Today’s Crown Prince investiture was, in truth, somewhat unusual. What made it unusual was that among those attending the ceremony, in addition to the civil and military officials required by protocol, the plaza before the Ancestral Temple was also filled with a thousand elderly men of distinction from the common people. These elders, holding their crane-head canes and dressed in newly made garments, had not only been exceptionally permitted to enter the Ancestral Temple to observe the ceremony, but had also been granted, by the Emperor’s grace, places to sit.

Such a spectacle had never been seen in any previous dynasty throughout history.

The auspicious hour determined by the Observatory official who presided over celestial time and calendrical matters was the third quarter past the Hour of the Snake today. Now, with less than a quarter of an hour remaining before that mark, the Crown Prince, the hundred officials, and all one thousand elderly men of distinction were already in place — yet the Emperor had still not appeared.

Beneath the layered eaves of the great hall, amid the shade of ancient cypresses, the solemn and imposing Ancestral Temple stood before them. Liu Guan, the Minister of Rites, who as one of the Nine Ministers of the Realm was presiding as master of ceremonies today, stood in the spirit road and looked up from time to time at the sun climbing steadily overhead, a faint expression of anxiety crossing his face.

The Crown Prince’s investiture was second only to the Emperor’s enthronement — it concerned the dignity of the state and the mandate of Heaven. Every step had been rehearsed in advance, and not the slightest error could be permitted. Moreover, there were the thousand elderly men outside the Ancestral Temple, their hearts full of excitement, craning their necks in anticipation. If there were a delay, it would not only be an ill omen — it would likely stir all manner of doubts both at court and among the people.

Liu An surmised that the reason the Emperor had unconventionally invited the elderly men of distinction to observe the ceremony was that he wished the Crown Prince to rapidly establish in the eyes of the common people the image of one destined by Heaven to inherit the mandate.

First summoning the senior officials for a lecture, commanding their loyalty to the Crown Prince, and thus establishing his position at court — and then making these further arrangements — to be honest, although he had followed the Emperor for many years and knew the Emperor had always been fond of the Crown Prince, the Emperor’s various measures, which struck him as somewhat out of the ordinary, were not something he entirely understood. If not for the fact that the Emperor was in his full prime, with great ambitions still unfolding, he might even have had the impression that the Emperor was content with what he had achieved and now wished with all his strength to cultivate the Crown Prince to succeed him.

Naturally, that was far too absurd. The only explanation was that the Emperor placed extraordinary importance on this heir he had designated early, and hence the arrangements he had made today.

But the auspicious hour was nearly upon them, and the man was still nowhere to be seen. If the moment were lost, for a new dynasty’s Crown Prince under the eyes of all the world, this would be no small matter.

He heard the vice-ceremonial official standing behind him begin to murmur in puzzled undertones, and grew still more anxious. He was just about to send someone to inquire once more when he heard a deep rolling of drums from the direction ahead. He looked up — and saw the Emperor in full ceremonial hat and dragon robes, side by side with the Empress, both of them borne in a sedan chair together, approaching amid the escort of the ceremonial guards of honor.

Throughout the Ancestral Temple, which held several thousand souls, there fell in an instant a silence deep as reverence.

By the old conventions, the Empress had no assigned place today — but this being a new dynasty, certain rules were naturally the Emperor’s to set. If he could summon a thousand elderly men into the Ancestral Temple to observe, he could naturally also bring the Empress along.

Liu An let out a breath of relief and immediately led the protocol officials forward to receive them.

The Emperor and Empress took their seats. After the bowing ceremony had been received, an official walked out from within the Ancestral Temple and announced in a loud voice: “At the third quarter of the Hour of the Snake precisely, the great ceremony begins!”

The moment his voice fell, solemn and harmonious music and ceremonial dance rose all around; the ceremony officials took their appointed places; the master of ceremonies led the Crown Prince forward, and the investiture began.

This ceremony, compared to the preceding Emperor’s enthronement, involved nothing more than reducing the three kneelings and five prostrations to three kneelings and three prostrations, interspersed throughout with various other rites. As the sun climbed overhead, after the better part of an hour, approaching midday, the lengthy and elaborate rituals finally neared their conclusion.

A column of palace attendants came forward in procession, each bearing a tray laid with yellow silk.

On the trays they carried were, respectively, the Crown Prince’s coronet, his seal and tally, and his imperial edict of investiture.

Xie Changgeng stood before the altar dais, facing the several thousand assembled in the plaza of the Ancestral Temple. On the steps below the dais before him waited the Crown Prince kneeling in readiness, accompanied by the assisting ceremony officials.

Mu Fulan had been seated behind him throughout. Under the blazing sun, she noticed a small dark-red patch of dampness gradually appearing on the back of his garment.

