"Brother."

The eyes were not stained with dust, and the princess called me with anticipation. I was caught off guard and threw away my armor.

She was begging me to ghostwrite for her and write an article on her father's proposition, on "the nature of a gentleman, benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom are rooted in the heart".

She was the smartest little girl I had ever met, but she had no patience to read those Confucian scriptures, and now she was very concerned about her studies, and often came to check and supervise, often leaving a bunch of homework for her to complete.

Once, when I saw that she had too much to copy, she was working hard, so I quietly wrote a few pages for her while others were away. The work of copying other people's handwriting was easy for me, and the princess was overjoyed, and from then on when she had a little more work, she came to me and begged me to write for her.

I wrote for her two or three times and refused to write again, repeatedly explaining to her the subtlety of Hanmo and the essence of the article that I could not get by studying and understanding it myself. She even said that she knew, but said that it was only this once, not for example, and I agreed, but there will be another time soon.

This time it turned out to be a pure knife catch. Finally, I made up my mind to ask her coldly, and I would not agree to it anyway.

Her eyes flickered, and she ordered the waiter to take the tea, only me and her were left in the study, she came over, took my sleeve with both hands, and called softly: "Brother." ”

My heart seemed to be gently scratched by her fingers, and it contracted suddenly.

She admired my almost stunned expression with satisfaction, then lowered her eyelashes and smiled, pulled my sleeve and shook it, and pleaded again: "Brother, can you write it for me this time?" I promise it's really the last time. If you don't finish it before dinner, you will be scolded by your father again. ”

What can I say? In this situation, even if she told me to die, I would gladly accept my life.

I sat down silently, she laughed and jumped around like a little bird, paved the paper of Shezhou Chengxintang for me, polished the four and ink of Tingqi in the Duanxi Longxiang inkstone, and then handed me a Xuancheng Zhuge three pens, and finally moved a purple flower pier myself, climbed up and knelt on it, supported my elbows on the bookcase, smiled and looked at my writing, and praised from time to time.

This "brother" became a curse that I couldn't get rid of. The princess likes to use it to make me bow down, but sometimes she calls me like this inexplicably, without any purpose.

Occasionally, she would call me "brother" in front of others, at first the palace people were shocked, saying that there was a difference between respect and inferiority, and asked her to change her words, but Miao Zhaorong didn't care, and said: "Back then, the official family was in the Spring Palace, and he also loved to call Zhou Huaizheng, the servant who served him, as his brother." Without him, he is just a little close to his subordinates. ”

"The princess has no brother, and the adopted son of the official family, the Thirteenth Tuanlian, has also left the palace to live outside the palace, so she is a little lonely." Han said to me privately.

Now there is no child, once the thirteenth son of Runan County Wang Yunrang was raised in the palace, given the name Zongshi, awarded the Yuezhou regiment training envoy, the Forbidden City people often call it "thirteen regiment training". Later, because Miao Zhaorong gave birth to the prince Yu Wang Xin, he ordered Zong Shi to return to the mansion, and later the prince died, and he did not call Zong Shi back to the palace today.

"When the thirteenth regiment practiced in the palace, the princess called him her brother. You are about the same age as the thirteenth regiment, and she felt very cordial when she saw it, so she called you so. Han said, but said: "However, our status is lowly, and it is a blessing to be honored by nobles." When the official family was the crown prince, Zhou Huaizheng was the deputy governor in charge of the affairs of the East Palace, and he often served the official family, and the official family jokingly called him his elder brother. Once, Zhou Huaizheng saw that the official family was practicing calligraphy, so he stepped forward to ask the official family to give him a royal book, and the official family wrote a few big characters to him on a whim - 'Brother Zhou family beheaded'. Originally, it was a joke, but I never thought that a few years later, Zhou Huaizheng had a secret discussion with others, and wanted to murder Xianggong Ding, please ask Kou Zhun to be the prime minister, and serve Emperor Zhenzong as the emperor, and pass it on to the prince, which is now the official family. This plan failed, and Zhou Huaizheng was finally beheaded. The official family can be described as a prophecy. Some people also say that Zhou Huaizheng is honored by the official family and does not know how to avoid taboos, and sooner or later he will be punished by God. ”

I understood what she meant, and later expressed to the princess that she would no longer call me that, but she ignored it, and still called me as she wanted, and I said no more, and even a little glad that she did what she did, because every time I heard her call my brother, I would feel a secret warmth.

