Returning once more to the small lean-to that had originally belonged to her, Dan Qing’s expression went numb, and she only asked He Miao to fetch a small box she’d hidden by her pillow.
This had been the place she’d lived in ever since she arrived in this world, small, its furnishings a little worn, but it had been hers alone.
A little nook of her own where she could shut the door on everyone else and quietly work through her sadness and unease by herself.
But from today on, this place would no longer belong to her.
It would become Noble Lady Guo’s birthing room, and later, the room of the child in her belly, they would be the real family here, while she, from beginning to end, would remain the one who was unwanted.
“Princess, should we pack up your clothes and jewelry too?”
Seeing Dan Qing looking unhappy, He Miao asked carefully.
Dan Qing shook her head, only taking out a pink tourmaline-inlaid hair comb from the very bottom of her jewelry box and having He Miao pin it into her hair.
This comb had been the very first gift Consort Yi had given her after she’d arrived here, she’d keep it as a memento. As for everything else, she’d leave it all to Noble Lady Guo.
Her jewelry wasn’t much, but it was still worth some silver, Noble Lady Guo had always complained about good things being wasted on her, so now, leaving it all behind, she’d surely be satisfied.
The Grand Empress Dowager had specially sent eight servants along to help Dan Qing move her things, but on the way back, aside from He Miao carrying a single small box, everyone else’s hands were entirely empty.
As she left, Dan Qing turned back for one last look at the rear hall, only to see the door shut tight, let alone Noble Lady Guo, there wasn’t even a single maid there to see her off.
She couldn’t quite tell if she felt sad or numb, but she didn’t linger any longer, and turned to walk out.
Inside, Noble Lady Guo leaned against the door, straining to peer through the crack, her tears already soaking her collar.
Liu Ye, worried she might strain her belly, supported her from behind by the waist, urging, “Little mistress, if you can’t bear to let her go, this servant will go catch up with the princess and tell her you want her to come back often.”
Noble Lady Guo sniffled, and only after her daughter’s retreating figure had disappeared from sight did she finally straighten up and shake her head. “It’s her good fortune that the Grand Empress Dowager takes a liking to her, why should you tell her to come back often? I only wish she’d never come back at all, staying in Cining Palace forever, that way she’ll have a good future ahead of her.”
Liu Ye, feeling for her, helped her sit down, wiping the sweat from her brow and the tears from her face.
“Didn’t the person His Majesty sent say it was because you and Consort Yi are both pregnant and truly can’t manage to look after the princess, that’s why the princess is staying at Cining Palace for now? Why must you go and drive the princess away like this? What if, once you give birth to the little prince, His Majesty has the princess come back to keep you company again?”
Noble Lady Guo suddenly gripped Liu Ye’s hand tight. “Pah, pah, pah, don’t say such unlucky things! You don’t understand, as long as I don’t want her, the Grand Empress Dowager won’t send her back to me. Look at that woman up front, has she ever kept a room for the Fifth Prince? If I don’t leave the Fourth Princess a way back, she’ll only have a better life for it!”
Liu Ye’s eyes reddened too. “This servant only feels for you.”
“Nothing to feel sorry about, don’t I still have this one in my belly?”
Noble Lady Guo took the handkerchief and wiped her face clean. “Go quickly and take people to clear out the western lean-to, and make sure it’s a big commotion, best if the whole palace hears about it.”
Liu Ye agreed, then asked, “This servant noticed the princess didn’t take much with her, what should be done with her things?”
Noble Lady Guo sighed. “Gather up the useless bedding and things and have them burned. As for her clothes, jewelry, and the little trinkets she liked, quietly put them away and store them in my room.”
…
When Dan Qing returned to Cining Palace in low spirits, she found a woman in lake-blue clothing kneeling before the Grand Empress Dowager, seemingly pouring out some tearful complaint.
Seeing Dan Qing return, the Grand Empress Dowager cut the woman off and told her to rise.
“Princess, this is Consort Rong.”
