After all, West Lake in the sixth month has a beauty unlike any other season — its lotus leaves stretch to meet the sky in boundless green, and lotus blossoms glow crimson in the sun, a red like no other.
The Southern Court.
It was an especially scorching summer day, and Jiangnan was once again nearing the season for gathering lotus. Amid the maddening drone of cicadas, Zhou Pei woke from her sleep, the traces of a nightmare still lingering faintly in her mind — thousands upon thousands of people locked in conflict, their fury converging into an unspeakable tide in the darkness, the smell of blood drifting from somewhere far away.
How much time had passed since that nightmarish great battle?
The Jurchens combing the mountains and searching the seas, the wanton slaughter across Jiangnan.
The half year she and her father had drifted upon the sea, leaving her younger brother behind to flee and struggle across this stretch of Jiangnan for that same half year.
In memory, so much time seemed to have passed. And yet, thinking carefully, it also felt as though it had only just happened.
Her personal maid, Yiren, came in carrying iced plum soup. She roused herself a little, brushing the gloom from her mind, and before long had changed her clothes and stepped out of her room. In the corridor, the eaves of the Princess’s residence cast a stretch of shade; ahead lay a walkway, groves of trees, and a great lotus pond, its rippling water glinting in the sunlight.
The weather was too hot — the walkways and pavilions built over the pond stood empty of people, and only the occasional guard on duty could be glimpsed beneath the eaves. Amid the cicada song, the faint sound of quarreling drifted over from the neighboring courtyard down the corridor.
Zhou Pei frowned and walked that way. The long corridor stretched on, and the voices grew clearer the closer she came — and it was precisely that clarity which made her mood settle ever more heavily.
The courtyard where she lived faced that great pond and was the most spacious of all, with more than ten rooms lined up along the water, looking out over the gardens and pavilions by or upon the water. It was, in effect, the heart of the Princess’s residence, and it was here that Zhou Pei lived and handled her daily affairs. The courtyard beside it was somewhat smaller; a great scholar tree within cast a patch of shade beneath the punishing sun. As Zhou Pei approached, she saw what appeared to be a confrontation between two men — though in truth it was only one man picking a fight. The Prince Consort, Qu Zonghui, was cursing at Cheng Zhouhai, having gone on for some while already, and seeing that Cheng Zhouhai refused to respond at all, he now rushed forward and shoved him.
“…What, too good to talk to me? You think being some pretty-faced boy toy makes you something? Look at your age — you’re old enough to be her father…”
Facing Qu Zonghui, Cheng Zhouhai simply kept his eyes lowered and said nothing. When the Prince Consort charged forward and shoved with both hands, he stepped back twice, so that the blow landed on empty air, and Qu Zonghui himself stumbled forward two steps, nearly falling. This only made Qu Zonghui angrier still. “You still dare to dodge me…”
“Enough!”
Zhou Pei appeared at the courtyard gate, her almond eyes blazing with anger. Dressed in full palace attire, the Princess Imperial carried her own natural authority, and the moment she appeared, the courtyard fell silent. She looked at the man who was, in name, her husband, and in her eyes was an undisguised disappointment — though this was hardly the first time. After forcing herself to take two breaths, she tilted her head slightly. “The Prince Consort has been terribly rude. Take him away.”
She said this to the maid at her side, Gong Yiren, who bowed to receive the order, then quietly summoned two guards standing nearby. As they approached Qu Zonghui, they murmured apologies. The guards stepped forward, but Qu Zonghui raised his chin at Zhou Pei and waved a hand, refusing to let them near.
“I’ll leave on my own!”
Having declared this proudly, he glanced once more at Cheng Zhouhai, then turned and left the courtyard.
Seen only from behind as he walked away, Qu Zonghui was tall and slender, his robes trailing gracefully, his stride carrying itself with pride — indeed a man who could win the hearts of many women. Over the years, he had in fact relied on this very appearance to capture the affections of many women throughout Lin’an. And every time he left Zhou Pei’s presence, he made sure to maintain this same air of composure, perhaps hoping that seeing his pride, she might, in some small way, come to reconsider.
