Skip to main content

Noteworthy Read

Chapter 12: The Slowest Fall

  Shen Qingwu was certainly not insane. Back in Tokyo, the invitations descended on her like weather. Banquets from her employer. An invitation from a certain prince consort. An invitation from a certain prime minister. The Shen family's servants came again and again and again, wearing different faces but carrying the same message. Everyone in the capital was curious about this General Zhenxi who had appeared from nowhere, and everyone wanted a closer look. Shen Qingwu ignored all of them. Bo Rong had told her before she left: she represented the Yizhou army, and her purpose in coming to Tokyo was simply to explain the war situation clearly. Nothing else mattered. But then she watched Yang Su — who had accompanied her — get swept up immediately into a current of banquets and gatherings, perpetually busy, perpetually attending, and Shen Qingwu reconsidered Bo Rong's advice. Perhaps he had been tactful. Perhaps what he had actually meant was not that she didn't need to social...
Post a Comment
Read more
Labels

Chapter 22: LONGEVITY

 


The Emperor had not been sleeping well.


On the surface, there was nothing to complain about. The Prince of Qin's memorial had arrived from Changzhou bearing excellent news: Cui Yi, the Military Governor of Lulong and Protector-General of Shuobei, had fallen ill and requested leave to return to Luoyang for recuperation, surrendering Changzhou without a single arrow loosed. The Prince of Qin asked that Pei Yuan remain to manage the aftermath while he himself led the Zhenxi Army back to the capital. Clean. Bloodless. A victory the court could hold up to the light.


And yet.


It was Prince Qi, Li Lai — the Emperor's most beloved son — who had first framed it beautifully. He had entered the palace with bright eyes and said, "Father, the reason the enemy submitted without a fight is because of your profound virtue. Cui Yi was so moved by Your Majesty's authority that he willingly returned Changzhou." The Emperor had glowed at this for a full afternoon.


Then Prince Xin, Li Jun, had entered the palace and dismantled the glow with surgical precision. "Li Yi has always colluded with the Dingsheng Army. When they recaptured Xichangjing, he personally met Cui Yi — who was shockingly arrogant and barely observed proper court etiquette. Changzhou is a strategically vital position. How could Cui Yi relinquish it so easily? It's likely that Li Yi, greedy for merit, secretly promised Cui Yi something without Your Majesty's knowledge. Or perhaps they already had some prior arrangement, and Li Yi simply used the opportunity to his advantage. Moreover — Cui Yi handed over Changzhou, yes, but he still commands a large army and has returned to occupy Luoyang. That is the Eastern Capital, Your Majesty."


Luoyang. The Eastern Capital.


That particular wound never fully closed. The city had been given to the Dingsheng Army as the price of Cui Yi's participation in retaking Xichangjing. Li Yi had insisted upon it, and the Emperor — unwilling, resistant, ultimately impotent — had been shepherded into his imperial carriage and moved along. Every time he turned this memory over, he felt the humiliation of it freshly, like touching a bruise. Li Yi had recovered both capitals, yes. But what use was being the Son of Heaven if the eastern capital no longer answered to Heaven?


Then came Cui Yi's memorial to court, and it caused an uproar of a different kind entirely.


Cui Yi, it turned out, had no sons. The son the entire world had assumed existed — the heir to the Dingsheng Army — was not his son at all. He had only a daughter, raised as a boy since birth. Later, he had adopted a son and given him the name Cui Lin. The entire Dingsheng Army had assumed the adopted boy was the young master. No one had ever suspected otherwise. And this daughter — the real one — had disguised herself as a man and served in the Dingsheng Army all along. She was, by all accounts, rather famous. They called her Captain He. She had apparently fought on the front lines when Xichangjing was recaptured.


The crime of deceiving the Emperor was a serious one, and although Cui Yi's memorial was full of confessions and self-reproach, the Emperor could read the hollowness in every line. Empty words. Pretty paper. It was a perfect pretext for punishment — except that Gu Xi, pragmatic as ever, intervened before the Emperor could act on his instincts.


At the small court assembly in Zichen Hall, the moment the Emperor began to circle toward the subject, Gu Xi spoke: "Upon close examination, Cui Yi did commit the crime of deceiving the Emperor — but that deception occurred twenty years ago, against the late Emperor, not Your Majesty. He has now voluntarily confessed. Some leniency would be appropriate. Moreover, he is past fifty, and the whole world now knows he has no male heir. The future of the Dingsheng Army will naturally depend entirely on whatever the court decrees."


The Emperor paused. Sat with it. Turned it over.


The insult was not his to avenge — it was his father's. Cui Yi had confessed without being compelled, sparing the court any embarrassment. And with no male heir, the Dingsheng Army was, in the long view, an army without a future. When Cui Yi aged and died, the court could simply step in. There would be no war. No bloodshed. Just the natural consolidation of power, like water finding its level.


Thinking of it this way, it was actually a rather good situation.


The Emperor's expression lifted. He turned to Gu Xi with something approaching delight. "Prime Minister Gu is truly a pillar of my state."


The matter of Changzhou was settled quickly: Pei Yuan would manage the aftermath as requested. Gu Xi then suggested that the Ministry of Personnel select capable officials to govern the region, which had suffered severe agricultural abandonment and refugee displacement through years of warfare. The southern border needed rebuilding. That too was resolved.


Then Gu Xi raised another matter. "Now that Changzhou has been recovered and the traitor Sun is dead — we have in our possession Sun Jing's wife Lady Yuan, his eldest son, and the King of Baiyue with his princes, all currently held in Changzhou. Why not have the Prince of Qin bring them back to the capital? The army will return just in time for Your Majesty's birthday. We could present the captives at the Imperial Ancestral Temple to inform our ancestors."


The Emperor sat with this image for a moment: himself, seated upon the Xing'an Gate, looking down as the captives were led in procession. His birthday. His triumph. The Ministry of Rites could make it magnificent.


He left the hall in high spirits and went directly to find Empress Lu.


"Prime Minister Gu," he told her, settling in with the contentment of a man who had solved all his problems, "is truly a rare and capable minister."


Empress Lu smiled. "Of course." She was from a noble family and understood well that an Empress did not comment on ministers — so she offered only those two words and left space for him to continue.


The Emperor, in his good mood, decided to share the peculiarity of Cui Yi's memorial as though it were an amusing anecdote. "Cui Yi — the military governor of Lulong — was considered by the entire world to have a son. But guess what? That son wasn't his son at all!"


Empress Lu arranged her expression into appropriate surprise. "Not his son?"


The Emperor clapped his hands. "Only a daughter! Raised as a boy from childhood. And this daughter has been in the Dingsheng Army this whole time — disguised as a man. I'm told she's actually quite famous. Captain He. They say she even fought on the front lines when Xichangjing was recaptured!"


Empress Lu smiled pleasantly. "Your Majesty's benevolence extends to all the world, which is why so many talented people emerge — even Miss Cui..." She paused delicately. "Even young women can take to the battlefield. It is because Your Majesty possesses the qualities of Yao and Shun that Cui Yi reported this matter, hoping to obtain Your Majesty's forgiveness."


The Emperor received this warmly, then sighed. "This Cui Yi has obviously deceived the Emperor — and all the ministers in court say he's difficult to control. Even Prime Minister Gu advised me not to press the matter, but rather to appease him with imperial grace." He paused, the satisfaction returning to his face. "But I've had a rather good idea."


He glanced at Empress Lu with the expression of a man who wanted credit for his cleverness before revealing it.


"Since Cui Yi has no son, I will adopt a son for him. This way, the Cui family will have an heir — and the Dingsheng Army can be used by me in the future."


Empress Lu blinked. "Who does Your Majesty wish to have inherit the Cui family's mantle?"


The Emperor was positively glowing now. He took her hand. "I came to you precisely because I want to choose one of your nephews. You are my Empress — the Fanyang Lu family is a prestigious clan. Your nephew would certainly be worthy of the Cui family name."


Empress Lu was both amused and alarmed, but she let neither show. She said softly, "Your Majesty, I'm afraid this may not be appropriate."


He looked up, genuinely surprised. This gentle Empress of his had never said no to him before. "What — does the Empress not want to?"


"It is not that I do not want to." She was quick to soothe. "Your Majesty, please consider: Cui Yi commands the Dingsheng Army, one hundred thousand soldiers. Even I, confined to my chambers, have heard of General Cui's formidable reputation. Such a man, who currently relies on that army to occupy Luoyang in open defiance of the court — if Your Majesty appoints an heir for him, he may well interpret it as an attempt to seize control of the Cui family and gain military power over the Dingsheng Army."


The Emperor brightened. "Indeed! That is precisely what I had in mind. You guessed it immediately — you are truly my most perceptive consort. But how could Cui Yi possibly guess my intentions?"


Empress Lu kept her smile gentle. "Your Majesty's idea is excellent. But Cui Yi has led troops for decades. He raised his daughter as a son — cultivated her in both scholarship and martial arts, made her intelligent and quick-witted. And now he has reported this matter openly to the court, making it known to all the world. Such a man..." She chose her words with care. "Can he really not guess Your Majesty's true intentions?"


The Emperor's brightness dimmed slightly. "Then... should I adopt Cui Yi's daughter as my goddaughter? Bestow upon her a princess's title — and then choose a suitably obedient husband for her, to consolidate the Cui family's military power?"


"This daughter of Cui Yi," Empress Lu said, still gently, "was raised as a boy. She is probably no ordinary person. I fear she may not wish to become a princess."


The Emperor stiffened. "If she doesn't even want to be a princess — then what in the world does this young lady want to be?"


Empress Lu moved quickly to smooth the rising edge in his voice. "I was merely speculating — it may not be so at all. If Your Majesty has a plan in mind, why not send a trusted person to quietly sound out Miss Cui? If she is willing to become a princess, Your Majesty can issue the decree. Would that not be a win for everyone?"


But the Emperor had already passed the turning point. "No need to investigate," he said, his tone souring. "That old scoundrel Cui Yi — a complete scoundrel! His daughter is surely the same. The whole family, blind and ungrateful. What kind of minister is this? Even if she were wildly enthusiastic about the title — I would not bestow it on her. Humph."


Empress Lu, reading the weather with practiced ease, smoothly changed the subject to the Emperor's upcoming birthday celebration.



Meanwhile, at the Prince of Xin's residence, Li Jun and Li Lai sat together in the afternoon, and the conversation was not going well — for Li Jun.


Li Lai laughed and stretched, attempting lightness. "Even the entire empire belongs to Father, so we can give whatever we want as a birthday gift." Then, with a careless wave: "Besides — it's really the third brother who has things easy this time. He led the Zhenxi Army back to the capital in triumph, he gets to present the captives at the Imperial Ancestral Temple, and all the glory and prestige are his. We don't even need to prepare anything extra."


Li Jun felt each word land in his chest like an arrow. He kept his voice measured. "Brother Lai — if the court were to name Li Yi the crown prince, what are your plans?"


Li Lai paused. "Eldest brother is the eldest legitimate son. How could the court name Li Yi the crown prince? Father wouldn't agree to it either."


Li Jun sighed, and it was a deep one. "When he went to Changzhou, who could have predicted that Cui Yi would hand it over without a word? As you said — all the glory and prestige are his, and he'll present the captives at the Ancestral Temple upon return. As the eldest legitimate son — what does that title amount to, placed against military achievement of that magnitude?"


Li Lai spent a long time offering comfort. Li Jun only sighed. Finally, Li Lai smiled and said, "Brother — in Father's heart, you are the most important person. As long as Father thinks this way, what is there to worry about?" He paused. "Even the officials still observe propriety. Without propriety, the world would be in chaos. I think, setting everything else aside, Prime Minister Gu is a wise man. Things won't come to this."


Li Jun said, almost to himself, "In this world, propriety is truly hard to define. If we're talking about propriety — it's not even our Father's place to speak of it."


He was only grumbling. But Li Lai's heart stirred upon hearing it.


Li Lai spent the rest of the afternoon at his brother's residence, stayed for dinner as the light went golden, and only then returned to his own Prince Qi's estate. The next morning, he made a special trip to the palace.


The Emperor, who secretly doted on this son most of all, was naturally delighted to see him. Li Lai arrived bearing a box of pastries. "These were steamed by the cooks in my residence. I found them delicious, so I had them make another box for Father to try."


