“As the folk saying goes: If the Winter Solstice falls at the beginning of the month, the cold will come at year’s end. If the Winter Solstice falls at the end of the month, the cold will come in the first month. If the Winter Solstice falls in the middle of the month, there will be neither snow nor frost.”

Every year in the eleventh month came the Winter Solstice. Farming families relied on determining whether this day fell at the beginning, middle, or end of the month to arrange their winter lives.

In the past, spending winter at the Yun family estate was simple—they only needed to store enough firewood. During the day, they would minimize activity, with the whole family huddled around the fire pit slowly enduring the winter. Whether worried or happy, they waited for the sun to slowly set, passing an entire day’s time this way.

Now it was different. Who had the leisure to sit on the heated bed passing time? Only good-for-nothings would do that. The vegetables in the greenhouse needed tending, the pigs and sheep in the back courtyard needed feeding, and the eggs in the chicken and duck coops hadn’t been collected yet. The chicken coop was fine, but ducks laid eggs quite casually—when they felt like it, they’d stick their rear end up and out came the egg. On these freezing cold days, it didn’t take long before duck eggs became frozen eggs.

Early in the morning, the young ones were driven up to go to school. Before age ten, regardless of gender, all children on the Yun family estate had to attend school. The housewife would ladle a bowl of porridge for the child, give them one of last night’s leftover steamed buns for breakfast, and if they dared ask for fried bread, their father would beat them. There was food at school for lunch—at home they needed to be frugal.

Driving donkey carts to work was something only people from the Yun family estate would do, because the charcoal kilns, pottery kilns, and lime kilns—these large kiln complexes—were all on the plateau. Going to work required traveling a hundred li. The farming households of the Yun family estate were basically all kiln supervisors or master craftsmen, returning home only once a month.

Originally the kilns had been right at their doorstep, but later the Marquis felt these fire kilns were dirty and didn’t permit such workshops within a hundred li of Yushan. Anyone who dared pollute the Dongyang River would have their legs broken. Actually, the farming households didn’t understand—little kids could swim naked in the water, farming women could wash clothes and vegetables in the river, so why wasn’t the kiln allowed to draw water from the river? In the end, they unanimously blamed it on the Marquis being too clean-loving and disliking the black, sooty fire kilns.

However, after working on the plateau for three years, they understood why the Marquis didn’t allow fire kilns to be built on his own land. Streams of black smoke blocked out the sky and sun, the air had a choking, acidic smoke smell, and when it snowed, a layer of black coal ash would often cover the white snow.

The people of the Yun family estate discovered this but kept their mouths tightly shut. When Chang’an now had foggy mornings, the entire city would be shrouded in smoke, making the imperial palace standing alone on Longshou Plateau seem as if it were built upon dark clouds.

This was a cautionary tale! The Yun family estate was truly a good place for people to live, which is why at Yushan, fire kilns were strictly prohibited. Pigment workshops, papermaking workshops, leather workshops, wool workshops, and textile workshops were all on the prohibited list.

Ever since Xu Jingzong relocated all the academy’s workshops to Sanyuan County, the Lantian County magistrate was very dissatisfied and was only persuaded with great difficulty. Meanwhile, the county magistrate and registrar of Sanyuan County made a special border crossing to Yushan to express their gratitude, since their jurisdictional people now had more ways to make a living. The academy’s workshops had always been famous for their generous wages.

Winter Chang’an City was not a place where people could live. The increasingly prosperous Chang’an now had a full eight hundred thousand people. Every household’s coal stove continuously spewed black smoke—one could imagine what the air was like there. Most frightening was that what they burned was all bituminous coal, which was what the Guanzhong region produced.

Every time he went into the city on business, Yun Ye felt that the high officials and nobles in the city were very pitiful. Ancient people from over a thousand years ago could enjoy the same treatment as their descendants—truly not easy!

Zhangsun was coughing severely and could no longer live in the imperial palace. She originally had asthma, which over these years had been continuously treated and nurtured by Sun Simiao with medicine, finally not having another attack. Empress Zhangsun, who in history had passed away in the ninth year of Zhenguan, had reached the tenth year still in good health.

Crown Prince’s Secondary Consort Hou Shi urged from the side: “Your Majesty, your body is unwell. In this daughter-in-law’s opinion, it’s all from being fumigated by the city’s coal smoke. This daughter-in-law has heard people say that respiratory illness most abhors smoke. Why don’t this daughter-in-law accompany you to live at Yushan for a period of time?”

Since giving birth to a daughter, Hou Shi’s arrogant energy had been dampened considerably. Fortunately, the Crown Prince loved the daughter to his very bones, which somewhat made up for her regret. Now she was gathering courage and vowing to give birth to seven or eight more boys.

Half-reclining on the bed, Empress Zhangsun nodded. Chang’an City in winter truly made her uncomfortable to stay in—she couldn’t catch her breath, her throat itched terribly, she couldn’t even have a good sound sleep. Going to Yushan would be good. Sun Simiao and Yun Ye were both there and could definitely help her chest feel more relaxed. This feeling of having a large stone pressing on her chest like now was truly killing her.

Very strangely, once the carriage crossed the Ba Bridge, Empress Zhangsun felt somewhat better. She lay drowsily in the carriage and fell asleep. When she woke up, she discovered she had long since arrived at Yushan. The carriage had stopped beside her small building, all the attendants were guarding on both sides, and only the small building had continuously bustling maids.

