Minister Hu wasn't being very cooperative.
"I'm not sure you appreciate the gravity of your circumstances," Chu Yun said, nodding at Hua Nanyi to tighten the wooden boards fixing the Minister's hands to the armrests of the chair he was tied to.
With each turn of the bolt, the boards increased the pressure on the Minister's delicate wrist bones, promising crushing pain, and threatening to pulverise them into dust if he didn't comply soon.
Chu Yun had no stomach for torture but they had been trying to get the minister to reveal the 'benefactor's' identity since morning without much success.
Some part of Chu Yun had hoped that Xiao Zai would wake up in the morning, just by virtue of having Chu Yun sleep next to him.
That didn't happen, and Chu Yun's mood had only worsened since then.
Minister Hu groaned in pain as Hua Nanyi tightened the contraption over his wrists even though Chu Yun had told her beforehand to go slow and take it in small increments.
He refrained from rolling his eyes at the minister's dramatics, if he thought he was in incredible pain and under genuine threat of being maimed for life, all the better.
"I've told his Royal Highness that I don't know who he is!"
Chu Yun scoffed, crossing one of his legs over the knee and leaning back against his chair in a very undignified manner for someone as pregnant as he was. He didn't care. His back hurt, his feet hurt, there were a million other things he would rather do than sit there with Minister Hu in a dank interrogation room in the bowels of the royal palace.
"Minister Hu will have to do better than that to convince me."
It was possible that he was saying the truth, but Chu Yun didn't think so. There was something terrified about Minister Hu's gaze that made it seem like he feared handling something much worse than Chu Yun.
But who?
I'm aware that the minister values his elderly parents' lives much more than that of his spouses or children."
Minister Hu let out an anguished cry. "No-no, mama and papa, no."
Chu Yun nodded, smiling gleefully. "Yes, mama and papa."
The minister started crying, fat copious tears streaming down his face in rivulets. Chu Yun let him, his expression unchanging.
The more the minister believed him unfeeling and cruel, the better. If he didn't cooperate soon he would start listing out all the cruel things he would do to his parents -- Chu Yun might have no interest of actually going through with it, but he did have a very creative mind. He was sure he could come up with tortures to freeze even the blood of the most hardened criminal.
"I don't have all day," he said after Minister Hu's tears had soaked the front of his robes, the thin moustache above his upper lip trembling sickly with his sniffles. "Soon the people I sent over to Minister Hu's house will be here, and I'm curious to see what they found."
After a few more sniffles the minister finally nodded. "I'll talk, I'll talk..." Chu Yun waited, the minister let out a watery sigh, "I didn't lie, I really haven't seen the benefactor's face. He was always cloaked and hooded when we met."
That sounded familiar. Chu Yun sat up straighter in his chair. "Go on."
"I have never seen his face, but he's someone from the royal house of Su, I've seen his token, and the stamped taels he delivered to us proved his connection to the royal family as well."
Chu Yun really had to wonder just what the king of Su was doing. It was one thing for Ru Long to wander in disguise and come and go as he pleased -- but where exactly was he getting this money if not the royal purse? Was his father complicit?
"You're going to tell me exactly how you got in touch with this person, and you're going to schedule another meeting with him."
He got up from his chair with a tired groan, and a nod towards Hua Nanyi. "She'll keep you company as you write everything down."
In the meantime, Chu Yun needed to have a very uncomfortable conversation with his brother.