It had begun no larger than a single drop of water soaking through, but slowly spread to the size of a coin — and kept growing, seeping through the closely woven silk of the dragon robe, like a stain of blood-colored sweat bleeding through the cloth.

No one noticed. He himself seemed entirely unaware. He remained standing exactly as before — spine straight, shoulders steady, utterly motionless.

The palace attendants finally halted at the designated position and raised their trays.

He descended the altar steps with measured, unhurried strides, received the Crown Prince’s coronet with both hands, walked forward to stand before the small boy kneeling in the center — and with steady hands, placed that gold coronet upon his head.

After the coronet was placed, the small boy received the seal, tally, and edict of investiture, raised them above his head with both hands, and then performed three bows of gratitude.

The sun hung brilliant and fierce directly overhead. Layer upon layer of garments pressed in on her; sweat poured from Mu Fulan’s skin without cease, quickly soaking through her underclothes. Her garments clung tightly to her back, making her feel as though she were being slowly tormented.

She could not take her gaze from the figure of this man before her. Never before in her life had she felt time pass so agonizingly slow. It seemed an eternity — and at last, she heard the master of ceremonies call out beside her ear, “The ceremony is concluded!” Music and dance rose once more; the Crown Prince was escorted down from the dais.

At the ceremony official’s direction, the close to a thousand officials gathered in the plaza, together with the thousand elderly men of distinction, all sank to their knees and pressed their foreheads to the ground. Amid the vast and orderly sound of farewell, Mu Fulan watched as he turned and walked back toward her.

Ten paces. Eight paces. Five paces…

She could see clearly the fine beads of sweat densely covering his brow. She could wait no longer for him to walk the remaining distance on his own.

Without caring about the sideways glances from several ceremony officials in the distance, she rose to her feet and walked quickly to meet him — and, shielded by Cao Jin and several palace attendants hastening alongside, she reached out and caught him firmly by the arm.

The tips of her fingers brushed inadvertently against his palm — cold to the touch, and wet.

His footsteps faltered for a moment, and then he gently loosened the hand she had wrapped around his arm and continued forward on his own.

Mu Fulan followed him in silence to the sedan chair. As they had when coming, they boarded it together, left the Ancestral Temple, and then transferred to the palace carriage waiting outside.

The carriage door closed. There were no more eyes watching from around them.

This time, he did not refuse her support.

He let her help him as he sat slowly down, and exhaled a long, relieved breath. He turned his face, saw her looking at him, gave her a faint smile, murmured quietly, “I am all right” — and then closed his eyes, tilted his head to the other side, rested it against the wall of the carriage, and went still, as though he had fallen asleep.

The palace carriage sped forward. Its wheel struck a small stone on the road and the carriage lurched.

His body swayed with the jolt.

Mu Fulan instinctively reached out again to steady him.

At the very moment her hand made contact, without any warning, the man’s body went limp — as though a soldier had shed the hard shell of his armor and revealed the soft infant within — and silently slid from his seat, collapsing to the floor of the carriage. His forehead came to rest on the embroidered golden phoenix of the palace shoes she wore.

Mu Fulan looked down.

The person whose brow was pressed upon her feet had his eyes tightly shut, his face the color of old gold — not a trace of color remaining.

She knelt in the carriage, held him, undid his belt, removed the several outer layers of his garments, and saw that the back of his white inner robe was soaked through with a great spreading stain.

Crimson blood was still seeping steadily from the wound, through the drenched bandaging, falling drop by drop onto the floor of the carriage.

Her teeth trembled slightly, beyond her control. She pressed down hard against that bleeding point, raised her head, and shouted toward the outside of the carriage with all the force she had: “Faster! Faster still!”

……

A sedan chair was carried directly into the sleeping hall of Ziwei Palace. The imperial physicians surrounded the bed, working with grave expressions.

Mu Fulan stood by a window in the outer chamber.

She was still in her full ceremonial dress, her hands covered in dried bloodstains, which she had not yet called anyone to wash away. Several palace attendants stood at a distance, watching her quietly. She was gazing out the window at the trees and flowering plants of spring, half-unfurled and not yet in full bloom — staring as though lost in them.

From the inner chamber came a sharp, clear ring of metal — an instrument dropped into a metal dish.

After a long while, she turned her head and looked toward the imperial physician walking toward her.

“Your Majesty the Empress, the sleeve arrow inside the Emperor’s body has been fully extracted. We have probed carefully with the instrument — nothing remains. The wound has been thoroughly cleansed, and the bleeding has been temporarily stopped — it has not surged again. However, as the Empress is aware, the Emperor has lost a great deal of blood, and his vital essence has been gravely damaged. The injury also involves the lungs. What follows will require careful monitoring.”

