It was time for Min Li to... apologise. Yes, Min Li was going to bite the bullet and do what she needed to do for the benefit of all those around her.

It was the very last day of Min Li’s time off by the time she felt sufficiently brave enough to go to the crown prince and apologise.

Fortunately for the dull pain in Min Li’s rear end she had made a decision that she would try to talk to the crown prince in his room which meant she didn’t have to walk too far.

Min Li was stood in front of the crown prince’s door.

She held her hand up to the door to knock.

Is all this strictly necessary? I could just turn a new leaf and let my actions do the talking.

Min Li put her hand down.

But isn’t it better to both apologise and change.

Min Li put her hand up.

It would be so embarrassing for the crown prince to kick me out of his room.

Min Li put her hand down.

Don’t you think it was embarrassing for the crown prince when you put him the position you did.

Min Li put her hand up.

It was fair to say that two sides of Min Li were fighting like crazy within her. Min Li was ashamed to say that she still didn’t quite know which side would win.

“Oh, just do it already.” Lily who was besides Min Li and watching her put her hand up and down like a cat watching birds fly back and forth in the sky was fed up already.

Lily was the number one person vying for Min Li to apologise. Even Betti hadn’t nagged Min Li that much.

It was fair to say that Lily was rather against what Min Li was doing to the characters in her story. Lily had said over and over again that too much angst was not a good thing. The other servant girls were eager to read the next volume of Lily’s book ‘the crown prince and the maid’, and Lily was annoyed that her muses were, in her words, ruining her business.

At Lily’s insistence, Min Li made a move to rap on the door, but even before she had knocked once the door was opened for her.

Feng stood there looking at Min Li.

Min Li studied his face carefully.

Feng didn’t seem all that annoyed with her, she wondered whether his boss would be as unbothered as Feng seemed by the situation.

Feng held his arm towards the room, allowing Min Li to enter and then stepped out closing the door and leaving Min Li and the crown prince in the room alone.

Min Li looked back at the closed door in shock. She wondered what was up with all the people who kept delivering her to the lion’s den and then leaving without even wishing her luck.

Min Li took another brave step in the room and looked around.

The crown prince was sitting at his table and seemed to be writing something on a scroll.

Min Li gulped. She hoped he wasn’t appealing for her banishment. She reckoned that would be taking things too far.

“Your highness.” Min Li bowed for what could have been her first time ever to the crown prince.

The crown prince looked up at Min Li lazily not saying anything.

Min Li took that as her signal to carry on.

“Your highness, I have done a very bad thing. Please forgive me.”

That prompted a raise in one of the man’s eyebrows.

“I have done a very bad thing and I am truly sorry for my deed. I took it a bit too far.” The crown prince almost choked on the tea that he had just sipped. “I mean I took it way too far. And so, I hope that you can forgive me.”

The crown prince put down his cup of tea that he hadn’t managed to get a smooth sip of and looked at Min Li again.

“You say you are sorry.”

“Yes. Correct. Deeply sorry.”

“But you have never once shown that you are sorry.”

Min Li tutted deep inside her. I was right to put my hand down from the door. Actions will always speak louder than words. Min Li tutted deep inside her at Lily for telling her that she was doing the right thing.

The prince carried on still staring Min Li down.

“If you can do one thing to show me that you are sorry, then I guess I will accept your apology.”

Min Li was confused. That seemed like a very good deal; she could just give him a few of his favourite dishes to show just how apologetic she was. Nope. Nope. No, I can’t. He probably won’t accept anything edible I give to him ever again.

Min Li shined a smile at Fenhua, “Of course, what do you want? Should I pick up some flowers in the gardens for you? Should I massage your back? What would you like your highness?”

The crown prince rolled his eyes. It was the first time she had seen him so frustrated in a long time.

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“Why should I have to think of a good way for you to make amends. Shouldn’t you do that yourself?”

That was a good point.

Min Li sighed; this was about to be harder than she had thought.

Straight away, Min Li got up from the position on her knees that she was currently in. She picked up a fan laid on the table next to the crown prince and started fanning him.

Min Li leaned forwards to see if the crown prince was appreciating her first effort.

The crown prince’s face was weirdly contorted, his lips had thinned out into what looked to be a half sneer, half smirk.

Min Li recognised what the man was doing. He was trying to hold back the little smile that he had, not trying to show that he was pleased with her apology.

Min Li carried on fanning the crown prince, wondering what she should do to get him to forgive her completely.

She was sure that he would move on from what she had done quickly, or maybe he had already forgiven her. However, she knew that she should still do a little more for two reasons. Firstly, to help her own guilty conscience and secondly, she knew the crown prince was prideful, he couldn’t let anyone know that he had easily forgiven someone who had disrespected him so.

Min Li carried on fanning all through that afternoon.

Any time Feng or servant girls came in with a snack or some tea for Fenhua, Min Li served him. He looked all too happy when she did.

Any time the servant girls came in to serve the crown prince full meals with multiple dishes however, Min Li got as far away as possible and left him alone. She noticed that he no longer wanted to eat outside under the pavilion where numerous people could see him.

Any time the crown prince’s ink finished or seemed to dry out, Min Li happily bent down and made him more.

Overall it was a day of servitude, but Min Li realised that she didn’t mind it so much. In fact, although they didn’t say much, both the two were smiling like fools the whole day.

When Min Li thought that the tension in the atmosphere had come down enough, she decided that she wanted to start a conversation.

