border cook

In the afternoon, Jiang Yanyi took a bamboo basket to Fengfu to catch cats.

Feng Shuo was discussing with his staff in the study, and she went directly to his courtyard. The guards at the gate of the courtyard should have been explained by Feng Shuo, even if Feng Shuo was not in the courtyard, they respectfully let Jiang Yanyi in.

Jiang Yanyi put the jerky and jerky that he brought over on the table in the back room, and said to the boy standing at the door: "These are for the prince, please tell the prince."

It was rare for Feng Shuo to open Jinkou last night, and it was just for some snacks. Jiang Yanyi couldn't ignore it. When she came over, she wrapped some jerky and jerky in oiled paper.

The boy knew how much Feng Shuo valued Jiang Yanyi, so he said with a smile on his face: "Miss Jiang, don't worry, I will tell the prince as soon as the prince comes back."

Jiang Yanyi was embarrassed by the boy's enthusiastic attitude, nodded and said "thank you", and went to the asparagus bush to move the cat's nest.

It was so cold that even with the earth dragon warming it, there was a thin layer of snow on the top of the asparagus bamboo outside the wall, and Feng Shuo ordered someone to block the top of the cat's nest with partitions, so the snow did not fall.

It is not easy to find food in snowy weather, and Jiang Yanyi comes to feed it every day, and the mother cat does not go out now, and she nests in the cat's litter every day to concentrate on feeding the kittens.When Jiang Yanyi picked up the female cat, the female cat only meeked twice, without the slightest hostility from before.

The mother cat eats well and has enough milk, and the kittens are also fed one by one to be chubby and round, like little pompoms.

There are only four kittens in the cat litter, and the orange one is hiding somewhere.

She searched around in the outside yard but couldn't find it, and she also looked in Feng Shuo's room, but she still couldn't see it.

"Cuiba, where are you?"

"Cookies?"

Ciba is the name Jiang Yanyi gave that little chubby orange.

She searched all the places where the kittens used to play, but she still couldn't find Fat Ju. She couldn't help worrying whether Xiao Fat Ju had been playing in the snow for a long time and no one noticed, and was finally covered by heavy snow.

In such a cold day, I have to freeze to death.

The more Jiang Yanyi thought about it, the more worried he became.

At this moment, a guard's voice suddenly came from the gate of the courtyard: "My lord."

When Jiang Yanyi turned around, he saw Feng Shuo striding towards the gate of the courtyard. He was dressed in a gold-plated silk brocade robe, and his black hair was tied up with a gold-carved ruyi crown. He was very dignified.Xing Yaoben followed Feng Shuo, seeing Jiang Yanyi in the courtyard, he waited at the gate of the courtyard consciously.

Feng Shuo was a bit surprised to see Jiang Yanyi, and when he saw the cat she put in the cage, his eyes immediately understood: "Are you going to take the cat there?"

Jiang Yanyi nodded: "There are sausages hanging in the kitchen, attracting mice."

She was a little frustrated and said, "But the glutinous rice cakes are gone."

Feng Shuo frowned slightly, and after thinking for a while, he remembered that Ciba was the orange kitten.

He asked, "Have you seen everything in the room?"

"I searched under the desk, under the cabinet, and under the bed."

Feng Shuo didn't know what he remembered, his expression was a bit weird, he said: "Wait a minute."

He entered the room, followed by Jiang Yanyi, who found a pair of clean cotton boots worn indoors from the corner of the bed, and poured out a sleeping little orange cat from one of the boots.

The little orange cat was suddenly thrown out of the warm boots, and rolled round on the ground, then moved its sleepy eyelids, screamed twice, and strode its short legs again Go back to sleep in your boots.

Jiang Yanyi didn't know whether to laugh or cry, and walked over to pick up the little chubby orange: "Ciba, you little villain, you didn't answer when I called you for so long."

Little Pang Ju meowed twice in her hands, as if acting like a baby.

Jiang Yanyi also put the kitten into the bamboo basket, then smiled and said to Feng Shuo: "So it got into your boot, I said why can't I find it."

Feng Shuo always had a cold face, as if he didn't want to deal with these little things, "You disgusting little bastard."

Jiang Yanyi knew that someone was just talking about it. She had seen him handling government affairs, the kitten climbed up Zhuo, and lay down on the official document he was reading as if touching porcelain.

He lifted the cat away, and the next second the pompom ran over on its short legs and continued to lie down.

He stared at the kitten coldly, and the kitten meowed back at him angrily. In the end, he had no choice but to change another official document.

Jiang Yanyi didn't expose him, picked up the bamboo cage and said with a smile: "Then I'll go back first."

Feng Shuo nodded, looking at her eyes a little darker than usual.

When Jiang Yanyi walked to the door of the room, he suddenly stopped her: "Jiang Yanyi."

"Huh?" Jiang Yanyi turned around after hearing the sound.