The Emperor praised his filial piety extravagantly — that even with pastries, he thought of his father. They drank tea. They chatted. And then the Emperor, in the easy intimacy of the moment, confided his frustrations: the scheme to choose Empress Lu's nephew for adoption had been diplomatically deflected. The idea of making Cui's daughter a princess had been gently discouraged. "I think she's right," the Emperor admitted. "Cui Yi is already very arrogant. His daughter wasn't raised to the standards of a noble lady — she might be even more unruly. Making such a person a princess would only damage the dignity of the court." And then there was Luoyang, still sitting in Cui Yi's hands like a stone in the Emperor's shoe.


Li Lai listened carefully. Then he laughed, with the bright, easy confidence of a man who has just seen the solution to a puzzle. "Father, I have a simple way to win over Cui Yi entirely — without any violence, without any damage to the harmony between emperor and subject."


The Emperor leaned forward. "What way?"


"Since Cui Yi only has this one daughter, and I am not yet married —" Li Lai let the logic arrange itself for a moment before finishing: "— why not bestow her upon me in marriage? From then on, she becomes your daughter-in-law, and Cui Yi becomes the father-in-law of a prince. He will naturally have no cause for disloyalty. Getting Cui Yi to leave Luoyang altogether becomes possible."


The Emperor clapped his hands and laughed. "Brilliant! Very good!" Then he frowned slightly. "But that Cui girl was raised as a boy and has been involved in the army. I don't know what kind of person she is. If she is ugly and has a coarse nature — wouldn't that be a great injustice to you?"


Li Lai thought to himself: She is Cui Yi's daughter. Marrying her means the Dingsheng Army of one hundred thousand. Even if she were twice as coarse, it would still be extraordinarily worthwhile. But what he said aloud was generous and noble: "I am Father Emperor's son. It is my duty to share Father Emperor's burdens. Winning over the Cui family, preventing suspicion between the emperor and his ministers — this is what I should do. Regardless of Cui's appearance or temperament, I am willing to marry her, treat her well, and ensure that the Cui family remains loyal to Father Emperor."


The Emperor was visibly moved. He took Li Lai's hand. "Lai'er — I knew you were the most considerate child. Don't worry. I will certainly bestow several beautiful concubines upon you in the future. I will never let you suffer in vain."


The more he thought about it, the more perfect it seemed. The next morning, after court, he kept Gu Xi behind.


Gu Xi listened to the proposal and thought privately: Prince Qi is indeed cunning. The man held the title of legitimate son, while Prince Xin was merely the eldest. If Prince Qi truly married Lady Cui, the court would immediately face pressure to name him Crown Prince — to counterbalance Cui Yi's military power. But outwardly, Gu Xi only smiled and said, "Does Your Majesty believe Lady Cui is a suitable match for Prince Qi?"


The Emperor waved a dismissive hand. "Frankly, I think Cui Yi's daughter is not a good match for Prince Qi. But there is nothing to be done — Prince Qi is my son, so I can only let him be wronged somewhat. Prince Qi is also very sensible about it; he says he won't mind and will certainly live in harmony with Lady Cui."


Gu Xi said: "Your Majesty is wise. But Cui Yi is a military man — and military men are often crude and arrogant. Their daughters tend to be the same. I worry she may be... something of a laughingstock."


"Indeed!" the Emperor agreed heavily. He sighed. "I suppose we can only bestow a few beautiful concubines upon Prince Qi after the marriage."


Gu Xi chose his next words with care. "A military man like Cui Yi will fly into a rage at the slightest provocation. Although Your Majesty's wish to bestow a marriage is the greatest honor, a way of giving extraordinary face to the Cui family — I worry that if Cui Yi fails to appreciate it, the situation might become... embarrassing."


The Emperor was stopped cold. He stared. "Cui Yi wouldn't want to marry his daughter to Prince Qi? Prince Qi is such a fine boy — and he's my son. Who in the world wouldn't want their daughter married to him?"


"A warrior is impulsive," Gu Xi said. "Cui Yi has a strange temper — he cannot be judged by common sense." He paused briefly, then continued: "Your Majesty, for the best outcome — before issuing any decree, why not secretly send a trusted eunuch to Cui Yi to inform him of Your Majesty's intention? If Cui Yi is overjoyed and deeply grateful, Your Majesty can then issue the formal decree. Would that not be a celebrated story of harmony between ruler and subject?"


The Emperor thought this prudent, but then hesitated: "Then... what if Cui Yi really doesn't know what's good for him?"


Gu Xi understood perfectly — the Emperor was afraid of losing face if Cui Yi refused. He said, plainly: "Your Majesty is the ruler and Cui Yi is the subject. If Your Majesty truly wishes to arrange this marriage, a single decree is sufficient — Cui Yi would not dare disobey. But if, upon sounding him out, he proves ungrateful, Your Majesty will naturally change your mind immediately and no longer wish to arrange the marriage. The matter simply ends."


The Emperor turned this over. Then, slowly: "Yes. Yes, you are right. If he is ungrateful — would I still be eager to arrange this marriage? Does my Prince Qi really have to marry his daughter? Naturally, the matter would be dropped."


Gu Xi bowed, took his leave, and emerged from the palace into the mid-spring morning. He shook his head slowly, and sighed.


Prince Qi, he thought, is genuinely cunning, and genuinely has the Emperor's love. Prince Xin, for all his position as eldest son, was mean-spirited and suspicious — unsuitable to rule. And Prince Qin — a man of astonishing military achievement, whose mother had been of humble birth, who had been elevated above all other princes through merit alone — was a different category of problem entirely. Once the Crown Prince is chosen, the struggle for the throne will be a bloody battle.


He sighed again, his heart heavy with the weight of futures he could already see.


Wild apricot blossoms lined the road south, their white clusters trembling in the spring wind, drawing bees and butterflies in lazy spirals. Traveling north from the southern border, the spring scenery only grew more abundant with every li — the apricot blossoms of Changzhou had long since fallen, but here in the mountains and open fields, they were only just beginning to open their petals, as though the season itself was chasing the army home.


The Zhenxi Army had not been in any hurry after leaving Changzhou. There was a satisfaction in a slow return — the unhurried pace of men who had done what they came to do. But then an imperial decree arrived: return to the capital before the Qianqiu Festival to present the captured prisoners at the Emperor's birthday celebration. The pace quickened.


The Dingsheng Army had departed Changzhou first and taken the road back to Luoyang ahead of them. By rights, they had a comfortable head start. But after the Zhenxi Army crossed the Changling Mountains, they caught up.


Zhang noticed it first — which only made it worse.


He watched Old Bao of the Zhenxi Army ride past him like a gust of wind, followed by Huang Youyi, Zhao Youde, and several others, their horses kicking up a long wall of dust that drifted directly into his face. The Dingsheng Army's heavy cavalry was known as unparalleled in the world. These Zhenxi veterans were genuinely daring to make this a contest.


Zhang's jaw tightened. Fine.


When the Zhenxi Army halted for a rest and sat down to eat their rations, Zhang made his move. The ground shook before they saw anything — a distant thunder of hooves, then the Dingsheng Army's heavy cavalry appeared on the road, banners flying, armor gleaming under the spring sun, perfectly aligned, unstoppable in formation. The water in the pots the Zhenxi cooks had just balanced on their woodpiles sloshed and nearly tipped over.


Xie Chang'er stared at the approaching wall of men and horses and said, genuinely puzzled, "Why are they wearing full armor on the march? Is there an enemy ahead?"


Old Bao squinted at the Dingsheng banners rippling in the wind, the armor neat as stacked clouds, the men on horseback looking aggressively pleased with themselves. He watched for a moment. Then he turned and shouted, "Zhao Liu!"


Zhao Liu materialized beside him with the speed of long practice, half a dry ration biscuit still in his mouth, mumbling, "Present!"


"Bring out His Highness's banner."


Zhao Liu blinked. The Prince of Qin was above all the princes and technically had a banner — but Li Yi disliked ostentation and only used a military pennant in the field. He had brought the formal banner on this campaign, yes, but had not once displayed it. Why now, on the road back?


"What are you standing there for?!" Old Bao kept his eyes on the Dingsheng Army, which was continuing to ride past the Zhenxi camp without slowing. "These bastards — if we don't teach them a lesson, they'll kick dirt into our pots all the way to the capital!"


Understanding arrived. Zhao Liu stuffed the remaining flatbread into his mouth, wiped both hands on his jacket, and went to retrieve the specially bestowed gold-embroidered dragon banner and its accompanying flags from the box on his back. Together with the ceremonial soldiers, he tied them carefully to the flagpole.


The banner unfurled.


It was enormous. A great "Qin" character at the center, surrounded by golden dragons baring their fangs and claws, so majestic it seemed to generate its own wind. The style was almost identical to the imperial banner — and when it caught the breeze, the ribbons shimmered and flashed, dazzling in the spring light. Around it, additional flags were raised: the "Grand Commander of Lingnan Road" and a full array of Li Yi's titles, spreading out in formation, impossible to overlook, impossible to pretend you hadn't seen.


Zhang had ridden an arrow's length ahead before he turned to look back — intending to enjoy the sight of the Zhenxi Army's humiliation. Instead he found himself staring at golden dragons blazing in the warm spring sunshine.


His lieutenants gathered around him, their expressions uniformly anxious. "General — what do we do?" They were all seasoned soldiers. They knew exactly what that banner meant.


Zhang's eyes reddened. A long silence passed. Finally, through teeth that barely parted, he produced two words: "Shameless."


Utterly shameless. Undeniably. But — the lieutenants exchanged helpless glances — could they actually pretend they hadn't seen it?


Zhang, deeply aggrieved, said: "Dismount."


The Dingsheng Army stopped in unison, concealed their flags, and moved respectfully to the side of the road to wait. The Qin King's banner was the command flag of the entire dynasty's military — every soldier who saw it was required to dismount, conceal their flags, and yield passage. The protocol traced back to Emperor Taizong himself, who as Prince of Qin had concurrently held the position of Grand Marshal of the Armed Forces, commander-in-chief of the three armies. The dynasty was over a hundred years old and had not had a Prince of Qin for most of that time, but every army unit still meticulously preserved a drawing of the banner and taught every new recruit to recognize it. From raw conscripts to generals, everyone knew this rule. Even Cui Yi himself would have to dismount upon seeing it.


Zhang stood at the roadside holding his horse's reins, tears of sheer grievance welling in his eyes, watching the Zhenxi Army finish their rations, drink their fill of hot water, pack up at a leisurely pace, and ride past down the road that the Dingsheng Army had just cleared for them.


Li Yi, for his part, had not been paying attention to any of this.


After crossing Changling, he had ridden over to visit Cui Yi, who was still recovering from the poison and traveling by carriage rather than horseback. They talked for a while in the carriage. Then Li Yi climbed out, remounted, and rode alongside A Ying.


It was a good stretch of road — the two armies traveling together for several hundred li still, the Dingsheng Army heading toward Luoyang, the Zhenxi Army toward Xichangjing. The afternoon was warm.


"I'll grill fish for you tonight," he said. "The fish are easy to catch in spring."


She laughed softly. "I have something to do tonight."


He said, as though suddenly remembering: "You promised to wash the dishes for me often."


She couldn't help the smile that came — a sweet one, involuntary. She thought of the farmhouse outside Luoyang, the times he had cooked for her there.


Li Yi, satisfied, turned his horse and headed back toward his army. He had barely gone halfway when something made him look up. A portion of the Dingsheng Army's rear guard had stopped, lowered their flags, and pulled to the roadside. He frowned, puzzled — then followed their gazes to see, not far ahead, a very large banner fluttering conspicuously in the spring light.


His banner.


"Put it down! Put it down!" Old Bao had already spotted Li Yi riding back and was gesticulating frantically at Zhao Liu. But a banner of that size was not a quick operation. Before it was even half rolled, Li Yi had galloped up alongside him.


"Why are the banners out here?" The Prince of Qin's expression was not pleasant.


Zhao Liu felt the specific guilt of a man caught doing exactly what he had done. Old Bao stepped forward with the cheerful composure of someone who had been inventing explanations his entire career. "Spring in the south is very humid, Your Highness — it's been raining every day. These banners are decorated with yak tails, and we were worried about mold or insects. We took them out to air!"


Li Yi did not dignify this with a response. "Put them away."


Zhao Liu scrambled to comply. Li Yi was about to say something further when a rider came galloping hard from the north — and his eyesight was sharp enough to catch the detail immediately: a bamboo tube on the rider's back, with a long pheasant tail feather peeking from the side.


