As dusk approached, an iron rack had been set up in the courtyard of the Ning residence, and a crowd of people bustled about together—some preparing charcoal, others preparing ingredients. Ning Xi, under Juan’er’s watch, was skewering a chicken wing with an iron fork beneath the eaves, while Wenfang and Wending, having just returned from outside, rolled up their sleeves and laughingly joined the barbecue-preparation army.
Before the Wu Dynasty, since the iron wok hadn’t yet become widespread and stir-frying hadn’t yet appeared, cooking methods had mostly consisted of stewing or roasting, nothing especially remarkable. The main thing that set the Ning household’s barbecues apart was that the diners mostly had to do the grilling themselves—though the cook would marinate most of the ingredients beforehand, the actual grilling was largely left to each person. On top of that, meat and similar foods were still something of a luxury for ordinary households, and Ning Yi’s fastidiousness about food, with all his various preparations, made the flavors at home stand out considerably. In the past, whenever word got around that the Ning family was doing a barbecue, people like Wenren Buer would make a special trip over just to join the fun.
Even within the Ning household, this kind of all-you-can-eat-meat occasion still only came around occasionally, and only after Ning Yi gave the order. Ordinarily, even though the family was already quite wealthy, running a household still called for a frugal attitude. As for the sort of extravagant excess found nowadays in the households of men like Cai Jing—where the kitchen serving a single person’s meals was bigger than a five-star hotel of later ages, and a single dish might use a hundred chicken tongues—Ning Yi certainly wasn’t incapable of doing such things, but in his eyes that sort of thing was simply too tasteless. And people who came out of that kind of environment were, by and large, already rotten to the core.
On another note, the great clans of the capital nowadays mostly had numerous elders presiding over the household, and things had to be done according to proper form and propriety. Apart from a household like Ning Yi’s own, it would generally be very difficult for everyone to let loose together like this with no regard for appearances.
By nightfall, lanterns of all sizes had been hung beneath the courtyard eaves, the charcoal in the rack had already caught, and Wending and the others had also brought back all kinds of wine and juice from outside.
Little Ning Xi, now just past two years old, clutched his small cup of juice and kept calling out “want a wing,” supervising the cook by the charcoal to make sure the wing he’d picked out came off the grill crisp outside and tender within. As Ning Yi’s eldest son, he was, in truth, a bit pitiable—the juice was rationed, only one cup allowed, and once it was gone, he could only sneak off to beg some more from his uncles, sometimes even getting scolded for it. Wings and grilled meat also had to be approved before he could have them; seasonal fruits and vegetables, on the other hand, he could eat as much as he liked, but how could that sort of thing ever taste as good as freshly squeezed juice?
In truth, even the rationed wings and grilled meat were more than his small mouth and small stomach could actually finish at this age—but for something he loved as much as juice, not being able to drink his fill left him feeling quite put out, and once he’d finished off one delicious little wing and there was no more, that was genuinely no fun either. His parents would occasionally also make him eat some vegetables he didn’t want.
He was happy, of course, genuinely happy—but for a child his age, there was inevitably some sense that things weren’t a hundred percent satisfying. Naturally, at his age he could hardly put this feeling into words; after being scolded by his parents, he’d choke down his vegetable leaves with a woeful little face, and then go right back to cheerfully working his charm to beg for more juice, without a care in the world.
This state of affairs was, in large part, a result of Ning Yi’s philosophy of child-rearing. In his view, the most important quality in a man was restraint. Though he did want his child to live a happy life, a hundred percent happiness was absolutely not what a child—especially a boy—needed. If anything, absolute happiness was something that ought to be avoided during a child’s upbringing; otherwise, that child would find it very difficult to grow into a true man later on.
Fortunately, little Ning Xi was fairly obedient in this regard, and his birth mother Su Tan’er was, if anything, even stricter about this than Ning Yi. Otherwise, the boy would probably have been reduced to crying all day long thanks to Ning Yi.
Still, at this point, Su Tan’er, as his mother, had begun to worry about other things.
“If he gets a little older… do you think Xi’er will turn out too soft? Look at him—he hasn’t got a shred of backbone…”
The young woman, mistress of the household, sat on the steps of the pavilion behind Ning Yi, gazing off at the child on the other side of the courtyard, feeling both a tender protectiveness and some worry. Ning Yi sat on a rock in front, grilling chicken wings, and when he looked over, he saw Ning Xi secretly trying to wheedle some juice out of Su Wenfang.