He always called her by her first and last name, as if to distinguish her from thousands of people by this name, and there was an indescribable feeling in it.

The cold wind rolled in the fine snow from the door, blowing Jiang Yanyi's begonia-colored blouse, and there was a smile on her brows, bright and vivid.

Feng Shuo stood in the shadow of the room, and she happened to stand in the halo at the door, one black and one white, like two worlds that never intersect.

Feng Shuo asked: "You said earlier that you hid many things from me, so what about now?"

Jiang Yanyi was stunned, remembering that he was just a lonely soul from another world, his eyes dimmed: "There is only one thing, it is about my past, when I think it is time, I will tell you without reservation, okay ?”

Feng Shuo twitched the corner of his lips and said, "Okay."

After getting his answer, Jiang Yanyi walked out holding the bamboo basket containing a litter of cats, without looking back, and only sighed softly.

She knew Feng Shuo's thoughts on her, but she was not sure how much his feelings were.The ancients feared ghosts and gods, if she confessed her true identity to him, would he accept it?

Jiang Yanyi felt like a demon in Liaozhai, but fortunately, if she didn't speak, no one would be able to see through her identity.

But if she exposes herself impulsively, she can't imagine what will be waiting for her, maybe everything she has now will be lost.Whether it is a relative, a lover, or a friend, they will fear her, stay away from her, and even want to burn her to avoid future troubles.

Chu Changping was very kind to her, but this kindness was not for her, but for his real niece.Jiang Yanyi yearns for family affection, but she is also very sober. While she treats her original relatives as her own, she also regards them as benefactors.

She tried her best to give back how much her relatives gave her.This is also the reason why Chu Changping asked her to return to be the daughter of the rich, but she still wanted to open a shop to make money by herself. Blindly enjoying the benefits brought by her original identity would make her feel like a begging thief.

If she had been more selfish, she could probably have lied to Feng Shuo for the rest of her life, keeping her mouth shut that she was a lonely soul from another world.But she couldn't get past the hurdle in her heart—since she was the one who decided to spend the rest of her life together, she shouldn't lie.

Whether to say it or not is her attitude towards this relationship, whether to accept it or not is Feng Shuo's right to choose.

Now is not the time, she herself is still hesitating, she needs to think clearly, find a suitable time, and then confess all this to Feng Shuo.

The courtyard that was just cleaned in the morning has already been covered with another layer of snow. Jiang Yanyi's footprints fell on the snow, deep and shallow, spreading into the distance.

She didn't know that Feng Shuo was sitting in the room, staring at her back with deep and paranoid eyes.

Xing Yao came in with a pile of registers: "Master, after a night of screening, all the streets and squares have been checked, and only the south of the city is still searching from house to house."

There are a lot of poor families in the south of the city, and people of all kinds gather there. There are also many black households, so it is quite difficult to find someone.

Feng Shuo closed his eyes and asked, "Where did Lu Linyuan find out?"

Xing Yao said: "South of the city."

It's just a coincidence.In addition to the south of the city, Xizhou also has several workshops that are mixed with fish and dragons. It took his people a whole night to find out the other places and lock the south of the city, but Lu Linyuan directly searched from the south of the city.

Lu Linyuan could not rule out the possibility that the south of the city was more convenient for Tibetans based on his intuition, but Feng Shuo had a doubt in his heart, and if there was any disturbance, that doubt would only be magnified several times.

He said: "Send someone to secretly watch Lu Linyuan to see which street in the south of the city he starts searching."

Xing Yao was about to step back when he was ordered, but Feng Shuo suddenly stopped her: "Find out the letter about the daughter of the Jiang family that you checked earlier."

He only focused on the part about her and Lu Linyuan before, and he hasn't finished the rest.

Although Xing Yao didn't understand why his master wanted to investigate Jiang Yanyi again, he quickly opened the hidden compartment of his bookcase and found the pile of letters that Feng Shuo needed from the pile of well-organized letters.

He put it on Feng Shuo's case, but Feng Shuo didn't move, leaning on the back of the chair, frowned and said: "Get back."

Xing Yao retreated respectfully.

Feng Shuo was the only one left in the huge room. He looked at the stack of letters in the corner of the desk with unpredictable light in his eyes.

Since he promised Jiang Yanyi to tell him when she wanted to, then he shouldn't investigate her past secretly.

But the trace of uneasiness in his heart followed like a shadow, urging the growth of the haze, he was like a gambler who had come to an end, and this was a gamble he could never afford to lose.

***

Jiang Yanyi took a litter of cats back to the yard, and put the litter in the woodshed for the time being.

The kittens have just arrived in a new place, and they are a little scared, and they dare not move around.

Jiang Yanyi made a plate of cat food and brought it over. When the mother cat ate it, the kittens gradually became more courageous. Two kittens were already learning how the mother cat eats meat soup, but because they didn't master the skills well, they got confused. With soup on his face, the kitten shook his face, and then threw the soup on his face to the brothers and sisters next to him.

