The Grand Dowager knelt on the kneeling cushion embroidered with cloud-and-dragon patterns on a deep red ground, kowtowing with reverent devotion to offer incense before the ancestral tablets of the Xu family.

Nanny Du stepped forward to support the Grand Dowager to her feet.

“How do things stand over there?” the Grand Dowager asked, once she had steadied herself.

Nanny Du dared not tell the truth, and murmured softly: “The physician has administered the labor-inducing medicinal broth.”

The Grand Dowager, however, saw through it all as clearly as a mirror.

If the labor-inducing broth had been effective, the child would have been born by now.

She also knew the extent of the physicians’ capabilities.

If the labor-inducing broth proved useless, they could only resort to fierce and powerful medicines — and whether the mother or the child would survive would then be left to Heaven’s will.

At this thought, the Grand Dowager’s eyes grew slightly moist. Her gaze could not help but fall upon the memorial tablet of First Young Mistress Yuan.

You wore yourself out devising ways to bring Eleventh into this household as a wife, and now she stands at the threshold between life and death. If your spirit watches over us from beyond, then for Zhun Ge’s sake if nothing else, protect her — let her pass through this safely and without harm.

* * *

“Food?” Xu Lingyi was both astonished and relieved. His greatest fear had been that Eleventh Young Mistress would refuse to cooperate. He quickly said, “What would you like? I will have Nanny Wan prepare it for you!”

“Anything at all!” At a time like this, how could she know what she was hungry for? She only feared she might not have the strength when the moment came.

Eleventh Young Mistress thought of the child in her womb — how he had been put through all this turmoil, with no telling what state he might be in. But what was done was done. To be of two minds now would only plunge both her and the child into deeper peril. She could only make her choice without hesitation, actively adjusting her position to make it easier for the midwife to exert force. Yet her heart felt as though it were being cut by a blade, and tears spilled from her eyes beyond all control.

The midwife saw this and breathed a quiet sigh of relief, quickly saying: “Let the Madam hold a slice of ginseng in her mouth — that will help revive her spirits. Or if not, a little brown sugar water would also do.”

Ginseng would naturally be better.

But ginseng tonifies those who are robust; it does not strengthen those who are already weakened.

Xu Lingyi instructed Hupo: “Go and ask the physician whether, in the Madam’s condition, she may take ginseng slices.”

Hupo returned quickly: “The physician says that holding ginseng slices would be somewhat better.”

These things had been prepared in advance.

Nanny Tian, who had hurried over, quickly brought ginseng slices for Eleventh Young Mistress to hold in her mouth.

The other two midwives also grew bolder — one came to help, while another observed Eleventh Young Mistress’s reactions.

The light in the room gradually dimmed. The matrons began to light the lamps.

Eleventh Young Mistress lay limply in Xu Lingyi’s arms, gasping for breath in great gulps. The two midwives who had been performing the massage were also drenched in sweat.

Xu Lingyi took the cloth from Hupo’s hands and wiped the perspiration from her brow.

If even a grown woman was utterly spent, how much more so an unborn child.

“This cannot go on!” Eleventh Young Mistress forced back her tears. “Have the physician give me the medicinal broth — I am afraid I will not have any strength left by then!”

Even ginseng had proved insufficient. To use anything stronger now meant resorting to the fiercest of medicines.

“Close your eyes and rest for a moment!” He handed the cloth to Hupo and took hold of Eleventh Young Mistress’s hand. “When it truly can go on no longer, then we will use the broth.”

“I feel that it truly cannot go on any longer right now…” Eleventh Young Mistress murmured. Then from close by came the midwife’s startled cry: “My lord, Madam — the cervix has opened!”

Both Eleventh Young Mistress and Xu Lingyi felt a surge of energy at these words. Eleventh Young Mistress was already propping herself up on her elbow to sit, so alarmed was the midwife that she pressed her firmly back down: “Quick, lie down properly, lie down!”

The other midwives crowded around. One suspended a white sash from the frame of the canopied bed to give Eleventh Young Mistress something to brace against; another helped arrange clean cotton cloth beneath her; yet another placed a thick bolster pillow behind her back. Xu Lingyi, still seated there, had become something of an obstacle.

