Far below!
Ying Yang nearly fainted.
In the secret depths of her heart, known only to the System, the great gathering of the imperial family had already dealt her several devastating blows. She had so many brothers and sisters, yet apart from the two seventh-born infants lying in their wet nurses’ arms, there was not a single child capable of standing who was shorter than she was.
Not. A. Single. One!
Why on earth should a Gongzhu be malnourished?
Because for years she had been fed milk adulterated with alcohol, supplemented only occasionally by millet gruel, mashed beans, and similar fare.
For an infant whose body was still developing, such a monotonous diet could not possibly provide sufficient nourishment.
She needed protein. She needed vitamins.
Gongcheng Zhu knew nothing of such things as proteins or vitamins. She merely advised Fifth Gongzhu to eat more meat and exercise more often.
Ying Yang nodded approvingly. Then, remembering something, she instructed the physician:
“I have a prescription called Erzhi Wan. It is made from two medicinal ingredients, mohanlian and the fruit of nüzhen. I have heard that it is very effective for nourishing women whose constitutions are weak. Would you help me verify that?”
Since regaining the ability to speak, Ying Yang had sometimes slept beside her mother. She had discovered that Xia Xianshi suffered from insomnia and troubled dreams, and occasionally from weakness and aching in her waist and knees, dizziness, and ringing in her ears.
In her previous life, Ying Yang had taken the restorative medicine known as Erzhi Wan. Its ingredients and preparation were not particularly difficult to obtain or reproduce. While experimenting with tooth powder, she had made a batch almost as an afterthought.
She had simply never found a trustworthy physician to examine her mother. Erzhi Wan was medicine, after all, and medicines could not be taken indiscriminately.
Gongcheng Zhu was first astonished, then bewildered.
“Gongzhu, you would simply entrust this secret prescription to me?!”
And did the Gongzhu actually understand medicine and pharmacology?
If she did not, how could she casually produce a secret formula for a simple but highly beneficial medicinal pill? Yet if she did, why was she uncertain who ought to take it?
“More or less,” Ying Yang replied.
She knew that people in antiquity attached enormous importance to secret formulas and inherited traditions. But her thinking was, after all, that of a modern person: only when skills and knowledge were widely disseminated could they benefit the public.
Besides, she had quite a few prescriptions stored in her head. Giving away the formula for Erzhi Wan, a prepared traditional medicine intended to nourish the kidneys and liver, would hardly make much difference.
Her manner was careless, but Gongcheng Zhu did not treat the gift lightly. Instead, she solemnly promised that, without Wu Gongzhu’s permission, she would never disclose either the prescription or its uses.
Having made her vow, Gongcheng Zhu reflected inwardly:
The sage Confucius said that when three people walk together, there must be one among them who can be my teacher. Today the Gongzhu has taught me a secret prescription. By rights, I ought to honor her with the courtesies due to half a teacher. Yet the distinction in rank between us is already so great that calling her my teacher would seem excessive flattery. That would not be proper. It is enough that I know it myself and honor her quietly.
Ying Yang knew nothing of the vow the physician had made in her heart. Nor did she know that the exchange of the prescription between the adult and the child had been reported to the two Xia women.
“This child…” Xia Xianshi pressed a hand to her forehead. “How many times has she even met that woman? Yet she trusts her so readily! We don’t even know whether this woman physician is dependable, or whether someone might bribe her!”
Xia Changjun replied, “Her family are retainers and household dependents of the Meng clan, and she herself is loyal and upright. Among her relatives and neighbors, she has long enjoyed a reputation for steadiness and excellent medical skill. That is why the Meng clan recommended that she enter my palace to take refuge from trouble.”
“Take refuge?”
Xia Changjun beckoned for her younger cousin to lean closer.
When Xia Xianshi heard that their grandfather, Shaoyang Jun, had intended to offer a great sum of money to take Gongcheng Zhu as a concubine, she was utterly dumbfounded.
“Da-Fu… Da-Fu…”
Out of respect for her elder, she could not bring herself to utter the word outrageous.
Gongcheng Zhu was twenty-eight. Shaoyang Jun was already fifty-eight!
Xia Xianshi knitted her brows.
“If she were an ordinary widow, that would be one thing. Even a woman from a family of low rank might be acceptable. But the Gongcheng family’s noble rank is Shang Dafu. How could he forcibly take a daughter of such a household as his concubine?”
For a daughter of a Shang Dafu family to become a concubine, it would be as the concubine of a king, a royal son, or a Gongzi. What business did a Jun whose position rested on his female relatives have trying to do the same?
Even Wenxin Hou, with a fief of a hundred thousand households, would not dare forcibly take a daughter of the Gongcheng family as his concubine!
Xia Xianshi was not particularly brilliant or perceptive. Yet her position and experiences had given her a sufficiently acute awareness of the ruler’s mind.
Even the daughter of an ordinary Dafu who entered the palace would receive, at worst, the rank of Qizi, rather than that of Changshi or Shaoshi.
If the ruler of the state himself did not treat the daughters of Dafu families as servants, how could a Jun elevated through his connections to the imperial in-laws presume to make such a daughter into something scarcely better than a female slave?
Instinctively, Xia Xianshi felt that something was terribly wrong.
“This must not happen!” she declared gravely. “If it does, the Yushi Dafu may use it as grounds for an accusation!”
An influential family of imperial relatives might disregard ordinary acts of arrogance and tyranny. But an accusation of overstepping one’s station was no laughing matter. One careless misstep, and the entire clan might find itself sent off to build city walls!
Xia Changjun gave her younger cousin an approving look.
