The accident at the lantern tower had shaken the Heavens and trembled the Earth. The nobles lost every trace of their usual polish and came jostling and rushing down the stairs in disarray. Princess Taiping’s hair had come half-loose from running; she stood on an open stretch of ground, struggling to compose herself, when from some distance behind came a thunderous rumble of an explosion — though it seemed somehow muffled, as though contained by some larger mass, the sound low and reverberant, the very ground shaking underfoot.
Princess Taiping looked back, gazing toward the distance. From that direction, a column of water shot into the sky like a dragon taking flight. Those around her from the imperial family sighed in relief, understanding that the crisis was over, and only then did they begin, one by one, to remember their dignity.
The ladies and gentlewomen quietly straightened their appearances. The court officials rushed forward to enquire after the Holy Sovereign and the Crown Prince’s welfare. In the midst of the leaderless confusion, Xie Jichuan stood out as unusually calm and composed. He called over the Feathered Forest Guard’s commanding officer, established a tight perimeter around the area, arranged for the eunuchs to prepare carriages to escort the Holy Sovereign and the princes back to the palace, and at the same time had the Jing Zhaoyin’s officers go out to disperse the crowd and clear a road for the imperial procession.
He was speaking in his usual unhurried and unruffled cadence — a tone that in ordinary circumstances could seem a touch aloof, but in this moment carried an air of particular depth and authority.
It was Xie Jichuan who had received them at the base of the stairs when they came down, and Xie Jichuan who had remained at their side through what followed. The Crown Prince and Prince Xiang trusted Xie Jichuan completely and followed his arrangements entirely. Even the Holy Sovereign, who was seldom deferential to anyone, surprisingly offered no objection. When the carriages were brought forward, she let a female official help her aboard in silence, and returned to the palace.
Once the Holy Sovereign had departed, it was the Crown Prince’s and Princess Taiping’s party next. The various dukes and marquises were clear-headed enough to know their turn was not yet, and waited with equanimity — some even finding leisure to observe Xie Jichuan’s performance with mild amusement.
Being the first to step forward in a crisis was both an opportunity and a risk. Among those present were Li family and Wu family members alike, princes and princesses — and when the carriages came, who boarded first and who waited would inevitably offend someone. The assembled nobles looked forward to seeing how Xie Jichuan would navigate it.
They were to be disappointed: the expected scene never materialised. Xie Jichuan understood that whatever he chose, he would displease someone — so he simply chose nothing. After the Holy Sovereign left without objection, Xie Jichuan deliberately dragged out the time, waiting until enough carriages had gathered before having the eunuchs bring them all forward at once. Li, Wu, men, women — all boarded together.
Xie Jichuan had a thorough grasp of the principle that people chafe less at having too little than at having unequal shares. Those foolish princes and princesses weren’t going to die from standing around a little longer in the fresh air. Let them wait.
The assembled nobility watched this play out and felt a mix of feelings, but could not help but acknowledge that Xie Jichuan was sharp. With that kind of calculation, combined with the enormous merit he had just earned, a meteoric rise upon returning to court was only a matter of time.
The quicker-minded among them were already speculating about Xie Jichuan’s matrimonial situation — word was that the eldest son of the Xie family was still unmarried, and here was a golden opportunity for an alliance. Calculating as they examined their own daughters and nieces, some faces lit up with hope while others grew dark with disappointment.
But today’s merit was not Xie Jichuan’s alone. There had been several young people involved, and they too were worth placing a wager on. Marquis Jiang’an suddenly found more people coming to make conversation with him, casually steering talk toward Jiang Ling.
This was the first time Marquis Jiang’an had ever heard anyone say a kind word about his eldest son, and he was quite at a loss with it. His first instinct was to have the brat dragged over for a lecture — but looking around, he could not find Jiang Ling anywhere.
Not just Jiang Ling. All the young people who had charged up the tower were nowhere to be found. They had appeared like shadows — arriving out of nowhere when there was danger, and melting back soundlessly into the crowd the moment the crisis was resolved, not a trace of them remaining.
·
In fact, the whereabouts of Ming Huazhang and the others was not particularly mysterious. They had simply been collected by the Xuan Xiaowei.