The little boy, not yet even three, was sneaking around behind a pillar, begging Su Wenfang for a taste of the newly made juice. After taking one sip, an unmistakable expression of “delicious” bliss crossed his face—yet he didn’t dare take a second sip, clearly afraid his parents would scold him, and clutching his little cup, he took tiny sips as he wandered off.
“He’s only just past two, and you’re already worrying because he’s this obedient? If he had backbone at this age, he’d be making trouble with us all day long, and then you’d really have a headache.”
Ning Yi laughed, turning his head to nudge his wife beside him. Tan’er brushed back a strand of hair hanging by her cheek, then swayed there for a moment before gently bumping into Ning Yi. He immediately called out, “Who wants chicken wings, who wants chicken wings—trade me some tofu or fish for them!”
The area around them instantly livened up, and Jin’er darted over from the side. “I’ve got grilled steamed buns.”
“Who wants steamed buns—no, I don’t want your buns, go trade with somebody else.”
“I want this skewer… and this one too…”
“That’s outright robbery… this is the biggest one, take it and I’ll be furious with you, and besides, the look of these buns of yours…hey…”
Jin’er triumphantly snatched the chicken wings away, and passing by Ning Xi, she crouched down and tore off a small piece of meat to give the boy. He chewed and swallowed it, then held up the half wing still in his own hand and declared, “Mine tastes better.” He’d only been allotted the one wing, grilled by the household’s finest cook, so naturally it was far better than anything Ning Yi’s own hands could produce.
Yun Zhu came over carrying a tray with several bowls of wine, handing one to Jin’er, then over here, passing a bowl to Tan’er and another to Ning Yi. Watching the charcoal fire rise, she glanced at what was cooking. “What do we have?”
“Steamed buns Jin’er grilled, and some fish and tofu we traded for. Honestly, I feel like I ought to prep them myself before eating—can’t trust the cooking skills of this bunch of animals… but you can start with Jin’er’s buns, they’re about to burn.”
“I don’t want any.” Yun Zhu, holding her rice wine, had already had a few sips, her smile a little tipsy. “Where are the chicken wings?”
“All traded away already. The last one went to Su Wending’s wife—I’ll be holding that grudge for a month.”
Since the Su family had come to the capital, the extended family had grown larger, including everyone’s wives and concubines. In the capital right now, the scale of housing couldn’t yet accommodate each family with their own separate courtyard, so everyone was a bit crowded together, though on the whole things were harmonious and happy. Ning Yi was the one steering the household, and the ordinary relatives and young wives generally didn’t dare act too freely in front of him. A moment ago, when Ning Yi called out about trading for wings, the woman had come over timidly and properly traded away her wing—she’d hardly expected Ning Yi to burst out with such a remark, and the women standing near Su Wending’s wife all burst out laughing; Su Wending’s wife herself blushed and laughed too, turning to explain sheepishly, “It was Brother-in-law who called me over to trade.”
Tan’er laughed and walked over to fetch two skewers of wings, setting them over the fire. “Yun Zhu, I’ll grill these for you—but you have to play a song in exchange.”
Yun Zhu laughed. “What does Tan’er want to hear?”
“‘The General’s Command.'”
“Hmm… now that’s a hard one to ask for…”
Yun Zhu frowned and shot her a sidelong glance, then carried her guzheng over to the pavilion. “The General’s Command” was originally a piece of military music, a tune meant for marching into battle, and it sat rather oddly with Yun Zhu’s gentle, delicate style. Still, when it came to music, nothing was ever too much for Yun Zhu—as the first note of the piece struck down, a deep and stirring sound rang out.
The guzheng’s tone was ethereal, and as the melody rose, the lyrics of “The General’s Command” spilled from her lips—not shouted, but softly recited, and yet the very first note that sounded was enough to raise gooseflesh on everyone present.
“Long winds at the frontier, the flute’s notes cold and clear. The desert sun sets, the waning moon hangs overhead. Day and night I hear the camel bells, drifting in dreams back to my hometown…”
The stirring grandeur of the military song was concealed beneath that ethereal surface, and as the melody grew more intense and the lyrics unfolded, the whole atmosphere of the courtyard seemed to grow ever more vast and open, as if everything were a tale hidden deep in the river of history, stirred up into great waves and clouds of sand by the woman’s telling. Yun Zhu’s musical skill was nothing new to anyone present, so it wasn’t exactly a surprise—only that everyone had fallen silent.
Tan’er simply sat beside Ning Yi, smiling as she grilled the wings.
