Song Yixiao felt awkward and quickly blushed. Then she looked down and tightened her sleeves, appearing like a bashful girl.

After a while, she raised her head again. As expected, Yuan Xue'e and the others, including Jinxun, had left sensibly while Jian Xubai had walked to the position three steps away from her. He also stopped being loving and then said smilingly, "You respond quite fast!"

"Thank you!" Song Yixiao felt perturbed and wondered whether he was asking for the jade pendant back. Then she calmed herself down and asked, "May I know why you want to meet me?"

"I am free today. Ramble with me around the garden in the marquis's mansion then." Jian Xubai said with his hands put behind his back, "After all, I have made a sincere pledge to you that I would marry you. Although the imperial decree of granting the marriage is not issued, I must meet you and spend time with you anyway so as to make my words trustworthy, right?"

Song Yixiao was speechless.

Following him to wander a few steps, she asked, "Does Her Majesty the Empress Dowager dislike me?"

"Grandmother hasn't met you before. Why does she dislike you?" Jian Xubai couldn't help laughing and said, "But she loves me so much that she will never oppose me marrying you!"

"Then the imperial decree of granting the marriage?"

Was there anybody trying to obstruct it?

While Song Yixiao was still puzzling, Jian Xubai said, "It is because of your complicated family background. You are one of the Song Family, but you live in the prince's mansion. My sister doesn't know where to send the betrothal gifts. My aunt advises the Crown Princess to ask the Song Family to discuss with Prince of Hengshan and come up with a solution to keep you from being criticized. Hence, the matter has got held up."

"No wonder Madam Huang paid a visit with my stepmother!" Song Yixiao finally took a tumble and then felt confused, "Then Mother must have known about this. Why didn't she talk about it to me? And she even tried to stop me from coming here today?"

Thinking of Wei Mengying's scheme, she couldn't help feeling frightened, "Is Mother angry so she intends to teach me a lesson?"

Amidst fright, she heard Jian Xubai say, "But it will be solved soon. My third elder brother also wants to ask my grandma to grant his marriage. Because he is not conferred with a dukedom, he cannot get married until I am married. My father loves him dearly. Even though he doesn't want to help me, now he has to anyway."

He talked calmly while mentioning his father, as if talking of an irrelevant person. Song Yixiao couldn't help thinking of how eager he was to win the favor from his father. She felt melancholy and yet not surprised. Even she was vigilant against her birth father and mother after being hurt.

Could Jian Xubai feel nothing about his father who didn't love him at all?

Prince Consort Jian only showed partiality to his eldest son and he would fall out with his youngest son sooner or later.

However, the most important thing for Song Yixiao at present was to notarize her marriage, or why would the bad relations.h.i.+p between Jian Xubai and his father matter to her?

"It sounds like he will not go back on his proposal?" While thinking so, she ventured a question, "Didn't you say that you didn't want to get into trouble?"

Now why didn't he bother with the betrothal gift?

By asking so, she didn't expect to hear any honeyed words. Just because the marriage happened too suddenly and she was in a worrying predicament, she didn't dare to leave out any detail.

Jian Xubai heard that and didn't conceal his own thought, saying casually, "I am afraid to bring trouble on myself, but as to presenting betrothal gifts or holding the wedding ceremony, the others will handle for me. No matter how troublesome it is, I don't have to worry about it. Why do I change the fiancée?"

He thought that Song Yixiao was still determined to refuse his proposal so he gave her a threatening look, "You had better give up returning the jade pendant to me!"

Song Yixiao was speechless.

Well, she was counting on marrying Jian Xubai actually!

"You must embroider something for me when you have time, which should be something I can put on and show others, such as a purse or perfume sachet." She stayed silent while Jian Xubai still kept talking, "Put more effort on the embroidery... Oh right, are you good at it? If you are too bad at it, even if I find it okay, you may leave a bad impression on my grandma when she sees it!"

Song Yixiao said angrily, "Don't you know that the present I am preparing for the Dowager Consort's birthday is a piece of embroidery?"