Liao Yushan’s conduct had been extremely serious in its nature; he was to be taken to the Xuan Xiaowei’s private detention facility for interrogation. Ming Huazhang and the other five, as connected parties, were brought along together to the secret compound. Once inside, the six of them were separated, as though by accident.
When Ming Huashang walked on and realised she was alone, she felt entirely at ease. Having done this once before, she was well past the learning curve. She found a comfortable place to sit and settled in — she had nothing on her conscience and was afraid of no question from anyone. She waited calmly for the routine questioning.
Ming Huashang sat there expecting an inspector to come at any moment. She had no idea that at this very moment, Ming Huazhang had already been guided through a special passage into the Daming Palace.
When Ming Huazhang was finally allowed to remove the blindfold from his eyes, he found himself, as he had expected, inside the imperial palace — and standing directly before Han Jie. Han Jie looked at him and said, with an expression that seemed to carry a certain weight of meaning: “You two truly never do things by halves. A few days out of sight and you manage to cause this kind of upheaval.”
Ming Huazhang replied evenly: “There was a traitor within the Xuan Xiaowei who intended to assassinate the Emperor. I would think that is your failure of duty.”
Han Jie offered no remark on this. He said: “Come in. The Holy Sovereign wishes to speak with you. My apologies in advance.”
The standard procedure before Xuan Xiaowei members could be received in audience was a thorough body search — no weapons of any kind permitted. Ming Huazhang saw nothing unusual in this. Ordinarily, however, he would remove his own weapons; this time was a little different — it was Han Jie who did it himself.
It might have been because an assassination had just been attempted. This particular search was unusually rigorous. Ming Huazhang stood with pressed lips as Han Jie worked his way along both sides — his waist, his arms, his calves — checking each in turn. Being touched on the body by another man, even through layers of clothing, was decidedly not a pleasant experience. Ming Huazhang endured it for as long as he could manage, then finally said: “How much longer are you going to do this?”
Han Jie straightened up and gave a smile that carried no particular warmth or emotion: “It isn’t that I doubt you — these are the rules. A betrayal has just occurred; I have to be more careful.”
Ming Huazhang met Han Jie’s gaze. Han Jie returned it with a slight smile. Ming Huazhang’s own expression was as still as a lake in windless weather. He said calmly: “Indeed. The General is right to be cautious.”
The two exchanged these pleasantries, and Han Jie turned and led the way inside. Dragon-saliva incense burned in the Hall of Purple Dawn — rich, heavy, trailing threads of pale smoke — so dense that upon first entering, one could not quite tell whether this was the human world or the realm of dream.
Han Jie brought Ming Huazhang to stand before a gauze-draped partition and knelt in deference: “Your Majesty. The person has been brought.”
Ming Huazhang did not try to see through the partition. He performed the proper obeisance according to protocol: “Your servant Ming Huazhang pays his respects to Your Majesty.”
There was silence from above. A heavy, weighted gaze seemed to settle on him. Ming Huazhang was accustomed to this. But something nagged at him as he looked down at the glossy gilded tiles of the Hall of Purple Dawn.
Given how significant the events of today were, the Flower Festival would certainly be cancelled outright, and the Holy Sovereign would no doubt have been escorted back to the palace at the earliest opportunity. But was an imperial carriage truly so fast as to have arrived before himself and the others — who had ridden light on horseback?
All at once something crystallised, cold and sudden, in Ming Huazhang’s chest. When he had bowed just now, he had noticed that the figure behind the partition was reclining — and yet earlier, at the lantern tower, when he had saved the person he believed to be the Holy Sovereign, she had been walking perfectly well, coming down the stairs without difficulty.
How could the Holy Sovereign’s condition have changed so dramatically in such a short time? Or was the person he had saved at the Hibiscus Gardens never the Holy Sovereign at all?
That had been a body-double. The true Holy Sovereign had never left the palace.
The chill spread from the back of his neck down his spine. He could piece it together now, and he was not even surprised. His suspicion had been correct: she had known all along. He had no idea when he had been exposed.
