Chapter 20: Chapter 20: Why would a prince ever hobble?

Upset about the dismal way that she had left things with Fenhua, Min Li decided that she needed a way to take her mind off it.

After speaking to her friends for some moral support, Min Li moved on to her next target, Betti.

She had been thinking over the last couple hours just what she could do to find herself in so much trouble she would be in Betti’s bad graces.

Betti cared deeply for whether Min Li was doing her job correctly or not, so Min Li focused on thinking of a way to mess things up in the Eastern palace. The most important thing in the Eastern palace to the head maid had to be the crown prince so Min Li decided to mess with Fenhua a little bit. It would also serve as a little bit of innocent revenge for the annoying words Fenhua had said earlier in the day.

Yet again, Min Li had enlisted help from Lily and Rose. She hadn’t told them about the nitty gritty details as she was sure they would kick up a fuss. Their loyalties laid with the crown prince even though they had hardly spoken to the man before.

Their only job was to keep Tom in the courtyard near where he could see the pavilion that the crown prince had recently been insistent upon eating all his meals under.

The stage was set. Tom was in the garden under false pretences, searching for the non-existent rabbit that Lily and Rose had said was eating up the vegetable patch.

The main guest of honour himself, the crown prince, was waiting under the shade for his food, reading a book and occasionally turning back to talk to Feng.

Min Li was sitting where both the crown prince and Tom could see her getting ready to play the unrepentant culprit.

A few female servants came out in tow from the direction of kitchen. The food was ready in hand and the servants started loading the plates on the table.

The food looked heavenly, just as Min Li had intended. The food smelled even better than heavenly, just as Min Li had intended.

It wasn’t the classic table spread.

There were dumplings, noodles, steamed stuff buns and glutinous rice balls. Most of the dishes on the table were uncoincidentally the crown prince’s favourites. There were spicy dishes, sour dishes, salty dishes, bitter dishes and savoury dishes. The female servants had also served the man rice wine.

The prince and everyone around him took a deep breath in revelling in the flavours exposed with the uncovering of the dishes.

Unfortunately for the crown prince, one mere sniff of the air would not tell which flavour came with which dish.

Min Li knew that out of politeness to the chef, the prince liked to eat at least one bite of each dish the chef had made. If only he knew that the chef happened to be her.

Unfamiliar flavours with unfamiliar textures the crown prince hated, but he was about to have to get very comfortable with it.

As Min Li knew he would, the crown prince went for the one dish of the lot that he didn’t like, the slices of fried eel. Min Li hadn’t done anything much to that dish as she knew he would hate in anyway. Uncoincidentally, it was also the best dish at the table.

Min Li knew that after a bite of the fried eel the prince would stuff his face with one of the other dishes to take away the flavour of the previous dish.

He seemed to eye up the dumplings. They had never done him wrong and were salty and without strong flavour enough to cause a weird mixture of tastes in his mouth.

That was where he went wrong. This particular brand of dumplings that she had made him were both sour and bitter, made with vinegar and citrus peel.

The man’s face screwed up and he coughed and choked on his food, taking his time to swallow the food down.

He had weathered the storm and was unto the next dish.

But what, the man didn’t know was the noodles were more of the same bad thing.

The crown prince this time jumped up from his seat, holding an arm straight up in the air, trying to reach for help from anyone who could hear his inner cry.

With a yelp and a groan, the man sat back down in his seat. He now had everybody’s attention, including Tom’s.

The prince seemed to not trust the cook any longer.

He cast a suspicious eye on the rest of the dishes, but his manners wouldn’t allow him to leave without tasting all the dishes for the chef.

Feng leaned in and although Min Li couldn’t hear him, she was sure that he was saying in his high-pitched voice, “are you sure you want to do this your highness? We can just prepare some more food for you.”

Being as noble as he was, the crown prince reached forwards and picked up a steamed stuffed bun with his chopsticks. He gulped and looked in the air as if he was saying a prayer and then took the littlest bite of the bun.

He was right to.

The dish wasn’t simply the normal spiciness it usually was.

It was extremely spicy.

Draw droppingly spicy.

Spicier that the spiciest chilly in the world spicy.

And a very fun fact; the crown prince couldn’t do spicy.

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She wasn’t going to let him die, that much would be wrong. Just a little bit of coughing, and spluttering would be enough to ease her sadness and induce Tom the class snitch to tell the head maid.

The crown prince coughed like he was about to die.

That was not what Min Li had intended.

The crown prince’s eyes bulged out of his socket like a squeezed frog. Min Li tilted her head to look at the crown prince.

That was definitely not what Min Li had intended. If the crown prince kept this up, Min Li was sure to lose the little of the crush she had on him completely, quicker than she had planned to.

The crown prince was redder than a tomato and he went to pick up the glutinous rice balls which were usually sweet and sticking with the theme, unusually spicy today.

He nibbled and swallowed some of the rice ball not wanting the audience in front of him seeing him being a coward.

The crown prince’s face was as red as only the face of a mandril could get.

Min Li squinted her eyes.

Min Li tilted her head to the side to look at the crown prince.

That was definitely not what Min Li had intended.

Min Li was unconsciously pouting until she realised that she had to act as if she was revelling in the moment. Tom, although eager, was often taken down by his own slowness of thought, she had to make it foolproofly apparent that she was the culprit of the dastardly deed.

She started doing what no other man dared do, she started laughing. Not loud enough so the prince and the people around him watching could hear it, but just loud enough for Tom and a pouting Lily to hear it.

The prince animalistically reached for relief across the table practically crawling across it. Min Li was sure that after this whole saga was finished, the prince was going to have to confirm to the whole world that his species was in fact human.

The crown prince had reached for relief in the rice wine.

Oh, not the rice wine, Min Li winced.

Probably because she had only said it in her head, Fenhua did not heed Min Li’s warning. He gulped the rice wine down not knowing that he was about to be hit by an intensely bitter, sickly sweet flavour.

He coughed in pain and looked around searching for the criminal who had done this to him.

Some tried their best to avoid the prince’s gaze and Min Li was about to try the same tactic.

Unfortunately for Min Li, the crown prince seemed to know that Min Li was the culprit.

Fenhua stared at Min Li with watery eyes, got up from the chair he was convulsing in pain on and shouted “YOU” straight at Min Li.

Alright. You don’t have to be so upset about it, Min Li thought avoiding eye contact.

Tom, the most slow-witted of Min Li’s friends, was watching the scene with eagerness in his eyes.

Fenhua’s belly was rumbling but not in the same way his belly had been rumbling when he had been hungry to eat a minute ago.

It seemed as if all the food in his belly had finally met each other and were refusing to be in close contact.

The prince got up from his seat and started shuffling away trying not to move his legs too far apart from each other.

Kindly, everyone around him averted their eyes pretending not to know what was going on.

But Min Li still wasn’t sure that Tom would know for sure who had caused it. So, she decided to make it obvious.

She didn’t want to get punished by the crown prince for what she had done. But she had to make a sacrifice either way.

Min Li blocked the crown prince from leaving with his pride and dignity. The man looked at her in rage and fury.

By this time, he held not only his stomach, but his rear end too.

Min Li was sure that Tom, with it now being spoon fed to him, would know that she was the culprit now.

Min Li didn’t want the crown prince to be too embarrassed, so she let him go whispering a soft “sorry” to the man as he went.

The crown prince hobbled away.

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