Xu Lingyi simply yielded his place.

Nanny Tian took the opportunity to sit at the edge of the bed. She first tucked a slice of ginseng into Eleventh Young Mistress’s mouth, then began telling her how to bear down.

What followed, compared to all the earlier struggle, was so smooth it was almost difficult to believe.

In less time than it takes to burn a stick of incense, the midwife had sighted the child’s head. Aside from a brief moment when the child’s shoulders became briefly lodged, nothing else went wrong.

Amid the jubilant cries of “Born! Born!”, Eleventh Young Mistress felt only a sudden lightening of her body.

She still remembered the matter of cutting the cord, and hastily called out to Hupo: “Scissors, scissors!”

Hupo rushed in a flurry to fetch the scissors.

The midwife dared not refuse. She took the scissors, cut the umbilical cord, lifted the child by the feet, and delivered two firm smacks to the small bottom. When she heard the baby’s loud, vigorous cry, her own heart — which had been suspended in dread — finally settled. She cradled the child, still covered in the traces of birth, and held him up for Xu Lingyi to see: “Congratulations, my lord, and joyous felicitations — it is a young master, a son!”

Xu Lingyi gazed at the messy, lustily crying little creature, and a tide of emotions swept through him. He could not help but reach out and touch the baby’s wet, jet-black, dense hair. He turned to Eleventh Young Mistress: “It is a boy!”

Eleventh Young Mistress felt as though she had just run a marathon far beyond her endurance — every inch of her body felt as if it had come apart at the joints, so exhausted that even lifting a finger was an effort — yet her spirits were strangely exhilarated. At the words, she stretched out her arms: “Let me see!”

“Madam, do not move!” the attending midwife said with a smile. “The afterbirth has not yet come.”

Xu Lingyi’s heart clenched at this. “Is there any danger?”

“Nothing to worry about, nothing at all.” the midwife said with a smile. “It has already descended.”

That might well count as both mother and child being safe.

Xu Lingyi allowed himself a joyful smile.

The room, which had been so oppressively somber just moments before, was transformed. Smiling faces shone on every person, the air full of festive delight.

Young maidservants ran off at once to bring the news to the Grand Dowager, the Second Madam, and the Fifth Madam.

Nanny Wan and Hupo helped Eleventh Young Mistress to tidy herself.

Nanny Tian and the midwife carried the child to one side to clean him.

Exhausted as she was, Eleventh Young Mistress could not settle her heart. She asked Nanny Tian: “They said the shoulder was briefly lodged — please examine his arms and see if they can move properly.” She also asked, “Does he have any other ailments?” Then, hearing no cry from the child, she propped herself up on one elbow to sit: “Why has he stopped crying?”

Xu Lingyi saw her pallid face and weary bearing, and pressed down on her shoulder: “You tend to yourself — the child has Nanny Tian.”

Nanny Tian quickly laughed and said: “Madam, rest assured — the young master is doing very well. He seems to know we are giving him a bath, so he has stopped crying. He is lying there with those big round black eyes wide open, looking all about.” She clucked in admiration, “The young master is so very handsome — this hair, jet black and lustrous, those eyes, bright and glistening, that complexion, rosy and red. When a child is born pale, he only grows darker with age; when a child is born red, he will grow ever more fair.” She glanced at Xu Lingyi. “I see the features favor the Marquis, while the hair and complexion take after the Madam.”

Another midwife also nodded vigorously: “I agree. In all my years of delivering children, I have never once seen a newborn open its eyes so quickly. This child has remarkable vitality — when he grows up, I dare say he will be a great general just like the Marquis.”

Though these were words of flattery, knowing the child was in good health, Eleventh Young Mistress could not help but allow a bright, happy smile to cross her face. In the warmth of cloth being wiped across her skin, she drifted in a drowsy haze and fell asleep.

When she woke again, it was deep in the night.

From somewhere in the distance came the faint sound of the night-watch drum. In the amber glow of the lamps, the tall, elegant figure of Xu Lingyi paced back and forth through the room, cradling the child, pausing now and then to smile down at the infant swaddled in the bundle.