“Your Majesty, you rarely can fall asleep. This daughter-in-law saw you sleeping sweetly and couldn’t bear to wake you. This nap of yours lasted a full five hours.” Hou Shi helped Empress Zhangsun put on her clothes while wrapping the Empress in a cloak, then happily instructed the eunuchs to lift the sedan chair. Empress Zhangsun raised her hand to stop them and got down from the carriage herself.

The damp, cold air outside made her cough lightly, but after she expelled all the turbid air from her chest cavity, she felt comfortable all over. She moved her arms and wasn’t in a hurry to enter the small building, but instead paced along the small path by the roadside.

Empress Zhangsun’s favorite place was Yushan. Previously she would always go to Jiucheng Palace, but since Yushan had appeared out of nowhere, she had only gone once in these past few years. She liked walking on fallen leaves and also liked watching waterfalls and singing springs. Sometimes she would sit in the academy’s library for an entire day, take her books to the dining hall to get some simple food, and eat together with those students, incidentally asking about their situations. Being together with young people, she always felt she too became younger.

An empress shouldn’t be like this—she should be a high and mighty mother of the realm. It wasn’t that officials hadn’t submitted memorials impeaching her for lacking proper etiquette, but Empress Zhangsun truly didn’t care. In one lifetime, happiness was rare, so she continued doing as she pleased. Li Er banished the fellow who impeached the Empress for impropriety to Gaozhou to fish. He held a supportive attitude toward the Empress’s little hobby.

Not far from the small building where the Empress stayed was a grove of southern bamboo. She saw two young girls digging the ground with hoes where the bamboo leaves swayed. Walking over curiously, she discovered it was Gao Yang and Lan Ling. The two of them were digging enthusiastically, breathing heavily from exhaustion, with hot steam swirling from their heads. In the bamboo basket beside them were four or five winter bamboo shoots—they had apparently been digging for a while.

Clearly neither knew how to work—a perfectly good bamboo shoot had been chopped in two with one hoe strike. Really! Empress Zhangsun took the hoe from Lan Ling, ignored the two girls’ salutations, kicked aside the fallen leaves on the ground with her embroidered shoes, followed the direction of the bamboo rhizome, and quickly discovered a winter bamboo shoot. In just a few moves she dug open the soil and gently extracted a complete shoot.

“Your Majesty is amazing! Elder sister is a dummy—she’s already broken several.” The bootlicker Lan Ling immediately came forward to flatter, while flattering not forgetting to step on Gao Yang.

“How did you think to come here to dig shoots? It’s not yet time to dig winter shoots. Digging them now means there’s not much you can eat—such a waste.” Empress Zhangsun dug three shoots in succession. Feeling her whole body warm up, she stopped and asked Gao Yang.

“Yun Ya and Wu Mei have pickled shoots stir-fried in chili oil—they’re delicious! Elder sister went to ask her for some, but she only gave a little bit, so elder sister got angry and wanted to dig shoots herself to have the cook pickle them.” In front of Empress Zhangsun, Gao Yang spoke very little, but the bootlicker Lan Ling had already reported everything about her.

Empress Zhangsun laughed loudly, held the hoe, and had the two sisters carry the shoots she had dug and follow her. Only after leaving the bamboo grove did she discover that snow had already begun to fall outside. The imperial palace guards were arranging sentry posts here. The ox carts were hauling small pavilions borrowed from the academy—these small pavilions could be moved freely and had glass installed all around. They were specially used for guards in the field. Ever since Yun Ye heard the wails of guards freezing in the mountains last time, he had the academy specially design this thing. There was a small stove inside, and people inside were very comfortable. For visible posts, they just needed to light oil lamps; for hidden posts, they just didn’t light lamps. With mortise and tenon joints, they could be erected in the time it took to drink a cup of tea. The appearance of this thing won praise from all guards.

“Your Majesty, can I not go to the academy to sleep tonight? Early in the morning I have to run—it’s too cold. My nose runs so much it freezes—this doesn’t accord with my bearing as a princess.”

“No. You can eat dinner with Your Majesty, but you must go to the academy to sleep. Tomorrow morning you must also go running. The matter of the runny nose requires you to figure it out yourself. A princess with a runny nose is indeed unseemly.”

“I only have a runny nose. Yun Ya sometimes farts when she’s asleep. I heard it once when I got up at night—very loud, it startled me. When I asked her in the morning, she hit me and ignored me. She used to give me pickled shoots to eat, but now she won’t.”

Listening to Lan Ling’s rambling talk about academy matters, Empress Zhangsun laughed with great amusement, stroking Lan Ling’s head and saying: “How is it that a clever one like you didn’t think of this? For a young lady to be asked about such an embarrassing matter—how could she face people? When she hit you, I don’t believe you didn’t fight back?”

“Lan Ling gave her a nickname calling her Fart King, saying her farts were very loud, the king of farts. As a result, this name spread throughout the academy—not only did the female students know, but quite a few male students also knew. Yun Ya cried for three whole days. Only when her brother came back did things settle down. Lan Ling was punished.”

“At most I help out in the kitchen. You followed Meiji learning those strange movements, but I haven’t told Your Majesty yet—just wearing undergarments, waist twisting like a snake, buttocks shaking like sifting chaff. Your Majesty, you don’t know—now Gao Yang’s waist is so flexible she can put her head on her buttocks.”

Empress Zhangsun’s brow furrowed severely. Before her two daughters went to the academy, they never spoke so crudely. How was it that after staying at the academy for just over half a year, they were talking about buttocks and Fart King and such? Where was there any trace of princesses here? Tomorrow she would have to ask Yun Ye how he was teaching these children!