Ming Huazhang drew his hands slowly back and straightened upright. To rise without being granted leave to do so was nothing short of an act of grave disrespect — yet no one in the chamber made any move to rebuke him. Han Jie stood at precisely the distance of one pace from him; Ming Huazhang was quite certain that the moment he showed any suspicious movement, Han Jie would put a blade through his back without a second’s pause.
All these years, Han Jie had guided him without reservation, and before every assignment had spoken at such length that he came close to being tiresome. Ming Huazhang had trained his combat skills since childhood, but his true practical technique had come from Han Jie. There had been moments when Ming Huazhang had almost thought that Han Jie had some degree of appreciation for him.
He had believed Han Jie to be the one who had set him on his path — his unspoken teacher. But in this moment, Ming Huazhang understood: Han Jie had been, from first to last, nothing more than the Grand Commander of the Xuan Xiaowei.
Ming Huazhang’s expression was composed. He said, with calm deliberation: “That depends on who you are.”
To address the Emperor as “you” was an act of extraordinary insolence. Han Jie remained statue-still, as though he had heard nothing. From above came the Holy Sovereign’s low, measured laugh — which then turned sharp: “How much audacity the two of you have — scheming under Our very nose, deceiving your sovereign and committing a crime for which the punishment is death.”
Ming Huazhang said: “If the Emperor is wise and benevolent, a subject will of course be loyal in return — speaking with full candour and holding nothing back. But are you, in truth, a ruler worthy of trust?”
Han Jie, who had been standing like an old monk in meditation, heard those words and lifted his eyelids the faintest degree, directing a glance at the straight and unwavering back before him — then let his gaze drop again.
He had told him so many times. And the boy hadn’t listened to a single word. Han Jie reflected inwardly that Ming Huazhang was still far too young — still seeing the world in pure black and white, with no tolerance for ambiguity. Some things were better kept to oneself. What good came of stating them aloud?
As expected, the Holy Sovereign was provoked to anger. She pushed herself upright against the low table-rest before her, and when she spoke, authority radiated from her without effort: “What did you say?”
“Merely some thoughts of my own.” Ming Huazhang held her gaze without flinching through the gauze of the partition. He said: “I have often found it difficult to know how to assess you. If you are a mother — you drove your own sons to their deaths; not long ago you had your grandson beaten to death; Princess Yongtai was only a month along in her pregnancy and was frightened out of it, just like that. If you are an Emperor — I have nothing to say against routing political enemies for the sake of the realm, but if you are going to hold power, hold it all the way. You should have been a capable sovereign of the Zhou dynasty rather than relying on cruel officials, elevating sycophants, placing your confidence in male favourites, and using terror to suppress all dissent.”
The Holy Sovereign narrowed her eyes: “You think We have erred?”
“Whether it is error or not is not for me to determine — it ought to be given to all the world to judge.” Ming Huazhang’s gaze was burning and direct as he faced her, and he asked: “Holy Sovereign of the Zhou, dare you ask the people of this realm — ask the historians and the generations to come — whether you have been a good Emperor? If you can answer that with a clear conscience, then I, a remnant of the former dynasty, am willing to be taken into custody without resistance, in exchange for the stability of your realm. But if you cannot, then I will certainly work to bring down a tyrant on behalf of the people — and even if I die for it, the flame of resistance will be passed on, and one day that spark will become a wildfire that no force can contain.”
The Holy Sovereign let out a cold sound — not from anger, but from finding it faintly amusing. She had risen from the position of a Talented Lady. Her enemies had included Wang Empress and the Noble Consort Xiao, born of distinguished lineages; Grand Marshal Zhangsun Wuji, a kinsman with supreme authority; the vast old aristocratic clans; the entire imperial family; and the absolute authority that generation upon generation of men had poured, like stone laid on stone, into an unbreakable edifice over thousands of years. And yet they had all become dust beneath her feet. What standing did a young man with neither soldiers nor power have to challenge her?
Ming Huazhang was dismissed, but felt neither anger nor wounded pride. His spine was still perfectly straight as he said: “I have neither the resources of Lü Buwei nor the stratagems of Zhang Liang. What I have amounts to two words: ‘benevolence and justice.’ I believe these things exist in the world — which is why, when I learned of Liao Yushan’s plan, I fought to reach Qujiang Pool. And it is equally because I believe in benevolence and justice that I will resist your governance of cruelty and violence to the very end. Holy Sovereign — I also want to ask you: what is it that you truly want? If it is for every person under Heaven to fear you, then by all means, continue as you are. If it is to be a ruler who actually does something of worth, then everything you have done up to now has been profoundly wrong.”
