Chapter 132: Kitchen Talks

Morning arrived quietly, the kind of soft golden light that made the previous day’s chaos feel almost like something imagined rather than lived through. Lu Feng woke early, his body still humming faintly with the leftover weight of everything that had happened, and dressed with more purpose than usual before heading straight for the courtyard rather than the kitchen. There was someone he needed to speak with first, and it wasn’t over breakfast.

Behind him, in the kitchen, the morning had already taken on its own familiar pattern.

Aunt Gao stood at the main stove, sleeves rolled up past her elbows, stirring a pot of congee with the unhurried confidence of a woman who had been cooking for households far larger and far more demanding than this one.

The two young women hired to help with the house and kitchen, Xiao Yun and Xiao Ru, moved around her in practiced steps, one chopping vegetables at the side table, the other tending a second pan where strips of preserved meat sizzled softly.

Han Lin sat perched on a low stool near the window, a bundle of scallions in her lap that she was only half paying attention to as she talked, her fingers working through the motions from habit rather than focus.

"Truly, none of us need you in here," Aunt Gao said, not for the first time, though there was warmth rather than complaint in it. "You’re the lady of this household now, in all but name. You should be resting, not peeling scallions with the rest of us."

"I like it," Han Lin said simply, snapping the ends off another scallion. "Besides, if I sat around doing nothing all morning, I’d drive myself mad with worry after yesterday."

Xiao Ru glanced over from her pan, sympathy plain on her round face. "We heard a little about what happened. Is Master Lin truly recovering?"

"He is," Han Lin said. "Young Master Lu made sure of that."

That drew a soft murmur of relief from all three women, and for a moment the kitchen settled into comfortable, familiar work again, the scrape of knives against wood and the low bubble of the congee filling the silence.

"You know," Aunt Gao said eventually, tasting a spoonful of congee and adjusting the seasoning with a practiced flick of her wrist, "this household is only going to keep growing. More business, more visitors, more of this sort of trouble finding its way to our gate. We’re going to need more hands soon, mark my words."

"I’ve been thinking the same thing," Han Lin admitted, setting her scallions aside. "Bai Bao and Song Heng are stretched thin as it is, trying to guard the whole estate and still be expected to help carry things or fix a broken cart wheel whenever something needs doing. That’s not what they should be spending their strength on."

"Exactly my point," Aunt Gao said. "Give me a proper household and I’ll tell you what it needs. Men for the heavy work, hauling water, repairing the walls, moving crates when a shipment comes in. Cleaners for the grounds, since none of us has the time to keep every hall spotless on top of everything else. And someone to run errands into the city, deliver messages, fetch things from the market without pulling one of the guards away from the gate to do it."

"A messenger or two, at least," Han Lin said, nodding slowly as she pulled a small worn notebook from the pocket of her apron and began jotting the ideas down in neat, careful strokes. "Someone reliable enough to carry word to Lin Laifu’s people, or to Big Sister Su’s place, without us worrying whether it’ll actually arrive."

"You’ll want someone who knows the city well too," Aunt Gao added, wiping her hands on her apron. "Not just anyone off the street. Crimson Vale has more back alleys and shortcuts than most people realize, and a messenger who doesn’t know them will waste half his day walking the long way around."

"I’ll ask around among the tradesmen I’ve dealt with," Han Lin said. "A few of them seemed trustworthy enough, and they already know their way through the city better than we ever could."

"And a smaller carriage," Xiao Yun offered from the side table, not looking up from her chopping. "Forgive me for listening in, but it seems silly to send that grand carriage Master Lin gave the young master out just to fetch a bolt of cloth or deliver a letter."

Han Lin brightened at that, tapping the end of her writing brush against her chin. "That’s a wonderful thought, actually. The one from Lin Laifu could stay as Young Master Lu’s personal carriage, the one he actually rides in. But something smaller, simpler, would be perfect for errands. It wouldn’t draw nearly as much attention either, which might not be a bad thing given everything happening lately."

She wrote that down as well, underlining it twice, clearly pleased with how the morning’s idle chatter had turned into something worth actually presenting.

"You’ve got quite the list building there," Aunt Gao observed, amused.

"I want to have it ready properly before I bring it to him," Han Lin said. "He has enough weighing on him right now. I’d rather hand him a solution than a problem."

It was at that exact moment that the kitchen door opened and Lu Feng stepped through, having apparently decided the training grounds could wait a moment longer.

"Good morning," he said, glancing around at the small gathering before his eyes settled on Han Lin. "You’re up early. Did you sleep alright, after yesterday?"

"I slept fine," Han Lin said, closing her notebook and offering him a reassuring smile. "Better than I expected to, honestly."

"Good." He seemed to relax slightly at that, the tension in his shoulders easing by some small degree. He nodded a polite greeting toward Aunt Gao, Xiao Yun, and Xiao Ru in turn, each of whom bowed their heads respectfully, before his attention drifted back toward the room’s occupants. "Have any of you seen Ye Chenxue this morning?"

