Luowei’s fingers wandered through his damp hair, twisting and playing. Ye Tingyan lay with his eyes closed and then suddenly thought to ask her: “When did you go into that study?”

Luowei gave a soft laugh: “Three days ago — just when you left.”

Ye Tingyan was a little nervous: “So these three days, you…”

Luowei said: “At first I was very happy.”

She lowered her head and looked into his damp, bright, glittering eyes. The intention to needle him a bit dissolved considerably: “Chuyin never says anything untrue. At the time I was so overjoyed I was nearly out of my mind. I don’t know why — but I didn’t feel too surprised. I thought: you’re just that kind of person — even if you fell into a boundless abyss, you would find your way back.”

Ye Tingyan said quietly: “You weren’t angry… or heartbroken?”

Luowei said, deliberately keeping a stern face: “Of course — after the happiness, I started thinking: why couldn’t you trust me? But… in truth, I once went to the underground chamber beneath Song Lan’s Burning Candle Tower.”

After realizing what she was referring to, Ye Tingyan couldn’t help but stiffen.

Luowei smiled bitterly: “Before Ningle died she told me about it. I found an opportunity and went there to have a look. Do you know — Song Lan had already redecorated the place once, and put in my favorite sandalwood incense.”

“So it was because of that that you guessed his intentions, and despite the danger insisted on escaping at Guyou Mountain?” Ye Tingyan sat up and was pressed back down by her. “He dared to —”

“If I hadn’t acted, after Yu Qiushi’s death he would certainly not have let me go. I had thought before that at worst it would only be death — I never imagined… ” Luowei said. “It was too dark there. I held a candle and by the light examined the four walls. I found bloodstains on them. I felt my way along one brick after another, and nearly retched. Before long I fled back up. How did you survive all that time in there?”

Ye Tingyan reached out and gently stroked her face, wiping away the tears that were about to fall, one by one.

“So that was why when you came just now, I had intended to ask you one question — but when I saw you, I couldn’t bring myself to ask.” Luowei also reached up to stroke his face. She seemed to have grown very fond of this gesture now, repeating it over and over from earlier to now. “Xuechu told me and A’Fei — if one wants to completely change one’s appearance, there is a kind of medicine that is very, very painful. If one’s will is even slightly weak, one could even die in the process. But without it, you would not have been able to escape Biandu at the time, I suppose.”

Ye Tingyan laughed: “It’s all right. It wasn’t too painful. The suffering you endured within those palace walls was far, far more than mine by at least a thousand times.”

Luowei said: “Yes. We lived easy and smooth lives for more than ten years — how could we have suffered so much? And having suffered so much, why waste any of it on mutual resentment, suspicion, and regret? Just as I said before — none of this was your fault, or mine.”

“In your study there is a shattered bronze mirror,” she continued. “When I saw it, every shard held the shadow of the moon. These three days, I put it back together again. Now — it is a complete, whole moon once more.”

Even with the cracks left behind, it still has to keep being the moon.

Ye Tingyan sat up and kissed her. When tears fell onto her cheek, Luowei heard him say through a laugh: “Next time — next time, when we kiss, let us both not cry.”

“A’Tang?”

“Hmm.”

In the distance, the silhouette of the golden statue of the Crown Prince stood against the sky. The crabapple blossom at the tip of the sword remained. Luowei closed her eyes and saw a crabapple tree swaying in sunlight, all its branches bearing buds, not yet open. The spring breeze carried one blossom over and brushed it across the face of the young beloved, then fell upon her lips.

The crabapple is the flower of bitter longing — yet she tasted only the gentle warmth of sandalwood, slightly sweet, with a faint sorrow almost too subtle to sense.

And then that blossom opened petal by petal, evading the thrust of a slanting sword.

It would never wither. She recalled the words that had come from a divination slip long ago — the moon shines on the spring night throughout all ages.

Zhou Chuyin, standing on the other side of the boat’s prow, gave a light, deliberate cough.

*

After the hour of midnight, wind came through the window lattice.

Luowei was woken by this faint sound and felt somewhat thirsty, so she turned over and rose from the couch. She noticed that this room, which had been entirely dark before, had at some point been lit with a single lamp.

