His wound was not large, but it was very deep — what was most to be feared was internal bleeding that would not cease, or the wound turning putrid and refusing to heal over time. Should either of these signs appear, his life would be in danger.
After that night, the eunuchs reported that although the Emperor still attended to court affairs daily, he had become compliant with the instructions from the Imperial Physicians, and each night retired to rest early.
The Imperial Physicians’ daily reports corroborated what the eunuchs said.
The wound did not worsen. The Imperial Physicians reported that in recent days, with careful treatment, His Majesty’s wound was slowly improving. They dared not claim there would be no lasting effects in the future, but as far as the wound itself was concerned, it was a good sign.
Regardless of whether Mu Fulan genuinely cared in her heart about that man’s life and wellbeing, from the perspective of his identity alone — the supreme ruler of a newly established dynasty — he was like a great pillar, the cornerstone of all stability.
On the day after he was wounded, while he lay unconscious, she had secretly summoned Liu An to inform him of the true situation and to ask him to conceal it on his behalf, to prevent his absence from arousing suspicion among the ministers.
From the day he elevated Xi’er to the position of Crown Prince, whether she wished it or not, she was bound tightly to him — and she naturally hoped all would go well for him.
Now that his wound was finally turning for the better, she had not yet had time to breathe a sigh of relief before another matter arose, one that demanded a great deal of her energy.
On the day Xie Changgeng’s mother had been attacked by Qi Lingfeng, the Imperial Physicians had revived her, and at the time she had appeared to be largely unharmed — but from then on, her demeanor turned suspicious and fearful, and she was frequently unable to sleep through the night. Mu Fulan and the Imperial Physicians treated and examined her and prescribed a great many calming and steadying medicines, but they proved largely ineffective, and her condition fluctuated between better and worse — until a few days prior, an accident occurred.
That day, the palace attendants came hurrying to report that the Empress Dowager had dozed off in a haze and awakened to find a palace maid attending to her by the bed. Whether it was that the palace lamp was burning too faintly in the distance, or some other cause, she insisted the girl was Qi Lingfeng’s kin, despised her with fury, and in a fit of agitation inadvertently tumbled from her bed, striking her head on the edge of the bedframe, and fell to the floor. When the attendants helped her up in a frantic scramble, she suddenly lost sensation on one side of her body and her mind became clouded. Only Xie Changgeng and Xi’er remained clearly recognizable to her — even A’Mao, who had served at her side for many years, she sometimes no longer knew.
Xie Changgeng’s wound had yet to heal, and daily court affairs were already numerous; with the Empress Dowager’s accident, he became even more overburdened, going back and forth each day between the Hall of Political Deliberation, the imperial study, and the Empress Dowager’s palace. Within a few days, he grew noticeably thinner.
Mu Fulan truly could not bring herself to look away, and so she began attending personally at the old woman’s bedside. Knowing that the Empress Dowager still recognized him, Xi’er made sure each day, upon returning from his studies, to come and keep his mother company.
And so, in the blink of an eye, more than a month had passed. Though Mu Fulan and the Imperial Physicians employed every treatment at their disposal, the Empress Dowager’s paralysis showed no sign of improvement, and she could only lie in bed. When her mind was clear, she was relatively calm; when it clouded, she was far more difficult to attend to.
After the Empress Dowager fell ill, each day Mu Fulan spent nearly all her mornings and evenings in the Empress Dowager’s palace, aside from matters that required her presence elsewhere.
On this particular day, it was nearly the hour of Hai when the Empress Dowager finally drifted off to sleep. Mu Fulan brought Xi’er back with her, saw him to the side hall sleeping chamber to rest, and returned to her own sleeping chamber.
She felt utterly exhausted. With her maidservant’s help, she bathed, then took to her bed and lay down, too weary to think further on anything, closed her eyes, and fell into a deep sleep. She had barely been asleep for long when a palace attendant from the Empress Dowager’s quarters came to rouse her, saying the Empress Dowager had just awakened and again mistook the attendant at her bedside for Qi Lingfeng’s kin, her emotions in a frenzied state, the attendants afraid, and they had come to Mu Fulan first for help.
Mu Fulan immediately rose, dressed, loosely pinned up her long hair, and hurried over.