If she was not confident in her embroidery, how dare she decide to present such a gift? After all, the embroidery would be shown to the people at the birthday feast. Even though all the people would only say something nice at the feast, they were from rich families and had broad horizon. If her embroidery was not good enough, it would not be a grateful gesture for the Dowager Consort but a disgrace on herself then!

However, Jian Xubai a.s.serted eloquently, "Haven't you been working on the embroidery? Who knows whether it is done by you or your maids?"

Song Yixiao remained silent for an instant and then took off her own sachet with a poker face. Then she threw it to Jian Xubai, "Every st.i.tch of this was done by me. Do you think whether such a skill is good enough to satisfy Her Majesty the Empress Dowager?"

Jian Xubai directly fetched the sachet and looked it over for a while before he nodded his head with satisfaction, "Quite nice!"

Then he put the sachet into his sleeve naturally and obviously he was not going to return it.

Song Yixiao reminded him with embarra.s.sment, "The color and the pattern are for girls."

How could Jian Xubai put it on himself?

"You are so ungrateful!" Jian Xubai sneered, "Think about it! My grandma hasn't met you so far, so it remains unknown whether she likes you or not. However, your family background makes presenting the wedding gift so tough. My grandma must feel unhappy about this! If I don't find a way to dispel her dissatisfaction towards you, she may be instigated by others to make you suffer when you two meet!"

He took out the sachet and showed it to her, "My grandma likes quiet and well-behaved girls. She always says that embroidery requires patience. I will show this to her when I go into the imperial palace, which will surely bring you benefits!"

Song Yixiao caught the key point subtly, "Who will instigate her?"

"The one you need to stay away from is Princess Changxing." Jian Xubai said casually, "I spent quite some time with her when I was a child and she may have misunderstood something. This time, when she learns that I've chosen you to be my wife, she is very unhappy. According to the servants of my grandma, my aunt has tried to straighten her out and ease her unhappy, she still doesn't let it go... If you run into her later, you must be careful!"

After being silent for a while, he added, "Apart from Changxing, even though the others dislike you, they will not show their emotions to you directly. By then you only need to trim the sails. I think you should be able to deal with it!"

Song Yixiao had thought of it before. Now when she heard this, she didn't feel disgruntled. How could she not pay for a price if she wanted to take advantage? Moreover, Jian Xubai specially gave her such reminders and also took the sachet, which dispelled her doubt. She had been worrying about being killed for what she had seen in the pavilion of the apricot forest.

After all, if he wanted to kill her, he wouldn't need to do so much for her.

But Princess Changxing was of high birth and incomparable to ordinary people. She was about to beat around the bush about the princess's character and hobbies when Jian Xubai suddenly stopped with a killing intent crossing his eyes!

Song Yixiao felt confused and also stopped. She looked around subconsciously only to find a young man in purple standing under the albizzia and staring at them gloomily.

Jian Xubai also glared at him with a cold look.

They looked each other in the eye. It was at the end of spring as well as the beginning of summer. The garden seemed to be a bit chilly. The young man in purple said in a teasing tone, "Xubai, this is the girl you like?"

After looking Song Yixiao up and down, he snorted viciously, "How plain she is!"

"My dear cousin, you are always poor at sizing people up." Jian Xubai glimpsed him with an indifferent look and then turned to Song Yixiao with loving tenderness, saying in a tender tone, "Don't take his words personally!"

Song Yixiao smiled and said genuinely, "I am only a plain girl and it is so kind of you to marry me!"

She replied humbly and yet appeared demure with her eyes full of confidence and lenience. Her reply seemed more corresponding to Jian Xubai's words—" I'm taking the high road".

Satisfied with her coordination, Jian Xubai held back his softness and then said to Ji Zifu, "What brings you here? Xuepei is still not recovered and cannot meet visitors."

Ji Zifu narrowed his eyes and took a few steps forward, saying, "I am not close to Yuan Xuepei but after all, we spent a few years in Wuhuan together. Now I think that it is reasonable to pay him a visit. Moreover, even Yuan Xuepei doesn't ask me to leave. Why do you even bother?"

"Since you are here to visit Xuepei, why do you come to the garden?" Jian Xubai smiled and yet still didn't look nice, "Particularly, you have seen us arrive here. Why didn't you excuse yourself?"

