Prince Wei’s Manor.
Costly medicines were carried into the room in a steady stream, and a thick, pungent smell of medicinals permeated the air, until even the very air tasted of bitterness. People of all kinds came and went — first physicians, then monks and Taoist priests. When the last group emerged, their expressions were grave. They bowed toward Prince Wei and slowly shook their heads. “Your Highness Prince Wei, we are inadequate to the task. The situation is beyond saving. We ask that Your Highness seek more skilled practitioners.”
What skilled practitioners were left in Chang’an to seek at this point? Prince Wei sighed and asked, “Is there truly nothing that can be done?”
The physician shook his head, and said gently, “The Young Heir’s spirits are still strong for now. Your Highness has something to say to him — please say it while there is still time, rather than wasting it searching for medicine.”
This was a roundabout way of saying that Wu Yanji was experiencing a final surge of energy. Prince Wei sighed deeply and waved the physicians out. Behind the folding screen, Wu Yanji lay face down on the bed — skin torn and flesh lacerated, his breath fading. His lips were cracked beyond recognition, barely looking like a person anymore.
This son who had been so full of life and spirit only yesterday was now reduced to this. Prince Wei watched this scene with a heavy heart. He turned around and said to those on both sides, “Wash the Young Heir clean. Prepare for the last rites.”
Princess Yongtai was kneeling on the footstool at the side of the bed, without pause feeding Wu Yanji medicine and changing his cold compresses, as if doing so would make him recover. Suddenly a group of serving women entered, carrying burial robes, and bowed before Princess Yongtai. “Pardon us, Your Highness. We have been ordered to dress the Young Heir.”
Princess Yongtai saw the burial robes in their hands, and her eyes were struck through with sharp pain. She cried out in anger, “What are you doing? He is still well and whole. Who gave you permission to bring out such inauspicious things?”
Princess Yongtai was gentle and slender, and always spoke in a quiet, soft voice. This was the first time she had ever raised her voice to scold a servant. The serving women were baffled by the reprimand and answered resentfully, “His Highness Prince Wei gave the order. Please do not make things difficult for us, Your Highness.”
Prince Wei’s order. Princess Yongtai stared wide-eyed and trembled with rage from head to foot.
Rationally, she knew Prince Wei was right. Prince Wei had more than one son — it was not worth burdening the entire family for Wu Yanji’s sake. That was why he hadn’t gone to the palace to plead for mercy yesterday. Wu Yanji was clearly not going to survive — it was pointless to waste energy on it. Better to use the remaining time to dress him in burial robes while there was still time. A dignified heir of Prince Wei deserved to leave this world with propriety.
Every one of them had their own calculations. Her grandmother was overcome with furious grief. Her father could only act helplessly. Her father-in-law had made the choice that maximized his interests. This was how it had been during the exile, how it had been when she was separated from Ji Xian, and now this was how it was with Wu Yanji.
They were all doing what was right. They all counseled her to know her place, to consider the greater good. But what exactly was the greater good? All she had ever wanted was to stay together with her family, to live as an ordinary common woman, steady and untroubled. Why did heaven insist on tearing even this most humble wish from her hands, again and again?
Perhaps because she had cried so long the previous night, Princess Yongtai had no tears left now — she shook all over, her body trembling, though her eyes were dry. On the bed, Wu Yanji seemed to sense something. With great effort, he opened his eyes, reached out and took Princess Yongtai’s hand.
His hand was burning like a piece of coal. His breath came in more than it went out, broken and faltering as he said to her, “Xianhui, you are with child. You should not be agitating yourself. Go rest. I am fine here.”
Princess Yongtai was like a bowstring drawn too tight for too long. In that moment, it finally snapped. All decorum abandoned, she broke down entirely. “Fine — how can you possibly be fine? A’xiong is gone, and now even you are going to leave me? What did I do wrong? How much more do you want of me? Just how much?”
Princess Yongtai’s voice had already gone hoarse from crying the night before. Her wailing now came out low and ragged, each word seeming to tear her throat open — a cry of blood-soaked grief. Those inside and outside the room who heard it all felt a chill run through them. Then suddenly someone caught sight of the bloodstains on Princess Yongtai’s skirt and cried out in alarm, “Your Highness — what has happened to you?”