Yet he had never once understood that the woman before him had never harbored much longing for this side of a man. Perhaps she had simply seen too much, too early, or perhaps it was because of the endlessly complicated situations she had been responsible for handling these past several years. Each time Qu Zonghui made an effort to win back her affection, it would last a few days, sometimes half a month, and then, met with no response at all from Zhou Pei, he would storm off in humiliated anger, throwing himself into the arms of other women under the pretext of having “given up on himself.”
To Zhou Pei now, such efforts felt too much like a child’s game. Qu Zonghui did not understand that his “efforts” were, in truth, an arrogant mockery of the labor of everyone who did real work in this world — every single matter handled by the Princess’s residence touched the livelihoods of hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of people. If there were room in any of it for the word “giving up,” then this world would be far too easy a place.
The vast ocean makes it hard to see any other water as worthy. This year Zhou Pei was twenty-five, and without even realizing it herself, in the years that had passed, she had become an adult.
“The Prince Consort was out of line. I hope he did not trouble you, sir.”
“It’s nothing. The Prince Consort… it’s only because he loves the Princess, and so some unnecessary jealousy arose.”
“Oh.” Zhou Pei nodded and smiled gently. “Please, come with me, sir.”
“Mm.”
Beneath the dazzling sun and the drone of cicadas, the two of them walked one after the other toward the study in the main courtyard where affairs of state were discussed. This had become, over many, many days, a customary private arrangement between them; to outsiders it might well seem to carry some hint of impropriety, but Zhou Pei never bothered to explain herself, and Cheng Zhouhai’s position as one of the foremost advisors of the Princess’s residence had never once wavered.
Having inherited the legacy of the Princess Chengguo’s estate, the Princess Imperial’s residence had, over these several years in the Southern Court, grown into something even more sprawling than before across the whole of Jiangnan. After the Jurchens had combed the mountains and searched the seas, the Wu Dynasty had, in effect, lost the entirety of the Central Plains. Faced with this chaos, the officials who remained had resolved to set things right, and Zhou Pei and the others had reorganized the strength of the Princess’s residence out of that turmoil, beginning anew with the mindset of those who had already reached the end of the road.
Over the years, with the assistance of Cheng Zhouhai and others, Zhou Pei had worked diligently and cautiously to learn the methods Ning Yi had once used to build up the Bamboo Registry, reviving various industries. In those bleak times, with the Central Plains lost and great numbers of Han refugees who had lost their homes pouring down from the north, society fell into disorder and the people’s livelihoods withered; countless had no clothes to cover themselves and no food to fill their stomachs. To address this, the Princess’s residence worked in the shadows while the court’s decrees worked in the open, greatly expanding commercial workshops in an effort to give these people jobs. After the initial enormous confusion and hardship had passed, once people came to their senses, everyone suddenly realized that the wealth and influence of the Princess’s residence had swollen across every level of society.
The gap between rich and poor in society was widening, yet the revival of commerce still gave enormous numbers of people a chance to survive. After a year or two of chaos, the whole of Jiangnan had grown astonishingly, unexpectedly prosperous — a state of affairs no one could quite explain. Both those within the Princess’s residence and those at court could only attribute it to sincere cooperation across all fronts, to shame turned into resolve, to each person’s tireless effort.
To those within the inner circle, the growth of the various enterprises under the Princess’s residence’s system had even come, faintly, to surpass that of the Bamboo Registry system of old, the one that could not be mentioned. They had, at last, fully mastered on their own hands certain abilities that belonged to that traitor — and in some respects had even surpassed them. And after such enormous chaos, they had finally seen hope again.
Indeed, without such a great calamity, people living amid prosperity would never have awakened — it was the Jurchens’ three southern campaigns that had shaken the people of the Wu Dynasty awake. If this continued, surely the Wu Dynasty would rise again someday.
This was a saying that had gradually begun to spread at poetry gatherings and literary salons. Openly, the great humiliation of the Jingping Emperor had not yet been washed away, but the impassioned calls to cleanse that shame were gradually rising as well — perhaps a sign that society was, in some form, beginning to stabilize. Of course, the whole process might well continue for a very, very long time yet, but simply to have achieved such results already gave every participant a measure of pride in their hearts.
None of this was ever spoken of within the Princess’s residence, and yet, in the exchange of one report after another, in the accounts of place after place where people had managed to avoid starvation, Zhou Pei and Cheng Zhouhai and the others could still feel, in some corner of their hearts, a measure of peace.