News from the capital. Important news.


The rider spotted him and dismounted mid-gallop, panting, and bowed. "Your Highness." He unslung the bamboo tube and presented it with both hands.


Xie Chang'er stepped forward to receive it. Li Yi examined the seal: the Secretariat. Not military intelligence. But the pheasant tail meant a relay courier — a change of horse but not rider, two hundred li daily — an exhausting and expensive method used only when urgency truly demanded it. For non-military intelligence, this was unusual.


Old Bao had already pressed a water bag into the messenger's hands. The man drank half of it in one go and then simply sat down on the ground, spent. Huang Youyi and the others rushed to support him, guiding him to the roadside and bringing hot water and dry rations.


Li Yi read the letter. His frown deepened.


He needed to return to Xichangjing quickly — but calculating the distance and the army's current supply arrangement, it would take considerable time. When he had left the capital in haste, he and Pei Zhan had arranged for supplies to come not from Xichangjing but directly from granaries along the route, calculated against the rent and tax system. The outward journey had been exceptionally fast due to the urgency of the military situation — the return would not be.


Li Yi made his decision. He turned to Xie Chang'er and said simply: "Raise the banner."


Xie Chang'er absorbed this for a moment, then went immediately to relay the order to Zhao Liu.


The authority this invoked was significant — and everyone present knew it. As Prince of Qin bearing Emperor Taizong's concurrent titles, the banner gave him the power to requisition grain supplies from every prefecture and county in the country without seeking prior court approval. No one had used this authority in a hundred years. If word reached the capital, the court would erupt. It was, objectively, blatant. Domineering. The kind of move that invited impeachment.


But in this urgent situation, it was also the only move.


Zhao Liu, upon receiving the order, unfurled the banner he had just taken down. Old Bao, having just seen the messenger settled, turned around and found it snapping in the wind again. He couldn't help but laugh. "What's happening? Are we raising the banner again? Are we going to catch up with the Dingsheng Army and kidnap the bride?"


"His Highness is going to march at full speed," Xie Chang'er said briskly, already mounting his horse. He had a great many orders to deliver — especially advance riders to send ahead to the counties along the route, who would need time to prepare for the passage of a large army.


Old Bao understood then. A letter from the capital. Something important. The banner going up a second time made a different kind of sense.


He shouldn't have raised it the first time — without the order, without a reason. Old Bao felt a genuine pang of regret about that. And then another kind of pang, less noble: all-out march sounded simple enough, but his whole body already ached. Physician Fan had warned him about internal injuries after the last campaign and cautioned against strenuous exertion, which Old Bao had not taken particularly seriously. Li Yi had known about the injuries and kept him from fighting since they left the capital — but he hadn't anticipated that a forced march would make his bones ache like this.


He was truly getting old.


The thought arrived and vanished as quickly as a sparrow landing under a roadside apricot tree, because the entire Zhenxi Army, upon receiving the order, immediately ended their rest and began moving.


Old Bao cracked his whip and galloped off with the main force, entirely oblivious to Zhang's expression of bottomless resentment at the roadside.


The Prince of Qin marching at full speed drew attention from the first prefecture he passed through. The banner gave him the authority to requisition grain from every county north of Lingnan, and he used it — which caused considerable unease at court. The Emperor wanted to reprimand him for arrogance. But closer examination revealed that the authority was genuine, the precedents were real, and they had been established by the dynasty itself a century ago. Even the most vocal civil officials found they had nothing solid to stand on.


Moreover, the Prince of Qin had sent a fast horse ahead to the capital specifically to report the matter to the Emperor, explaining that he feared a slower march would prevent him from arriving in time for the birthday celebration. Every official in court knew perfectly well that missing the celebration was not what worried him — but the reason was too filial to openly attack. One could not stand in court and question the Prince of Qin's devotion to his father.


Even Gu Xi found himself saying to his daughter Gu Wanniang, with something like genuine admiration: "I originally thought Prince Qin was only skilled in military strategy. I didn't expect him to be so prudent and shrewd in handling matters of state."


But just two days after offering this praise, the Prince of Qin did something else entirely.


Marching at full speed through Yuezhou, he arrived to find all boats and carriages at a standstill. Upon inquiring, he learned the cause: a white tiger had been discovered in the mountains. A rare and extraordinary auspicious omen — and with the Emperor's birthday approaching, the Prefect of Yuezhou, who happened to be a protege of Prince Qi, had immediately reported the matter to the Emperor. Prince Qi had showered the Emperor with congratulations, speaking of auspicious omens in prosperous eras and lucky signs for peaceful reigns, and the Emperor had been thoroughly delighted. He had issued an edict ordering Yuezhou to send this auspicious creature to the capital as quickly as possible. The Prefect had immediately mobilized every available laborer and boat in the entire prefecture to build roads and build bridges and arrange a grand procession — which had the incidental effect of blocking the passage of the Qin King's army entirely.


Li Yi, upon hearing this, was not angry. He said simply that he wanted to see the rare auspicious omen. The Prefect of Yuezhou, filled with a specific terror, invited him to the tiger's cage.


The white tiger was over ten feet long. Its fur was pure white and glossy. Inside the cage, it paced and roared without stop — a formidable, furious creature, magnificent and dangerous.


"Release it," the Prince of Qin said, without so much as a raised eyebrow.


The Prefect's voice came out in pieces. "Your — Your Highness —"


Before he could finish, Old Bao stepped forward and said loudly, "His Highness Prince Qin's orders are always obeyed in this army. What — are you planning to disobey His Highness's command?"


The Prefect launched into rapid explanation. "No, no — I was only afraid that the wild beast was dangerous and might harm His Highness's noble health —"


"What a joke!" Old Bao was magnificent in full argument. "His Highness has never retreated a single step in front of thousands of troops. It's just a beast. Are you suggesting His Highness is a coward?"


Left with absolutely no remaining ground to stand on, the Prefect ordered the cage opened.


The white tiger hesitated for a moment at the open door. Then it stepped out, paced slowly, opened its blood-red maw, and released a roar that shook the trees and seemed to vibrate the earth itself. The Prefect's every instinct screamed at him to run. But the Prince of Qin stood there — directly in the tiger's path — and did not move an inch. His expression was that of a man watching a moderately large house cat.


The Prefect prayed. Not for prestige or career or the tiger's auspiciousness — simply that the beast would not kill anyone.


The tiger did not share his concerns. It gathered itself, leaped, and launched directly at Li Yi, who was nearest.


The Prefect's mind produced a single clear thought: it's over —


His body went limp. He was already falling backward when the flash came — white light, faster than he could process — the Prince of Qin's sword leaving its scabbard mid-draw, swinging in a single arc. The white tiger screamed as it fell from the peak of its leap, blood bursting from a wound that ran from head to tail. It hit the ground and was still.


The sword stroke had opened the tiger from end to end, spilling everything. Li Yi had stepped clear of the falling body with the minimal movement of someone who had done this kind of thing before, and not a single drop of tiger blood had reached his robes. The blade hung in the spring air and dripped slowly.


The Prefect was on the ground, unable to stand, unable to cry. Around him, the silence was absolute.


Li Yi looked at the tiger for a moment, then said: "Skin it and send it to the capital to make a white tiger skin rug for my father. I think it'll be the perfect size for the throne in the Zichen Palace."


The Prefect, from the ground, processed this. The Prince of Qin had just killed a rare and extraordinary auspicious creature and turned it into a floor decoration — for the throne room — while casually referencing the exact dimensions of a chamber the Prefect himself would never in his career be permitted to enter. Prince Qi had used this tiger to court the Emperor's favor for weeks. It was now a rug.


There was nothing to be done. The Prefect obediently followed the Prince of Qin's orders.


In Xiangzhou, the Prince of Qin did something that sent shockwaves all the way to the capital.


The governor of Xiangzhou was Dong Jin, nephew of the late Empress Dong and cousin to Prince Xin. The Dong family had been prominent in Xiangzhou for generations, though the last three generations had produced no one of particular distinction. But with a new Emperor on the throne and Prince Xin positioned as the eldest son and presumptive heir, the family's fortunes had brightened considerably. Prince Xin, for all his cousin's limited abilities, valued the man's complete obedience — and so Dong Jin had been installed in Xiangzhou.


Out of gratitude, Dong Jin had applied himself to finding Prince Xin a magnificent birthday gift for the Emperor. After considerable thought, he struck upon what seemed a brilliant idea: three hundred Ferghana horses, acquired at enormous cost from Liangzhou. Not merely impressive horses — he arranged for a former imperial horseman to train them as dancing horses, trained to move in formation to music. The Emperor would be enchanted.


The cost was staggering. To cover it, Dong Jin levied extra taxes and various forms of forced labor. Cruel officials saw opportunity and seized it: fodder demands stripped unharvested wheat directly from the fields; farmers' seed beans were confiscated under the pretext of feeding imperial horses. Resistance was met with charges of deceiving the Emperor, shackles, and beatings. Some were forced to harvest their own wheat under guard to hand over. Others paid ransoms that were skimmed at every level until families were left destitute, some forced to sell their children to survive.


The Prince of Qin was passing through Xiangzhou. Dong Jin, sweating quietly, had prepared a respectful banquet to entertain him.


The banquet had not yet begun when the Prince of Qin brought in a group of people.


They were emaciated. Hollowed. Every one of them had lost their home, their livelihood, or their family because of the horse-tribute affair. They stood in Dong Jin's banquet hall and said nothing, because they did not need to.


Dong Jin opened his mouth. Before a single word of defense could emerge, the Prince of Qin ordered him arrested and sent to the capital for questioning and punishment by the Ministry of Personnel.


Prince Xin, upon hearing this, smashed his teacup.


Dong Jin was his own cousin. This was a slap delivered in public, with full force. And beyond the personal insult — what right did a Grand General returning victorious from a campaign have to arrest the Prefect of Xiangzhou? This was unlawful. This was outrageous. Prince Xin was halfway to the palace to impeach him when Yang Dong caught his arm and pulled him back.


"Your Highness — Prefect Dong hasn't even arrived in the capital yet. We don't know the full situation. Furthermore —" Yang Dong's voice was carefully level "— even if Your Highness had killed Prefect Dong on the spot, under the banner's authority to punish officials for delaying military operations, it would have been perfectly justified and precedented. How could Your Highness go before the Emperor to plead your case?"


Prince Xin, beside himself, burst out: "I shouldn't have urged my father to bestow the title of Prince of Qin upon him!"


It had seemed, at the time, like such a clean trap. Someone had counseled Prince Xin that pushing the Emperor to officially bestow the title of Prince of Qin upon Li Yi would overextend him — give him a grand name and leave him exposed. Prince Xin had urged the decree. Li Yi had accepted the title without hesitation. That had been unsettling enough. But what everyone had failed to adequately calculate was that the title of Prince of Qin came with a century of accumulated extraordinary privileges — and Li Yi, it turned out, knew exactly what every one of them was.


Prince Xin stood amid the ruins of this realization, and deeply regretted.


The Prince of Qin had now shocked the court and the public multiple times before even reaching the capital. He had displayed the Qin King's banner in open country. He had killed the white tiger of Yuezhou with a single sword stroke. He had arrested the Governor of Xiangzhou and sent him to the capital in chains. By the time his army arrived at Jinzhou, not far from Xichangjing, the court was already buzzing.


During the court assembly, the Minister of Rites raised the question: "When the Prince of Qin returns victorious and is about to present the captives at the Imperial Ancestral Temple — should all officials not go outside the city to greet him?"


This was like pouring cold water into hot oil.


The Ministry of Rites produced the precedent immediately: when Emperor Taizong himself had returned victorious as Prince of Qin, the Emperor had not only ordered all princes and officials to greet him outside the city, but had also permitted the use of the imperial banners and drums.


Even the Emperor looked unsettled. Li Lai, quick and sharp, read the room in an instant — if the Emperor said something impulsive, it would be difficult to walk back. He spoke first, smoothly: "My third brother is still young. We mustn't spoil the Prince of Qin."


It was the precisely right note. The Emperor nodded immediately, visibly relieved to have been handed a position. "Yes. We mustn't spoil him too much." The Minister of Rites, who had only been testing the waters to begin with, agreed without argument. Officials would greet the Prince of Qin outside the city — other honors would be deferred.


The decree was sent — and promptly leaked to the Prince of Qin before it was formally issued. He submitted a memorial firmly declining. The Emperor, going along with the momentum, dropped the matter entirely.


