Wolf King And His Fox Consort [BL]

"I thought I would see you yesterday," she said, barely lifting her eyes from the paperwork she was filing.

Chu Yun sat down in the chair opposite her, wincing a little at the pain in his back. He maybe would never forgive Gu Wei for making him feel like an old man at the prime of his life, or for the unsightly swollen ankles.

"There was an interesting development..." He filed her in on what Gu Wei had revealed. Her expression grew more and more dramatic with each detail. For once Chu Yun merited more attention than her paperwork.

"I don\'t like any of this," she said, twisting a brush between her hands so tightly, Chu Yun feared she might break it. "How does something like this happen? How could my uncle have been so foolish?"

Hadn\'t Chu Yun been thinking the same thing of Chu Hean, just moments before?

He was afraid the answer was the same in both instances. "Love makes fools of us all," he told her, earning himself a disapproving glare.

His mind supplied him with an image of the Queen Dowager\'s wizened face -- he supposed they should feel lucky whenever love didn\'t make worse things out of people. The Queen Dowager had been quiet since Xiao Zai\'s ascension, happy to disappear into the background as if that was where she\'d always been.

But Chu Yun would never forget that she had weaved most of the spiderweb they were all caught in now.

Her heartbreak had set in motion all the others that would follow.

"Do you suppose he has designs on the throne?" Xiao Ziyi asked him, the brush straining under her fingers. It was as close to snapping as her nerves.

"I don\'t know what he wants," Chu Yun answered truthfully. "He seems poised to take the Su throne, why give up that easy road and go to all this trouble to reach the Zui thro-" He came to a sudden stop. "Unless..."

His eyes met Xiao Ziyi\'s. They had arrived at the same conclusion.

"Unless he wants both," they said, almost in unison.

Maybe that could explain why he had gotten close to Chu Hean as well. Why stop at Zui and Su, when he could find a way to worm himself into the Xin throne? Perhaps not him directly, but any future heirs he had with Chu Hean...

It made a kind of twisted sense to Chu Yun, that Ru Long wanted to bring back the old Zhou. Maybe he even felt entitled to it.

Xiao Ziyi\'s mind was spinning in a similar direction. "All the betas leaving for Su, the troubles on the border towns...he\'s been encouraging all of it."

"Where is the King of Su in the middle of all of this?" Chu Yun asked aloud, not because he didn\'t think Xiao Ziyi was right, but because the King of Su either agreed with his son\'s plan, or was letting him do whatever he wanted.

And if so, why? Out of guilt for Xiao Yao\'s death? Why start caring now. All of these were relatively recent developments, so did the King just woke up one day and decide to rope his son into a mad dash to unite all three nations under his control?

It didn\'t seem likely.

Chu Yun was convinced that somehow Ru Long had found the truth of his birth and that event had sent him down his current path.

He was sure he\'d find out how and why eventually. But first they needed to know what they were dealing with.

"I really think we should get the Queen and the Third Princess here," Chu Yun said, his gaze intent.

Xiao Ziyi nodded. She might not have liked the idea, but she now understood the urgency. Xiao Zai might be back walking around, recovering from his injury, but that didn\'t mean the threat was gone.

Ru Long was out there, and the more he remained an unknown variable, the more dangerous he was.

"I\'ll send the letter out today," she said, taking a clean sheet of paper from a stack in one of her drawers. "They might suspect something isn\'t right, due to getting a letter like this by bird, instead of more traditional post."

That thought had crossed Chu Yun\'s head as well, but it was something they had to live with. The postal service took too long, and was most definitely being monitored by Ru Long\'s people -- if he wasn\'t a complete idiot.

"In a way, we\'re throwing them a lifeline, it\'s up to them how they act."

Xiao Ziyi gave him a look. "What if they\'re in on his plans?"

That was a definite possibility. "Then we\'ll get information out of them anyway," Chu Yun said with a shrug. "We have to prepare for all possibilities."

---

He left Xiao Ziyi feeling, not optimistic, but at least relieved that they had a plan. A defined course of action regarding how to handle Ru Long.

It was better than running around like headless chickens worrying about where the next strike would come from.

If he closed his eyes Chu Yun could still see the bloom of red on Xiao Zai\'s chest, feel his hot blood under his palms.

He thought he wouldn\'t ever feel as scared and small as he did on that day his grandfather took him to the estate of the Qiang family. But feeling Xiao Zai\'s life run trough his fingers with each gasping breath made him feel like a helpless child all over again.

He turned a corner towards his and Xiao Zai\'s quarters and almost bumped into Hua Nanyi. He staggered a few paces to avoid her, and opened his mouth ready to apologise for his distraction, but she had already shouldered past him without a word.

Chu Yun watched her go with a pang of regret, but he only needed to recall Xiao Zai\'s glassy gaze when he\'d gone still in his arms to steel himself for what needed to be done.