It was cold and Jiang Yanyi didn't dare to bathe the kittens, but the mother cat patiently "licked" the fur of the kittens after the meal, so Jiang Yanyi didn't bother the old mother anymore.

Now that the kitchen is controlled by Chef Yao and Aunt Guo, she has completely let go of the burden and has become a full-time shopkeeper, only taking care of the accounts on the counter.

The regular customers in the store heard that Chef Yao came to her place and had tasted the stir-fried dishes made by Chef Yao before, so they couldn't help asking a few of Chef Yao's special dishes in Laifu Restaurant, whether they were sold here.

Chef Yao just came over today, and Jiang Yanyi hadn't had time to prepare these, so he just shirked that they were still making arrangements.

When the evening was over and the people in the shop gathered around to eat the mutton pot, Jiang Yanyi mentioned it.

She hadn't planned to sell Chef Yao's specialty dishes before. One was that the store mainly sold all kinds of pots, and the other was that there were already many people ordering dry pots every day. She was afraid that Chef Yao would be too busy to cook side dishes.

But some diners asked like that, and she felt that it was better to ask Chef Yao for his own thoughts, after all, those dishes were his own signature, and Jiang Yanyi didn't want to be inferior.

Chef Yao is a straightforward person. As soon as Jiang Yanyi said it, he said: "How can there be a reason why the diners want to eat by name, but the cook doesn't do it? Shopkeeper Jiang, you pay me such a high salary. take it out!"

Jiang Yanyi said: "I was worried that you would be too busy on the stove, but now that you are cooking, I will find you a helper."

Chef Yao waved his hands again and again: "What kind of work is this? Don't look down on me, Lao Yao, the shopkeeper! If you ask for money to help the cook, you might as well save it for the shop to buy some good wine."

Chef Yao said so, but Jiang Yanyi didn't insist.

The recipe was set that night, Chef Yao mentioned the ingredients and seasonings, Jiang Yanyi wrote them down one by one, and asked Yang Xiu and Bing Shao to buy the ingredients that Chef Yao asked for when they came over tomorrow morning.She has all the seasonings in her kitchen, so there is no need to buy them.

Chef Yao made another request: "Shopkeeper, can we have a few more knives? Not to mention, you must prepare a boning knife, a bone cutting knife, and a serrated knife."

Jiang Yanyi was ashamed, because her shop mainly sells pots, and she doesn't pay much attention to the cutting methods of various ingredients, so she is more casual about the knife equipment, a slicer and a chopping knife are enough for her.

Now as soon as Chef Yao mentioned it, Jiang Yanyi said repeatedly: "Buy, I will buy it tomorrow."

Chef Yao said: "Let me say one more thing, don't bother the shopkeeper. The knives sold in the market are not as good as those made by blacksmiths. Chengxiluo blacksmith's craftsmanship is considered the best in Xizhou City. If the shopkeeper can trust me, You can ask blacksmith Luo to make a few knives."

Cheng Xiluo blacksmith?Isn't that the blacksmith who made the stove for himself?

Jiang Yanyi had a good impression of the blacksmith, and said, "Master Yao, don't say that. I don't have much experience in this field, and I need more advice from you. I'll go to the west of the city tomorrow to find blacksmith Luo."

The meal passed like this, and when Yang Xiu and the two went back, Jiang Yanyi brought them the jerky that was made last night and asked them to bring it to Chu Changping.

The old scholar went along with them. Ever since it snowed, Jiang Yanyi was afraid that something would happen to the old scholar walking alone, so he asked them to give him a ride every time, and it was the same tonight.

Yang Xiu Bing Shao waited for the old scholar to enter the gate of the courtyard before turning around and walking back.

Today, the south of the city is full of officers and soldiers searching from house to house. Yang Xiu, Bing and Shao were scolded several times by the officers and soldiers when they came all the way.

Not long after they walked out of the old scholar's house, another group of officers and soldiers stopped them, asked them their identities, and wanted to see if they were injured, and the two still cooperated.Although they live together with Chu Changping's other personal guards, some secret missions must not be disclosed to the public. This is a rule, so the two of them don't know what they are investigating in the south of the city.

After getting dressed, he looked back at the officers and soldiers and muttered a few words.

It was also at this turn that Bing Shao found that the light in the old scholar's house was still on.

This is a bit abnormal.

This is not the first time for him and Yang Xiu to send the old scholar home. Because the old scholar was poor a few years ago, he couldn't even afford lamp oil, so he got used to staying in the dark at home.Later, when I went to work in Jiang Yanyi's shop, even though I had money, I still didn't light the lights at night.

Although Bing Shao was taciturn, he was careful, and he immediately said: "The old scholar never lights a lamp, is there something wrong?"