Ming Huazhang’s words were straightforward and plain, his argument common enough to be easily picked apart — next to those beautifully crafted memorials full of penetrating arguments and literary elegance, this was exceedingly easy to refute. Yet the Holy Sovereign sat in silence for a long time. Because she could tell the difference: those elegantly turned memorials were fine words. But what came from this young man standing before her was something he genuinely, with his whole heart, believed.
The Holy Sovereign could not help following his words and asking herself: what was it she truly wanted?
She had been fighting her entire life, and was truly, deeply tired of it. Life and death cannot be reversed; she had already reached the end of hers, and in the time remaining she only wished to live to the full — to reclaim all the pleasure the first half of her life had denied her. She had made her pilgrimage to Mount Tai, she had founded a dynasty, she had become the first woman to sit upon the throne of the Emperor — these achievements could not be stripped from her by anyone. But that the Zhou dynasty would have no successor, that the governance would revert to the Tang — this too had already been decided and could not be changed. What meaning was there in further repression, in further vengeance?
She had already sent away her eldest daughter, her eldest son, her second son, her eldest grandson. She had no wish to kill another grandchild. Revenge given and revenge taken — when would it end? They were political enemies, and they were family. This cycle of retribution — it was time for it to stop.
The Holy Sovereign let out a slow breath, as though all the strength had gone out of her at once. She sank back against the day-couch in weariness, and said: “All of you leave.”
Having delivered his speech — or one might say his tirade, directed squarely at the Holy Sovereign — Ming Huazhang had been ready to face the storm with composure. He had not expected only a gentle wind — without even a thunderclap, and then it was over. Ming Huazhang raised his eyes and swept a brief look at the indistinct shape of the old woman behind the gauze, knowing he had gambled correctly.
The Holy Sovereign had made wide use of cruel officials, harsh laws, and the encouragement of informers — but she herself personally despised informers. There had once been an official who, seeking to please her, had written a sealed memorandum denouncing a friend for something said over dinner. The next morning at court, she had hurled the memorial directly at the man’s face in front of the entire assembled court and civil service, condemning the informer as a despicable wretch — his friend had fed him beef, and he had repaid it by carrying tales behind his back. That the loyal subjects of the Li Tang — men like Lord Di — had been able to survive and remain was also in part because she had a genuine, deep-seated respect and admiration for that kind of honest and upright integrity.
She was an extraordinary judge of people. She had killed Li Xian’s entire family; it would be extraordinary if Ming Huazhang harboured not a shred of grievance over it. Better to lay his hostility plainly on the table than to cajole and flatter and wag his tail like a dog. Ming Huazhang chose to trust that the first woman to rule as Emperor in the history of the realm would have the capacity to tolerate someone like himself.
As it turned out, he had gambled correctly.
The Holy Sovereign was letting him leave. That meant she had no intention of taking his life. If even Ming Huazhang went unharmed, the Duke Zhenguo’s household was in even less danger. Ming Huazhang could finally release the tension he had held in his body since the moment he walked in. Without another word, he rose and left.
Han Jie, with the good sense to know when to follow, also withdrew from the great hall. When they stepped out into the daylight, Han Jie glanced at him with an expression that hovered somewhere between a smile and something else: “His Lordship Prince has rendered meritorious service in protecting the imperial carriage. Congratulations are in order.”
Since the Holy Sovereign now knew that Ming Huazhang was Li Xian’s son and had chosen not to kill him, she would hardly allow him to go on living under someone else’s family name. It was easy to foresee: Ming Huazhang would soon be reverting to his birth name, and receiving a prince’s title and territory would follow as a matter of course.
Ming Huazhang returned his gaze with the same steady composure: “General Han sees all and hears all. I would not dare claim merit in your presence.”
Han Jie smiled and gave a slight bow: “We both serve the court as best we can. That is all either of us does.”