It was not long after Prince Wei had arranged his eldest son’s final affairs that a servant came to report: Princess Yongtai, overcome with grief, had miscarried the child. The bleeding would not stop, and the situation was looking poor. He stood beneath the bare-branching budding mimosa tree and, once again, arranged his daughter-in-law’s final affairs.
When the serving women received their orders and departed, Prince Wei stood gazing at the garden erupting into spring. After a long silence, he said quietly, “So. Spring has come.”
A pity that Yanji and Princess Yongtai would not see it. Word was that Li Chongrun had not been saved through the previous night either. The Crown Prince had lost a son and a daughter. He had lost a son and a daughter-in-law. In some sense, it seemed, neither had lost by much more than the other.
May the three of them travel together in the realm beyond, and may they see the warmth of spring and the beauty of flower-filled mornings, a good season on a fine day.
·
Inside Duke Zhenguo’s Manor, Ming Huashang wept until she exhausted herself and dozed fitfully back to sleep. Ming Huazhang stayed beside her with patient steadiness the entire time, and only when her breathing steadied did he carefully ease her back down against the pillows.
When all this was done, he turned to face Duke Zhenguo and Lady Ming — utterly composed and open. “Father. Grandmother.”
As a gesture of respect to his elders, he lowered his gaze slightly. Inwardly, he was perfectly clear about what he was about to face. Now that it had truly come to this point, Ming Huazhang found he felt far more at peace than he had imagined.
For a long time he had held back, deliberated, always with too much weighing on both sides of the scale. He had suppressed his own feelings for so long, wanting to wait until he could find a way forward that would protect everyone — no risk, fully within his control, without harm to anyone — before he would confess his feelings.
But all things in the world could be controlled. Feelings alone could not. A love one could switch on and off at will was not truly love.
Prince Shao had died and he had not been there in time to save him. But at the very least he could still protect Ming Huashang. He had held her in his arms before the eyes of numerous elders and maids — in any family, that would have been an egregious breach of propriety, and frankly very unwise. But in that moment he had been capable of no other thought.
This was likely the most impulsive, the most out-of-character, the most unwise thing he had done in all his life. And yet Ming Huazhang found, to his own surprise, that he felt no regret — for it was also the first time he had ever acted entirely from the heart, without considering any consequence.
Nothing was more unbearable than losing her. Against that, everything else — the possibility of disappointing his foster father, the possible harm to the cause of restoring the Tang dynasty, the potential damage to Zhang Huai Crown Prince’s legacy — all of it became irrelevant.
He had burst his shackles in a reckless moment. Now, in calm rationality, he knelt to gather up the pieces.
Duke Zhenguo looked at Ming Huazhang for a long time and showed nothing, then said mildly, “Come with me.”
“Yes.” Ming Huazhang replied. He calmly and methodically gave the maids a set of instructions for caring for Ming Huashang, then followed Duke Zhenguo outside with a composed step.
Lady Ming seemed to sense something, and did not follow. Instead she stayed in the courtyard to keep watch over Ming Huashang. Ming Huazhang followed Duke Zhenguo into the main courtyard. Once inside the room, Ming Huazhang knelt with remarkable calm and bowed deeply, his forehead touching his hands on the floor. “I am at fault. I ask Father to punish me.”
Duke Zhenguo suppressed his anger. “What is the Commandery Prince doing? You are the lord, the Ming family are subjects. We cannot accept so great a bow from you.”
Ming Huazhang did not move. Both hands remained pressed flat to the floor, his forehead resting on their backs. In the clear, smooth surface of the stone beneath him, he could see his own eyes reflected — calm, dark, and unwavering.
Ming Huazhang’s heart was utterly at peace. “Father has shown me the kindness of saving my life and raising me as his own. Of course he deserves this. It is I who have betrayed Father’s trust, having developed feelings for Shang’er that I should not have harbored. I have come before you to acknowledge my wrongdoing.”
Duke Zhenguo sat above him and was silent for a long while. He had just been considering whether to pretend he hadn’t noticed — but this boy had gone straight ahead and pierced through the paper screen, leaving him no room even to feign deafness.