"She’ll be in her private training area, most likely," Han Lin said. "She’s usually out there before any of the rest of us are even awake."

"Thank you." He hesitated a moment longer, studying Han Lin’s face as though checking for something he might have missed. "You’re certain you don’t need anything? I can send Xiao Yun to fetch more scallions if you’ve run through the ones you have."

Han Lin laughed softly, waving him off. "Go, Lu Feng. I promise the scallions and I are managing just fine without your supervision."

He allowed himself a small smile at that, nodded once more toward the room, and left the way he’d come, the kitchen door swinging shut gently behind him.

For a long moment after he’d gone, nobody said anything. Then Xiao Ru set down her spatula and turned toward Han Lin with poorly disguised curiosity written all over her face.

"He really does dote on you, doesn’t he," she said. "Checking on your sleep first thing, offering to fetch scallions himself. Most young masters wouldn’t bother learning the names of the kitchen staff, let alone worry over whether one of them slept well."

"He’s protective," Han Lin said, though the corner of her mouth twitched with fondness rather than embarrassment. "He’s always been like that, even back when it was just the two of us."

"Protective," Xiao Yun repeated, sharing a knowing look with Aunt Gao over the chopping board. "Is that truly all it is?"

Han Lin rolled her eyes, though not unkindly, used to this particular line of teasing by now. "It really is. He’s the closest thing to a little brother I’ve ever had, and I imagine I’m about the closest thing to an older sister he’s had either, given how his own family treated him. That’s the whole of it."

"A little brother who blushes half the time you scold him," Aunt Gao said, not quite hiding her own smile as she went back to stirring the congee.

"He does not," Han Lin said, though there was laughter in it now, and the conversation dissolved into easy chatter again, the morning’s earlier seriousness giving way to warmth as the four of them settled back into the comfortable rhythm of preparing breakfast together.

Out past the kitchen, across the wide stone courtyard, Lu Feng made his way toward the private training area Ye Chenxue had claimed as her own not long after they’d purchased the estate. He heard her before he saw her, the faint whisper of displaced air, the soft tap of bare feet against packed earth.

He slowed his approach without quite meaning to, drawn in by the sight that greeted him past the bamboo line.

Ye Chenxue moved through a form unlike anything he’d seen her use in an actual fight, fluid and deliberate, each strike and pivot connected to the last in a way that felt less like combat and more like something closer to dance, if dance could also kill a man in half a breath.

Her sleeves traced arcs through the morning light, her steps light enough to barely disturb the dust beneath them, and for a long stretch Lu Feng simply stood at the edge of the clearing and watched, genuinely transfixed. There was a rhythm to it he couldn’t quite name, each movement flowing into the next without pause or hesitation, as though her whole body had memorized a song only she could hear.

When she finally brought the form to its close, settling into a still, balanced stance with her breathing barely elevated, Lu Feng found himself clapping before he’d consciously decided to.

Ye Chenxue turned toward him, one eyebrow raised, though something in her expression suggested she wasn’t entirely displeased by the audience.

"That was beautiful," Lu Feng said honestly, stepping into the clearing properly now. "I’ve never had much reason to study martial arts myself, not the way you clearly have. Watching that, I understand why people spend their whole lives chasing forms like it."

"It’s called the Drifting Cloud Style," Ye Chenxue said, wiping a faint sheen of sweat from her brow with her sleeve. "An old style. Not flashy enough for most cultivators these days, who prefer raw power over precision. I’ve always preferred it anyway."

"I can see why." He meant it. There had been something almost hypnotic about the way she’d moved, more art than violence even though he had no doubt each motion carried real intent behind it.

"What brings you out here so early?" she asked, studying him now with the same sharp attentiveness she’d shown him last night. "I doubt it was only to watch me train, satisfying as that apparently was."

"I wanted to continue what we started talking about last night," Lu Feng said. "The journal Han Lin found. I’d like to go over it properly, and I’d rather do that somewhere private. My room, if that suits you."

"It does." She nodded once, decisive as always. "Give me a little time to clean up first. I’ll meet you there."

"Take your time," he said, already turning to head back toward the kitchen, intending to ask Han Lin where exactly she’d stored the journal after finding it. He made it two steps before something made him pause and turn back toward her.

"Chenxue," he said. "That style. Drifting Cloud. I’d like to learn it from you someday, if you’d be willing to teach me."

Something soft flickered across her expression, there and gone so quickly he might have imagined it if he hadn’t known her as well as he did by now.

"I’d be glad to," she said. "Whenever you’re ready. Just say the word."

He smiled at that, more genuinely than he had all morning, and turned again to make his way back toward the kitchen, already looking forward to the conversation waiting for him there and the one still ahead in his own quarters.