Even without any ceremony, the Prince of Qin's arrival caused a sensation the likes of which the capital had not seen in years.


The rebellion had been quelled. The two capitals were recovered. The city was returning to itself — merchants arriving, populations moving, the long-interrupted rhythms of ordinary life resuming. And in Xichangjing, there was a tradition of spectacular public crowds. Every spring, the peony season drew such multitudes that the streets became genuinely impassable. Now, with the Prince of Qin returning in triumph, the city's young women were particularly determined to see him for themselves. He was twenty-two years old. He had recaptured both capitals. They said he was descended from the Seven Killings Star. They said he was exceptionally handsome, with the bearing of a dragon and a phoenix. How could anyone stay home?


Two days before the army arrived, people were already lining the long street outside Chengtian Gate with bamboo beds and benches to claim their spots. Wealthy families rented rooms and pavilions along the route so their ladies could watch in comfort. On the day itself, both sides of the street were packed from early morning. The constables from Taiping and Wannian counties were nowhere near sufficient — the Prefect of the Capital had petitioned days in advance to deploy the Left and Right Imperial Guards, and they were barely managing.


When the King of Qin entered the city, the cheering was like weather — it arrived before he was visible and continued long after he had passed. Those who managed to see through the crowd caught the flash of armor, the thunder of hooves, banners billowing like clouds, soldiers moving in a river that seemed to have no end.


In the Gu family mansion in Chongren Ward, not far from the Imperial Street, Gu Xi and his daughter Gu Wanniang were playing chess by the window. Even from this quiet courtyard, the distant cheering reached them in waves.


Gu Xi laughed softly. "Today, every young lady in the capital has gone to the streets to watch the Prince of Qin lead his army in triumph. They all say he is truly incomparably brave and awe-inspiring."


Gu Wanniang held a chess piece above the board, studying her options, and said: "Speaking of which — His Highness's recent actions have left me somewhat puzzled." She set the piece down carefully. "His Highness is not usually someone who enjoys making a show of things. So why the banner in the open road? Why the tiger in Yuezhou? Why Dong Jin in Xiangzhou — drawing attention from every direction?"


Gu Xi said: "That is naturally related to that important matter."


The important matter in question was the urgent report the Secretariat had sent south to the Prince of Qin — the report that had made him display the banner without hesitation and drive his army through the night to reach the capital.


At the end of February, a former eunuch of the Crown Prince's Eastern Palace had appeared outside Chengtian Gate, accompanied by a child. He claimed that General Han Chang, in order to draw away the enemy during the chaos of the palace coup, had hastily entrusted the Crown Prince to his care and fled. Now that the traitor was dead and the realm was at peace, and General Han had vanished without a trace, he had brought the Crown Prince back.


The court had been thoroughly shaken. Several people in the palace recognized the eunuch — he was indeed a former servant of the late Crown Prince, a man named Gao Xuan. The child appeared to be approximately the right age, bore a vague physical resemblance to the Crown Prince, and even carried a private seal that had belonged to the late Crown Prince.


And yet the doubts were substantial. All of the late Crown Prince's close attendants had been killed by Sun Jing. Gao Xuan had served the Crown Prince but had been demoted for a transgression and disappeared during the coup — no one knew where he had gone. And when Han Chang had fled with the Crown Prince, he had been accompanied by several loyal fighting men. Why would Han Chang have entrusted the child to a defenseless eunuch?


Gao Xuan had his explanations. The traitors around Sun Jing all knew Han Chang's face — so Han Chang had given the child to Gao Xuan, who was unknown to them, and led his men away to draw the pursuit. Gao Xuan had hidden with the child for months, telling his neighbors in his hometown that he had bought a boy from the capital to adopt as a son. Eunuchs with savings sometimes adopted sons for their old age — the neighbors had accepted the story without suspicion. Only after the rebellion was quelled and the Emperor ascended the throne had he finally come forward.


It was a plausible story. But the Crown Prince's birth mother was dead. His wet nurse was dead. His stepmother, the former Crown Princess Xiao, had colluded with Sun Quan and disappeared after Xichangjing was recaptured — presumed dead, or perhaps a suicide. The princes who had known the Crown Prince personally had long been killed by Sun Jing. Even the Emperor himself had only seen this Crown Prince two or three times, and always from a distance at court banquets. Children's appearances change quickly. No one could state with certainty whether this child was real.


Moreover — even if real — the so-called Crown Prince was merely the eldest son of the former Crown Prince. Now that the Emperor had ascended the throne, the child's status was extraordinarily delicate. He was not the Emperor's son. He was not the established heir. He was a problem wearing a dead man's seal.


But since Gao Xuan had presented the child at the palace gates, the court could not simply ignore it. At Gu Xi's suggestion, the Secretariat had sent the fastest possible report to the Prince of Qin in the south. And sure enough — upon receiving it, the Prince of Qin had immediately begun his return.


Gu Xi reached across the chessboard and removed a few captured white pieces, setting them aside, and said: "The Prince of Qin is a man of principle who has never coveted empty fame, nor does he particularly care about his reputation in court or among the people. He knows the Crown Prince has returned to court. He fears that some people will immediately become restless — perhaps do something outrageous to curry favor with the Princes of Xin or Qi. Therefore, he not only rushed back with all his strength, but displayed the Prince of Qin's banner and, on the way, killed the tiger and arrested Dong Jin — greatly diminishing the face of Prince Xin and Prince Qi, causing discussion everywhere." He paused. "With the Crown Prince's return drawing all that attention, it becomes — temporarily — diluted. Set aside. Besides, my original intention was that this matter needed to wait until His Highness Prince Qin returned before anything could be determined."


Gu Wanniang absorbed this, seeing the architecture of it clearly now — the arrogance had been deliberate camouflage, the spectacle a calculation. She asked: "So — is this Crown Prince real or fake?"


Gu Xi smiled, quite easily. "If His Highness Prince Qin says he is real, then he is real. If His Highness Prince Qin says he is fake, then he is fake."


Several days before entering the capital, Li Yi had already known the answer.


After receiving the urgent letter from the Secretariat, Li Yi had turned it over carefully in his mind for a long time. Then he had told A Ying — Cui Lin — the truth.


She had gone still when he finished. Then she looked at him and said, "Your Highness — aren't you afraid I'll take advantage of this to cause trouble? You're telling me something this important."


He had been slightly worried, if he was honest with himself. But hearing her say it directly, he found himself laughing instead. "Your Dingsheng Army has so many overt and covert spies in the capital that any disturbance there reaches you within days. Something as significant as a eunuch leading a child to the palace gates — you would know by tomorrow at the latest. What exactly would I be hiding?"


She couldn't help but give him a look. "Then didn't you place any spies in Luoyang?"


"I really didn't," he said. "After all, I didn't intend to take advantage of this to cause trouble."


This was, she thought, genuinely exasperating. He had a talent for saying the most disarming things in the middle of serious conversations, as though he didn't notice the effect.


"Then is this Crown Prince real or fake?" she asked, setting the exasperation aside. She was curious, in spite of herself.


Li Yi's expression shifted. The lightness left it. He sighed — deeply, the kind of sigh that came from somewhere that had been carrying weight for a while. "I don't know."


The former Crown Princess Xiao had been poisoned during the chaos of the coup. Though she had been saved, she had spent a long time afterward hovering at the edge of survival, kept there only by Cui Lin's careful attention and Taozi's. When she finally recovered enough to speak of it, she had asked to become a nun.


Li Yi had been buried in the work of Xichangjing's defense at the time — pressed from every direction, without a spare hour. Even so, he had made time to personally select a temple for her: Qingyun Temple, nestled in the mountains three days' fast ride from Xichangjing, with a market town at the foot of the mountain where all necessities were available. He had wanted to send additional guards.


Empress Xiao had refused gently but without any room for argument. "I am now only one step removed from death. Becoming a nun and living in seclusion is already a form of survival. Why would I need guards?"


So Li Yi had let it go.


When Lady Xiao entered the temple, she had been in genuine despair. Whether the Crown Prince was real or false, whether Han Chang had made the decision or some other circumstances had governed it — she was the only one who would know for certain, and at that moment of her life, she had been in no state to tell anyone anything.


Cui Lin said, with the decisiveness that was simply part of how she operated: "Since you need to return to the capital quickly, and it's on the way anyway — I'll come with you to ask Master Xiao. Then we'll know."


She still wore her military clothes. She traveled with Li Yi through the night, day after day, until the morning the court was debating whether officials should greet the Prince of Qin outside the city — on that very day — she and Li Yi arrived at the foot of the mountain that held Qingyun Temple.


They left the main group, rode their horses to the mountain's edge, and prepared to ascend.


Cui Lin hesitated.


It was brief — just a pause in her motion, a slight change in her bearing. Then she turned to him and said, with an unusual gravity that made him look at her more carefully: "Seventeenth Brother. I have a few words I want to say to you."


She rarely sounded like this. He felt the weight of it. "What is it?"


"If the Crown Prince is a fake — what are your plans?" She held his gaze steadily. "And if the Crown Prince is real — what are your plans?"


Li Yi answered directly, without hesitation. "If the Crown Prince is a fake, I will do my best to persuade Master Xiao to bring the real Crown Prince back to court. If the Crown Prince is real, that would be a great joy — and I would persuade Father to make him the Crown Prince."


The sun was beginning to lower. The wind moved through the mountain trees, finding its way into the spring evening forest. All around them, birds were returning to their nests — tired from the day's flight, circling the treetops in unhurried spirals. The light was warm and long and golden, the kind that made everything look considered. Her hair shifted in the wind. Despite the days of hard travel, her eyes were clear and bright in the fading light. She looked at him for a moment before she spoke.


"There's something I've wanted to ask you for a long time." She kept her voice level, thoughtful. "Why do you think this way? Why do you keep wanting His Majesty to make the Crown Prince — your grandnephew — the heir?"


"The Crown Prince is the rightful heir," Li Yi said simply. "And neither of my two elder brothers is suitable to be heir apparent."


This was self-evident. She moved past it. "Do you want to be the Crown Prince?"


It was the first time either of them had asked it so plainly. Of all the people in the world, only she would put it to him directly like this. He answered just as directly. "I don't want to."


She was quiet for a moment, choosing her words. "Neither of your brothers is suitable. Li Xuanze is young —" she shifted the address deliberately, to the name rather than the title "— and the palace coup happened in chaos. The late Emperor died without formally appointing him as heir. He is the eldest son of the Crown Prince, yes. When the Crown Prince died for his country and the loyalist armies came to the rescue, he did carry that weight. But if His Majesty appoints Li Xuanze as Crown Prince now, it is like placing gold in the hands of a child walking through a crowded market." Her voice was measured, but not without feeling. "How could the Prince of Xin and the Prince of Qi possibly allow it? Having a treasure becomes a crime in itself."


"I will protect the Crown Prince," Li Yi said earnestly. "I will send my most capable people — or I will personally serve as his tutor. Pei Yuan can be appointed as his Chamberlain."


She couldn't help it. A small laugh escaped her — not unkind, but unguarded. "Your Highness is truly thoughtful."


He heard the fine edge in it. "Then, in your opinion — what should be done?"


"The Crown Prince is still young," she said. "We don't know what kind of person he will become. If he grows up mediocre — how can he rule the world?"


He couldn't stop himself. "The Crown Prince is the rightful heir. His position is legitimate. Even if he is young, there are ministers who can assist him, guide him carefully —"


"Have you considered," she said, her voice cooling slightly, "the upheavals that would follow if he were truly made Crown Prince? Every official in court with their own agendas. Your two brothers — would they allow him to live to adulthood? Even if you do everything in your power to protect him — what happens if there is a single slip?"


Li Yi finally said it: "What you actually think is that I should compete for the Crown Prince position."


She nodded, without apology. "That's right. You are the most suitable person to be the future ruler of this world." She said it plainly, without flattery, the way she would state a fact about the road ahead. "You are kind, benevolent, with great love in your heart — you will have compassion for the common people. You have outstanding military achievements. You command troops exceptionally. You have recovered both the east and the west and ended the wars. If you are made Crown Prince, the court officials will not object. With no more strife in the court, you will ensure good lives for ordinary people. You are an indisputably capable ruler. If you ascend the throne, the next few decades will be a period of peace and prosperity."


He paused for a moment, looking at her. Then he reached over and took her hand, and said her name quietly: "A-Ying — have you thought about our future?"


