After coming ashore, Xie Zheng set Fan Changyu down for the time being. As he raised his hand to take her pulse, his gaze fell upon the pair of deerskin wrist guards wrapped around her cuffs, and his eyes lingered there for a moment longer than usual.

His gaze then lowered to her left hand, swollen beyond recognition. His already tightly pressed thin lips drew even tighter, almost forming a straight line.

Even when she was hunted by the Wei manor’s death warriors, she had never been injured this badly. Yet now, after running into mere bandits, she was reduced to such a state.

He lifted his hand and removed the wrist guard from her injured hand, then focused as he began to take her pulse.

But the pulse beneath his fingertips was pitifully weak, and the body in his arms was as cold as ice—almost no different from that of a dead person.

The stench of blood filled Xie Zheng’s senses, making his brows furrow tightly.

She should not be like this.

In his impression, no matter when, she was always warm to the touch.

But this icy body before him seemed to be telling Xie Zheng that her life was slipping away, little by little.

A tangle of inexplicable emotions welled up in his chest; the sudden panic made him feel unbearably restless—so violent he wanted to kill someone.

Xie Zheng lowered his gaze to her tightly shut eyes. She was drenched from head to toe, her hands and face tinged a bluish purple from the cold. The wet garments clinging to her body, and the cloak he had thrown over her, offered her no real warmth at all.

She was far too cold. He had to warm her at once.

Xie Zheng swept a glance over his personal guards and said in a deep voice, “Leave my clothes here. Withdraw ten zhang away and turn your backs.”

The guards looked at each other, and when they realized what Xie Zheng intended to do, astonishment flickered in their eyes. But they quickly obeyed.

After they had retreated, Xie Zheng took another look at Fan Changyu’s bluish face. When his fingertips reached her collar, he paused briefly. Then he untied her hair ribbon, used it to blindfold himself, and began to strip away her soaked, icy clothes. Groping for the dry garments he had removed before entering the water, he wrapped them carefully around her body.

Because he could not see, every touch of his fingertips felt unusually vivid. When he finally secured her tightly in the dry clothes and tore away the blindfold, a thin sheen of sweat had already formed at the tip of his nose.

Silently, he took hold of Fan Changyu’s left arm. Before changing her clothes, he had already noticed her arm was dislocated; upon closer examination, he realized the bone had even been set incorrectly.

To be wounded like this and still shield that scholar, was she truly not afraid of dying at the hands of bandits?

He could not name what he was feeling inside.

But for a fleeting moment, he thought bitterly—what was it to him even if she died?

Yet the motions of resetting her bone—pressing, loosening, pushing—were done with the gentlest care.

Xie Zheng’s face darkened. After setting the bone back in place, he ordered a guard to find a stick and bind her hand to it for temporary support.

It was the first time the guards had seen him treat a woman in such a way. For a moment, they couldn’t discern what their lord intended. After Xie Zheng had finished tending to all her wounds, one of them asked, “My lord, are we heading to Jizhou Prefecture now?”

Xie Zheng looked at Fan Changyu’s still bluish face. At last, he gathered her up in his arms and walked toward his warhorse. “Find a household nearby to rest for the night first.”

All his clothes were now wrapped around Fan Changyu. The river wind cut like blades as it whipped against him. His upper body was bare, droplets of water still falling from the strands of hair across his forehead, yet he did not so much as shiver. His body was lean and sinewy, the lines of his muscles sharply defined—slender, but brimming with strength.

The guards watched as their lord, bare-chested, mounted his horse with the woman wrapped tightly in his arms. They scarcely had time to recover from their astonishment before spurring their own mounts to follow.

The horse’s back jolted with each stride. Xie Zheng carefully avoided Fan Changyu’s dislocated arm, shielding her protectively in his embrace. Feeling the weight pressed against his chest, his hand tightened slightly around the reins.

He lowered his gaze to her lifeless profile and said coldly, “You had better stay alive. Otherwise, who do you think will take care of that little tag-along for you?”

Only the sound of the wind answered him. His lips pressed into a thin line, and he drew her closer, holding her even tighter against himself.

The hundred light cavalrymen accompanying Xie Zheng were all former scouts; it didn’t take long for them to find a household in this wilderness—a solitary, blind old woman living alone.

Not wanting to alarm her, Xie Zheng brought only a few personal guards. Ordinary folk feared soldiers, so they claimed to be traveling merchants, handed the old woman a few taels of silver, and borrowed a bedroom and a kitchen.

Some of the guards went to the stove to boil water, others asked where they might find a doctor nearby, and then set off to fetch one.

At first, the old woman was suspicious—these men had brought an unconscious woman, after all. She worried they might be traffickers. But hearing the clatter of water being boiled and medicines being discussed, her heart settled.

