Thank You

'Wait, what am I thinking, I must have lost my mind.' Immediately turning her eyes from the man she had just internally labeled as "yummy", Chang focused on herself. She tried to pick herself up off the ground but her body refused to cooperate wiith her. As if her legs were made of rubber, she was unable to get a firm foot under herself.

Shaking and wobbling like a newborn calf, she tried to rise up with the assisstance of her hands on the ground. As soon as she put weight onto her legs,,, they collapsed under her leaving her back on her hands and knees in the dirt. 

'C'mon work legs, pleeease.?' Chang tried to will them into working but to no avail, her hips and thigh muscles were so sore they kept jumping and shaking.

Liang Jian Amal bemusedly watched her struggle like a newborn animal to find her footing. When she fell again she looked up at him briefly with helpless, pitiful eyes, and he pulled her up into his arms from the ground.

"This is normal after your first time riding, after some stretching and a hot bath, your legs will be fine again."

Chang nodded her head against his shoulder obediantly. She gripped the front of his white shirt and inhaled his musky comforting smell. 'Hmm feels nice.' Feeling the steady beat of his heart under her hands, and his smell she let herself doze off for a bit in his arms, exhausted from their day of play.  Yawning she faintly heard herself mumble to him that it would be just for a few minutes.

Liang Jian Amal carried Chang to the water gardens which were in between the medical wing and the main palace complex. The water gardens were some of the most extensive grounds in the palace as they encircled the medical building, and it took him almost twenty minutes find LiHua.

LiHua sat on a swinging wicker bench that hung from a massive Babylonian Willow which protected a small jade pool. Li Hua had her ankles crossed lightly swaying them forward and backward, rocking the bench. The willow's low hanging wide sweeping branches had almost completely hidden her, if not for the movement he might have missed her at first.

"Li Hua." Liang Jian Amal called out to the woman sitting alone. As if she didnt hear him, she did not react and kept swaying on the bench to and fro.

"Li Hua." He called out in lower tone, as he drew closer, ducking beneath a few of the branches.

He came around to the front of the bench and saw the emotionless, vacant expression on her face. 

"Mother.." Clearinghis throat, Liang Jian Amal painfully choked out the unfamiliar word, addressing her as she had asked him to not so long ago.

Li Hua finally looked up at him recognition pooling in her eyes. She looked down at her daughter breathing shallowly in his arms. She smiled at the two of them, a small halting smile that almost faltered into a frown.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I wish I could stay with the two of you longer, I wish..I wish just so much that things were different" Her words cut off as her voice broke and a few bitter tears rolled down.

"You have nothing to apologize for, I'm sorry, I thought there might be a chance if we came here." He looked down clenching his jaw.

"You gave me the chance to have more time. You brought Hao Jin Ying into my life, who has become a good friend. You brought my daughter back to me again, and smiling. I have not seen her smile so brightly since her father passed away, and you've brought that out again. So please don't apologize to me, I am so thankful. I am so grateful that when I pass, I know that my Xiao Xi will have someone by her side. I couldn't bear the thought of leaving her alone in this world, but I won't be because of you.."

Li Hua looked at him smiling, tears glistening in her eyes, the sun shining down in small broken rays through the lacy silvery green foliage. "Thank you."