She was slightly caught off guard. His fingers were warm and strong around hers, and there was a thread of something helpless in his voice underneath the warmth.


"A-Ying, we will inevitably marry in the future. If I become the Crown Prince and you become the Crown Princess — the court and the people will absolutely not allow the Crown Princess to hold the reins of military power. At that time, you —" He didn't finish that sentence. He started again. "If I remain the King of Qin, assisting the Crown Prince — one day I could resign my title and return to Laolan Pass to guard the border. How carefree and happy we would be. Even if I didn't go back to Laolan Pass, we could return to Yingzhou together. Far from the court, far from all of this." His tone was entirely sincere, and entirely vulnerable. "Wouldn't that be better?"


She listened to all of it. She was moved — she couldn't pretend otherwise. She was quiet for a moment.


Then she said: "If one day the court orders you to conquer the Dingsheng Army — to kill me, to kill my father — what would you do?"


He paused. "A-Ying. I would never obey such an order."


"When we first met," she said, "you and I argued about whether to save one person or the world." She held his gaze. "Now — set that aside. You just said you would never obey such an order. What are you relying on? You're relying on your status as the King of Qin. On being a man of great military achievement. Only by being strong can you protect yourself, your family, your loved ones." She raised her riding whip and pointed toward the distant mountains, the empty sky. "The King of Qin's banner is the banner of the commander-in-chief. When the three armies see it, they obey. The grain of every county in the country can be requisitioned. The officials of every county can be punished. That is power. You can disobey the court because you have power."


She let that settle before she continued.


"Those who wield power can decide the life and death of millions with a single word. And the Eastern Palace — no, not just the Eastern Palace — no matter who becomes Emperor, they cannot tolerate a Prince of Qin like you." Her eyes were direct on his. "Even if you truly achieve your goal of helping the Crown Prince grow up safely, and he ascends the throne — do you think you can return to Laolan Pass after that? Won't everyone in the world be unable to sleep soundly, knowing you are still alive and still hold such power?"


He was silent for a long moment. Finally he said, quietly: "Ah Ying, Xuanze is still young. That is precisely why I want to find good teachers for him, assist him properly. It is like nurturing a tree when it is young — if you take good care of it, it grows straight." He looked at her. "Everything is uncertain now. Why are you pressing me like this?"


She looked at him with an expression that was steady and sorrowful at once. "Because once things are certain, it will be too late."


She shifted slightly, and when she spoke again, her voice was quieter. "You just asked me if I've thought about our future. Of course I have. I've thought about it a hundred times, a thousand times. Going back to Laolan Pass with you, having children, working at sunrise and resting at sunset — how carefree that would be. Or going to Yingzhou, in spring in the valleys when they're full of apricot blossoms, taking the children to fly kites and ride horses —" Something briefly crossed her face — genuine, unguarded longing. "Just thinking about these things fills me with joy. But it's not something I can simply do because I want to."


She steadied herself.


"You are the Emperor's son, and I am Cui Yi's daughter. You said the court cannot tolerate the Crown Princess holding the Dingsheng Army — but can it tolerate the Princess of Qin holding it? Father will grow old one day." Something glinted in her eyes, quickly controlled. "He will fall ill. He will leave me. At that time, the Dingsheng Army may be my only family and my only support in this world, besides you. You are unwilling to be the Crown Prince. Do you think abandoning power will protect me — and the Dingsheng Army?"


Li Yi had no answer for a moment. The sun had sunk lower. The wind moved steadily through the trees, and somewhere in the branches above them, a bird called once and went quiet. The silence between them was not empty — it was full of things that had been said and things that hadn't been.


Finally he spoke. "A-Ying, that is precisely why I want to ask Father to make Xuanze the Crown Prince. He is still young. These matters — what the court will demand, what must be answered — they will only arise after he is grown, after he assumes the throne. That could be ten years from now. Twenty. With that much time, we can surely find a solution."


She looked at him. "You truly don't want to be the Crown Prince?"


He nodded. "I don't want to be the Crown Prince. I don't want to be the Emperor. I want to guard the frontier — to become a renowned general, like Wei Qing, like Huo Qubing, protecting the land."


She drew a long breath. Let it out slowly. And finally said nothing more.


---


Master Xiao, hearing of their arrival, came out personally to receive them.


Night had fallen by the time they reached the inner chambers of Qingyun Temple. Lanterns had been lit throughout the grounds, warm points of light in the dark, the mountain wind making them tremble. Master Xiao sat with them, and upon hearing of the Crown Prince's return to court, her expression changed. She said quietly: "That shouldn't be the real Xuanze."


Li Yi understood. He began, with care, to try to persuade her to allow the real Li Xuanze to return to the capital with him.


Cui Lin had already read his intentions from the foot of the mountain. She had known before they arrived that she disagreed. She did not want to sit through the persuasion. She rose and said, with perfect courtesy: "Master, I haven't visited Qingyun Temple before. I'd like to have a look around."


Master Xiao understood this too. She summoned her trusted former attendant, Jinniang — now dressed in Taoist robes — and asked her to accompany Cui Lin. They set out through the halls, Jinniang's lantern casting warm, shifting light on the stone path.


They had not gone far when a gust of mountain wind came through without warning and blew the lantern out entirely. Jinniang made a distressed sound, but Cui Lin said easily: "It's all right. Go and get another flame. I'll wait here."


Jinniang looked uncertain. "It's strangely dark in these mountains. I know the paths well, but isn't it frightening for Commander He to wait here alone?"


She still used the old address — Commander He — out of habit from the days of recuperation. Cui Lin smiled at it. "It's really all right. Go ahead."


Jinniang, knowing that Commander He was not like other women and had spent her years in an army camp, turned and went to find fire.


Cui Lin stood alone in the dark mountain path.


Around her, the wind moved through the pines in long sweeping sounds — not quite like thunder, not quite like waves, but something between the two, vast and continuous. She looked up. Above the trees, the moon hung at a high and distant angle, pouring a cool clean light over everything. Clear as mercury. Light as gauze. The mountains were wrapped in it.


She stood for a while and felt her thoughts settle, the way they did sometimes in a good camp at night, far from everything complicated. The moonlight was so clear it almost seemed playful — illuminating the path and the trees and the rocks with equal attention, making the ordinary strange and the strange beautiful. She found herself walking deeper into the path, past the waiting stone, drawn forward without quite deciding to move.


Past a stand of pines, she heard it: the sound of water, a stream finding its way over rocks. Then the lower sound of a small waterfall, its spray catching the moonlight and scattering it. She stood and watched for a long time. Then she followed the stream to where it opened into a still pool — the surface flat and dark, holding a perfect reflection of the moon. It seemed to make the actual moon above seem closer, more reachable — as though reaching down to the water was nearly the same as reaching up to the sky. The pebbles at the bottom of the pool were visible through the moonlit water with perfect clarity. Beside the pool stood a pine tree so large that two or three people linking arms could not have encircled its trunk, reaching up and up into the dark sky above.


She crouched at the water's edge and tested the temperature. It looked shallow. It was, in fact, very deep, and the water was icy cold.


She stayed awhile. Then, mindful that Jinniang would return and not find her, she followed the path back to the rocky outcrop she had started from.


Jinniang was already there, relighted lantern in hand, having searched the surrounding area with evident anxiety. She exhaled visibly upon seeing Cui Lin return. "The mountain path here is treacherous and narrow. If the Captain hadn't come back, I would have sent people searching everywhere."


They continued through the temple — front hall to mountain gate, Jinniang explaining each building and its history in patient detail. Cui Lin was not a person who worshipped gods or Buddhas, but the place itself was genuinely worth seeing. By the time they had explored most of the grounds and returned toward Master Xiao's quarters, she saw Li Yi standing under the eaves of the inner courtyard, his hands clasped behind his back, his face turned upward.


Looking at the moon.


She walked up beside him and asked: "Is everything settled?"


He nodded.


She didn't ask what had been decided. "Shall we go?"


---


They descended the mountain and returned to the main camp as the night deepened toward dawn. They had been traveling together for so many days, moving easily in the same space. But once they reached the edge of the camp, she stopped.


"Seventeenth Brother."


He turned to look at her. In the dark, her voice was quiet, but something in it made him go still.


She was smiling — she was always smiling — but there was something behind it now that hadn't been there before. A faint and careful melancholy, the kind that knows it is being observed and tries not to show itself.


"Luoyang is close from here," she said. "I'll go straight back to Luoyang from here."


The Dingsheng Army was still moving slowly under Cui Yi's leadership — many days' journey remaining. He didn't try to stop her. He said only: "I'll send a team to escort you."


"No need."


They had parted many times before — had said goodbye across hundreds of miles and said nothing at all and said everything in letters, sometimes one a day, sometimes three in a week, writing the next one before the previous had arrived. None of those partings had felt quite like this one. She knew it. He knew it too. Many things seemed to have shifted in the hours since the foot of the mountain, irreversibly and without ceremony.


He didn't insist on the escort — he knew she had always moved safely and that she would have her own people.


He reined in his horse and stayed still, watching as a troop of soldiers quietly emerged from the shadow at the edge of camp and fell into formation around her. She rode forward. He watched her go.


Then he turned his horse in the other direction and rode.


The dew had begun to fall, settling on the grass, beading on the leaves. A droplet found his shoulder. He rode without paying attention to it.


He was thinking of the descent.


On the way down the mountain, she had suddenly asked him if he would like to hear her sing. He had agreed immediately, and she had begun — that small tune, the one he had heard before, starting with the apricot blossoms in spring, the sparse shadows, the willow branch farewell. Her voice in the mountain night had been something between a dream and a real thing — light as mountain mist, clear as a nightingale, the words falling softly through the dark trees.


Then she had continued into the second verse, the one she hadn't finished the last time. Her voice stayed soft: From all directions, returning to the inner chambers, the courtyard is filled with the fragrance of roses. Adjusting the ink to know the color of the incense, painting eyebrows with leisure, the spring water and green railings, side by side painting mandarin ducks.


The second verse was, on its face, sweet — the words were all tenderness and domestic peace. But in her voice there had been a thread of something else, faint and unmistakable, the way you can hear a crack in a bell even when the note rings true.


When she finished, neither of them spoke for a while. Then he had said her name softly in the dark: "A-Ying."


The last time she had sung this tune, it had been outside Luoyang, at the Taiqing Palace. That had been a different night entirely. The same song, the same voice — but the distance between then and now felt like a country.


She had smiled and said: "Seventeenth Brother — would you sing me something too? How about that 'Eighteen Bends of the Laolan River'?"


He had nodded, ready to begin. Then she had changed her mind, quickly, lightly: "Let's do it next time. Sing it for me when we meet again."


He hadn't understood at first — not quite, not immediately. Then he had. And a faint, formless sadness had arrived in his chest, the kind that doesn't announce itself but simply settles.


When would they meet again? Would the moon still fall this way on mountain forests, on her clear eyes? What night would that be? What night was this?


He stood his horse at the crossroads and watched her go — further and further, her figure shrinking, her entourage becoming a single dark shape, then a small one, then nothing. The sun rose. Its first light came across the fields in long gold lines, touching the grass. Birds opened their voices in the trees. The morning dew had soaked through to his skin without his noticing.


He reached into his robe and found a flower there — delicate, half-withered now after most of the night. He had picked it before they went up the mountain, taking advantage of a moment when she was looking elsewhere. He stood there for a moment, holding it.


What was I thinking then? he wondered. Was I thinking — this flower is so beautiful. Should I tuck it into her left temple or her right?


Little Black shifted under him, pulled at the reins, and let out a long whinny — half impatience, half complaint. He seemed to want to follow Little White. Li Yi patted his neck and gathered the reins. Little Black moved, obediently if reluctantly, toward the camp. At the very edge of it, the horse couldn't help himself — he turned and looked back. But Little White was long gone, and the road was empty, and the morning was very bright.


The King of Qin entered the capital in triumph.


He presented the captives at the Imperial Ancestral Temple. Bells rang and drums sounded in a display that had not been seen in decades — the Emperor seated atop Xing'an Gate, looking down at the procession with an expression of pride and satisfaction that he would remember for years. Among the civil and military officials watching from their ranks, several veteran ministers wept openly and without apology.


The ceremony was barely concluded before the Prince of Qin walked into court and announced that Han Chang had escorted the true Crown Prince grandson, Li Xuanze — and that the child previously presented at the palace gates was a fake.


