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Chu Yun\' heart rate picked the moment Xiao Zai\'s lips touched his palm. The mood was very ambiguous, and they had both spent hours surrounded by omegas, especially Chu Yun.

It was odd that not all of them were mated, and yet Chu Yun hadn\'t been able to pick up on that at all. Maybe it was due to the sheer amount of them under the same roof -- maybe it dulled his senses in the same way a busy street filled with alphas, betas and omegas, did.

He cleared his throat with an anxious grimace and pulled his hand away from Xiao Zai\'s lips. "Good, that\'s good."

Xiao Zai looked up at him, his eyes were very dark, filled with something heated. Chu Yun shuttered his gaze. "You should go now, it\'s getting late."

"Or maybe I could stay."

Chu Yun\'s heart skipped a beat, wrenching painfully inside his chest. "I don\'t know if that\'s a good idea."

Xiao Zai got up, towering over Chu Yun even though they were of an height. "Why? Because you don\'t want me to, or because you want it too much?"

His fingers hooked in the dip of Chu Yun\'s waist and he reeled him against his chest. "What are you afraid of?" Xiao Zai whispered against the side of Chu Yun\'s face, his warm breath tickling his skin.

Chu Yun stepped away from his soft grip, turning around. "I\'m not afraid of anything, I just want you to go."

He remained with his back turned to Xiao Zai. After some time, he heard the sound of the door sliding closed softly.

The tension straining his shoulders left with Xiao Zai, and Chu Yun let himself drop on top of his bed, feeling drained and tired.

He rubbed be bridge of his nose with a sigh, unsure of why he felt so disappointed.

---

The next morning Chu Yun woke up with a vicious headache, the result of a night of restless sleep.

He didn\'t have time to languish in bed, though, there were many things he had to see to. Not least of all, the likely arrival of new servants.

He\'d just made his way into the main hall when a young servant hurried to warn him there were people at the gate, saying they had been offered work at the Second Prince\'s estate.

Chu Yun went out to greet them himself instead of sending out the steward.

Fan Jiang\'s mother was a woman whose face showed all the signs of the rough life she\'d led. It was possible she wasn\'t even that old, but she looked elderly, her spine curved under the years of toil, her hands knotted by manual labour. Her eldest son too looked older than his 27 years, his skin looked sallow and frail, and he blinked a lot, as if being under direct sunlight was still unusual for him, after spending so many years working in the mine.

Chu Yun greeted their deep bows with a short one of his own. 

Hui Li wringed her knotted hands. "Uhm, a young lady gave us back our contracts and said we could find work here?"

Her son looked around the estate in confusion, as if he still couldn\'t believe it. 

Chu Yun nodded and gestured for them to follow him towards the kitchens and the adjacent servant quarters.

---

Hours later, Hua Nanyi found Chu Yun drinking tea in his study, while reviewing some documents.

"You know... we really don\'t need any more servants," she said, sitting down in front of him and balancing her cheek on her open palm.

Chu Yun shrugged. "The money to pay their salaries is coming out of Xiao Zai\'s royal stipend, so I can\'t say I give a fuck," he grinned, "besides, with so many servants, there\'s very little work to do, so Fan Jiang might get up to something exciting. Have you been keeping an eye on him?"

She nodded. "For now he\'s just very happy to see his mother and brother," she winced a little, "he mostly just cried a lot."

While Chu Yun felt a great deal of sympathy for Fan Jiang\'s family, it remained to be seen if he was ever going to extend that sympathy to the man himself.

"But he\'s been out of the estate, in the previous days?"

Hua Nanyi nodded again. "I managed to follow him into a busy street but lost sight of him not long after."

That was interesting. Hua Nanyi was very good at what she did. "Do you think he knew he was being followed?"

"Hard to say, the street was really packed, I\'m not infallible." He rolled his eyes at her and she smirked. "But I never caught him looking backwards, so I don\'t think so."

Chu Yun drummed his fingers against the tabletop. "All the same, I think it\'s safe to assume he already reported to the King the state of my relationship with Xiao Zai."

"What do you think the King is going to do?" she asked.

"Depends, but I\'d wager he won\'t do anything until the First Prince\'s wedding." he leaned back on his elbows on the floor, closing his eyes and letting the sunbean streaming into the airy room warm his face. "The auspicious date is not far away, so I guess we\'ll learn soon."

The more important thing was getting more ministers on their side. There were nine lower Ministries, and three upper Ministries. The Ministry of Works was one of the three upper Ministries, so it had a lot of power inside the court.

Chu Yun still wasn\'t sure if they could trust Minister Hu, but they still had the information Hua Nanyi had collected to use against him, if necessary.

He was sure they had Minister Song\'s support too, on account of being the only beta Minister, and working in the Ministry of Coachmen, which was a post of little influence in the court. 

They needed the support of at least five of the lower Ministries, and to sway at least one more top Minister if they wanted Xiao Zai\'s claim to the throne to hold any water.

"Things are about to get interesting, I\'ll tell you that," Chu Yun said, stretching out under his sunbeam like a cat, enjoying the last rays of sunlight before winter truly settled in.