Still fanning as hard as she could, she blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

“Are you well?”

Dumb thing to say, you have been next to him the whole day, you know that he is ok.

The crown prince smiled. “Are you well? I heard from the doctor that you had a little talk with the head maid. Has your butt recovered?”

Now the man was chuckling, not even able to hold his bamboo pen straight above the scroll anymore.

A little ink dripped on the scroll from the pen.

“Has your own butt recovered?” Min Li retorted.

The bamboo pen was now perfectly straight above the scroll.

Wrong thing to say. Min Li groaned at her own stupidity.

Min Li looked at the man and winced, “Too soon.”

“Too soon.”

With that reply to Min Li knew that the crown prince had definitely forgiven her.

….

The next day was Min Li’s first day back on the job, for that reason she was confused when she met with Feng outside her door before she could head to the servant quarters.

Feng led Min Li towards the direction of the crown prince’s room causing Min Li to worry that her read on the crown prince was incorrect and he didn’t actually forgive her and instead was going to make her leave the Eastern palace.

Although Min Li no longer had any real need for the Eastern palace as she had already searched the library as much as she could, she really didn’t want to have to leave.

She knew that Betti, the queen and even his majesty would happily accept her in their dwellings, but she was now pleasantly attached to her life at the Eastern palace.

At the crown prince’s room, Min Li found that Fenhua was already at his table writing. He looked up at her and smiled when she came in and went on writing again.

Min Li waited at the other side of the room ready for him to banish her from the Eastern palace forever.

“Are you just going to stand there?” The crown prince’s deep voice cut to the room. Min Li had been so caught up in her own thoughts that she hadn’t realised that the crown prince was looking at her from the other side of the room.

In delight, Min Li picked up the fan from besides the crown prince and started fanning him enthusiastically.

Instead of Min Li having to garden for the day, she realised that she was going to have to do exactly what she had done the day previous.

The more Min Li thought about it, the more it made sense.

With the servants not seeing Min Li on the first day of work and knowing that she had gone with the crown prince, they would think that she had to undergo some amazingly evil punishment. If word got around enough and as rumours did, it got exaggerated enough, all respect for the crown prince, if it had ever gone away, would be restored as well as the good functioning of the kingdom.

The only problem with Min Li serving the crown prince was whatever he was doing, Min Li hadn’t checked, was boring.

The man was in the midst of his work head down, totally enthralled and not wanting any disturbance. Min Li was in the midst of her work, yawning every two seconds, totally bored and wanting any disturbance that she could find.

In respect of the crown prince’s work, Min Li did her best to stay quiet.

When her arm ached, she changed the arm she was fanning with.

When both arms ached, she took a little break.

And she did that over and over again, not once complaining.

She stood and fanned, then she kneeled and fanned next to the crown prince of the floor.

Her brain was underworked. Her eyes were tired. Her eyelids done for the day.

She decided that she was just going to take a very little break, not long enough for the crown prince to get hot, but long enough that she felt refreshed and ready to carry on.

…

Min Li felt to the left. That was weird; her bed was a little bit harder than she thought it was.

Min Li felt to the right. That was weird; some parts of her bed weren’t as smooth as they always were but unbelievably lumpy.

Min Li squeezed the offending lump. She heard a yelp.

Min Li’s eyes flew open and she sat up straight. In her sitting up, she accidentally smacked Fenhua’s eye which with some flailing slid them both off the chair that Fenhua was sitting on.

Min Li felt a real quick wave of pain flowing through her which soon stopped.

Now both Min Li and Fenhua were on the ground and sadly for Min Li, happily for Lily if she had seen it, Min Li was sitting on the crown prince’s lap.

Min Li looked around to survey her environment. She wondered if there was any outside influence that could have caused the quick wave of pain she had felt. She hadn’t injured herself, she had injured Fenhua and so she didn’t know why some pain had shot through her own nape.

She was right next to the crown prince’s workstation where she had been fanning him.

Her little thirty second power nap had presumably turned into a full-blown sleep and the crown prince had been nice enough to not remove her head which was probably at the time leaning on his lap as a rather useful cushion.

The emotions that Min Li was feeling changed extremely quickly. Where she had felt a wave of pain, she now felt extremely cosy and snug.

“You need to get off.” The crown prince let out slowly. Fenhua was rubbing his neck and seemed to be feeling much of the same comforted, sleepy feeling that Min Li had been.

Not realising what Fenhua was saying due to the bubble of happiness that seemed to be flowing down from Min Li’s head, Min Li again surveyed her surroundings.

Fenhua gently moved Min Li up and away from him so that they were no longer touching.

As soon as Min Li was out of the position, her head started to clear again. She didn’t seem the same fogginess she had felt before.

It seemed that the same phenomenon was occurring with Fenhua.

As soon as they were not touching, he seemed to be able to speak better and clearer, not that she was registering what he was saying.

Min Li wondered what was going on, she touched his hand expecting to feel different, but nothing happened.

She did it again concentrating to try to feel any electric impulse. She did it again and again and again.

Fenhua was now looking at Min Li with a look that she was very familiar with. He looked at her with astonishment in his eyes.

He looked at her like he was astonished that someone could be so slow witted.

Min Li looked Fenhua in the eyes and smiled. Fenhua smiled back at her. But it was the type of smile that was given in pity for the ill or in fear when trying to placate the crazy.