Just a moment ago there had been only moonlight.

He must have lit it while she was asleep.

The study was in disarray everywhere. Many of the hanging white veils had been pulled down. The sheets of xuan paper were scattered all over the place. Only the bronze mirror she had carefully reassembled still sat upright before the window.

Luowei recalled the way Ye Tingyan had cupped her chin just now, forcing her to look at her own reflection in the bronze mirror. Her face grew warm at the memory. She took a sip of the tea that had grown cold in the bronze cup, intending to go and pour another cup at the window — but after a few steps she felt her waist suddenly tighten.

Her snow-white inner robe had been slightly torn, but was still just barely intact. Only the long sash hung at her side — and at this moment, that sash was clutched in the hand of the person behind her.

Ye Tingyan had somehow also woken. He was propped on one arm, looking at her languidly.

She didn’t know what had gotten into him, but he had found another pale pink robe to put on after bathing. In the midst of their entanglement, the robe had not come off, merely become somewhat disheveled. Luowei looked back and saw his bare shoulder, and on his neck a fresh bite mark she had left.

She was still looking at this portrait of a beautiful person when she was seized by the sash and tugged — her already aching legs could not hold her up, and with a tilt she tumbled back into his arms.

Both hands slid along the gauze of her outer robe, adding even more of an intimate charge. Ye Tingyan kissed the back of her neck and asked indistinctly: “Where are you going?”

Luowei answered honestly: “A bit thirsty.”

And so Ye Tingyan turned over and pressed her down against the layered embroidered pillows on the couch, pecking kisses all over her face like an addiction, and said between each kiss: “…I’m also very thirsty.”

Luowei propped her hands on his shoulders, half wanting to push him away, but in the end let her hands fall helplessly.

In the darkness, she studied his features and was suddenly a little curious: “When you disguised yourself, why did you choose to look like this? Wouldn’t something plain and unremarkable be safer?”

“Not necessarily,” Ye Tingyan said in an unhurried tone. “Do you remember that day you came down from Guyou Mountain?”

Luowei said, puzzled: “Hmm?”

“I had already instructed Lingcheng then to put some marks of bee stings on your face — that day the palace servants who had accompanied the hunting party to the rear of the mountain had gathered honey, and many had been stung. Those who could not appear before His Majesty were sent back overnight.” Ye Tingyan said. “So there is no such thing as safe or unsafe — only fitting or unfitting.”

Luowei suddenly understood: “You traveled the rivers and lakes under the Third Young Master’s name to begin with in order to build momentum for your return to the capital. If your appearance were somewhat striking, it would be more likely to attract people’s attention — so when Song Lan sent people to investigate you, those who had seen you would firmly remember everything you had done. That way, none of your arrangements would go to waste.”

“There is another reason,” Ye Tingyan said, looking at her. “…I wanted you to like it a little more.”

Luowei raised an eyebrow: “You had not yet returned to the capital, and already you had decided to come and win my favor?”

Ye Tingyan nestled against her and laughed softly: “Who could have imagined things would go so smoothly? My Lady Empress, in your eyes do I not make a rather pleasing sight?”

Luowei flicked lightly at the garment on his shoulder: “Very much so.”

Ye Tingyan turned his head sideways, his unbound hair brushing across her cheek: “Then once more…”

Luowei glared at him: “Don’t you need to attend court tomorrow?”

Ye Tingyan said: “Court doesn’t resume for two more days.”

……

And so they carried on until the second evening. After bathing, the two dressed themselves and Luowei loosely pinned up her hair, then followed Ye Tingyan together to the front hall to discuss matters.

Zhou Chuyin was adding something to the defense map on the wall with his brush. Seeing the two of them enter, he didn’t even lift his eyelids. Bai Sensen came over to take Ye Tingyan’s pulse and said in surprise: “Your mood these past few days has been pleasant — it’s much better than before.”

Luowei hurriedly asked: “Before, when he had his heart ailment and would cough up blood — what was the cause?”