Mu Fulan was quiet for a moment, then said: “You have all worked hard. Please go and rest — two of you may remain here. The others, please go to attend to the Empress Dowager. I will manage the Emperor’s subsequent care.”

The physicians withdrew.

Xie Changgeng lay in the inner chamber, eyes half-open, half-closed — half in unconsciousness, half still aware. He wanted to open his eyes fully, but all his strength had deserted him. Even breathing had become torment. He wanted to sleep and let go entirely — but that last thread of remaining clarity seemed hooked on something, stubbornly refusing to leave him. Until the faint sound of that woman’s voice drifted into his ears — familiar, pleasant to hear — like a gentle current of warm spring water flowing softly over every pore of his body. He felt all at once as though his whole being had gone slack and loose, the pain seemed to recede from him — and his eyes closed. Consciousness left him.

His sleep was long and deep. When he finally woke, he knew it must be deep into the night.

All around him was perfectly still — not a sound to be heard.

The long night of the deep palace, a silence like the underworld — he was no stranger to this. In his previous life, he had passed through countless such nights.

But at this moment, in this sleeping chamber of the deep palace, at his side there burned a glowing, warm, dimly red light.

He opened his eyes and slowly turned his head.

He saw her, leaning on a low couch that had been temporarily set up beside the bed — her body curled slightly — eyes closed, as though she had been keeping watch here all along, worn through with exhaustion, and had fallen into deep sleep.

He looked at her.

In this moment, for reasons he could not say, a memory from many years past surfaced suddenly in Xie Changgeng’s mind.

It was far away, at the foot of Jincheng Mountain in the Tianshan range — that one night, in a small tent, where a dim and warm light burned just like this. She had gone down the mountain in search of medicine, worn herself to exhaustion, and had fallen into deep sleep just as she was now — utterly unaware of his arrival.

This scene, like a dream from a former life, caused an ache to rise abruptly beneath his chest.

In those days, he had still harbored a quiet, secret hope that he might be able to keep her.

He gazed at the woman in the dim reddish glow of the lantern, not daring to breathe too loudly for fear of waking her.

He sat slowly up, got out of bed, and on still-unsteady feet, moved quietly to the low couch where she lay. He lifted the blanket that had covered himself, and gently draped it over her shoulders.

Being this close now, he could at last see clearly — beneath her eyes, there spread a faint, pale shadow of exhaustion.

He gazed at the face before him beneath the fringe of her eyelids. Unable to stop himself, he raised his hand and slowly extended it toward her — and yet, in the very instant his fingertips were about to make contact, he recoiled as though a candle flame had singed him, and snatched his hand sharply back. He turned abruptly — and in doing so inadvertently pulled at the wound. A stab of pain shot through his lungs; his chest went heavy, like the urge to cough up blood; his vision went dark, and for a moment he could not keep his footing.

Mu Fulan was startled awake. She opened her eyes to find herself covered by a blanket, and the man — who must have woken at some point without her knowing — standing with his back to her, one hand gripping the edge of the bed, his body folding forward in pain.

She was alarmed. She jumped up from the couch and caught him, letting him lean on her as she eased him slowly back down into the bed. Then she sat at the bedside and gently massaged the acupressure points along his back.

Xie Changgeng gradually recovered, and said with his eyes closed: “I am better now. That just now was careless of me. Go and rest. If anything is needed, I will call the palace attendants.”

Mu Fulan slowly withdrew her hand, yet did not rise to leave.

She looked at the gaunt, pale face of the man before her, unshaven and drained of color, and said quietly: “That day, I told you — the ceremony could have been postponed. Why did you have to take such a risk?”

Xie Changgeng lay as though asleep at first, without reaction. After a long while, he slowly opened his eyes, met the gaze she had turned on him, and said: “Xi’er’s investiture is decreed by Heaven. As long as there is breath in my body, a coronation ceremony once set cannot be changed.”

Mu Fulan fell silent. He, too, said no more.

The lamplight flickered. One lying down, one sitting upright — so close they were nearly side by side, yet also as though separated by the farthest reaches of the sky. It seemed as though there were countless things to say, all rising to the lips — yet none of them knew how to begin, or what to say.

“You…”

“You…”

Both of them suddenly spoke at once, then stopped, and looked at each other.

His eyes were unmistakably dim and sunken — and yet within them something flickered faintly, like light.

Mu Fulan’s heart gave a sudden lurch.

At that very moment, she heard footsteps approaching from behind her. She turned her head — and saw Xi’er walk in.

The young boy came to a stop near the two of them, and said: “Mother, you are tired — please go and rest. I cannot sleep, and I wish to attend to Imperial Father.”

He gazed steadily at Xie Changgeng. “I will take good care of Imperial Father,” he said.