He Miao murmured a reminder into Dan Qing’s ear.
Dan Qing understood at once and hurried to bow. “Greetings to Consort Rong.”
Consort Rong wiped her tears clean and managed a weak smile. “Greetings, Fourth Princess. Old ancestress, since the Fourth Princess has returned, this concubine will take her leave.”
The Grand Empress Dowager waved her off, then, noticing the whole crowd of empty-handed maids and eunuchs trailing behind Dan Qing, asked curiously, “Why didn’t you bring anything back? Was your mother reluctant to part with your things?”
Dan Qing shook her head, saying dejectedly, “I brought some, He Miao’s holding it. There wasn’t really anything else worth keeping anyway.”
As she shook her head, the little bell attached to the tourmaline hair comb on her head gave a soft jingling chime, and the Grand Empress Dowager, catching sight of it, felt she had a fairly good idea of things now.
Dan Qing hadn’t been wearing this when she left.
The Grand Empress Dowager had some impression of this hair comb, it was one of a batch of tourmaline ornaments the Imperial Household Department had sent in during the New Year. At the time, she’d told the princesses to each go pick out one they liked, and since Dan Qing had been ill and unable to come, she’d had Consort Yi go choose this one on her behalf.
Small and delicate as this comb was, it was only the kind of thing young girls wore for fun, hardly a treasure of any real value, and yet Dan Qing had gone back home once and only managed to pick out this one single item to wear back, which said enough about just how little of value had ever sat on her dressing table.
Since that was the case, there was no need to keep anything else either, this was a princess she herself was raising now, surely she wouldn’t lack for things to use.
“Sumalagu, go find some bright, fine jewelry from the storeroom for the Fourth Princess to choose from,”
The Grand Empress Dowager, feeling that Dan Qing had suffered a grievance, was all the more determined to be good to her, and instructed at once. “She likes soft, delicate shades like pink and purple, I recall there’s a string of pink-blue tourmaline beads too, find that as well and let her have it to play with.”
Sumalagu went off to comply, and Dan Qing didn’t decline either, simply squeezing in to sit beside the Grand Empress Dowager and wait.
Seeing that Dan Qing still looked rather unhappy, the Grand Empress Dowager picked up some milk curd candy from the table to coax her into eating, and Dan Qing, turning her grief into appetite, took it with both hands and began gnawing away.
When Kangxi arrived with Yinreng to pay his respects, he found his daughter once again with her mouth smeared full of milk curd candy, struggling hard to swallow it down.
Kangxi: …snort.
Yinreng: “Quick, bring water, can’t you see the Fourth Princess is choking?!”
After drinking a few mouthfuls of warm water from the cup Yinreng handed her, Dan Qing finally managed to swallow the candy stuck in her mouth. She shot a grateful glance at the brother who had rescued her from danger, then turned an angry glare toward her wicked father, who clearly found the whole thing amusing.
Kangxi: “Hahaha!”
The Grand Empress Dowager patted Dan Qing’s back to help her settle, while scolding her grandson, “Is this any way for a father to behave? If you hadn’t barged in so suddenly, would Garu have choked at all, and you still have the nerve to laugh!”
Kangxi protested, “Grandmother, can you be reasonable for once? You’re the one who gave her the milk curd candy that made her choke, what does that have to do with me?”
As the old saying goes, the old grow young again, sometimes, once people reach a certain age, their temperament turns almost childlike once more.
The Grand Empress Dowager, for whatever reason, was determined to spar with Kangxi today, insisting he admit that Garu had been startled by him rather than simply choking on her own, while Kangxi, caught up in the playful mood himself, absolutely refused to admit it, grandmother and grandson neither willing to give an inch, neither willing to concede defeat.
Dan Qing looked from one to the other, utterly caught in the middle.
She was nothing but a poor, innocent little princess, could the two great powers here please stop fighting?!
Yinreng, seeming quite used to this sort of scene, quietly took Dan Qing’s hand and signaled for her to slip away with him without a word.
