Chapter 762 - A Crisis Caused by Peonies (2/2)

At the sight of Xiaoyu at the gate, she looked relieved.

Then she knelt down in front of Xiaoyu and said anxiously, “Your Highness, you’re finally back. Please turn to His Majesty immediately. Madame, Madame is being punished by the Empress!”

Hearing her mention the Empress, Xiaoyu became so sullen as if intending to tear the Empress into pieces.

The vicious and ruthless look on his face indicated his strong urge to kill the Empress immediately.

Lin Mengya grabbed Xiaoyu’s hand and gently shook her head at him.

If the Empress just meant to make things difficult for Madame Jingrou, she’d at least send someone here to guard the gate.

But now, since the humble palace maid was able to open the gate, it meant that this was probably a deliberate trap set by the Empress whose target was either Xiaoyu or the Emperor deeply in love with Madame Jingrou.

“Stop crying now. Tell us what happened and why Her Grace punished Madame,” Lin Mengya said.

The palace maid stared blankly at the young woman in purple in front of her and immediately told them what had happened today.

Although the palace maid wept with a delicate look, she was coherent enough to make the whole thing clear to Lin Mengya with only a few words.

The crisis was caused by a vase of rare peonies.

Madame Jingrou had never been interested in these delicate and precious flowers. Thus, when the greenhouse got some novel flower seedlings, they were usually delivered to the other imperial concubines’ palaces according to the tradition.

The imperial concubines usually did not care about this kind of trifle. After all, none of them had the time to pay attention to the new flowers in their yards.

However, the vase of peonies somehow were delivered to the Fengyu Court yesterday.

This was supposed to be nothing serious, but the vase of peonies were given to the Empress as a tribute.

Thus, this could be minor or significant. If the Empress was a virtuous woman, she would only blame the hasty palace maids for delivering the vase of peonies to the wrong place.

However, the person in charge of the greenhouse in the imperial palace worked for Madame Jingrou.

In view of this, the Empress and the other mesdames took this opportunity to pursue this matter and blame Madame Jingrou for overstepping her bounds and disrespecting the Empress.

By now, punished by the Empress, Madame Jingrou had been kneeling for four hours, while instructed to hold a copy of palace rules with both hands and read it aloud. The Empress was obviously trying to make things difficult for her and embarrass her.

The maids of the Fengyu Court attempted to absolve their master from blame, but the Empress said that if any of them dared to plead for mercy, she would instruct Madame Jingrou to kneel for another hour.

As such, no one of the Fengyu Court dared to say a word.

Moreover, Madame Jingrou had secretly instructed them not to disturb the Emperor these days in any case, so Madame Jingrou had been kneeling by now.

After learning the whole thing, Lin Mengya certainly should solve the problem.

After pondering for a while, she decided to send Xiaoyu away. Otherwise, he would fall into the trap set by the Empress.

“Go and pay respects to your father now, and don’t mention anything else. Leave everything here to me. Lass, what’s your name?” Lin Mengya said.

The palace maid had thought that the prince could save her master. Unexpectedly, the lady in purple proposed a solution before she asked the prince for help.

“Your Highness, Madame…” When she was about to say a few more words, she saw the prince, who had always cared about his mother a lot, turn around and leave.

“Sister, now I leave my mother’s business to you. Ningqiu, from today on, treat this lady’s words as my commands.” After saying this, Lin Zhongyu went to find his father without stopping.

Lin Mengya was the only person he could trust.

The palace maid named Ningqiu was dumbfounded and watched the savior leave, showing a look of disbelief.

Lin Mengya smiled, knowing that Ningqiu did not think her, a stranger, trustworthy, but now was not a good time to explain.

“You’re Ningqiu, right? If you want to help your master, you should do as I say. Now, please find a palace maid uniform for me and another vase of peonies,” Lin Mengya said.

She had come up with a plan. She was familiar with the conspiracies in the imperial palace. Besides, she had heard from Xiaoyu that the imperial concubines were not quite scheming.

Moreover, the Emperor regarded Madame Jingrou as the apple of his eye. If the Empress of the Lieyun Empire were as scheming as the Empress of the Jin State, the Empress of the Lieyun Empire would have ruthlessly ruined their relationship at the very beginning.

The relationship between Madame Jingrou and the Emperor, who had gone through the ups and downs of life together over the years, had been solid for long.

Perhaps they took pleasure in Madame Jingrou’s crisis at the moment, but the Emperor might not spare them when he was available.

They were the daughters of powerful families, which explained why they resorted to such inferior means. They were simply not smart enough to play intrigues.

Ningqiu, who acted quickly, immediately dressed Lin Mengya up as a palace maid according to Lin Mengya’s instruction.

Although Lin Mengya was slender, she was really ravishing. Even in an ordinary palace maid uniform, she was still indescribably beautiful.

Compared with her, the mesdames and beauties in the imperial palace seemed to be homely.

However, now was not the time to comment on the lady’s appearance.

Ningqiu saw the pretty lady cut her finger and gently drip a drop of her blood into the peonies she brought over.

After a while, Ningqiu rubbed her eyes in surprise.