Perfect Match – CH 016

Chapter 16

At a temporary resting place at the foot of the mountain.

As soon as Teng Yue left, Xiuniang came looking for her young lady. Seeing Deng Ruyun’s face and hands covered in wounds, her eyes turned red.

“Those damned bandits! How could they beat a girl like this?!”

Deng Ruyun was not actually beaten by the bandits, but rather, she was unable to resist the suddenly appearing guards and suffered these injuries.

Fortunately, her drug was potent enough to knock out Xiuniang; otherwise, how could she, a woman with a child, have survived against a skilled guard? She would have died ten or twenty times over.

Deng Ruyun did not bother saying these things to frighten Xiuniang; she simply thought Xiuniang’s arrival was timely.

Her injuries were throbbing more painfully, and she felt her strength waning.

“…Go and fetch Deputy General Tong for me.”

Tong Meng quickly arrived.

The wind blew the carriage curtain slightly open, and he glanced at her, immediately seeing the general’s wife’s pale, frosty face.

“Madam?!”

How did the madam become like this?

Tong Meng saw her pale lips move slightly, and she forced herself to speak.

“Deputy General Tong, please find two soldiers to escort us back to the estate. My injuries are probably quite serious; I want to go back and see a physician.”

This situation was far too serious.

Tong Meng’s mind raced.

The Yang family cousin was unharmed, and the general went to see her; yet the general was completely unaware of his wife’s severe injuries!

Tong Meng, seeing that the madam was on the verge of collapse, immediately ordered his men to take over his duties.

“I will personally escort Madam back!”

He then ordered three or five soldiers to clear the way and sent others to the county town to find a reliable physician.

“Thank you for your trouble, Deputy General Tong…”

Tong Meng heard her still politely thanking him; she seemed never to have considered him as her lieutenant, as her husband’s subordinate, but only as someone who had been troubled by them.

*

Teng Yue left the bandit stronghold.

His Yang family cousin, before leaving, regained her senses for a moment and pulled him aside, asking, “Cousin, are you going to send her away?”

Send her away… They’d already sent her to the estate; even to the bandits’ den, was that not enough? Where else did they want to send her?

Teng Yue felt a mix of emotions. He could not understand how he had let things get this way. He mounted his horse and rode straight to where she had been resting.

But when he arrived, he searched the area for any sign of her carriage. He saw neither her carriage nor any trace of her. Linglang was gone, and even Tong Meng was nowhere to be seen.

Teng Yue’s eyelids twitched. “Where did Madam go?”

“Reporting to the General, Madam is feeling unwell. Deputy General Tong escorted her back first.”

Feeling unwell… Teng Yue’s eyelids twitched even more.

“Did she go back to Xi’an Prefecture?”

The soldier shook his head. “She said to take her back to her estate in Tongguan County first, and she was in a great hurry.”

In a great hurry back to her estate?

Teng Yue’s eyelids twitched faster and faster. He immediately turned his horse around and galloped towards the estate.

… …

He had never been to this estate in Tongguan County before. If he had not seen his soldiers at the gate, he would not have known which household it was.

The servants here had not seen him either; only his mother’s attendant came forward.

Teng Yue asked directly, “Is Madam at the estate? How is she?!”

The attendant said she was injured and being treated by a physician in her room.

Teng Yue quickly entered the courtyard and found the estate small and messy, with traces of blood on the walls.

The attendant explained, “Second Master, please do not be offended. This estate was just bought by the Old Madam and has not been renovated yet. Country estates are shallow and crude, unlike city mansions. Madam was ordered by the Old Madam to renovate the estate, but unfortunately, before she could even start, all this happened…”

The attendant went to pour him tea, but he raised his hand to stop her.

Why would he drink tea?

Teng Yue looked at the dilapidated mud-brick house, with figures hurrying to and fro inside. He took two steps forward but first saw a small figure crouching under a tree in front of the house.

It was Linglang.

She was crouching under a jujube tree, its leaves falling in profusion, hugging her knees and burying her head in them.

She seemed to hear footsteps and looked up.