Eleventh Young Mistress felt a warmth bloom within her, the corners of her mouth curving into a quiet, contented arc. She softly called out “My lord” and said, “Where are the servants attending in the room?”

“You are awake!” Hearing the movement, Xu Lingyi smiled and carried the child to sit at the edge of the bed. “Are you hungry? Would you like something to eat?”

Now that he mentioned it, Eleventh Young Mistress did indeed feel a little hungry — but the great red swaddling cloth, embroidered with the Three Stars of Fortune leading a deer among plum blossoms, was right before her eyes, and her heart was set only on seeing the child. She propped herself up on her elbow to sit: “Let me have a look!” Her body felt numb and rather taxing to move.

“Lie back down quickly!” Xu Lingyi said. “The physician says your constitution has always been delicate, and after this ordeal, without two or three months of careful recuperation, you cannot hope to recover your vitality.” Even as he spoke, he brought the child before her.

The child was sleeping soundly, his expression very serene. His little face was rosy and red; his features had not yet fully formed, but the nose was high and well-defined — plainly resembling Xu Lingyi — and his hair was jet black, as Nanny Tian had described, “jet black and lustrous.”

This was the little creature who had put her through such an ordeal.

Yet Eleventh Young Mistress, thinking of it, did not feel even a trace of displeasure — only a sweetness, gentle and warm.

She could not help but lean forward, using the tip of her nose to delicately touch his cheek.

Suddenly disturbed in his sleep — even if by his own mother — the baby still showed no mercy: he scrunched his little nose, then puckered his small mouth in displeasure, rubbed his head against the swaddling cloth, and promptly sank back into deep slumber.

Eleventh Young Mistress felt her heart go soft, so tender it could have melted into water.

“He is quite amusing, is he not?” Xu Lingyi looked at Eleventh Young Mistress, her brow and the corners of her eyes gentle as flowing water, and smiled. “Just now he blew a little bubble at me.” He pointed to the right corner of the baby’s mouth. “Right there — tiny, no bigger than a grain of rice.”

Usually babies would blow bubbles only after feeding, when traces of milk remained on the lips.

Eleventh Young Mistress quickly asked: “Has he eaten anything?”

Before the child was born, she had looked at several wet nurses. But because the first milk was best, she had wanted to find one whose confinement period was closest to her own, and had not yet made a final selection.

“No!” Xu Lingyi said with some concern. “He has been sleeping all along. The three wet nurses found earlier all tried to feed him, but he refused to eat. Nanny Tian says he may simply not be hungry yet. So they gave him a little water, which he drank down in one go. I suspect he may not care for those wet nurses. I have already given the order — first thing tomorrow morning, several more will be fetched from the nursing agency for him to try.” He also said, “Lie back down! The midwife says you have a wound, and told you not to move about!”

At that, Eleventh Young Mistress remembered the servants who were supposed to be attending in the room.

Xu Lingyi smiled: “I noticed that the maidservants who usually keep night watch in your room were all sleeping in the outer chamber. Fearing they would disturb you, I had them stand watch outside.”

Only then did Eleventh Young Mistress recall that earlier, Xu Lingyi’s footsteps had been unusually light — utterly inaudible.

Lost in thought, Xu Lingyi had already softly called out “Nanny Tian,” saying: “The Madam has woken!” Then he turned to speak to Eleventh Young Mistress again: “Mother and Second Sister-in-law and Fifth Brother’s wife all came to see you. Seeing you asleep, they did not wake you. They said they would come again early tomorrow morning. Zhun Ge and Jin Ge also came to see their younger brother.” At this he laughed. “Both of them were so delighted they could hardly contain themselves, and asked if they could sleep with their little brother.”

Thinking of those two brothers, Eleventh Young Mistress smiled faintly: “How are they?”

“Very well,” Xu Lingyi said with a laugh. “The two of them go to school together, come home together, play flute together, make lanterns together…I never expected Jin Ge to get along so well with Zhun Ge.” He sounded rather moved.