A’Mao came out to meet her, her face downcast with misery. “Empress, the Empress Dowager no longer recognizes even me! A’Mao knows the Empress has been burdened with worry these days, but this side truly cannot manage the Empress Dowager — I fear that at this rate, if something ill happens again… His Majesty’s side, the Empress previously gave orders that unless it is a serious matter, he should not be disturbed. A’Mao had no choice but to send someone to trouble the Empress once more.”
Mu Fulan said it was no matter, then went inside. She saw the Empress Dowager propped against the bedhead, one side of her body unable to move as it should, while the other hand still in her power was pointing at a palace maid kneeling before the bed, her mouth mumbling incoherently: “Qi Lingfeng’s kin! My son is the Emperor — how dare you still haunt this place, bent on harming me, harming my son! Someone come — drag her away and kill her…”
She was screaming, that one functional hand pounding the bed with force, her expression fierce with fury.
The palace maid was terrified, crying out her innocence while begging ceaselessly for mercy. Hearing footsteps from behind, she turned and saw it was Mu Fulan — she scrambled and stumbled over, kneeling behind her, weeping and pleading for her life.
Mu Fulan dismissed the palace maid, took out her gold needles, and instructed the attendants to help the Empress Dowager lie flat, preparing to administer acupuncture.
When the Empress Dowager’s frenzied spells erupted, the calming medicine was utterly refused; only the gold needles inserted into the acupoints could quiet her.
A’Mao and the palace attendants knew the procedure and hurried forward. A’Mao coaxed the Empress Dowager while an attendant moved to restrain her remaining mobile arm. But without warning, the old woman’s eyes locked with piercing intensity on Mu Fulan, who was walking toward her, and suddenly — from some unknown wellspring of strength — she heaved herself over on the bed, and that one functional hand shot out at Mu Fulan with a fierce, vicious swipe.
The back of Mu Fulan’s hand was instantly raked with several streaks of blood, the welts rising beneath the skin as blood seeped slowly out — a hot, searing pain.
“Empress, are you all right!”
A’Mao cried out in alarm, then wept as she begged: “Empress Dowager, please, please calm yourself! The Empress is here to treat your illness!”
The Empress Dowager let out a cold, scornful laugh. “What do you know! You think I don’t recognize her? She is no good person! She took my son from me! My son used to listen to me in everything — whatever I said, he would heed. But it was because of this woman — she seduced my son, and after that my son listened to her instead, never to me anymore. In his eyes, there was no longer any place for me, his own mother! I will beat her to death…”
She struggled with all her strength, trying to lunge at Mu Fulan once more, but was pressed down on all sides by the attendants who rushed in — her body immobilized, though the gaze she fixed on Mu Fulan was still brimming with loathing.
Mu Fulan furrowed her brow slightly, took a handkerchief to dab at the scratched back of her hand, then took up her needle and pressed it into the acupoint.
Moments later, the Empress Dowager slowly quieted, her eyes closing, mumbling faintly, until at last she sank once more into a deep slumber.
Mu Fulan put her things away and instructed the attendants to take turns keeping careful watch over the Empress Dowager.
A’Mao, eyes reddened, escorted Mu Fulan out. Mu Fulan offered her a few words of comfort, then made her way back to the Palace of Ziwei.
She entered her sleeping chamber and dismissed the maidservants and attendants to their own rest. After washing her hands, she found herself without the least trace of sleepiness, and sat alone before the lamp, gazing at the flame, lost in thought for a moment. Then the back of her hand began to ache again. She glanced at it — the scratch marks had begun to swell. She rose and went to find the jar of ointment with its pain-relieving, toxin-drawing properties.
She opened the medicine chest where she habitually kept her medicines, rummaged through it, and could not find the ointment she was looking for. Then it came back to her — a few days prior, a palace attendant in her service had stumbled going down steps in the dark, misjudging the way, and had scraped the skin of her hands and feet; Mu Fulan had given the ointment to her.
Mu Fulan closed the chest.
In the dead of night, she was too reluctant to make a great fuss of sending someone all the way to the Imperial Physicians’ Hall to fetch more.
She absently took a clean handkerchief, intending to wrap it around her hand and make do for the night, when she suddenly heard a faint sound of footsteps at the entrance of the sleeping chamber.
She slowly turned her head.
A figure appeared in the shadow where the chamber’s palace lamp did not reach. It paused there for a moment, then walked slowly toward her.
