The husband who forced her to marry her couldn't keep her warm, and she didn't want him to

"...Mother, what if father stays over and finds you...?"

"There is Qiu Wen. She is your father's concubine. She is used for times like this."

...

"Qiu Wen is old, and now that you have the power to manage the family, why don't you arrange for someone younger and prettier to be around you?"

A breeze blew in, causing the firelight on the high table to flicker slightly. Aunt Lian casually took off the gold hairpin on her head and lit the lamp.

In the gradually brightening light and shadow, Aunt Lian's complexion looked a little rosier, and she sighed: "Your father is greedy for a delicate flower-like woman, but he believes that nostalgia is a virtue."

"As soon as Qiu Wen entered the mansion, I asked her to come to Tingyuxuan. Our master-servant relationship over the years is naturally different from that of ordinary people."

She looked at her face in the dressing mirror. She was no longer as young as a flower.

The same goes for Zheng, they are all old people.

Gu Yan stood behind her mother holding a comb, helping her take off the pearl hairpin on her head, and asked, "What if Qiu Wen is pregnant like Chun Xing?"

That concubine Chun Xing seemed to be certain that the baby in her belly was a boy. She started to become arrogant even before the baby was born.

After being taught a lesson by Gu Jinchu last time, he behaved himself for a while, but now he started to act arrogantly in Zizhu Pavilion again.

"Qiu Wen is different from Chun Xing." Aunt Lian smiled, "Qiu Wen will probably have a hard time having a child of her own in this lifetime...otherwise why would I keep her by my side."

"Sister Yan, you have to remember that if something is uncontrollable, you should solve it from the root. Over the years, so many lives have been lost at the hands of your grandmother and aunt. If you prevent them from giving birth, won't that solve their worries..."

Gu Yan opened her eyes wide and lowered her voice, "You mean...Qiu Wen has a hard time getting pregnant?"

"She's been taking medicine after medicine, and she's already infertile." Aunt Lian patted her daughter's hand, "Is there any woman in the harem who is really generous?"

"Otherwise, Zheng wouldn't have used her unruly daughter to repeatedly prevent me from being promoted to a co-wife."

Gu Yan lowered her eyes to look at her mother's belly, and reached out to grasp her mother's slightly cold fingertips, "Mother, this time, father and grandmother will not regret it again, right?"

Aunt Lian held her in her arms and said softly, "We were too impatient last time. This time, just wait for Zheng to suffer the consequences. Someone will give us what we want..."

...

When Qiu Wen heard this, she felt her face numb. She saw Qiaozhen coming out of the side room, and she quickly walked to the little girl in the yard and took the mugwort from her hand.

I accidentally choked myself, my eyes turned red and tears flowed down.

Qiaozhen held her stomach and ran to the toilet five or six times in a row. Her legs were weak.

He whispered to a little girl in the yard, "Hey! Hey, did anyone approach the inner room just now who didn't want to do anything?"

Aunt Lian and the fourth young lady were discussing things inside. Qiu Wen went to see Doctor Lu off. She couldn't let Aunt Lian know that she had left her post without permission.

The little girl glanced at Qiu Wen beside her and quickly shook her head, "No! I've been helping Sister Qiaozhen keep an eye on it."

Qiaozhen and Qiu Wen are the head maids serving the aunt and the fourth young lady, and they can be considered as irrelevant people.

Qiu Wen closed her eyes when she heard the little girl's answer, but the tears in her eyes flowed more and more violently.

"Sister Qiu Wen, you are not used to this kind of work. Go wash your face quickly so that your eyes won't hurt." The little girl took the things in her hand diligently.

Qiaozhen looked at Qiu Wen's rabbit-like red eyes and didn't notice anything unusual about her. She urged her, "Go and clean up quickly. It's my turn later. I don't know what I ate wrong!"

...

At night, Qiu Wen held the things that Aunt Lian asked her to burn.

Only then did she have time to calm down and think about what Aunt Lian and the Fourth Young Miss had said.

When she was twelve years old, her hometown was hit by a flood. She was starving to the point of being skin and bones. Her parents were afraid that she would starve to death and become worthless, so they sold her to a human trafficker for only two taels of silver.

Because she looked half dead, many buyers felt that she was unlucky, and the last one came to Gu's house.

Second Madam Zheng had just given birth to the third daughter and was still plump. She still felt that she had never seen a more beautiful woman than Zheng at that time.

I even remembered what the Second Madam had said, 'She looks so pitiful, just consider it as a blessing for my Chu sister.'

In this way, she was left in the Gu family, and after she was almost able to work, she was taken to Tingyuxuan.

At that time, Aunt Lian asked her to raise her head while she was kneeling on the ground, and looked her up and down for a long time and said, "Well, it looks like she is a blessed person..."

He told the housekeeper beside him, "Go tell the second lady that I think this girl is a good match for me. I just happen to be short of someone here, so I'll hire her."

She was left in Tingyuxuan and trained as a maid by Aunt Lian. The sisters who came into the mansion with her all envied her, so she was even more grateful to Aunt Lian for her recognition and support.

When she was fifteen, her aunt always praised her for her good looks, saying that those maids who were assigned as servants or housekeepers by their masters were not as lucky as her.

At this time, my aunt mentioned blessing again, but the concept in her mind had changed.

One day she saw her aunt holding the fourth young lady and crying silently, several maids in Zizhu Pavilion were fired one after another, and the master had not come to Tingyuxuan for a long time.

At first, she wanted to repay her aunt's kindness, as it was her aunt who said that as long as she became pregnant, she could become the master's concubine.

Even if she was a concubine, her daily expenses were better than those of a servant's wife or the wife of a housekeeper, not to mention the future development of her children...

She stared at the gradually burning brazier, the flickering flames imprinted in her eyes.

Where will the children be?

Where is the future?

Those bowls of "tonic medicine" had already pushed her into the abyss. She was a woman who couldn't have children, and she knew so many secrets of her aunt...

She threw what she had in her hand into the brazier. The light and flames were slightly obscured, but a thick smoke rose up.

Qiu Wen covered her mouth and nose, picked up some with a dead branch, and was about to throw the last item in her arms in, when she heard a roar from behind, "Who's there!"

She was so scared that she grabbed her things and ran to the bamboo forest on the side, where the environment was most suitable for hiding.

Before he could run in, he tripped and fell forward hard.

Qiu Wen had her arm twisted and was pushed forward, "What are you doing? Why are you arresting me?"

The two maids were very strong. They led them into Sui'an Hall and saw Gu Jinchu sitting at the top. They bowed and asked:

"Miss Third, I am from Tingyuxuan. After all, I am the master's concubine. It is unreasonable for you to let the servants humiliate me like this, isn't it?"