Human traffickers would never treat a captured woman with such care.

She found several sets of her daughter-in-law’s clothing and brought them to the room, asking, “This lady looked fine just now. How did she end up falling into the water?”

Three braziers were burning in the small room. Though Xie Zheng was bare-chested and already sweating, the body of Fan Changyu, half-buried beneath the bedding, was still icy cold.

There was no wooden tub in the old woman’s home, so he couldn’t submerge her in hot water to restore her body heat quickly. He could only use cloths soaked in warm water, wrung out, and apply them repeatedly to her stiff, frozen limbs.

Placing the cooled cloth back into the basin, he wrung out a new one and wrapped it around her hands, replying, “We were ambushed by mountain bandits who attacked our boat. She caught a chill after jumping into the river to escape.”

“What a calamity…” The old woman sighed when she heard of the bandits, her voice tinged with pity.

She handed him the clothes she had brought. “These are my daughter-in-law’s garments. Change your lady into them later.”

Xie Zheng thanked her.

The old woman added, “In weather this cold, coming up from the river—you must have soaked through your own clothes too. I’ll find you a set of my son’s to wear.”

When she left, Xie Zheng sat by the rough wooden bed, watching Fan Changyu. After a while, he noticed the bluish tint on her face had faded somewhat, replaced by a flush of red.

He lifted a hand to her forehead. As expected, she was burning up—her skin scalding hot beneath his palm, like molten fire beneath the surface.

His brows knitted together. He removed the cloth from her hands, soaked it again in warm water, and pressed it gently to her brow.

By the time his guards returned with the physician, Fan Changyu’s face was already flushed crimson.

The physician had been jolted nearly senseless from the rough ride. Barely catching his breath, he was shoved straight into the room to examine the patient.

Had it been anyone else, he might have grumbled about being dragged in such a state, but faced with a room full of hardened soldiers, he dared not show the slightest temper—only praying he could finish the consultation and leave alive.

Upon entering and finding that the patient was a woman, the physician’s heart flickered with surprise. Still, he dared not inquire further. When he took her pulse, his wrinkled brows drew tighter and tighter.

“This is a case of evil cold entering the body,” he said at last. “Why was she only brought to a doctor now? If her constitution were any weaker, she might not survive the night.”

No sooner had he finished speaking than he felt a cold, heavy gaze settle on him.

Looking up, he saw the tall, bare-chested man standing in the snow—a face both striking and severe—and the doctor’s heart thudded with fear. Hastily, he added, “Not that she’s beyond saving! But medicine alone won’t be enough. We must perform gua sha [scraping therapy] to invigorate the blood and open her meridians. Drive out the wind and cold first, then the medicine will work twice as well.”

The method of gua sha for dispelling wind and cold was something Xie Zheng had heard of before. It was a common folk remedy among the soldiers—painful, yes, but sometimes more effective than a whole prescription of medicine.

He looked toward Fan Changyu, whose lips were cracked from the fever, and after a moment of silence said, “I understand.”

The physician was escorted to the kitchen to prepare the medicine, while Xie Zheng ordered his guards to bring another basin of warm water.

Everyone here was a man, except for the old woman—and she was blind. Yet gua sha required one to judge with the eyes how far the redness had risen. That left only him to do it.

Xie Zheng placed a copper coin into the basin of warm water. Looking at Fan Changyu’s flushed, feverish face, he said softly, “When you wake up, you’ll probably accuse me of taking advantage again.”

No answer came.

Gua sha was performed on the back, but Fan Changyu’s left arm was dislocated and bound to a wooden splint, so she couldn’t lie face down.

He picked up one of the old woman’s son’s garments and slipped it loosely on, then went to the bed, helping Fan Changyu sit up so that her back leaned against his chest. Turning his face slightly aside, he reached down to untie the sash at the front of her clothing.

The knot loosened, and the oversized robe—already ill-fitting—fell away from her shoulders.

Xie Zheng took the copper coin from the basin, swept her loose hair to the front, and for a moment stilled. He had intended to stay utterly focused, but the sight of that smooth, evenly toned back made his breath catch shallowly.

It was unlike a man’s rigid frame, and unlike the boneless softness of the dancing girls he had seen at victory banquets. Her back was firm yet delicate, her slender waist drawn by taut lines of sinew—thin, but imbued with strength and resilience.

The skin, once bluish from the cold, now paled to a cool white as warmth returned to it.

Earlier, afraid she would freeze, Xie Zheng had even removed her soaked undergarment when changing her clothes. Now, with her head drooping in feverish stupor, the pale curve of her neck was fully exposed—fragile and defenseless. Only a lock of black hair draped over her shoulder offered the slightest concealment.

And the garment half-falling around her waist—the inner layer beneath—was his own.