Duke Zhenguo sighed at great length. “Commandery Prince, please rise first. It is not right for you to bow so before me. You are still young — you do not yet understand the feelings between men and women. Perhaps in a few years…”
“Father, I understand.” Ming Huazhang rarely interrupted anyone, but now he did, speaking slowly and with measured firmness. “I kneel here today not as the son of Zhang Huai Crown Prince, but in my own name, as Ming Huazhang, asking for your forgiveness. I know what it is to love, what it is to bear a duty, what it is that exists between men and women, and what it is that exists between an elder brother and his younger sister. I have betrayed your guidance and failed to observe the three precepts of a gentleman. And yet I am unrepentant. I dare to make the presumptuous request that you show mercy and permit this feeling I have for Shang’er.”
Duke Zhenguo looked at Ming Huazhang for a long time. Even kneeling on the floor, he held his spine perfectly straight, his bearing unyielding. Duke Zhenguo sighed, stepped down from the seat, and raised Ming Huazhang to his feet with his own hands. “The Commandery Prince speaks too gravely. To know the stirrings of young love is the most natural thing in the world. The fault, if any, lies with me as a father for being negligent — neither of you has done anything wrong. However, Commandery Prince — you still carry the Ming family’s surname. Even if I were to consent to your marrying Shang’er, the entire world of public opinion would not consent.”
“I know,” said Ming Huazhang. He straightened up, his eyes calm. “Which is why I am not asking you to betroth Shang’er to me. All these years I have lived in the manor, using the guise of an elder brother to move freely in the inner quarters, and yet I have allowed feelings of a different nature to grow in my heart toward Shang’er. This is how I have betrayed your trust. I had to tell you. I ask for your forgiveness. As for whether Shang’er is willing to marry me, and whether I am lucky enough in this life to take her as my wife — that is her affair. I only want to treat her well. Nothing more, regardless of whatever she decides.”
Duke Zhenguo stood in silence, looking at the young man before him — eyes like polished jade, just beginning to show the edge of something fierce. When Duke Zhenguo had first seen Ming Huashang and Ming Huazhang’s improper behavior, he had been genuinely furious — he could not deny it. But Ming Huazhang stood before him so openly, so honestly. He concealed nothing of his feelings, and laid himself bare to the Ming family’s judgment while making equally clear that he would not give up.
Duke Zhenguo had raised Ming Huazhang as his own son with all sincerity, pouring into him every hope he held for a son, a grandson, a sovereign. This child had not disappointed those hopes. He had grown into someone finer than Duke Zhenguo had dared imagine, so that when Ming Huazhang unexpectedly revealed his feelings for his own daughter, even though Duke Zhenguo wanted to resist, he could not find a single fault in the young man.
Duke Zhenguo could only shake his head with a helpless and rueful laugh. At last he said, “So be it. Children’s affairs are for children to manage. I was a failure as a husband — I have no standing to point fingers at others. You have both grown up now. Work out your feelings between yourselves, and let things go as far as they will. But Commandery Prince, I must still remind you — the injustice done to Zhang Huai Crown Prince has not yet been set right, and Prince Shao’s blood has once again stained the Danfeng Gate. The road ahead is long and treacherous, and every step from here will be anything but easy. Think carefully about what you are doing.”
“I understand,” said Ming Huazhang. He lowered his gaze, and made his solemn promise to Duke Zhenguo — as a son, and as a man. “I know what I am doing. Whatever responsibility is mine to bear, I will bear it alone. I will never implicate Shang’er.”
Duke Zhenguo wanted to say that what he feared was not being implicated — had he feared death, he would not have carried Ming Huazhang home seventeen years ago. But as a father, he opened his mouth, and found he could not go on.
As a subject, he could face death without a tremor. But as a father, he selfishly wanted his daughter to live a peaceful, secure, and carefree life. From that vantage point, Ming Huazhang was truly not a desirable choice for a son-in-law.
In the end, Duke Zhenguo only patted Ming Huazhang on the shoulder. No words were exchanged, but both men understood the meaning of the gesture. From outside the window came a quick set of footsteps. A maid stopped at the door, breathing rapidly. “Master, Second Young Master — the young lady is having another nightmare.”
Duke Zhenguo’s heart lurched and he rose at once — but Ming Huazhang had already moved before him, and was hurrying outside with swift strides. Duke Zhenguo pushed aside everything else and rushed toward Ming Huashang’s room as well.