The court erupted.


The Prince of Qin petitioned immediately for Li Xuanze to be established as Crown Prince. It caught even the Emperor off guard. The debate ignited at once and did not stop. One faction argued from propriety: Li Xuanze was the eldest son of the late Crown Prince, who had died at the hands of the traitor Sun Quan alongside the late Emperor. Li Xuanze was the last bloodline of the Crown Prince lineage, honored in absentia by the loyalist armies — his claim was legitimate. The other faction countered: the late Emperor had never formally named Li Xuanze as heir. The Emperor had already ascended the throne. It was legally and historically arguable. There were precedents on both sides.


But everyone calculating in the back of their minds knew that it was the Prince of Qin who had made the petition — the Prince of Qin who had recovered both capitals, who held the banner, who had the army and the court's cautious respect. That was not a small thing. The debate raged for days.


The Emperor was furious. He ordered the imposter imprisoned, and the eunuch Gao Xuan executed by the most severe method available, his family exterminated.


And then, into this already boiling situation, Cui Yi submitted a memorial.


It landed in the court like a stone into still water — except the water was already not still, and the stone was enormous.


Cui Yi, Military Governor of Lulong, Protector-General of Shuobei, commander of one hundred thousand men, stated in the memorial with complete directness that His Majesty had sent someone to inquire whether he was willing to marry his daughter to Prince Qi. This concerned his daughter's lifelong happiness. He had asked her. She had said that if she were to marry, she would follow her own heart and choose one of His Majesty's princes as her husband.


The court detonated.


Even the Emperor, caught entirely off guard, felt a wave of embarrassment wash through him. The entire tacit arrangement — the discreet inquiry, the private refusal, the quiet ending of the matter — had been designed specifically so that no one would lose face. Cui Yi had taken that arrangement, set it aside, and submitted a public memorial that placed the entire situation directly in front of every official in the dynasty.


The Censor-in-Chief Song Xin stepped forward, his expression severe. "Your Majesty — did you truly send someone to question Cui Yi about this matter?"


The Emperor, who knew the Censorate was not something any emperor trifled with, felt his composure waver. "I — I did send someone to inquire. But I did not expect Minister Cui to submit such a public memorial —"


Song Xin did not pursue the gap in the Emperor's words. He bowed and said, in a voice that carried: "As a subject, Cui Yi has uttered words of extraordinary arrogance — presumptuously claiming he wishes to select a prince from among the Emperor's sons as his daughter's husband. I request that Cui Yi be punished for his great disrespect, and that Your Majesty issue an edict to reprimand him and strip him of his title."


A ripple of sharp breath moved through the hall.


Cui Yi's memorial was arrogant — there was no question. The Emperor had handled the inquiry appropriately. Even a refusal could have been delivered privately. To write it in a memorial, to state openly that he wished to choose among the Emperor's sons — it was the height of presumption. But Cui Yi dared this precisely because he had something to rely on: one hundred thousand soldiers, Luoyang under his control, and a court that was currently powerless to move against him. If the Emperor listened to the censor and issued a reprimand, trouble would follow immediately.


Sure enough, the Emperor straightened in his seat. "Indeed! This Cui Yi is truly arrogant! Does he think our imperial family is a marketplace, where he can simply pick and choose?"


A civil official moved quickly to the other side: "Your Majesty, Cui Yi controls several prefectures and occupies the Eastern Capital. The court is already concerned about his excessive power. Your Majesty was wise to consider marrying a prince to his daughter — and now Cui Yi is merely requesting a prince as his son-in-law. Your Majesty should grant this. It consolidates the Cui family's military without a single soldier deployed. It is a brilliant move."


The Emperor found this satisfying. He nodded. Then he found something else. "But it is the greatest honor for the Cui family that my son would marry his daughter. How could they take the initiative to submit a memorial saying they want to choose one themselves?"


Another official: "Your Majesty is absolutely right. The Cui family is so unruly — how can a Cui daughter be worthy of being a prince's consort? Your Majesty must not agree."


The first official again: "A military man may be unruly, but he is not without naivety. Your Majesty is a monarch with a broad mind. You can certainly forgive the Cui family's manner."


"The monarch is the guide for his subjects. How can a subject select a prince as his son-in-law?"


"You are being old-fashioned and inflexible."


The hall filled with noise and stayed noisy.


In truth, the court had been like this for days already — divided between the faction of old ministers who had served the late Emperor and wanted Li Xuanze made Crown Prince as a matter of loyalty and honor, and the new ministers who had helped the current Emperor ascend the throne and felt, with some legal justification, that naming Li Xuanze heir would undermine the Emperor's own legitimacy. Roughly equal in number. Endlessly loud.


And now Cui Yi's memorial had added a third fire to the existing two. The new ministers in particular saw opportunity: if Cui Yi's daughter married the Emperor's son, Li Xuanze could not logically be made Crown Prince. And as for Cui Yi's daughter wanting to choose the prince herself — what of it? Let her choose. She wouldn't suffer for it. The important thing was which prince she chose.


Li Yi, who had been in court since the memorial was read aloud, kept his eyes down and said nothing. His expression was contained and revealed nothing. Prince Qi had been initially startled but recovered quickly, settling into a studied calm. He had become exceptionally careful since the false Crown Prince was exposed — he hadn't expected Li Yi to produce a real one, and the effort he had quietly invested in Gao Xuan had come to nothing, with Gao Xuan dead and no trace left pointing back to him. Fortunate, that.


Prince Xin, now stripped of that title and demoted to Prince of Anyang, had not recovered his composure so neatly. He had not expected Cui Yi to agree to a marriage at all. If Cui's daughter married Prince Qi, it was a disaster for him. If she chose Prince Qin instead — equally a disaster. Either way, some brother of his would have a father-in-law commanding one hundred thousand soldiers, and Li Jun did not know how to sleep peacefully with that thought in his chest.


He harbored deep and specific resentment toward Li Yi. Han Chang sending the Crown Prince back — he was certain that was Li Yi's orchestration, designed to block his path to the throne. And if Li Yi married Cui's daughter, she would become a threat that would shadow the rest of his life.


He turned it over bitterly, and arrived at one more regret: he was too old, already married with children. Otherwise — as the eldest legitimate son, wouldn't Cui's daughter naturally have chosen him? He would have been the obvious candidate.


---


After the court session ended, Li Yi had not yet reached the gates of the Qin Prince's residence when Xie Chang'er rode up from the opposite direction, pulling his horse around to match pace.


"Your Highness — Taozi has arrived. She says Miss Cui invites you to meet at Leyou Plain."


Li Yi was still for a moment.


Then he turned his horse and rode.


---


It was late spring — the fourth month. The flowers in the capital had faded weeks ago, but on Leyou Plain above the city, the grass was lush and uncut, stretching to the horizon in a long sweep of green. Wild peonies had opened among the tall grass — pink and purple blossoms scattered through the green like something scattered carelessly and beautifully, as though spring had not quite finished here, had held a little back, kept a little for this high place.


He rode up to the plain and saw her from a distance.


She was standing beneath a large apricot tree — enormous, its season of blossoming well past, its canopy now a full and generous spread of green, wide enough to stand under like a roof. She was looking out toward Xichangjing below, her back to him, still and unhurried.


Little White, grazing nearby in the long grass, spotted Little Black coming and let out a long whinny, breaking into a canter to close the distance. Li Yi dismounted before his horse stopped moving, draped the reins loosely over the saddle, and patted Little Black's neck. Little Black needed no further instruction — he was already moving toward Little White, and the two horses pressed their heads together with the ease of old companions.


She heard the hoofbeats and turned.


She was wearing a riding dress — not the military uniform he usually saw her in. She rarely dressed this way, and she wore no jewels, but in the full spring sun of the plain she needed none. He looked at her for a moment. She looked him over in return, with the frank assessment she had never bothered to disguise. He had come directly from court without going home first, and was still in his formal robes — crimson gauze over white, dragons and deer embroidered on the shoulders and sleeves, white socks and black boots, crimson knee covers. He was very tall, and in this formal dress he looked formidable and fine both at once. Not a formal crown today, only his hair gathered up with a gold crown piece. The white jade hairpin that she had given him held it in place.


She studied him for a moment. Then she smiled and said: "Seventeenth Brother."


A pause.


"Do you know what I meant by having Father submit that memorial?"


He looked away from her face and looked at the plain. "I didn't know before," he said. "But I do now."


In court, when the memorial was read, he had been uncertain. They had parted at the foot of Qingyun Temple without another word between them, and in the weeks since — not a single letter. They had always written to each other, sometimes every day, sometimes faster than the previous letter could arrive. He would be writing the next before the ink was dry on the last. Thousands of miles between them had never felt like distance, because she was always in the next letter. But this time she was in Luoyang, three days' fast ride away, and the silence had been complete. Each day had stretched. The hours were longer than they should have been. In the stillness of night, he would turn over and think: What is A-Ying doing? She must be asleep too. The third-watch drum would sound in the deep dark, and he would think of her.


Then Cui Yi's memorial had arrived in court, and a small hope had opened quietly in his chest. He had thought — he had allowed himself to think — that the memorial was a refusal of Prince Qi, offered in the only way she knew how: publicly, unmistakably, with enough force that it couldn't be gently redirected. An announcement that she would choose her own prince. Meaning him.


His hope had become apprehension. Then quiet joy. Then — standing on Leyou Plain now, looking at her face — something less clear, and heavier.


He spoke carefully, measuring each word. "If this memorial was submitted because you wanted to marry me — then you wouldn't have asked to see me today. Since you did ask to see me today —"


He couldn't finish the sentence. The moment he followed it to its conclusion, something in his chest seized. He felt it the way you feel a blade — not impact but opening, the cold spreading inward. He had known pain before. He had not known quite this kind.


A shadow of melancholy crossed her face. Of course he understood — he had always understood her, even when she said nothing. She thought of the moment she had told her father to submit the memorial, and her father asking her: Aying, will you regret it?


And she had said: Life is like chess. This world is the grandest and most intricate game. I will not be a pawn — I will be one of the players. Since the Prince of Qin is willing to be a pawn, even if I must force him, I will force him to become the other player.


She had known, when the Emperor sent his inquiry about Prince Qi, exactly what Prince Qi wanted. She had seen clearly what kind of man Prince Xin was. She had known the two of them would eventually destroy each other. And Li Yi, meanwhile, was committed to making Li Xuanze the Crown Prince, which would pour oil on every fire currently burning in the court simultaneously. She had needed to force him to see it — to see the danger he was walking into with his eyes open and his hands loose at his sides.


That had been the calculation. The plan.


But standing in front of him now, watching the pain move through his eyes with the quiet devastation of someone who was trying not to show it — her heart softened before she could stop it.


She hardened it again deliberately, and said: "Seventeenth Brother — Father only has one daughter. The court sent people to inquire. I could not do nothing."


He asked, and it sounded almost like a different conversation: "A-Ying — do you really not want to marry me?"


"Seventeenth Brother." Her voice was steady. "If I married you — would this matter be resolved?"


"Of course," he said, and it came out fast and urgent. "A-Ying, I used to understand you so well. I always felt that you were right — that your thoughts and mine were always aligned, that we could always think to the same place at the same time." He stopped. When he continued, his voice was quieter. "But A-Ying, I don't understand you anymore." Another pause. "You are standing right in front of me, and I feel as though you are a hundred and eight thousand miles away."


She felt it too — the specific sadness of that. They had always moved together, almost without effort, the way two people can sometimes find each other's rhythm without trying. Since they met. Since they argued about saving one person or saving the world, since she had kicked him into a well the second time they met and he had climbed out still willing to talk to her. But this time they were like the stars Shen and Shang — occupying the same sky but never visible at the same hour, separated by the geometry of things beyond them.


"Seventeenth Brother," she said, "when you persuaded Master Xiao to have General Han escort the real Crown Prince to court — you should have known that upheaval would follow. You have no interest in the throne, and you regard fame and fortune as clouds passing. But unfortunately, not everyone in this world is like you."


"Then what does that have to do with whether you're willing to marry me?" The words came before he could hold them. "Ah Ying — with our relationship — are you really using marriage to coerce and control me?"


The instant the words were out, both of their faces went pale. He was already sick with regret before the sound had finished traveling between them.


She took a breath. Let it out. Said, with a flatness that was more frightening than anger: "So what if I am?"