"You two are still not engaged or married yet. Now that you meet in private, you are the ones who should hide away!" Ji Zifu was a handsome man with rosy lips and pretty white teeth but he talked so meanly, "How dare you ask me to excuse myself?"

Song Yixiao frowned in secret while Jian Xubai only replied him with "yeah" and then added, "But there are only three of us here."

"What?" Ji Zifu was confused.

"Without you coming here specially, there would be only me and my future-to-be fiancée in this place." Jian Xubai heaved a sigh and said as if he were helpless, "So we have tried our best to hide from others. Yet, we didn't expect that you would come here to disturb us."

Song Yixiao unfolded her eyebrows and pursed her lips, trying to make her facial expression appear demure and elegant and resist laughing. It must be because Yuan Xue'e helped clear the site that no other people were in the garden except them.

However, as Jian Xubai said so, Ji Zifu became the filthy person who deliberately came to the remote place to peep at his cousin and his cousin's wife-to-be meeting in private!

Although Jian Xubai looked Ji Zifu each other in the eye indifferently, the former one still called the latter nicely as "dear cousin", which behaved with courtesy. However, in a blink of an eye, he put a label of being virtueless and despicable on Ji Zifu!

She was looking on aside. Yet, Ji Zifu felt ashamed into anger by his cousin and accidentally glimpsed her, saying, "Just because I have heard that the garden is empty now, I'm afraid you may do something indecent and shameful!"

Song Yixiao felt so mad!

It was good enough that Jian Xubai was not a pushover. He heard that and then sneered, "You mean that a man and a woman must do something indecent when they are alone? But your father, aka, my uncle used to meet Aunt Daiguo for many times before getting married. By saying so, at what place do you put Uncle and Aunt Daiguo?"

Now it was Ji Zifu's turn to get mad. It was well known that Marquis Fuyang and Daiguo Grand Princess fell in love at the first sight, got married as they wished, and respected each other like guests amidst the past 20 years afterwards.

Such a much-told tale suddenly was turned into a story that a n.o.ble princess pledged to marry a man without parental consent frivolously by Jian Xubai.

Yet, it was kind of true. Back then in order to fight for the throne, the Empress Dowager and Emperor Xianjia intended to set Daiguo Grand Princess up with Marquis Fuyang, so of course, they would make an opportunity for them two to run into each other. Otherwise, how could Daiguo Grand Princess who lived in the imperial palace get to meet with Marquis Fuyang? If they hadn't met each other, how could they have fallen in love?

At that time, Marquis Fuyang's clan was quite powerful in the previous dynasty, so Emperor Xianjia's half-brothers would try to stop the marriage. Therefore, in order to facilitate the joint marriage, Daiguo Grand Princess must gain the favor from Ji Weiguan. As a result, they had to meet each other and spend time together alone. It was Ji Weiguan and his father who went to beg the previous emperor for the imperial decree of granting the marriage!

After all, it was for the sake of Emperor Xianjia and this couple loved each other quite much, so no one dared to mention the story behind. If others did, even by accident, Ji Zifu would teach him a lesson well!

And he might be praised by Emperor Xianjia for that!

However, Jian Xubai was no ordinary person. Daiguo Grand Princess didn't suffer any wrong for the sake of her brother while Jinguo Grand Princess became very different forcibly just for her brother! Furthermore, she was not interested in the court affairs. As such, if Jian Xubai and Ji Zifu came into a conflict, Emperor Xianjia would surely help the former one. Moreover, it was Ji Zifu who started the dispute today!

Seeing that Ji Zifu left angrily with nothing to say in reply, Song Yixiao looked sideways at Jian Xubai only to find that he just whisked his collar as if nothing had happened. He said smilingly, "We have stayed here long enough. Shall I escort you back to the Embroidery Compound?"

Song Yixiao had fulfilled her goal of coming here and also watched a good show, so she was fine with the suggestion. However, they just walked for a while when Jinxun suddenly ran towards them in a hurry. She saw them walking shoulder to shoulder and then made a curtesy randomly before reporting out of breath, "Your Ladys.h.i.+p, we must go back now! A servant of the prince's mansion has sent a word that Her Highness the Princess Consort suddenly pa.s.sed out!"