The month before the planned summit passed quickly for both royal houses.
King Huìwén had received Ming Yue's message and made arrangements to send his eldest son, Crown Prince Wang Wei, on his behalf. To his great surprise however, his youngest son, Prince Zhixing had also insisted on attending. Zhixing had taken little interest in matters of politics to date, spending most of his time training with the military and reading about the exploits of Jin's greatest generals in wars long since past.
Still, the king was reluctant to refuse his third son, and this trip could mould him into a reliable right-hand man for Wang Wei if all went well.
Of course, King Huìwén had no idea that his only daughter was now so highly thought of by the second prince that there was no question of her not attending the summit as part of the Han delegation. After all, she had only been able to send very brief messages, so any information not directly related to her mission had, inevitably, failed to reach his ears. To his mind, the princess was still operating well below the radar as a lowly maidservant.
As for Han Kingdom, Weisheng had been busy with constant preparations. In order to ensure everything went smoothly, he had been meeting with his father and the senior court officials on an almost daily basis. He could tell that some of the ministers were not particularly thrilled with the idea of the summit, but they kept their views largely to themselves, knowing that if they made too many objections this would raise considerable suspicion about their motives.
Also, some minor skirmishes in the south had required his attention recently, sometimes taking him out of the palace for days at a time. Consequently, he and Ming Yue had barely had an opportunity to be alone over the course of the last few weeks and, when they had, she had been completely preoccupied with preparing for the summit which, rather surprisingly, she seemed even more invested in than Weisheng.
It wasn't that his small attempts at intimacy – a touch on the hand here, or a private smile there – had seemed unwelcome. In some cases, they had even been returned. It was just that she had made no effort at all to address the unspoken questions remaining between them. Now, with the day of the departure for the summit drawing near, Weisheng's resolve was crumbling, and all he could hope for was that the long trip would give them some time to talk properly, even if he had to initiate the conversation himself.
Finally, the day of departure arrived, and the prince said his farewells to his father, his mother, and his younger brother. His older brother was nowhere in sight, and had been suspiciously absent for the last few weeks, but Weisheng couldn't pretend that his overwhelming response to this hadn't been something akin to relief.
The party of travellers this time was much larger than the group that had journeyed to the northern provinces some months previously. After all, this was a formal meeting between two neighbouring kingdoms. In addition to a large number of guards and servants, the prince's group also contained Minister Shen, Minister Xie, Minister Deng, Luo Jian, Eunuch Wang, Doctor Xiao and, of course, Ming Yue.
The journey to the chosen location at the border would take three days as, given the size of the convoy, travelling at speed was not an option. This time, however, they were travelling with their own accommodation, and at the end of the first uneventful day of the expedition, the guards and servants hurried around a large patch of open ground, setting up a number of the less grand tents which formed part of the supplies for this very purpose.
Usually, the prince's temporary chambers would have been in the centre of the ring of tents, for security. However, it was well-known that he valued his privacy highly, so instead, the only structures separating his own accommodation from the open plain were a few smaller tents for Luo Jian's handpicked royal guards and Luo Jian himself. The royal advisers were located at the centre of the camp, and the tents of servants and guards were scattered about the rest of the ground.
As with back at the prince's mansion, Ming Yue had been allocated her own small tent, which was not far from the prince's own. It was here where she was currently waiting. She knew it was unlikely that Weisheng would summon her tonight. The following day would just be another stretch of travelling, so her services would most likely not be required, and it would be risky for the prince to ask to see her outside of the privacy of his own mansion when there was no obvious reason to do so.
Consequently, what Ming Yue was waiting for was the rest of the travellers bedding down for the night, other than the guards and soldiers patrolling in shifts. When they were setting up the camp, they had deliberately done so near a source of fresh, flowing water, and Ming Yue was now keen to use that water for her own ends and in pursuance of her usual routine. Of course, it would not be as relaxing as the hot, fragrant water of the mansion's bath houses, but right now, the only thing she was concerned with was washing the dust from the road off her skin before it sank deep into her pores.
Gradually, the noise from the camp lessened until, finally, silence descended. Ming Yue slipped outside and looked around. Behind her own tent was a row of evenly spaced small tents, each housing several guards. After these, a strip of open ground then a cluster of trees. Beyond the trees was the large stream where she intended to bathe. She had taken a look at it earlier, while the camp was being made, and had noticed a small rock pool to one side where the water was not as fast flowing. It was perfect.
Getting out of the camp would not be a problem; the night guards were more concerned with watching for people trying to get in. As for the return trip, Ming Yue had an idea, and was hoping her new-found ability would come into play to assist her.