“Emotional depression, that’s all. The other day when the two of you were arguing in front of the bamboo grove and he fainted coughing blood — it actually cleared some of the stagnation in his blood,” Bai Sensen said. “The poison called ‘Withered Orchid’ is difficult to fully eliminate. That he has recovered to this degree is already no small feat.”

Luowei was taken aback: “The ‘Withered Orchid’ poison — that was the one from back then…”

She sighed and asked: “And his eyes, what about them?”

Ye Tingyan seized her wrist and offered it to Bai Sensen, saying: “If you want to hear about it, I’ll tell you everything in detail later.”

Bai Sensen took her pulse, his brow creasing slightly. Luowei was focused on studying Ye Tingyan beside her and hadn’t noticed. Ye Tingyan, his arm around her shoulder, steered her to one side and gave Bai Sensen a long, meaningful look.

Luowei, entirely unaware, moved along with him and asked: “What is the current situation at court?”

Ye Tingyan replied: “While I was in the palace, I sent Pei Xi to make a round of inquiries at the censorate and remonstrance bureau. The matter of the Empress being confined on Guyou Mountain has already stirred up a great commotion. Although the two bureaus have not yet resolved to submit a joint memorial, when Song Lan resumes morning court, many censors and remonstrators will certainly submit memorials.”

Luowei gave a soft “mm” and asked: “And what are your plans?”

Ye Tingyan smiled: “Naturally, to add fuel to the fire on your behalf.”

*

In the late autumn of the fourth year of Jinghe — the second month after the young emperor Song Lan took personal control of the court — the Censorate and the Remonstrance Bureau, citing two matters — the Empress’s inexplicable confinement at Guyou Mountain and the Emperor’s extravagance and frivolous pleasures — for the first time in fifteen years submitted a joint memorial at morning court, demanding that the Emperor release the Empress from the mountain and issue a self-reproving edict pledging to reform his ways toward simplicity.

Ever since the summer, the two supporters who had helped the Emperor govern — the chief minister and the Empress — had one after another been stripped of power, stirring resentment among the censors and remonstrators at the Emperor’s monopolization of authority. The acting Chief Censor of the time made especially sharp accusations, pointedly calling out the Emperor for his failure to maintain humility after assuming personal rule.

According to reports, the Chief Censor had come to learn of this after chancing to encounter a young eunuch within the imperial city whose palm bore a gash-like wound. Upon inquiry, he discovered that the wound had been left by gripping a sharp jade object — during the Emperor’s spring outing to the Twilight Garden for hunting, the Emperor had tossed a precious jade ornament about as a toy and smashed it to listen to the sound. After the Empress entered and intervened, the Emperor gave the smashed pieces of jade as a reward to the eunuchs. The eunuchs scrambled to grab the jade fragments, and in their fear that others would get there first, they clenched the pieces tightly in their fists — which was how wounds like these, cutting across the palm, were left behind.

Since ascending the throne, the young emperor, under the supervision of the Empress and the chief minister, had been reasonably diligent in his governance, and a reputation for benevolence was in circulation — for instance, the story that he had “not slaughtered the singing cicadas.” When the smashed jade case came to light, it was inevitably a cause of great uproar.

In addition, there had also been rumors circulating within the inner court over the past few days: it was said that after the Empress departed, the Emperor had wasted no time in ordering all the singing cicadas in the palace gardens to be killed. How many singing cicadas remained in late autumn? This act clearly showed that the Emperor had long harbored dissatisfaction with the Empress.

Public opinion, overwhelming as mountains and seas, pressed down upon the golden throne. Song Lan had originally only prepared a response to the matter of Luowei’s disappearance. Now the smashed jade case and the killing of cicadas were both raked up without warning. Song Lan made a miscalculation and flew into a rage, full of shame and resentment.

Perhaps it was bewilderment at why even such a trivial matter as “smashing jade to listen to the sound” could cause such a great storm.

In his furious indignation, the former Chief Censor Lu Hang mounted the hall holding his ceremonial tablet, struck himself against a pillar, and died in direct remonstrance — setting off the first case of a scholar dying in direct remonstrance since the Virtuous Emperor’s era and the Mingtai Restoration.

History would record this event as the “Jingqiu Remonstrance.”