“Three feet of blue-edged steel in hand, six letters from home beneath my pillow. I vow to take the enemy general’s head, and weep to see it done. Report it to the court! Who will hear…”
The reworked military tune carried an atmosphere that hushed everyone into stillness, as if listening to countless untold stories. When it ended, even Ning Xi clapped along beside them. These skills were, after all, a remnant of her days as a courtesan; aside from Ning Yi, who could freely ask her for such things, Tan’er herself would not normally make such a request lightly. But not long after, Yun Zhu went on to perform two more pieces for everyone. By now, she no longer felt any awkwardness about it—seeing the whole family’s delight was enough to make her happy too, there beside Ning Yi.
As for Jin’er, her particular talent was dance, a form of bodily expression that leaned rather toward the alluring, so aside from performing for Ning Yi alone, or exchanging a few moves with some of the female relatives, it would hardly have been appropriate for her to perform in front of men like Wending and Wenfang.
Gatherings and celebrations like this one were far from rare in the days that followed. Apart from the times he needed to visit the Chancellor’s residence, Ning Yi spent most of his time at home handling matters. There was a great deal that needed handling, but the specific tasks didn’t require him to run around doing everything in person—the basic operational routines of Bamboo Records had already taken shape, and from that autumn on, Ning Yi was remotely directing further refinements to Bamboo Records’ metabolism, so to speak: its operational efficiency, its capacity for generating new resources, and its systems of oversight and self-protection.
Even for Ning Yi, the whole endeavor amounted to something of an unfamiliar and novel experiment. The limits of communication meant that as Bamboo Records expanded, the responsiveness of its central core inevitably fell short, and relying on rules and regulations alone made it very difficult to contain the attrition of manpower and the friction that arose in its operations. Even if Ning Yi handled matters personally, when he focused on one particular problem, his grip on the rest of such a vast operation would inevitably weaken.
Even with the intelligence network of the Secret Investigation Bureau available as support, the problems that arose around Ning Yi remained extremely complex. Countless individual matters, piece by piece, could not be resolved by relying on rules alone, and yet could only be resolved by relying on rules and operational models together. Through the whole of that winter, Ning Yi devoted nearly all his outward-facing energy to this task, and aside from the occasional exchange he could have with Su Tan’er by his side, none of this was something outsiders could really be told about.
For the most part, though, he simply enjoyed the warmth of home. Ever since having a child, and standing alongside Ning Yi to hold up the household, the strength Su Tan’er displayed had grown ever more formidable. Of course, this strength wasn’t the kind that showed itself outwardly as sharpness—compared to the Tan’er of when she’d first married Ning Yi, who had carried more visible edge about her, though that edge had also carried a certain rawness. Now, as a mother, she seemed young in Ning Yi’s eyes, yet even as her outward manner grew gentler, her presence became all the harder to overlook—when problems arose, she would often find a solution while seeming to make light of it. Though outwardly more smooth and gentle, the household’s maids and servants still held their mistress in the deepest awe—that was simply an undeniable fact.
Only in front of Ning Yi would Tan’er return to being that girl who once sat chatting and dreaming with him up in the little tower in Jiangning. On nights when the weather turned cold and even the moonlight seemed to chill, Tan’er would curl up against him like an infant. Sometimes she would bite down gently on her lip, her brow furrowing faintly in sleep, and Ning Yi would reach over, wanting to smooth away that furrow.
In a sense, as his wife, Tan’er had taken on much of what should originally have been his own burden to carry. Since coming to Bian Liang with Ning Yi, Tan’er—already quite gifted to begin with—had matured all the more swiftly. She shouldered the household’s concerns on Ning Yi’s behalf, and in certain respects, could even support the operations of Bamboo Records for him, discussing all manner of matters with him. Such maturity did not come without a cost—outwardly, it showed in the fact that, even as she remained young, the pressure she was capable of exerting on those around her, amid her ever-growing gentleness, was immense.
And in that infant-like sleep, that furrowed brow.
One night, Ning Yi teasingly said to her, “I’m honestly a little worried—one day you might turn into someone as formidable as Empress Lü…”
The woman, lying naked in Ning Yi’s arms, only laughed clearly, feeling his presence beside her. “As long as you’re by my side, Liheng, that will never happen.”
Sometimes, she would also go rest at Yun Zhu’s place—a habit formed earlier, back when Ning Yi wasn’t at home.
Of course, it wasn’t anything of a romantic nature between the two of them…