phoenix knot

Dong Liu was lying on the kang, the sky was bright outside the window, and he waved to his wife, "Come and help me see if the beard fell off, I sweated profusely after running two laps today, it's been itchy in Renzhong, my throat It's also itchy and painful."

Su Mingyue leaned on his side and inspected it carefully, "No, the glue I used is not afraid of sweat or water, it doesn't fall off, don't think about it." She handed over a mirror, "Look for yourself."

Dong Liu looked in the mirror and felt relieved, "I took that soup today and talked too much, my throat hurts."

"It's like this, I can't drink it tomorrow, or I'll have a rough throat from now on." Su Mingyue took out a candied fruit from the wooden box on the table, "Eat rock candied kumquats to moisten your throat."

Dong Liu closed his mouth, and couldn't help licking her fingers. Su Mingyue smiled, and suddenly raised his hand to uncover her beard, "Be careful next time, and don't let someone strip your beard."

"How could I let others get close like this?" Dong Liu carefully put his precious beard into a small box and put it on the bedside table, and turned around to become Liang Guanjing. "You said that Hua Mulan served in the army for ten years, but no one found out that she was a woman. I think it would be too troublesome for a woman to disguise herself as a man. Unless she looks like a man, like Han Chengying."

"Fart, Zheng Guogong mainly wears women's clothing, so it must be very beautiful." Su Mingyue commented objectively.

"She's going to have a menstrual period too. Well, speaking of it, I feel that my stomach is swollen and uncomfortable. I'm afraid it will come tomorrow. You said that Hua Mulan started as a soldier. She slept with others in the barracks. , why hasn't anyone noticed? If she had to march on the road when she came, wouldn't she have to suffer more than ordinary people?"

"Have you never had that kind of time when you came to your body but encountered a time when you were on a march?"

Liang Guanjing shook his head, "I never started as a soldier. If I am marching, I must ride a horse. It would be much better to put soft cushions inside and outside the trousers. Speaking of which, I was in the army. It was my third brother who had menstruation for the first time. The cotton pads he sewed for me, when his eyes were still fine."

"I see. Those soft cushions you put in the box were used for this? I'll sew some new replacements when I have time."

"So what I admire most is not Zhong Wuyan and Mu Guiying, but Hua Mulan."

Liang Guanjing hugged her and gently patted her, while Su Mingyue turned sideways and gently rubbed her lower abdomen.

"Tomorrow, Xiyu will go to military training. I will have a day off. I have to find someone to shout for me. I think that Ling Shishi is not bad, he is a seedling."

Su Mingyue said: "Don't assign him any more work, because he will be promoted to head of a hundred households, the fellow villagers who were with him all hate him and want to make trouble for him."

Liang Guanjing didn't take it seriously, "I can't stand this kind of supercilious look in the barracks, it's unbearable, and I won't be able to become a climate in the future."

The two were gossiping, Lianxiang came in with tea, "I went out today to inquire about what Sixth Master ordered."

Su Mingyue said: "What else did you order that I don't know?"

Liang Guanjing said: "It's that Li Mingtang." She sat up on the kang, Su Mingyue helped her undress, and reached inside the clothes to untie the straps that bound her chest.In the past, Liang Guanjing was served with tenderness and tenderness, but now that Su Mingyue was by her side, and the two had such a relationship, Liang Guanjing was a little embarrassed to show her chest in front of others, and felt that she should avoid suspicion.

"This man is indeed famous." Lianxiang was also very knowledgeable, turned to answer the question, and told Liang Guanjing what he had inquired about, "This man is famous for his masculinity."

"Oh!" Su Mingyue exclaimed, "He didn't like you, did he?"

Liang Guanjing gave her a white look, "If you say that, I suspect that he has already seen through me, because he treats me with courtesy and respect, without any intention of being frivolous."

Lianxiang said again: "Although he is manly, he is also an infatuated master. Naturally, what he admires is his immediate superior, the Commander of the Dragon and Tiger Guard, Mr. Chang Qinghe. He is an official in name, but he is not an official. Chang Qinghe's master status. Chang Qinghe did work in Huguang before, but not long ago, his family practiced martial arts for generations, and there were no real estate, houses or shops in Huguang, so he had a feud with Huguang's magistrates and profiteers. Made it up."