She gave him no space to explain or retract. She continued, and her voice was level and precise as a blade being measured: "I am Cui Yi's daughter. Our Cui family has a hundred thousand soldiers. We control Pinglu, Fanyang, Hebei, Henan. We hold Luoyang, the Eastern Capital. To this court, we are probably more formidable than Sun Jing ever was. The court can do nothing to the Cui family now." She held his gaze without flinching. "With such military power behind me — if Your Highness wishes to marry me, am I obligated to simply agree? Should I not instead be pointing my sword at Xichangjing and contending for the throne myself?"


His face had gone very pale. "Aying," he said, "you are saying things against your conscience."


If she truly meant any of that, she would never have urged Cui Yi to join in retaking Xichangjing. If she truly meant it, she would never have surrendered Changzhou.


She couldn't help the short, humorless sound that escaped her. "And aren't you saying things against yours? You know perfectly well I am not using marriage to coerce you."


The silence between them was different now — taut, and full of the things they had just said, none of which either of them had meant.


Little Black and Little White had wandered further into the tall grass, grazing contentedly, occasionally raising their heads to call to each other. The sun continued its tilt toward the west. The grass moved.


She said, after a moment: "Father asked if I would regret it. I want to ask him the same question." She did not elaborate. Cui Yi had, at one point, held a real chance to contend for the Central Plains. She had told him she liked Li Yi and wanted to marry him. Cui Yi had made other plans accordingly.


He had said only: The people are suffering too much. The world is suffering too much. We cannot have any more wars.


"But we cannot let a foolish Emperor rule," she had said.


And they had not disagreed on that.


"Seventeenth Prince," she said now, standing in the spring light of the plain. "Li Xuanze is far too young. We cannot know what he will become. And if we make him Crown Prince, how will Prince Xin and Prince Qi allow it to stand? I fear there will be renewed conflict over the succession." She looked at him directly. "The people are suffering too much, and the world is suffering too much. Can you bear to watch the world burn again over the succession?"


"That is precisely why we must make Xuanze Crown Prince," he said, and he meant every word. "The old officials will honor the late Crown Prince's loyalty and guide the child as he grows. The new officials will find their place. It is a resolution that serves everyone, and there will be no more division between old and new." He steadied himself. "As for Prince Xin and Prince Qi — with me present, they will never dare act rashly."


"Even if you guard the Crown Prince every hour of every day — can you guarantee absolute safety?" Her voice did not rise. "If you can, remember: you are the Prince of Qin. You hold military power. The moment your brother frames both you and the Crown Prince for plotting to usurp the throne — how do you defend yourself? If you relinquish your military power to clear your name, how do you protect the Crown Prince? If you take the Crown Prince back to Laolan Pass, your muddle-headed father, pushed by the right words from the right person, could issue an edict ordering you to take your own life. Would you obey? Would you disobey? And either way — how would the Crown Prince survive?" She spoke quietly, but each point landed. "I have mapped every path of this situation. Every one is a dead end. Only by taking the Eastern Palace yourself will you have a real chance to survive it."


"Aying," he said, with genuine pain. "I don't believe that is my only way out. You think too treacherous and evil of people."


"Then Your Highness may wait and see," she said simply. "Perhaps in time, Your Highness will see the treacherousness and evil in people's hearts for yourself."


He was silent for a long moment, the melancholy settling fully into his expression. He had finally understood the full architecture of her memorial — not just the surface of it, but the structure underneath. One peach can kill three warriors. Three hundred soldiers had a different kind of leverage. She intended to use herself as bait — to draw Prince Xin and Prince Qi into fighting each other, to stir the winds of conflict in the court and direct them away from Li Xuanze, or from the Prince of Qin, or from whatever she judged most needed protecting. She was placing herself on the board deliberately, as the most valuable piece.


He asked the question he already knew was foolish, and asked it anyway: "Ah Ying — do you like me?"


She looked at him, and for a moment something unguarded appeared in her face — wistful and helpless together, the expression of someone who has considered every angle of something and arrived at no good answer.


"One day," she said, "I met a man. He was very capable and extremely intelligent. I had never met anyone like him before. Although we argued fiercely the first time we met, and I kicked him into a well the second time —" She paused briefly, and something almost like a real smile arrived. "— I liked him then. I've never liked anyone before, so I don't know what it's supposed to feel like. But I know that I liked him. Whether he is the Seventeenth Prince of Laolan Pass or His Highness Prince Qin, whether he is a commoner or a prince — I just like him."


"Ah Ying." His voice was raw with it. "I like you too. And you like me too. So why won't you marry me?"


"Your Highness, please go back." Her voice was gentle now, and final. "Perhaps you'll understand in a few days." She looked at him steadily. "It is not that His Highness Prince Qin can return to Laolan Pass and be the Seventeenth Prince simply because he wishes it. It is that His Highness Prince Qin cannot refuse to be the Crown Prince."


He looked at her for a moment longer. The setting sun was finding its angle across the plain, and the light it cast was the particular gold of late spring — warm, extended, reluctant to leave. It fell across her clothes and her face and her eyes, and it was beautiful, and he was aware of being aware of it in the specific way of someone who suspects they are seeing something for the last time in this particular form.


He had liked her from the first moment. Even after she kicked him into the well — even in the sting of that — he had felt only a bewildered, helpless joy. He still felt it. Underneath everything that was happening right now, it was still there, unchanged, in the place where it had settled and refused to move.


He asked one more question. His last one. "If I were not the Crown Prince — would you still not want to marry me?"


The golden light lay across her eyes. It softened nothing in them. They were bright, and dark with what they held, and entirely clear. She looked at him for a long moment before she spoke.


"What if I said yes?" she said quietly. "Would Your Highness feel any better?"


He looked at her. "Ah Ying," he said at last, "saying that won't make me feel better. I'm just — extremely sad."


---


He rode back alone, down from the plain into the capital.


Leyou had always been his favorite place outside the city. The poem he had loved since boyhood — the grass on the plain grows lush and green, withers and flourishes each year — wildfires cannot burn it all, the spring breeze brings it back to life — even a three-year-old knew it, plain and simple as it was. But how wonderful. Full of life. He had always felt, growing up, that his own life was something like that grass — unnoticed, easily trampled, enduring cold and frost without anyone marking it. But it didn't matter. Every spring, it came back. That was what grass did.


Later he had met her, and they had promised to visit Leyou Plain together when the world was at peace. He had been full of pure happiness then — the uncomplicated happiness of a man who has found in the vast world a single person who fits perfectly alongside him. She was rare. Irreplaceable. The blood of his heart, a gem in his eyes. She knew him and loved him and their minds moved together. He had imagined bringing their children here someday — the spring grass, kites, horses, her voice.


He thought of the poem he had loved less, and thought of now: the sunset is infinitely beautiful, but it is near dusk.


The sun was almost gone. Below him, the city was beginning its evening. Little Black carried him at a slow, unwilling pace, and Li Yi let him go slowly, not pressing.


Behind him on the plain, he knew she was still standing under that tree. He had turned to look, twice, and seen her there — motionless, not mounting her horse, not moving toward him. He knew that if she rode toward him, he would turn immediately and ride toward her, and he would open his arms from a distance, and she would ride into them. Her warmth was the most familiar warmth he knew. Everything complicated could be held back, for a moment, by his outstretched hand.


She did not ride toward him.


He turned away for the last time, and did not look back again.


The sun set. The plain softened into shadow. The wind moved through the tall grass, and the wild peonies — still pink and purple among the green, still beautiful, still holding the last of the spring — bent in the direction the wind chose. A bright star rose. The light faded slowly, the way spring light always does — not suddenly, but by degrees, until you look up and it is gone.


She stood under the apricot tree and watched him become a small thing in the distance, then a smaller thing, then nothing.


Night came down over Leyou Plain.


---


The Emperor spent his birthday in considerable comfort.


The court remained tangled in its debate over the Crown Prince. Cui Yi's memorial had caused a separate uproar. And then the Prince of Qin fell ill.


Reportedly, after recovering somewhat from his court appearances, he had gone alone to Leyouyuan for a solitary walk — without his usual entourage, without ceremony. He had lingered until dusk. When he finally entered the city through the gate, there had been an accident: a mule cart carrying a full load of oil jars had overturned inside the gate, and the road was slick with spilled oil. The Prince of Qin's horse had slipped and gone down, and the Prince had sustained serious injuries — large scrapes, deep wounds on his arms and legs.


The Emperor initially suspected theater. Li Yi had once feigned illness convincingly, and the Emperor had not forgotten. But the wounds were genuinely severe. The imperial physician sent to examine him returned to the palace with a deeply concerned expression: the warm weather, the exposed wounds, the risk of infection. A day later, the Prince of Qin developed a high fever. He had always been extraordinarily robust — the kind of man who rarely even caught cold. When he fell ill, he fell like a landslide. Four or five imperial physicians worked in rotation, trying every prescription they had, keeping the situation continuously chaotic.


Pei Yuan, having finally concluded his work in Changzhou and returned to Xichangjing just before the birthday celebration, heard the news and was immediately alarmed. He retrieved his family's secret medicine for injuries and rushed to the Prince's residence.


Li Yi had been ill for several days. The fever was persistent. The wounds were red and swollen. His spirits, however — somehow, inexplicably — remained high. Pei Yuan examined the wounds with a growing sense of horror, asked careful and detailed questions about exactly how the fall had happened, and found the answers deeply unsatisfying.


"Even riding the wildest unsaddled horse back at Laolan Pass," Pei Yuan said, refusing to let it go, "you would not have fallen like this." The more he thought about it, the more frightened he became. "Who ambushed Your Highness?"


"No one ambushed me," Li Yi said, with the exhausted patience of a man who had been asked this several times. "I lost focus for a moment. I fell."


Pei Yuan looked at him. Then went to find the imperial physicians.


The others were useful. Physician Fan sighed heavily and launched into an extended explanation involving spleen deficiency, liver excess, and excessive worry. Pei Yuan listened for several minutes, almost took it at face value, saw Physician Fan out — and then stopped dead on the step, and stamped his foot.


Excessive worry.


That evening, when the fever returned at dusk, Li Yi was too weak to eat. Old Bao had roasted mutton especially and brought a full plate. Li Yi did not touch it. He was lying on his couch with his hand resting on the brocade quilt, which was very warm, probably from the heat of his skin. His eyes were on the window.


Suddenly, a small noise came from outside.


He threw the quilt aside immediately, put on his robe, crossed to the window, and pulled it open.


Pei Yuan was standing outside the window. He asked, the instant Li Yi appeared: "Did Miss Cui write to you?"


Li Yi felt his temples throb. He slammed the window shut.


Pei Yuan walked around to the door and came in. "Did you write to Miss Cui?"


Silence.


"She submitted such a memorial," Pei Yuan said, with the tone of a man assembling a case. "Wasn't it all in order to marry you?" He watched Li Yi's face. The silence continued. Pei Yuan felt as though lightning had struck him from a clear sky.


He had been worrying about this situation for months — since before he knew who Commander He truly was. He had spent considerable time quietly dreading that Li Yi would marry he, and had spent equal time unable to imagine a scenario in which the Emperor would permit it. When the truth came out in Changzhou and Commander He was revealed as Cui Yi's daughter — Pei Yuan had nearly wept with relief. He had stood in Changzhou looking at the sky, which seemed particularly blue, and thought that the Seventeenth Prince was simply gifted, to have chosen well without knowing it, to have fallen for Cui Yi's daughter at first sight when every external circumstance had conspired to hide who she was.


Now this.


Pei Yuan sat down by the bedside with the bearing of a man who intended to fix things by explaining them clearly enough. "Miss Cui would never be interested in Prince Qi. She has always been fond of you. Young ladies are sometimes shy and cannot very well write in a memorial that they wish to marry you directly. You should quickly inform His Majesty and ask him to send an envoy to the military governor to grant the marriage."


Li Yi sighed. He was burning all over. His ears were ringing softly. Pei Yuan was talking, and he found it, at that particular moment, genuinely excruciating. His hand lay on the warm quilt and his heart was cold. He thought: I'm so sick, and she won't even come to see me. Does she truly intend to abandon me?


He knew, with one part of his mind, that this was childish. He had been distracted — genuinely distracted — when the horse slipped. But when he started to fall, he had not fought it. He had not tucked or dodged or done any of the things a man with his training would instinctively do. He had let the ground come up and meet him, and he had let it hurt, because the alternative was the other hurt, and at least the physical kind made sense.