“…As for Quanzhou, those eight farms — the land can’t be recovered, but I’ve already spoken with Steward Mu; after this grain collection, the price won’t be allowed to exceed the market average by any margin. He’s afraid we’ll seize the estates outright, so he shouldn’t dare play any tricks. As for the cotton mill at Puqing, two hundred more people were brought in this time — there may not be enough work for them all, which is troublesome, but Foreman Ren tells me he has some new ideas… whatever we do, I think, the important thing is that people have something to eat. As for Yangzhou, the relief grain isn’t enough anymore, we’ve made some arrangements…”
In an even, unhurried tone, Cheng Zhouhai, as the chief steward, related these matters to Zhou Pei one by one, and from time to time she would ask a question or two. As this went on, Cheng Zhouhai, looking at the woman behind the desk, would occasionally feel a stirring of emotion within himself. He was a man of considerable, deep-rooted male pride — or perhaps it was not simply that — his pragmatic, results-driven nature meant he never trusted anyone unconditionally; over the years, only a handful of people had ever earned his genuine effort.
The woman before him was not someone of extraordinary brilliance; when he had first known her, she had still been an ignorant young girl. After Old Qin’s death and Ning Yi’s rebellion, when the world had collapsed, following Zhou Pei had, for Cheng Zhouhai, been little more than an expedient at the time — the more naive she was, the easier she was to fool and control. And yet, over the years since, the woman’s difficult, trembling effort had not escaped his notice. She had spent countless nights nearly sleepless, comparing and handling affairs from every region, tirelessly asking questions, tirelessly learning; she had traveled to distant places for disaster relief, facing enormous numbers of refugees head-on, handling and comforting them at the very front line; facing the coercion and resistance of local powers, she had labored to learn every manner of response and every method of division, and in the most extreme, difficult circumstances, she had even once drawn a blade with her own hand and killed a man, forcefully suppressing a conflict, and once things had calmed, she went on tirelessly traveling from place to place, winning over one side after another.
Many of these methods had come from Cheng Zhouhai’s own suggestions and guidance. By now, Cheng Zhouhai might not exactly admire the woman before him, but he had, to some degree, come to regard her as a companion standing shoulder to shoulder with him. And so, even as he watched this “Princess Imperial” grow gradually calmer and more composed amid endless troubles, he also found himself feeling a kind of pity and sympathy for her.
As a person — and especially as a woman — she was never happy. All these years, what weighed upon her was the responsibility that came with being of the imperial house, and with having such an unreliable father, the responsibility for the common people of the realm — a burden that should never have fallen upon a woman in the first place. Had she been born a man, she might at least have found some satisfaction in achievement and accomplishment; but on this child before him, there was only a heavy, deep weight, and shackles.
Sometimes Cheng Zhouhai even thought that if she gave up trying so hard, and simply accepted her husband, Qu Zonghui, as he was, she might find some measure of happiness after all. This Prince Consort’s nature was not necessarily bad — he was only young, arrogant, and weak. Each time, he approached her full of yearning, and then, ten or fifteen days later, feeling himself neglected, he would go off in search of other women — in truth, if Zhou Pei had simply shown him a little warmth, he might never have done such things in his life.
After all, this Princess Imperial, as a woman, was extraordinarily beautiful and possessed a rare bearing; her immense power and her long years of solitude gave her a mysterious, unapproachable radiance, and having lived through so much, she also carried a calm, cultivated grace. It was no wonder that a man as shallow as Qu Zonghui would be driven away time and again, only to come crawling back, unwilling to give up.
Every time these thoughts drifted unbidden through his mind, somewhere deeper still within him, there was an even more secret sigh. It was a sigh he did not wish to dwell on himself — a thing beyond any solution — for in certain respects, he perhaps understood, better than anyone, what lay in the depths of this Princess Imperial’s heart. That was a dark secret he had glimpsed by chance, many years ago. In a courtyard in Bianliang, long ago, the deep bow Zhou Pei had once given that man… such a thing was truly enough to be the death of one.
He buried these thoughts away.