Her eyes were red and brimming with tears, which made Teng Yue’s heart sink.

“What’s wrong, Linglang?” he asked quickly, walking over.

But when Linglang saw it was him, she turned away in disappointment, burying her head back in her knees.

She did not want to talk to her uncle, but the way the little girl lowered her head suddenly reminded Teng Yue of something.

That day, he was returning from outside the city to the garrison headquarters. As he rode his horse through the bustling crowd, a child called out from afar.

“Uncle!”

The call seemed to be directed at him. For a moment, he considered looking in the direction of the voice.

But he could not remember whose uncle he was. The thought flashed through his mind, but he did not dwell on it.

Just then, a sandstorm suddenly swept through the street. He turned his head to shield himself from the wind and inadvertently saw a woman in the distance, carrying a child of about four or five years old, struggling against the wind.

He thought the woman’s figure did resemble his newlywed wife, but at that moment, he assumed she was a lazy, pleasure-seeking woman. How could she possibly be struggling to carry a child in the marketplace?

So he turned and rode away, not giving her another glance…

Teng Yue looked down at Linglang, his heart growing colder with each glance.

Therefore, the person who had seen him from afar and called out “Uncle!” was Linglang.

The woman carrying the child through the sandstorm was none other than his wife.

But he sat high on his horse, surrounded by the crowd, never bowing his head to respond.

“I’m sorry, Linglang,” the man tried to hug the child. “It’s all my fault…”

But the child turned away, avoiding his hand.

She buried her face in her arms. “But what about my aunt?”

As she spoke, large tears streamed down her reddened eyes.

Teng Yue’s heart skipped a beat. “What happened to your aunt?”

Little Linglang cried, her voice trembling with sobs.

“Auntie… Auntie was so badly injured protecting Linglang!”

“When? When was she injured?” Teng Yue panicked.

“Last night, someone beat Auntie… Auntie was knocked down by bad guys, and she bled a lot from her waist…”

Every word Linglang uttered, through her sobs, felt like a sharp stone striking Teng Yue’s heart.

A lot of blood from her waist? She really did not just have those two wounds on her hands.

Teng Yue stood up abruptly, then turned and ran towards the door.

She did not tell him; instead, he went to check on his Cousin Yang, whose skin was not even scratched…

In the narrow courtyard, he reached the door in one step, pushed it open, and a strong stench of blood assaulted his nostrils.

He was a man who led troops in battle; he knew that such a strong stench of blood meant severe injuries and a great deal of blood loss.

Inside, Xiuniang was covered in blood. A physician stood in the hall, and a female physician sat by the bed in the inner room.

The physician and the female physician were clearly husband and wife; the former, not wanting to approach, repeatedly asked questions.

“How is it? Has the splinter been pulled out?”

The female physician’s mouth was dry. “Almost, almost, but there’s too much bleeding. Quickly prepare some hemostatic medicine!”

The physician took out all the hemostatic medicine from the table, and only then did he see Teng Yue. “Who are you?”

Teng Yue asked directly, “My wife… what’s her condition?”

The physician then recognized his identity but frowned deeply.

“A splinter was deeply embedded in Madam’s waist, and it’s been there all night. Perhaps the location was relatively lucky, and Madam endured it until now. The splinter can be pulled out, but stopping the bleeding might be a bit difficult.”

Before the physician finished speaking, everyone who had heard him saw him.

“General…”

She was asking him why he was here. The implication was that he was there.

Teng Yue’s body stiffened.

He could not answer her question; he even wanted to call her name, but did not know how to utter the words.

He only saw the white cloth soaked in blood on the floor and her pale, almost frosty face.

She seemed to sense his stiffness and, despite her severe injuries, spoke softly to him.

“I’m alright, but this estate has not been repaired yet; it’s a mess everywhere. General, please wait in the outer room for a while; I will be done here soon.”

But she had only spoken a few more words when suddenly a large amount of blood gushed from her waist.

“Oh no!” the female physician exclaimed in alarm.

Xiuniang also cried out, “Oh no, young lady, do not move!”