“Precisely. That is why the Meng clan recommended Gongcheng Zhu to enter my palace as my woman physician.”
Xia Taihou was powerful, and outsiders could not be certain where her limits lay. Consequently, no one wished to make a public affair of the matter. It would be best if it could be settled quietly.
The Meng clan, favored by the Qin kings for three generations, was exceptionally well informed about palace affairs. They had found a way to petition Xia Furen.
For the Xia and Ying families to produce a little Gongzi together was of immense importance.
Had the Xia women not suffered difficult births and premature deaths, leaving only one surviving girl who had once been considered simple-minded, while women of the Mi and Zhao families bore sons in succession, Xia Taihou would never have made up her mind to secure the title of Chang’an Jun for Gongzi Chengjiao.
Having a Taihou in the family could raise a clan’s standing beyond measure. And the Xia family had committed far too many overbearing acts under the protection of that glory.
If the clan wished to preserve its splendor—and avoid being called to account after Xia Taihou’s death—it desperately needed one of its daughters to bear the ruler a son.
Moreover, Xia Furen’s rank was higher than Shaoyang Jun’s.
Between the weight of the family’s collective interests and the difference in their standing, Xia Furen had no difficulty restraining her granduncle.
Gongcheng Zhu obtained protection. Xia Furen gained an excellent physician and a debt of gratitude from the Meng clan. The Meng clan demonstrated its loyalty and generosity while discreetly displaying its influence.
All three parties benefited.
Only Shaoyang Jun had been left to suffer.
There was, however, one thing Xia Xianshi could not understand.
“How did the Meng clan learn that A-Jie was pregnant?”
…
“Who in the palace could possibly keep their eyes off Huicao Hall?”
Mi Furen knelt beside Huayang Taihou’s couch, stirring a medicinal decoction.
“Only a few ke passed after the Fifth Gongzhu spoke those words before everyone who needed to know had heard them,” Mi Furen told Huayang Taihou. “Besides, Xia Changjun’s mother was hardly discreet in her efforts to find a woman physician.”
Huayang Taihou had loosened her coiffure and was resting with her eyes closed. Hearing this, she gave a little laugh.
“Young people certainly have energy to spare.”
She had been a Taihou for ten years. The contests for favor within the inner palace had long since ceased to interest her. She concerned herself with greater and more important matters; the rest of her time she spent enjoying life.
“You have Fusu. Her child has not even been born yet, and even when it is, it may not be a boy. Why are you in such a hurry?”
Mi Furen lowered her head.
“I have Fusu, and Zhao A-Jie has Qin and Jianglü. That is why we were granted the rank of Furen. Yet she was made a Furen merely because Dawang loves her.”
“And if one day she becomes Wanghou…”
If that day came, even if the Xia woman could not bear a boy herself, would no one place an obedient, filial son before her to raise?
Such a son would have a formidable maternal clan and a “divinely gifted” sister whom Dawang favored and valued. Where, then, would Fusu find a place to stand?
People of high rank attached great importance to worshipping and offering sacrifices to the gods. But when a supposed “divine gift” appeared to favor one’s rival, then that divinity had to be false!
Such was Mi Furen’s justification for her treatment of the little Gongzhu.
Someone had recounted the whispering game played in Ganquan Palace to Huayang Taihou as an amusing anecdote. Only then had Huayang Taihou summoned Mi Furen to attend upon her illness.
She cared nothing for the struggle among her grandson’s consorts to win his favor. What concerned her was that Fusu, the eldest Gongzi of the Qin king, must never have a mother who would become a hindrance to him.
“The Wanghou will not be a woman of the Xia family,” Huayang Taihou said calmly.
Mi Furen’s face lit up with surprise and delight.
“Truly?”
“Nor will it be you.”
Mi Furen faltered. “Then…”
“None of you is worthy to become the Qin Wanghou.”
Huayang Taihou delivered those words with almost merciless coldness.
Mi Furen turned deathly pale.
“This concubine… this concubine understands.”
Only the daughter of a ruling king of another state could outrank the daughter of a powerful clan of imperial in-laws.
Since none of the three Furen could become Wanghou, why should Mi Furen rush to suppress the others before they had even begun to rise to prominence?
For all she knew, when a new Wanghou arrived in two years, they might need to join forces merely to survive.
Huayang Taihou stroked the dark hair of her younger kinswoman and spoke gently.
“Xiuyi, you have been more blessed by the gods than I. The state depends upon its eldest son. Raise Fusu well, and your blessings will come in due course.”
The fortunes of a state were never certain.
Go back fourteen years. Who could have imagined that mighty Qin would lose three rulers in so short a span? Who could have imagined that powerful Qin would be driven back toward its ancestral heartland, with enemies nearly breaking into the capital itself?
And who could say with certainty how long the present Qin king would live?
If the present king died young, Chang’an Jun would ascend the throne. But if he lived a little longer, dying at an age comparable to his father and grandfather, then Fusu would have his opportunity.
Judging from Huayang Taihou’s experience and understanding of the world, the latter possibility seemed somewhat more likely.
After all, the present king had no fondness for lifting heavy ritual cauldrons.
Author’s Note
Today I had taro milk tea with sago pearls and takoyaki. Delicious~
Translator’s Notes
– Erzhi Wan (二至丸): A traditional medicinal formula made with mohanlian (墨旱莲) and nüzhen fruit (女贞实).
– Shang Dafu, Qizi, Changshi, Shaoshi, Yushi Dafu: Historical ranks and offices.
– The cauldron allusion: The reference to lifting a heavy ritual cauldron evokes the death of King Wu of Qin, who was said to have been fatally injured while attempting such a feat.