The lamplight gradually revealed the face of a man — gaunt from a long illness, his features growing ever more sharp and sword-like — a face she recognized.
He had come.
After all this time — since that night he had awakened, and then left the following morning at the first watch of the fifth period — tonight was the first time, in all these weeks, that he had come to her sleeping chamber.
He was busy until very late every day and slept directly in the Hall of Yuanchen, night after night without exception. It was said that among the palace attendants, there had once been whispered talk that His Majesty did not favor the Empress; that the Empress had been brought from the Kingdom of Changsha to the capital and given the place of Central Palace only because of the Crown Prince.
But not long after, Mu Fulan heard yet another rumor making the rounds.
It was said that one night, a palace maid in service at the Hall of Yuanchen, emboldened by her fair looks, had tried to warm the bed of the Emperor as he was still reading memorials deep into the night — and had been dragged out by eunuchs that very same night, never to be seen again. She was said to have been classified among the ranks of palace spies that had not yet been fully rooted out. What became of her, one could well imagine. When the news spread, every palace maid was struck with fear, and from then on not a single one dared harbor even the slightest transgressive thought.
Shortly after that came yet another rumor: the Emperor had not opened the Six Palaces — the Empress alone held the position — yet he did not sleep in the Palace of Ziwei. The reason, it was said, was not what people had first assumed — that he did not favor the Empress — but quite the opposite: it was the Empress who was not pleased with the Emperor, and it was for the Crown Prince’s sake that she had come from the Kingdom of Changsha to take the position of Central Palace.
These rumors, of course, about the baffling and inscrutable relationship between the Emperor and Empress — they came like the wind and went like the wind as well. In this cold and rule-bound palace, no one dared speak of them openly.
Mu Fulan quietly lowered the injured hand she had been holding, concealing it beneath her sleeve.
Xie Changgeng halted a few paces away from her, paused, and said, “Just now, when I finished my affairs and went to see my mother, A’Mao told me everything…”
His gaze traveled from her face, past her trailing dark hair, downward — all the way to the sleeve she had raised to hide her hand.
“Your hand — what has happened to it?” His voice came out with a faint, stifled roughness.
“Nothing. Only a slight break in the skin. It will be fine in a couple of days.” Mu Fulan smiled and answered him.
He walked toward her, finally stopping directly before her.
“Let me have a look.”
His voice carried a tenderness and frustration that perhaps even he himself had not noticed. He hesitated for a moment, then extended one hand toward her.
But Mu Fulan stepped back, hiding her hand behind her back, a smile on her face. “It was only a scratch. I tended to it myself just now. It is nothing — there is no need to look.”
He looked at her, his outstretched hand suspended mid-air. After a moment, it slowly withdrew. Then he opened his other hand — the one he had been holding closed all this while.
Resting in that palm was a delicate little vial.
“This is the finest jade ointment newly prepared by the Imperial Physicians’ Hall.” He set the ointment down.
“Starting tomorrow, you need not go over there anymore. I do not wish to see you endure this kind of hardship any further. She has Imperial Physicians and palace attendants to serve her. I will go visit her myself as well.” He said.
“I thank Your Majesty for your consideration.”
Mu Fulan did not decline. She only lowered her eyes and spoke quietly.
Yet Xie Changgeng did not leave. He continued to look at her in silence.
Just as Mu Fulan was about to say she was tired and needed rest — she heard him say: “In a few days, the chieftains of the three tribal clans of the Southwest, and…”
He hesitated for a moment, as though finally making up his mind about something.
“…and Yuan Handing, will enter the capital together to pay tribute.”
“Yuan Handing has rendered no small service to the Kingdom of Changsha over the years. Whatever title you wish me to confer on him — say the word, and as long as it is within my power, I will not be the least bit stinting.”
Upon hearing that name, she quickly raised her eyes, and something overflowed in their depths — a faint light of joy, a smile of genuine, heartfelt happiness — the kind he had never once received from her.
And what right did he have to claim such a smile from her for himself?
In the past, even the man who had rescued her mother and son from desperate straits had not been her own husband.
Xie Changgeng gazed at those beautiful eyes before him, and once more something gripped his chest tightly — his lungs, wounded and not yet healed, seemed to pull with a dull, hidden ache.