did by taking his birthright and giving it to him who didn't want it. And he, who yearned for it had nothing and wasn't much recognised and appreciated.
That must really hurt but he dared not to sympathise with him. His brother had done much worse to him and though he didn't want the crown before he wanted it now. He should feel every ignominy his mother had felt when she was alive.
"You're going to pay for this Li-Rong. I will certainly make sure of it. Just you wait and watch"
His face calm devoid of any emotion shrugged, there was nothing to be scared about. His brother was a coward. He couldn't do a single thing without his mother's knowledge and that was pathetic enough. They were all bounded in their mothers and listened to their every word. Wrong and right. Very sad the lot were wrong.
"As you wish. Keep your eyes away from the palace maids Prince Lengxiao. The next warning could be in front of the court" he said after him as he scuttled away. His robe flying in the wind. Lavish and one of the rarest fabrics.
His brother always wanted to make a statement but words cannot describe the piece on his head or the tassel on his waist of who owned the crown.
"Say that to yourself" he heard the distant words and a scoff.
His father would take anything but infidelity and relationship with anyone in the palace grounds. He didn't want his lineage to be tainted and soiled with that of a low born—his words.
He pivoted, changing direction of where he'd wanted to go. He instead went to the paddock in the palace grounds. A place where he colonized for himself when his mother was alive.
His father had left him to take a piece of space in the palace grounds for his horse and guessing correctly that'd been the same time prince Lengxiao had begged their father for a pet and he'd declined saying animals weren't allowed in the imperial grounds.
His mother, the empress, couldn't do anything about it. It was the order of the emperor, no one was to break it and his mother did. Not like he ever wanted the paddock.
It wasn't his to begin with but Xin-Yi, she wanted a pony after saying she saw it in her dream. He'd begged his mom to get it for him because she wanted it but couldn't get it and he was the only reliable source she could get it through. So he made it happen.
His mother had purchased it from Shu. Another kingdom that breed the finest horses. For a very expensive amount that'd the empress and everyone in the palace talking then about how the emperor was keeping quiet through the whole
experience.
But nothing happened after that, his father said nothing and acted like the paddock didn't exist. He still couldn't understand why he did all those things.
But that was it. They couldn't go back in time or turn back time to relive those memories and try to ask his father the reason for his humane actions and behaviors towards him with how he now was a monster in the flesh.
It was all in the past.