The princess always asked me to sit in on the lectures, and if she didn't understand anything after the class, she would ask me, and my studies were continued in this special way.

In the middle of the night, I was reading by candlelight, when I heard someone knocking on the door. I thought it was the palace man who urged me to sleep, but when I opened the door, I found that it was the princess.

It was clear that she slipped out while the people who served her were asleep, she was only wearing a middle coat and white socks on her feet, but she was not wearing shoes, in this cold winter night.

I was taken aback and asked her, "Why did the princess come out at this time?" ”

She smiled: "I'm hungry, do you have anything to eat?" ”

Before I could answer, she had run into my room, looking curiously left and right.

I quickly figured out the latest winter coat to drape over her, but it was hard for me to keep her here.

I have been promoted to the senior class, so I have a single room. Being alone with the princess late at night is a big mistake anyway.

I tried my best to persuade her to go back, saying that I didn't have any pastries here, and if I went back to wake up my insider, she could eat whatever she wanted. But she said: "Daddy always tells me to be considerate of people and not to work too them." If I wake them up, they will inevitably go to great lengths to go to the Imperial Catering Bureau to deliver food, then will I not violate my father's teachings? Originally, I thought, if you are hungry, you should be hungry, like Daddy, endure it and it will pass, but who knows that there is a partridge in my belly, cooing all the time, but I can't get by. So, I had to sneak out to find you. ”

I asked her why she didn't take the snacks she had in her room, and she said she was tired of eating. I laughed and wanted to ask her how she knew I would have something she wanted to eat, but when I thought about it, I realized that she always had a reason that she was conscious of, so I didn't mention it, picked up two small taro from the table, and asked her, "Does the princess eat this?" ”

It was a small Lingnan taro, only a little bigger than a green jujube. As a waiter, I sleep later than the master on weekdays, and the Imperial Diet Bureau will prepare some snacks for us.

She didn't recognize it and asked me what it was. I was not surprised, because she eats fine things every day, even if she eats taro, it is also a taro pastry or taro soup made of **, which she has never seen before.

I told her the name of the thing, and said it was the only thing I could eat here, and she gladly agreed to taste it, so I took my mattress and spread it under the porch, and invited her to go out and sit there, and then wrapped her tightly in the quilt to keep her from freezing, and then sat down beside her, and began to peel taro for her.

After peeling one, I handed it to her, and saw that she was wrapped by me like a big dumpling, and only her head could move, and her eyes were wide open at the moment, turning her black and bright eyes, looking at me, and then looking at the taro in my hand.

I couldn't help but turn my head and let the smile melt into the endless night.

The princess struggled to reach out from the quilt to pick it up, but I was afraid that she would catch a cold, so I quickly stopped, and handed the taro to her mouth, and she lowered her head and ate it little by little, like a little bird pecking rice.

She quickly finished one, saying that the simplest of foods was delicious, and I continued to peel it for her, while she watched quietly.

There are no lights under the eaves in the middle of the night, but the moonlight is clear, and the shadows swept from us are overlapped. Originally, the two of them were relatively speechless, but there was no sense of embarrassment at all.

The snow began to fall lightly in the air, I was wearing dark green clothes at this time, my heart moved slightly, stretched out my sleeves, took a few pieces of scattered white snow, and asked the princess with a smile: "Does the princess know how many petals the snowflakes have?" ”

She immediately replied, "Hexagon!" ”

I said not really, and led my sleeve to her and asked her to count it herself. She looked at it, let out a low cry of surprise, jerked her hand out of the cotton cocoon that wrapped around her, grabbed the sleeve of my coat with snowflakes with it, tapped the tip of her other finger on it, and muttered the words in her mouth: "One, two, three, four, five......"

"There are pentagonal ones." She came to a conclusion, and counted again, and after a while, she happily discovered: "There are also triangles and four corners!" ”

I smiled without saying a word, took the quilt to cover her hand, and fed her the peeled taro. The snowflakes spread into a few thin bits of dampness on the sleeves of my shirt, and I didn't feel cold, even though it was a deep cold day.

I loved the bright smile of the princess, and I was filled with joy to serve her in this way. In this cool dark night, she was more like my only source of light than the crescent moon.

"Waiji," the princess asked me suddenly, "why did you come to the palace?" ”

I was stunned and didn't know how to explain to her the complicated situation in my family, and then I simply said, "Because my family is poor." ”

"What is poverty?" She asked, confused.

