Chapter 6 — Kneeling before the Queen and Duke

For seven consecutive days after being rescued and returned to the royal palace, Sam Khinh Vu remained in a coma, only occasionally stirring slightly, her lips moving in meaningless sentences that no one could hear clearly. Viet Khoi assigned people to be on duty day and night. He personally stopped by every morning to ask about the situation before entering court. He returned in the evening and continued to sit by the hospital bed, sometimes quietly reading books, sometimes just sitting and looking at her still pale face, thinking vaguely. The old physician of the royal palace, who had administered the antidote the first night, now entrusted the treatment to another person with a greater reputation in the capital's medical community, who was invited to carefully monitor the recovery process, because Viet Khoi wanted to make sure there were no residual effects left in the patient's body.

This person used to hold the position of Royal Physician in the palace, but because of his old age, he retired and was only occasionally invited out to examine patients for noble families with close relationships with the royal family. He has far more profound knowledge than ordinary physicians, especially knowledgeable about the types of poisons used in power struggles in the royal court in the past, as well as being familiar with old records about royal vestiges that not everyone knows about.

During those seven days, Viet Khoi never sat still. He silently ordered his guard Bang to scout around the capital to find out if any noble family had recently held a funeral for a young woman. Without much effort, Bang found out the news about the funeral of the young lady of the Tu family, which was rumored throughout the large and small business associations in the city because Tu Bach Quan had business relationships with many silk merchants. Hearing that news, Viet Khoi became even more certain about his suspicions, but he still maintained a very cautious attitude, not in a hurry to verify or take any further action, just silently letting people continue to monitor all movements from Tu Phu's side without revealing any traces.

He also asked someone to discreetly inquire about the businessmen who had interacted with Sam Dinh Ngan during his lifetime, gradually piecing together some details about the marriage between Khinh Vu and Bach Quan, about her holding full control of the estate according to her father's will, as well as vague rumors about the recent not-so-smooth relationship between the couple. The more information Viet Khoi gathered, the more uneasy he felt, with a hunch that Khinh Vu's fake death was not simply an accident, but most likely the result of a premeditated plot, originating from the closest people in her family.

On the eighth day, while changing Khinh Vu's clothes and wiping her body according to daily routine to avoid ulcers from lying in one place for a long time, the maid in charge of taking care of her suddenly cried out in surprise and quickly invited the Royal Hospital to come and see. On Khinh Vu's left shoulder blade, hidden under a thin layer of skin, appeared a red birthmark like cinnabar, with a strange shape like a spreading phoenix wing, with sharp lines that could not be a normal natural birthmark.

When the royal physician saw the birthmark, his face suddenly changed completely, his hands trembled slightly, and he quickly sent someone back out, leaving only Viet Khoi himself to report. "Your Majesty," he said, his voice choked with emotion and horror, "I have served in the Royal Hospital for thirty years, and have personally examined many concubines in the palace, and I still remember very clearly that twenty years ago, there was a lady named Vinh Tan. When she gave birth to a little princess, I was the one who delivered the baby. When that child was born, she also had a birthmark exactly like this on his left shoulder, in the shape of a phoenix wing. They all called it a sign from heaven, thinking that the future child would have great fortune."

Viet Khoi heard that, his heart was shocked, he quickly asked again for clarity. "What do you think the little princess will become in the future?"

The royal physician sighed, his eyes filled with sadness. "That story has been going on for twenty years, few people still talk about it. On the full moon night of July that year, Vinh Tho palace where Princess Vinh Tan lived suddenly caught fire in the middle of the night. The princess unfortunately died in the fire, while the little princess was missing, her body was never found. Only people rumored that the nanny had carried the child and escaped before the fire spread, but after that the news about the two people separated was never heard of, the court at that time only considered the princess to have passed away in the fire. Mom, set up an altar to worship and not pursue further."

"So this birthmark..." Viet Khoi looked towards the hospital bed, his voice deep and thoughtful.

"I don't dare to say for sure," the Royal Hospital replied, "after all, the phoenix wing birthmark, although rare, is not absolutely unique to only one person. But if the prince allows, I would like to check one more sign that I still remember clearly, which is under the left heel, the little princess at that time had a small red mole, located right in the middle of the sole of her foot, a very rare location."

Viet Khoi immediately called the maid in to check, and sure enough, just as the Royal Physician had said, under Khinh Vu's left heel a small, bright red mole was clearly visible as he described. The whole room was engulfed in heavy silence, everyone felt the weight of this discovery, a discovery that could shock the entire court if confirmed.

At that moment, as if his body was trying to reveal a part of the truth, Khinh Vu stirred slightly, her fingers tightened on the edge of the blanket, a tear rolled down the corner of her still closed eye. Viet Khoi quickly bent down, grabbed that skinny hand, feeling the warmth gradually returning to her body. He used his finger to gently wipe away the remaining tears at the corners of her eyes. His own breathing was uneven, both happy that she had reacted and worried about what might lie ahead.

"This matter," Viet Khoi turned to instruct the Royal Physician, his voice unusually serious, "absolutely do not reveal even half a word. If she is indeed the lost little princess from the past, then the person behind the fire twenty years ago is still out there, and the person who harmed her this time is very likely closely related to the mastermind that year. If this news gets out before we can find out clearly, I am afraid that her life will be lost." will never be safe.""

The royal physician nodded, solemnly swearing that he would keep this secret until his death, not revealing even a single word. He said goodbye and left when it was late afternoon, leaving Viet Khoi alone sitting beside the hospital bed, looking at Khinh Vu's still pale face with hundreds of thoughts in his mind. If what the Royal Physician just said was true, then his childhood friend was not simply the victim of a trivial family plot, but also the last link of a royal secret that had been buried for twenty years, a secret that could shake the entire Dai Ninh dynasty if exposed to light.

That night, when the moonlight was high through the royal palace window, Viet Khoi still sat quietly by the bed, constantly piecing together the fragmented pieces in his mind: a young lady of the Tu family suddenly passed away from an illness, was buried in a deserted hillock with few visitors, bearing on her body the royal seal that only those in the palace knew about. The more he thought, the more he felt that this whole thing was not as simple as it seemed on the outside, and perhaps, the journey ahead for both him and Khinh Vu would be even longer and more arduous than what either of them could imagine right now.

He remembered his childhood years, when Khinh Vu was still a smiling little girl, often following him around the royal gardens, always asking about all kinds of things in life, from how to distinguish precious flowers to mythical stories about the royal family that she was extremely passionate about. At that time, neither of the two children could have imagined that the young merchant girl herself was of royal blood, ironically pushed by fate into another family, living a completely different life than what should have belonged to her. Viet Khoi gently squeezed Khinh Vu's hand, his fingers stopped at the pulse point on her wrist, counting each weak beat as if to reassure himself that she was still here. He stood up, put on his cloak, and decided that night that he would personally go to the Royal Study room to search through all the old records about the night of the fire that year, because if he did not authenticate every detail himself, he would not be able to safely place the life of this childhood friend on any guess, no matter how small.