Liang Guanjing touched the man who had removed his beard, "Then tell me, why did Li Mingtang kill the businessman in the kiln? It's still on the head of his boss, Chang Qinghe."

Lianxiang smiled and said, "Isn't it to snatch a man?"

Liang Guanjing gave her a blank look, "So you didn't find out anything else?"

Su Mingyue said: "The commander of the dragon guard, Chang Qinghe, is a manly man?"

Lianxiang said: "It is said that he is very clean and self-disciplined, he is really different from ordinary people, there is no female family member at home, no servants by his side, Li Mingtang admires him, he looks down on Li Mingtang."

"I don't think I'm staying by my side as a teacher, and I just want to hang on to others and not give you any sweets. This command makes you really bad." Liang Guanjing curled his lips, "Go and find out the details of the businessman in that kiln."

Lianxiang said: "Then I can only go to the kiln to inquire, I don't look like a woman disguised as a man."

Su Mingyue smiled and said, "Why don't you go to the brothel?"

Liang Guanjing made a gesture to pinch her, "Which lady would let Xianggong go shopping in a brothel? Forget it, anyway, I don't want to get involved in this matter."

After dismissing Lianxiang, Liang Guanjing and Su Mingyue lay on the kang and chatted, Liang Guanjing got into the bed to listen to the sound of the fetus in her womb, after a while her hands and feet became irregular again, the two of them laughed and quarreled, very happy.

At the end of March, the northern land finally warmed up, and the fields began to be busy with spring farming.Emperor Tai-zu's garrison order was to let soldiers go out in wartime, and farm on the spot if there was no war on the front line, so as to ensure sufficient food and grass.It stands to reason that there is no need to train soldiers during the busy farming period. The soldiers under the other thousand households finished their work in the field and fell asleep when they went back. However, the soldiers under Dong Liu were so miserable. Planting in the soil, carrying water to irrigate the seedlings, busy until the sun is slanting to the west, and picking up the fallen drills to continue.Obviously that Dong Xiyu was very skilled, but he only made the soldiers stand still for a few hours, or ran around the battlements stupidly, and refused to teach some real kung fu, and said that it was grinding their temper.

Dong Liu even left the practice to Dong Xiyu, but he didn't care about it at all, and went back to Baishui Town to be Su Mingyue's filial son and grandson.

When the sun was clear and the weather was sunny, Dong Liu took his wife to the streets for shopping. The owner bought cabbage, and the west bought bean curd. The fried dough twist was sprinkled with sesame seeds. As soon as it was hot out of the pan, he wrapped it in oil paper for his wife. Take it and taste it.Cailian at the side persuaded: "Madam is pregnant, eat less greasy food."

Su Mingyue squinted at her, "You're the one who gets in the way the most. I'm no longer shy. I've had a good appetite recently."

But Dong Liu said: "Cailian is right, eat too much greasy food, it is easy to give birth to a difficult child."

The fried dough twist was given to the gluttonous children on the side of the road. It's a pity that Su Mingyue doesn't have a beard, otherwise he should blow his beard and stare.A group of people walked east, west, north and south, and sure enough, they didn't need it all morning, and they had already finished their shopping.

"Why don't you see the kilns in Songcheng?" Su Mingyue asked.

Dong Liu was speechless, "You still notice if there is a kiln nearby?"

"I used to follow my father to the capital when it was hot summer. We passed the Qinhuai River by boat. There were fireworks and willow alleys lined up on both sides of the building. There was a girl lying on the railing in the building, waving colorful handkerchiefs outside. The water sleeves stretched three feet. It's as if the snake demon is captivating, and it's a million times more beautiful than the snapdragon grass that flaunts in the water. My father was so angry that his mother-in-law pulled us back to sit in the boat, and even blocked me and my second sister with his body, asking us not to look at it. It is said that no evil is seen, unclean, but I think those girls are so charming, they are really good-looking."

Dong Liu smiled slightly, "So you liked this tune early in the morning."