It was only then that I realized that the concept of poverty had not been carefully explained in her current education.

I gave her the most straightforward answer first: "I just don't have much money." ”

"I don't have much money!" The princess sighed, "My sister only gives me twelve copper coins a day, and if I lose all my money, she will not give it again, and if I win, I will give all the money to the people who play with me, and in the end there is still no money in my hand, so am I very poor?" ”

"Oh, no......" I began to think seriously about how to interpret this word, "poor, that is, not warm, not full, may not even have food, can only eat taro every day......"

"But taro is delicious......," the princess interrupted me in confusion, "I will eat taro every day from now on." ”

Obviously, the wrong example was just given. I was speechless. I never thought it would be so difficult to explain the meaning of a word.

After thinking about it for a long time, I told her, "If there are some things that you have, or even have a lot of, but others don't have them, and they need them very much, then they are poor compared to you." For example, if the princess has a lot of beautiful clothes, but your little girls don't, then it can be said that they are poorer than you. ”

Maybe this example isn't good enough, but beyond that, I can't think of anything else she can explain to her that she's seen and perceived. She had lived in the palace since she was born, and it was impossible for her to have seen anything really associated with poverty, and she would not have known what it meant to be unclothed and starving.

She thought for a moment, then said, "I seem to understand a little...... That is to say, other people's families have a lot of clothes and a lot of taro, but your family doesn't have so many clothes for you to wear, and there are not so many taro for you to eat, so you can only be sent to the palace? ”

I smiled wryly, "That's it." ”

"Then I understand!" She happily announced, and continued to tell me her experience, "Qiuhe is poorer than me, because I have a lot of time to play, but she works all day and has almost no time for herself; Miss Fan, Miss Zhou, and Miss Xu are also poorer than me, because I have my mother by my side, and their biological mother is outside the palace; Mrs. Yu is poorer than my sister, because my sister has a famous name, she doesn't have it, she is just Jieyu, so the monthly money and festival rewards are not as much as my sister...... Then, Mrs. Zhang is much poorer than the widow, because the widow has the title of queen, but she doesn't. Last time, she wanted to use the red umbrella on the queen's chariot in her car to increase the number of guards to the queen's quota, but she was scolded to death by the ministers......"

Speaking of this, she couldn't help but smile, but then said gloomily: "However, Daddy often goes to Zhang Niangzi's Pavilion, and generally only goes to the Rouyi Hall every month, so in this way, the Lady is poorer than Zhang Niangzi." ”

I could hardly interject on this topic, so I could only remain silent, and the princess did not seem to wait for me to speak, and went on again: "Where's Daddy? Daddy must have had his own poverty...... Oh, by the way, almost all of the ministers who often count him have sons, but he doesn't have ......"

I am becoming more and more unable to express my opinion. In the end, she finally mentioned herself: "Actually, I am also poor, my eyes are poor...... Although the girls who serve me don't have as many clothes as I do, they have seen a lot of interesting things outside the palace before, and I don't even know about them...... In addition to the Imperial Palace, I have only been to the four gardens of Yichun, Yujin, Ruisheng, Qionglin and Jinming Pond, and I have never visited the Wazi Night Market, nor do I know what a hotel tea shop is...... I really want to go to the Zhouqiao Night Market to try the rice on the street and the badger and wild fox meat in front of the Jade Building, and I also want to go to the Suzaku Gate to see how to make fried sheep white sausage and sand sugar ice and snow cold yuanzi, and I also want to go to the Xiangguo Temple Roast Pig Courtyard to see the big monk who sells roasted pork......"

Originally, her first words were quite sentimental, but the last sentence made me laugh. Xiangguo Temple burns Zhu Yuan has a monk with the law name of Hui Ming, breaks through the precepts of the Qing Dynasty, opens a shop that sells pork, it is said that the taste is very good, among which the roasted pork is particularly good, it is famous far and wide, and now the world calls the Roast Zhu Yuan as "Roast Pig Courtyard". It stands to reason that the palace family has the opportunity to go to Xiangguo Temple to make incense, but it is indeed a little difficult to meet the meat monk.

"What's so funny!" The princess frowned, very dissatisfied, "Can you still go out when you want to go out when you enter the palace, and see whoever you want?" ”

I'm still speechless. Since entering the palace, I have indeed never gone out, and the impression left in my memory has become more and more blurred.

"Well," the princess sighed, very annoyed, "Waiji, we are all trapped here. ”