That realization struck through him like a blow. A loud roar seemed to explode in his mind, and the copper coin between his fingers suddenly felt scalding hot.

He furrowed his brows hard, turned his face away, and took several deep breaths before forcing himself to focus solely on the task at hand. Then, pressing the warm copper coin against her snow-white back, he began to scrape downward.

The first stroke brought only a faint flush to her skin. With the second, the redness deepened noticeably. He continued, stroke by stroke, until the scarlet hue darkened into a deep red; only then did he move to another spot.

The cold inside her was severe. Throughout the gua sha, Fan Changyu remained completely unconscious, her body swaying loosely, kept upright only by Xie Zheng’s steady hand at her side.

By the time he finished, her back was a sight that could hardly be looked upon—covered in mottled purplish-red marks—yet strangely, it carried a kind of cruel, striking beauty.

Xie Zheng’s fingertips burned; fine beads of sweat gathered at his forehead and nose. He tossed the copper coin back into the basin and hastily grabbed a garment, wrapping her tightly in it before laying her back under the quilt. Then he turned and strode out the door.

The cold wind and falling snow struck his face, finally cooling the heat that had built up inside him.

When the guard arrived with the freshly boiled medicine, he found his lord leaning against the wooden pillar under the eaves, arms crossed, staring absently at the closed door—so deep in thought he hadn’t even heard footsteps approaching.

The guard cleared his throat softly. “My lord… the medicine is ready.”

Xie Zheng came back to himself, cast the man a brief glance, and reached out to take the bowl of medicine from his hands.

Just as the guard was about to tactfully withdraw, he heard his usually cold and merciless lord ask,

“Among common folk, in this sort of situation… a man would have to marry the girl, wouldn’t he?”

The guard froze for a moment before realizing that Xie Zheng was referring to himself and the woman inside the room.

He thought to himself: Well, anywhere you go, a man would have to take responsibility for the girl in such a case. Seeing his lord acting so uncharacteristically, it didn’t seem like he was indifferent toward her—so why ask something like that?

He could only answer honestly, “Naturally, my lord would have to.”

Before Xie Zheng could respond, a scout stationed a few li away strode quickly into the courtyard to report, “My lord, the officials from Jizhou Prefecture are searching along the riverbank.”

Xie Zheng’s eyelids lifted slightly. “They’re searching for the Qingfeng Stronghold bandit leader as well?”

The scout glanced cautiously at him. “It seems… they’re looking for the lady inside. The scholar rescued from the river earlier is the grandson of Grand Preceptor Li—he’s with the Jizhou officials now, searching for her.”

The corner of Xie Zheng’s mouth curved coldly. He already knew that Grand Preceptor Li had sent his grandson, Li Huai’an, to Jizhou.

Wei Xuan’s corruption during the grain levy had caused a massive uproar, giving Grand Preceptor Li—long an enemy of the Wei faction—the perfect weapon to use against them. The northwest region had always been under Wei Yan’s control, and this incident nearly drove the two factions to open conflict in court. In the end, a “man of pure integrity” was sent over—supposedly to assist with the northwest war effort, but in truth, it was all a power struggle.

With Li Huai’an now in Jizhou, Grand Preceptor Li’s faction finally had a pair of eyes within the northwest, which had been tightly held by Wei Yan’s people.

What Xie Zheng hadn’t expected was that this man would somehow be entangled with Fan Changyu.

Was it a coincidence—or had Grand Preceptor Li’s faction caught wind of something, probing into the secrets behind the Fan family?

Lowering his gaze to the steaming bowl of medicine in his hand, Xie Zheng spoke in a calm, detached tone laced with chill, “Guard the mountain pass. Don’t let anyone in.”

The scout accepted the order and departed.

Carrying the medicine bowl, Xie Zheng entered the room.

Inside, Fan Changyu lay quietly beneath the bedding. The feverish flush on her cheeks had not yet faded, leaving a faint color of life upon her face.

Xie Zheng sat by the bedside, watching her for a while. “I told you long ago your taste in people was terrible,” he said.

Fan Changyu, warmed by the gua sha treatment, was now sleeping deeply. Naturally, she didn’t respond.

Feeding her the medicine proved troublesome. He had to pry open her lips and pour it in, and most of it spilled out again. Displeased, he used a random piece of clothing lying nearby to wipe it away—yet he still persisted, patiently feeding her the rest, little by little, until the bowl was empty.

The firewood in the brazier crackled softly. Firelight flickered across his sharply cut profile. With a finger, he brushed away a trace of medicine from the corner of her lips. Then, lowering his eyes, he looked at her in silence for a long while before suddenly saying,

“Fan Changyu, I will marry you.”

“You don’t speak? Then I’ll take it as your consent.”