The two children tiptoed out of the main hall and ducked into Dan Qing’s side chamber, only letting out a long breath once they were together inside.
“Never mind them, Han Ama will back down on his own in a bit,”
Yinreng winked at his little sister, finding the flower-like little girl in front of him especially adorable, and so said on his own initiative, “Garu, have you started learning to read yet?”
Having heard the Grand Empress Dowager call Dan Qing “Garu,” and feeling the name suited her well, he’d taken to calling her that too.
Dan Qing could read, of course, but it was simplified characters she knew.
She could make sense of everyday sentences written in traditional characters when they were strung together, but pull out a single character on its own and it became ambiguous, and if it were written in classical Chinese, she’d turn illiterate on the spot.
So faced with Yinreng’s question, she shook her head without hesitation.
She wasn’t even five years old yet, what characters could she possibly know?
Yinreng, looking like he’d expected as much, produced a small notebook from inside his robe and opened it to the first page, laying it in front of Dan Qing.
On it were some characters with simple strokes, written in a very neat hand.
“This is a copybook I made specially for you, to help you learn characters,”
Yinreng said with a proud little smile, seeking credit for his effort. “Grandmother Su speaks both Manchu and Mongolian well, but as for Chinese characters, she doesn’t know all that many. Han Ama says there are far more Han people in the world than Manchus or Mongols, so we absolutely must learn Chinese well and know our characters, so we can make the Han people listen to us.”
The principles of statecraft Kangxi had taught him were naturally far more complicated than this, but he hadn’t come here to show off, so he only picked out what Dan Qing could understand.
“Garu, you speak Chinese really well already. Why don’t I teach you to read Chinese characters from now on? If you can master Manchu, Mongolian, and Chinese all at once in the future, you’ll become a princess held in the highest esteem, maybe you could even be of help to Han Ama!”
Dan Qing thought it over, was Yinreng suggesting she might become some kind of translator in the future?
Whether or not this career plan was realistic, learning to read characters was certainly the right thing to do regardless.
She was, after all, a proper princess of the Great Qing, surely she couldn’t remain functionally illiterate, having to find some eunuch to read her a family letter aloud the way her mother did?
“All right, I’ll learn!”
Dan Qing took Yinreng’s hand and hooked her little finger with his, then very solemnly pressed her thumb against his as well. “Pinky promise, sealed with a thumbprint, no going back on it for a hundred years!”
Yinreng froze for a moment, watching his little sister stretch her small hand out so earnestly, insisting on pressing it against his own, and suddenly felt a sense of responsibility well up inside him.
His little sister trusted him. She’d said, no going back on it for a hundred years.
“All right. A hundred years. No going back.”
Yinreng’s eyes grew brighter too.
This was his sister. He would teach her, protect her, and never betray her trust. A hundred years, never changing!
Outside the door, Kangxi murmured quietly, “Baocheng, raised at our own side, has never been particularly close to his brothers and sisters. This is the first time we’ve seen him take such a liking to a princess, it seems sending the Fourth Princess to Cining Palace was the right choice after all.”
Liang Jiugong said with a smile, “Our Crown Prince is actually the type who cherishes people most, it’s only that he hasn’t had much chance to spend time with the other princes and princesses.”
Kangxi snorted. “We’d be quite willing to let them spend more time together, but who knows what’s really in their hearts? Go tell Consort Rong to take good care of her health, palace affairs needn’t concern her for now, they’ll be handled entirely by Consort Hui.”
Liang Jiugong acknowledged the order and withdrew with a bow.
Was Consort Rong actually ill?
Of course not, just a moment ago, on their way over, they had passed Consort Rong walking back looking perfectly fine.
But if His Majesty said she was ill, then ill she must be.
It seemed this Fourth Princess had now caught the eye of the most honored figures in the whole Forbidden City, better days lay ahead for her. As for anyone who dared scheme against her at this point, the consequences would be—
Well, they’d have only themselves to blame.