Su Mingyue made a gesture to pinch him, "It's you who want to compare yourself to a brothel girl, I don't mean that."

Hong Ling also said: "But just now, it seems that there is no kiln in Songcheng."

Dong Liudao: "Why not? There are family-prostitutes and official-prostitutes. This is Yanmen Pass. There are a lot of people coming and going. From the high officials of the imperial court to the traffickers and pawns, they all pass through Yanmen Pass. Songcheng is thirty miles away from the pass. It takes half a day to ride a horse. Most of the families of the defenders are placed here. Don’t those bachelors have to go out all day to gamble and prostitute? It’s just that the border is not as good as the capital, and there are not so many tricks to attract guests. It’s you in the capital The girls seen by the Qinhuai River, who can come out to show their faces, can only be regarded as second-class private prostitutes. They rarely receive customers, and they have the right to act as fronts, or there are old bustards mixed in. Those who actually receive customers are locked in the house. It’s the beautiful ones who suffer more, and within a few years, they will be covered with a secret disease, and when they die, they will be wrapped in a mat and thrown into a mass grave outside the city.”

Hong Ling and Cai Lian were stunned when they heard this, "Is the first-class prostitute better?"

Dong Liudao: "First-class private prostitutes may not be very beautiful, but they are proficient in everything from piano, chess, calligraphy and painting, and they are easy to see no visitors when they are kept in the house. Gentlemen compete to write poems to praise, but as long as you can afford the price, no matter you are an old man in his sixties or a reckless man in a military camp, don’t you have to pick up guests? The oiran lady who took over the guest will disappear after a year or two of popularity, don’t wait for old age Fading, there are still newcomers in the house anyway, who remembers?"

Su Mingyue sighed, "They are all unlucky women."

"Officials and prostitutes are even more unbearable. At the end of the five elements of low status, many people were convicted of family crimes and entered the Jiaofang Division. One day they were the daughters of the government, and the next day they were thrown into the military camp at the border. Let your stomach be full." Poems and books, with outstanding talents, tattooed on the same face, will never stand up. Even their children, their children's children, are from humble backgrounds. But in fact, they have never done anything wrong in the deep boudoir. It is the former Qiu Zheng Some of Lan's family members were demoted to the Jiaofang Division, and if he touches the emperor's woman, the emperor will suffer along with his family's women." Dong Liumian raised his head to let the sun shine on his face.

Lianxiang said: "Sixth Master, don't say this anymore, it scares the girls."

As he was walking, through the wall, shouts and curses and women's crying and begging suddenly came from the courtyard, and the sound of a basin of water being splashed on the ground.

A north-facing courtyard door opened, and a middle-aged woman came out, followed by the guard. For a moment, after they saw a few blooming peach blossoms in the courtyard, four ragged women knelt down in a row. He raised his hand and put the footbath on his head, and the water all over his body trembled like chaff.And the middle-aged woman who went out was still cursing, her northern dialect was sonorous but she couldn't quite understand it.

Dong Liudao: "She said that she would go to Ren Yazi to refund the money. These girls have a secret illness, and the price she paid was to buy clean girls. She will starve them for three days. In order to save food money, she will find a few more people to look after them. Don’t let them commit suicide, then they can’t get their money back.”

The door was closed heavily, and a piece of broken round bamboo weaving was hung on the door, which was the code of the local house-prostitute.

"The brothels in Songcheng don't hang lanterns at the entrance, and there are many people coming and going, and whoring-prostitutes don't want to be seen. The soldiers at the border do not like to prostitute officials-prostitutes, because most of the officials-prostitutes have tattoos on their faces. , It’s not good-looking if you lose your face, because the house-prostitutes are rampant. I don’t want to go to the brothel to inquire about the news. It’s not because I look down on the girls in the brothel and dislike them. It’s because I feel uncomfortable but I can’t do anything. I can save it One or two, but they can't save all the women in the world." Dong Liu squeezed Su Mingyue's hands tightly, and they gradually walked away.

Su Mingyue couldn't help but look back at the bamboo weaving, and said to Dong Liu: "You must be in control, all the poor women in this world are waiting for you to rescue them."

Dong Liu didn't speak, but hugged her tightly.