The physician, disregarding everything else, quickly brought in hemostatic medicine, “Quickly, apply the medicine, stop the bleeding first!”

The three of them busied themselves around her, her face growing increasingly pale, as if she no longer had the strength to even sit up.

She finally had no time to pay attention to him anymore and no longer exchanged polite words. She simply closed her eyes, offering her last bit of strength.

As Xiuniang turned to bring over the water, he stepped forward and supported her shoulders.

Her shoulders were slender, just a hand’s width in length.

Perhaps it was the unfamiliar strength she felt, for she opened her eyes and looked over, then paused slightly upon seeing him.

“Do not move,” Teng Yue had to say. “Have them remove the splinter from your waist first.”

He finished speaking, then turned to her, letting her lean against him.

He wanted to give her some support, just a little.

But this position made her even more uncomfortable. He could feel her body stiffening, yet Teng Yue’s grip on her remained firm.

He looked at her pale face, slowly taking in the details of this wife he had previously known so little of—

She had unusually long, delicate willow-leaf eyebrows. Beneath them, her eyes were bright, her nose was small and straight, and her lips were usually quite rosy, not the pale white they were now.

And she was astute, bold, and quick-witted.

From the very beginning, she had sensed the impending danger. Even after being banished to the countryside, she sought help from Madam Zhou and Inspector Sun, devising numerous contingency plans.

After her brief escape, she sat in the woods by the roadside, waiting.

He rode by, pausing briefly.

But she neither approached to “delay” him, nor did she let anyone tell him she was there.

She treated herself as a complete stranger, not disturbing him, quietly sitting in the woods, silently watching him appear and disappear before her.

At this moment, Teng Yue looked at her once rosy and fair face, now crisscrossed with several cuts and scratches from a night’s run through the forest. Her deathly pallor made the blood from her wounds appear even deeper.

That night, the bandits had still captured her and taken her to the mountain, intending to use her and her niece in exchange for a dozen or so other bandits in their hands.

But she did not wait for him to exchange them, nor did she wait for him to storm the bandit mountain to rescue them.

Was it because, in her eyes, she and Linglang were strangers, outsiders, mere passersby not worth exchanging two lives for the lives of a dozen bandits?

Passersby… He was the one who treated her like a stranger first.

That day, they met on the road, and he immediately rode away.

Teng Yue could no longer undo his actions. He could only look down at her intently, seeing her eyes tightly closed, fine beads of sweat trickling from her forehead.

At that moment, the female physician swiftly pulled the last piece of the wooden splinter from her waist.

The pain made her body tremble involuntarily.

He gripped her shoulders tightly, supporting her body.

But he could feel that she was so weak that she might collapse at any moment.

Yet she was still trying her best to hold on.

Teng Yue carefully observed her face, while Xiuniang kept wiping away tears, saying to the female physician, “Please use more hemostatic medicine; our young lady has really lost too much blood. How can a person lose so much blood…”

Yes, how could a person lose so much blood?

Teng Yue had already ordered someone to fetch more medicine, both hemostatic and blood-replenishing, but seeing her current condition, he could not help but call out to her softly.

“Yunniang, if it hurts too much, do not try to hold on any longer.”

Perhaps relaxing and falling into a coma would make her feel better.

But then he suddenly called her by her maiden name, and she glanced up at him, slightly surprised.

That glance seemed to hold a complex emotion, unreadable to him, but she quickly looked away.

“Thank you, General. I’m alright, not in that situation.”

The man pursed his lips; this answer surprised him completely.

He could not help but tighten his grip on her shoulders and arms.

Compared to the lazy, indolent, and scheming person he had imagined, this was the real her.

A person without a wealthy family background, even penniless and struggling to make ends meet, without parents or siblings, yet having to support an entire family.

He could not imagine what kind of life she had led before coming to Xi’an, carrying this burden of supporting her family.

Yet, even with this, they always called her the country girl surnamed Deng.

Anyone could bully her, make her take the blame for others, or kick her out whenever they wanted.

But everyone else was an outsider, while he was her husband, with whom she had shared her life.