He had hurt himself badly. She had not come.


She was heartless. Completely heartless.


Pei Yuan, suspicious, said: "Miss Cui probably doesn't even know Your Highness is ill. I'll send someone with a letter immediately."


How could she not know? The Cui family had spies and informants woven through every layer of the capital. Everyone in the court and the public knew the Prince of Qin was ill.


Li Yi reached out and grabbed Pei Yuan's sleeve. "Don't."


Pei Yuan misread this and looked at him sharply. "Is it — is it really that she doesn't want to marry you?"


The expression on Li Yi's face confirmed what Pei Yuan had been trying not to believe. He felt a surge of anger and frustration that was almost entirely on his Prince's behalf. "How could she do this?"


"No." Li Yi steadied himself and said it with effort. "It's not her fault. It's that I don't want to marry her anymore."


Pei Yuan stared at him. "Liar."


"I —"


"Do I not know you?" Pei Yuan had abandoned all pretense of composure. "You act like you would fight anyone who dared to interfere with marrying her. If His Majesty himself issued an edict against it, you would probably defy it without a second thought. How could you not want to marry her?"


"She is Cui Yi's daughter," Li Yi said. He was burning all over and still willing to have this conversation. His head was buzzing, but he was patient. "So I don't want to marry her anymore."


"Nonsense!" Pei Yuan lost what remained of his restraint. "Seventeen Lang — you don't need to lie to me. You don't need to lie to yourself. How could you not want to marry her? You have always liked her, from the moment you first met. You couldn't hide it. I knew then — this woman is your destined calamity."


He was lying to himself. He knew he was lying to himself. But lying to himself felt, at this particular moment, like the only thing that was possible — especially now, burning with fever, ears ringing, vision blurring at the edges. Especially now, when the faint layer of resentment and despair had come up to the surface again, and underneath it something older: the memory of being a child with nothing, a mother gone early and a father who did not want him. The world had been vast and indifferent then. There had been no place in it that was his.


If she truly abandoned him — no matter how vast the world was, there would be no place in it again.


He thought this, and felt the pain of it like something crumbling in his chest, a destruction that was worse than dying. He did not want to argue anymore.


"Believe it or not," he said, in a low and exhausted voice. "I just don't want to marry her anymore. That's all."


Pei Yuan stared at him for a long time. Something in the quality of his looking changed. When he finally spoke, all the argument had gone out of him. "Take care of your injuries, Seventeenth Brother," he said quietly. "Whatever has happened — you cannot allow yourself to be this ill."


---


Being ill, Li Yi found, was appropriate timing if nothing else. He had never been this weak. He had never felt this lost. But he also knew — clearly, beneath it all — that wounds healed, given time enough. Illness passed.


She would not come to see him.


He had known that before he let himself fall.


And so Pei Yuan came every day. The fever persisted. By the day of the Emperor's birthday celebration, Li Yi had not fully recovered — but he sent for liquor, used fire to sterilize a knife, removed the dead tissue from the wound himself, then washed it thoroughly with the liquor. It was excruciating. The wound stopped swelling. It began, slowly, to heal.


On the eve of the birthday celebration, there was a fire at Prince Xin's residence.


It broke out in the inner courtyard. Princess Xin did not survive. Prince Xin wept without stopping, calling her his lifelong companion, his grief raw and uncontrolled. That night he had been resting elsewhere in the residence when the alarm was raised. Without stopping to dress properly, he had run to the scene in his undergarments, trying to organize the firefighting, then trying himself to rush into the burning palace when it became clear the fire would not be contained in time. His attendants could not hold him back. The palace collapsed. Falling tiles struck him. Even bleeding from his head, he kept calling out her name, her nickname, trying to reach her. His servants had to physically drag him back. If they had not, Prince Xin might also have perished.


The Emperor heard the next morning. Half of Prince Xin's residence was ash. Hearing of the Princess's death, the old Emperor felt a formless dread settle over him. But it was his birthday, and a princess was a junior member of the family, and he could not let her death cast shadow over the occasion. He rallied himself, sent envoys to offer condolences, ascended the Hanyuan Hall to receive the officials' congratulations, hosted the banquet — and then, as soon as propriety allowed, retreated to the Western Palace.


Li Yi, still recovering, heard the news and went still.


Pei Yuan came after the midday banquet. Li Yi said, without preamble: "There is something strange about what happened at the Prince of Xin's residence."


Pei Yuan agreed. "Fires happen in the capital. But the Princess's courtyard was magnificent and spacious. For it to burn through so quickly, to collapse so fast — it's too much of a coincidence."


"Don't alarm anyone else," Li Yi said. "Use my token. Investigate this thoroughly."


He was troubled by more than the fire itself. After Li Xuanze's return, the child had not been housed in the palace — his official status was still unresolved. But Han Chang, rewarded for his service with the title of Marquis of Bohai County and a residence near the palace gates, had taken Li Xuanze in. That residence was not far from Prince Xin's.


He gave Pei Yuan instructions to quietly reinforce the guards around Han Chang's residence, to keep Li Xuanze protected without drawing attention.


---


By the time of Princess Xin's funeral, Pei Yuan had finished the investigation.


The fire had not been accidental. The Princess's courtyard had been deliberately set. The arsonist had been careful: knowing that visible piles of firewood and grease would leave evidence, they had filled the storeroom of the rear palace with bolts of silk and satin instead. Once ignited, the fabric burned instantly and completely, spreading faster than water, consuming the roof before anyone could act.


The mastermind required no detective work to identify.


Li Yi felt the cold move through him slowly. He did not want to complete the thought — he already knew why Prince Xin had done this, and the reason was something he did not want to hold in his mind. But he held it anyway: Cui Yi had submitted a memorial saying his daughter would choose a prince as her husband. Prince Xin was already married. Cui's daughter would not choose a man who already had a wife. So Prince Xin had resolved the obstacle.


She had been right. He had not believed it. Now a woman was dead.


She had always been right about this. He had called her too cynical about the evil in people's hearts — and she had told him simply to wait and see.


He found himself unable to sit with it quietly. Ignoring Pei Yuan's objections, he moved to present the witnesses and evidence directly to the Emperor himself.


Pei Yuan caught his arm and held it.


"Your Highness — setting aside everything else — Prince Xin is the eldest son, and he and Your Highness have a long history of conflict. The matter of the succession is already in turmoil. Prince Xin harbors deep resentment toward you. If you step forward now, it will look suspicious — it will give Prince Xin room to claim he has been framed by an enemy. You may make it easier for him to escape, not harder."


Li Yi stopped. Thought.


"This is only about exposing Prince Xin's crimes," Pei Yuan added, more quietly. "Please trust me — there are ways to bring all the evidence before the court without Your Highness being the one to carry it."


Li Yi nodded slowly. Pei Yuan exhaled, and allowed himself the private relief of someone who had narrowly prevented a disaster. He had already discussed it with Pei Zhan. Between the two of them, with the family's decades of court connections, finding the right person to bring the right evidence forward was not a complicated matter.


---


In the meantime, in Luoyang.


The last peonies outside Cui Lin's window had gone. In their place, a trellis of roses had opened — dozens of them, crowding each other for space, their faint fragrance drifting through the window screens in the warm afternoon air. The sun came through the silk gauze in long warm panels.


She sat with a small folding knife, opening the sealed report that had just arrived from the capital, reading it in the quiet of the afternoon room.


Taozi came in with a plate of pastries, offered her one. Seeing the report in her hands, she asked: "Is the Prince of Qin better?"


Cui Lin said nothing.


Taozi tried again, with more energy than was strictly necessary: "Serves him right. Riding around on a tall horse, and then falling off of it. Hmph. He'll suffer for that."


Still nothing.


Cui Lin finished reading. She set the report down, took a pastry from the plate, and bit into it. Then she said: "He must have the strength to argue in court. He must be fully recovered."


Taozi's eyes widened. "He went back to court to argue as soon as he was recovered? This Prince of Qin is truly —" She searched for the word. "Hopeless."


Hopeless, Taozi thought to herself, with feeling. Xie Chang'er had sent three or four letters. The Prince of Qin himself had sent nothing — not a single word. Xie Chang'er had told her the Prince of Qin was practically dying, and she had not believed it. Even if he were dying — wouldn't he write? She had given the letters to the captain — no, to her mistress — and she was quite sure her mistress had read them. And if her mistress had read them, perhaps she would have written back, or at least gone to see him. Hmph. Don't think she didn't know exactly what he was doing. He had fallen off a horse like that — wasn't it just hoping her mistress would come?


Taozi sighed, deeply and without intending to hide it.


Cui Lin glanced at her. "Why are you sighing?"


Taozi said, weakly: "I just — so I sighed."


Cui Lin sorted through the rest of the report without comment. Taozi made conversation: "Who did Prince Qin argue with in court? Why did they argue?"


A censor had brought the witnesses and evidence of Prince Xin's murder of Princess Xin before the court. The resulting chaos was severe. The Emperor, firm in his belief that his own son was incapable of this, refused to accept it. Prince Xin wept bitterly throughout, denying everything, insisting he had been framed. The Emperor privately summoned Gu Xi and asked about the possibility of getting the witnesses to recant — if they confessed to setting the fire themselves and retracted the accusations against Prince Xin, the matter could simply end.


Gu Xi had looked at the Emperor for a long moment, then said carefully: "Your Majesty, we have both witnesses and physical evidence. Getting them to recant would be extremely difficult under any circumstances. And even if we succeeded — given what is already known publicly, how could we silence what people are already saying?"


This left the Emperor unable to proceed as he wished. But Prince Xin was his eldest son, and he was not willing to genuinely punish him. Fortunately, Yang Dong had a flash of inspiration: he found a steward from Prince Xin's household willing to serve as a scapegoat. A large sum of money settled the man's entire family. He came forward and confessed — that he had harbored resentment against the Princess for mistreating him, and had acted alone.


The Emperor breathed again. He would execute the steward, appease Prince Xin, and close the matter.


Then the Prince of Qin walked into court, still healing, and declared the steward a bought scapegoat. He named Prince Xin as the briber. He detained the steward's family. Under interrogation, the steward — terrified, his family in custody — immediately broke and told the truth.


The Emperor found himself unable to protect Prince Xin any further. Prince Xin was demoted to Prince of Anyang, fined three years' salary, and confined to his residence. Prince Xin himself had already spent a fortune quietly settling his wife's family, who were the true aggrieved parties and who declined to pursue the matter. The case closed. The farce ended.


It also, naturally, added a fresh layer to Prince Anyang Li Jun's hatred of Li Yi.


"Even Pei Yuan couldn't persuade him?" Taozi asked.


"He is so stubborn," Cui Lin said, with complete calm. "Even I can't persuade him when he gets like this — let alone Pei Yuan. He deserves to suffer a great loss before he understands he shouldn't have done it that way."


Taozi couldn't stop herself. "You seem quite worried about him."


Cui Lin said nothing. She set down the report.


The afternoon was quiet and warm. The roses moved gently in the breeze outside the window.


She thought of him often. She had thought of him often since they parted — especially after learning he was ill, when for a moment everything in her had wanted simply to go. She had almost gone.


She knew he harbored a little resentment. He always had — not loudly, not in ways he showed easily, but she had always known. From childhood, from the particular shape of how he had grown up, he carried a quiet anxiety underneath everything else, a fear of loss that he hid well and she had always been able to read. When the young master was still alive, she had seen it then too. He hid it beautifully. She had never said so aloud.


He was clever enough, and had once been foolish enough, to say something he believed: Ah Ying, we both like each other. But I like you more than you like me.


She had never corrected him.


In fact, she knew — with perfect private certainty — that it was not true. She liked him more than he liked her. She had always known this. He harbored resentment, and so did she, in her own way. Right now, for instance, she resented that he had simply refused to be the Crown Prince and expected the world to arrange itself around that refusal. She resented that he had not written. She resented that she had made the right decision and it had cost this much.


Was he truly so heartless? He knew perfectly well that no matter what happened, she would never stop loving him. His throwing himself into that state was its own form of coercion against her — if she went to him, he would take her hand and ask her to change her mind, and she would soften immediately, and everything she had planned would come undone.

So she absolutely could not go.

The peonies had faded, the roses had bloomed, the vexing spring was almost over, but he hadn't changed his mind, and neither had she.
Tags:

Comments

Post a Comment

📚 Reading History

🆕 Latest Chinese Web Novels