MTLNOVEL Chapter 210: Warm Water
The maps blurred.
Not from heat or exhaustion or candle smoke, but from the way my eyes refused to focus, like even they were protesting the last seven days. The brush in my hand was still, ink drying on the bristles. I hadn't moved in ten minutes.
I didn't have the energy to.
The war room was cold and mostly dark. Just one candle burned near my elbow, flickering low against the curves of the Daiyu topography. I could hear the scribes outside, still sorting reports. The scent of ginger tea had long since faded. Somewhere, I'd left my scarf.
I should've gone to bed.
But the minute I lay down, my mind would start spinning again. Routes. Allies. Ghost coins and phoenix seals. Lady An's veiled smile. Yizhen's warning. Zhou Wen's cowardice. The Emperor's silence.
Too much.
Too fast.
And too alone.
I didn't flinch when the door opened behind me.
Didn't need to.
Footsteps I recognized. Gait like silence. Shadow before shadow.
Shi Yaozu crossed the threshold and closed the door with a finality that echoed like thunder. In his arms was the black-wrapped parcel from Lady An.
He placed it on the table without ceremony, then stepped back into my line of vision. Not interrupting. Not speaking. Just… watching me.
"You were gone a long time," I said softly.
"She had a lot to say."
"And?"
He shrugged. "She thinks veils make her smarter."
I almost smiled.
Almost.
He studied me for a moment longer, eyes drifting not to the maps, but to my face. My mouth. My hands. My shoulders.
And then I saw it—the thing he never let anyone else see.
Worry.
"You're hiding it well," he said.
"Hiding what?"
He stepped closer and reached for my brush hand. Held it lightly.
"Everything."
My fingers curled, instinctively resisting the comfort. But he didn't let go. Just took the brush from me and set it aside. His other hand cupped the underside of my wrist, thumb brushing across the pulse there.
"You haven't rested."
"I don't need—"
"You haven't stopped," he said, quietly but firmly. "Not since we left the mountain."
His eyes searched mine.
"You don't need to carry it all."
"If I don't, who will?"
"Mingyu."
He let that hang in the air, then added, "The generals. The ministers. Even people like me. That's the point of building power—so you don't have to be the sword and the shield."
I looked away.
But his hand was warm on mine. Steady.
"I know," he said, softer now. "I know you won't step back. I know it's not in you to sit and let others fight. But just for a little while... let me take you somewhere."
I blinked.
"Where?"
"Someplace no one knows. Not Mingyu. Not Longzi. Not the court."
I hesitated.
He didn't.
"I found it during a scout run a year ago. It's quiet. Clean. Safe." He tilted his head, reading me with the precision only he had. "Hot springs. No guards. No names. Just peace."
The silence between us deepened.
Not strained. Not uncomfortable. Just full of all the things I couldn't say.
I stood slowly.
"Alright," I said.
He didn't smile.
He didn't need to.
He just lifted the dark cloak from the hook behind the door and draped it over my shoulders, then pulled the scarf he always wore from his own collar and tucked it gently around my neck.
Then he led me out the door.
-------
The trail twisted beyond the outskirts of the camp, up a narrow ridge most horses couldn't manage. The night air was sharp with pine and ice, and the sky overhead had turned a deep ink blue, the stars too bright to look at directly.
Yaozu didn't speak much as we walked.
He didn't need to.
His presence beside me was enough—silent, calm, and entirely mine.
It took almost an hour.
When we finally arrived, the clearing was just as he described. Hidden behind a tangle of thorn-wrapped brush and leaning pine trees, the stone basin had formed around an underground spring, its edges soft with moss and worn from time.
Steam curled up into the night like mist from a dragon's breath.
No walls. No guards. Just the sound of bubbling water and the occasional rustle of wind through branches.
He stepped forward first, testing the path with his boot before offering me his hand.
I took it, grabbing on like it was a lifeline to my sanity and my happiness.
Breathing out a sigh of relief at the feel of him, I followed.
The moment I stepped into the shallow rim of the spring and peeled off my robes, I felt it.
Heat.
Real heat.
Not just temperature—but comfort. Muscle-melting, bone-soaking, silence-drenched comfort.
I didn't wait.
Didn't ask.
I stepped in.
The water wrapped around my calves, then thighs, then chest, until I was waist-deep and weightless. I folded down into the heat with a sigh that tasted like surrender.
He waited.
Waited until I nodded.
Then followed.
His boots hit the rock. His coat landed on a low branch. He moved with quiet reverence—more ritual than routine.
He didn't come close.
Not at first.
He let me be still for a while, soaking, breathing, floating.
Only when I reached for the side of the rock with a trembling hand did he come near.
"You're shaking," he said.
I looked down.
"I'm fine."
"You're not."
He stepped into the water beside me and knelt in the shallows, hands moving slowly, deliberately. One slipped beneath my hair, lifting it gently to drape over the edge. The other pressed flat to my back, drawing small circles between my shoulder blades.
"You don't need to break yourself to win this war," he whispered.
"I'm not broken."
"No," he agreed. "But you're bleeding. And you haven't even noticed."
The water lapped gently around us.
Then his hands moved lower—over my spine, down the edges of my ribs, never invasive, never rushed. Just… reverent.
Like he was checking that I was still whole.
The feeling of his hands on me caused something inside me to loosen—just enough to breathe again.
Minutes passed.
Then an hour.
The stars shifted.
And when I finally leaned back against him, spine pressed to his chest, arms loosely wrapping around my waist, I let myself close my eyes.
For the first time in days.
No dreams.
No whispers.
No impending sense of doom.
Just the slow rise and fall of his breath behind me, and the warmth of his body keeping the world at bay.
And when I finally spoke, it was so soft even the steam barely caught it.
"Don't let go."
"I won't," he promised.
And I believed him.