Sure enough, as she suspected, it was easy to slip past the guards and use her qinggong to leap up into the trees and out of sight. However, her exit from the camp hadn't gone completely undetected. By sheer coincidence, someone had been gazing intently at Ming Yue's tent from the shadows at the exact moment she emerged and made her way into the night.
Weisheng had been unable to sleep. He had barely seen Ming Yue all day, and if the rest of their journey to the meeting place went the same way, time would slip away from them and they would lose this valuable opportunity to confront their feelings away from the eyes of any palace spies. He pondered over this as he stood silently in the darkness. Originally, he had only come outside to take a look at the stars, away from the pollution of the lights in the capital, hoping it would give him some inspiration when it came to his love life. However, he had found his eyes drawn to Ming Yue's small tent, not far from his own.
Imagine his surprise when the woman herself appeared and made her way swiftly past the patrolling guards and into the trees. In an instant, Weisheng's curiosity had gotten the better of him and, without a second thought, he followed her.
Ming Yue quickly located the pool she had spotted earlier, and immediately removed her dusty clothes and sank into the water. Thankfully, it had been a hot day, and the residual warmth from the sun meant that it was not as cold as she had feared. As she looked out across the water, she suddenly felt at peace. The moon was high and bright, so she could clearly see the trees just beyond the banks either side of the stream, and the moonlight was now reflecting off the surface of the calm rock pool. Ming Yue lifted her hands and watched the clear liquid running through her fingers. Then she ducked her head underneath the surface, and all the sounds of the world suddenly disappeared.
Weisheng had lost sight of the woman after entering the treeline, but he heard the sound of water, and instinctively headed towards it. However, when he reached the bank of the stream and looked around, he saw nothing. He stood perfectly still for a moment, surveying the scene in front of him. After a few moments, a faint movement to the right caught his attention, where he could see a small rock pool. Before he could move closer, the surface of the pool stirred, and a head of long black hair emerged from the water.
Weisheng knew it was her, even though she had her back to him. Who else could it have been? For a while he just stood there, frozen in place, as she crouched in the pool moving her arms back and forth, just watching the water run over her skin as if she was fascinated by it. He was snapped from his daze when Ming Yue began to move upwards, and he realised she was about to stand.
Immediately coming to his senses, he spun around to give her some privacy. He stood there for a while before he recovered enough to head back towards camp, but then he felt a sudden blow in the centre of his back. Turning around, he was confronted with the image of a very unimpressed young woman.
"How long have you been standing there?" she asked. "And, I'm warning you, if I don't like your answer, I will be hitting you with something a lot bigger than a pebble."
Weisheng rushed to reassure her.
"Not long, not long at all. I mean, I didn't see anything. I saw you leave the camp, and I was worried, so I followed you but, when I got to the stream, I couldn't find you. I didn't expect that you would be..." he gestured towards the rock pool. "I'm sorry," he finished. "I didn't mean to disturb you."
He looked so forlorn that Ming Yue couldn't stay angry with him. In truth, she was more annoyed with herself for not realising that she had been followed.
She sat down on a large boulder and started using the edge of her cloak to dry her long hair. Weisheng approached her slowly and sat down next to her. He reached for the cloak.
"Let me do it," he said. "You don't want to catch a cold before the summit."
Instead of protesting, she let him take the material and start gently rubbing her head with it, combing his fingers through the strands of hair as they dried. For a while, neither of them spoke, then Weisheng was the first to crack.
"That night. Why did you run away?"
"I don't know," she answered, honestly. "Maybe I just needed to get away so I could think." She lapsed back into silence, but Weisheng wasn't willing to leave things there.
"And after you'd thought?" he said. "Why didn't you say anything?"
Ming Yue looked around sharply at his question.
"Why didn't you?" she retorted.
There was another period of silence, until both spoke out loud at the same time.
"I didn't want to pressure you!"
"I didn't want to overstep my bounds!"
After a brief pause, they both laughed, more from relief than anything else. Ming Yue was the first to recover her composure, however, and tried to bring them back to a sober reality.
"Tell me, Weisheng. Do you see any future for us, though?" She frowned up at him.
He took no time at all in responding to her, but it was not to answer her question.
"Don't think about that. Not now. Just tell me. What do you want?" He took hold of her shoulders and gazed intently at her.
Ming Yue hesitantly reached up and ran her fingertips softly over his cheekbones, then down his jawline, before she finally touched his lips. Bringing her hand down, she leaned closer to him and gently pressed her mouth to his, for just a couple of seconds. However, as she went to pull away, she felt strong arms circle her waist, drawing her forward and, before she knew it, Weisheng was returning the gesture ten-fold.