“…Also, yesterday afternoon, I ran into Dexin. He’s spent the past two years traveling, and he’s rather different now…”
Once the official business was finished and they had drifted into idle talk, Cheng Zhouhai mentioned having run into a friend the day before. Zhou Pei raised her eyes. “Li Pin — Li Dexin? These past years I’ve often heard people speak of his talent and learning. He’s been traveling the realm — is he building his reputation?”
“Not quite. He told me his heart still holds a great many doubts.” Cheng Zhouhai glanced at Zhou Pei, then smiled again. “I suggested he enter office, or simply come help at the Princess’s residence, but he declined. Still, yesterday he raised some concerns with me that I found rather sound. These past two years, all the various shops under our hands have been developing very quickly, but that’s largely because of the refugees continually pouring south from the north — we’ve been meeting each challenge as it comes, but there may be trouble ahead…”
“Is there ever a day without trouble? That would surprise me…” Zhou Pei clasped her hands together, resting them against the side of her face, her gaze drifting to the thick stack of documents on the table beside her, and she let out a deep sigh.
Cheng Zhouhai only smiled. In truth, what he and Li Pin had discussed the day before had touched on rather profound matters — much of it debates rooted in the fundamentals of Confucian thought — while Zhou Pei, having spent these years chasing the shadow of a certain man, had grown increasingly pragmatic. If Cheng Zhouhai were to repeat their conversation in full, Zhou Pei would likely only find it tedious and a waste of time, so he simply gave her a brief summary of Li Pin’s current circumstances. Zhou Pei sighed once, and let the matter drop.
Their conversation came to an end there. As he was about to leave, Cheng Zhouhai said, “I’ve heard the Crown Prince is coming by today.” Zhou Pei nodded. “Yes, he said he’d arrive this afternoon. Did you wish to see him, sir?”
“Not particularly.” Cheng Zhouhai shook his head, hesitated, then said, “What the Crown Prince intends to do is meeting a great deal of resistance.”
“He’s infatuated with the study of natural principles — as for this matter, he isn’t especially resolute about it anyway.”
Cheng Zhouhai gave a wry smile. “What worries me is that the Crown Prince may in fact be quite resolute about this one…”
With that, Cheng Zhouhai took his leave. Zhou Pei smiled faintly, a smile with a touch of bitterness to it. After seeing him off, she turned back to her official duties. Before long, the Crown Prince, Jun Wu, arrived, passing through the Princess’s residence and heading straight inside.
Compared to the illustrious status of Crown Prince, the twenty-three-year-old Jun Wu now appeared in far too plain a set of clothes and headwear, a light blue-green robe, a beard along his jaw, his gaze sharp yet somewhat distracted — the result of too many matters occupying his mind at once, along with an excessive focus on certain particular things. After exchanging greetings, he said, “Qu Zonghui came to make trouble again today.”
“There’s no need for you to keep people watching him,” Zhou Pei said with a sigh, shaking her head.
“If he keeps this up, sooner or later I’ll break his legs.”
“You two used to be friends.” Zhou Pei smiled faintly, then after a moment added, “What I mean is, people should be put to proper use. He’s a man of no consequence — he isn’t worth the trouble.”
Ever since Qin Siyuan’s death and Ning Yi’s rebellion, the foundation of the former Right Chancellor’s household had been scattered, and it was only after Prince Kang ascended the throne that it began to reassemble, gathering chiefly beneath Zhou Pei and Jun Wu, this brother and sister. Among them, Cheng Zhouhai and Monk Juemin followed Zhou Pei in handling matters of commerce and governance, while Wenren Buer, Yue Fei, Wang Shanyue and others found shelter under Crown Prince Jun Wu, the two sides keeping in regular contact and looking out for one another.
But in temperament, the relatively free-spirited Jun Wu differed considerably from his rigid, exacting sister, and though the two of them shared deep affection as siblings, whenever they met, they could never quite avoid bickering and disagreement. This was mainly because Jun Wu remained infatuated with the study of natural principles, which Zhou Pei dismissed as neglecting proper duties, while Jun Wu felt his sister was becoming ever more concerned with “the bigger picture,” turning gradually into just another court official. For this reason, over the years, the frequency of their meetings had gradually decreased.
Meeting now, the two of them instinctively steered clear of the topics likely to spark an argument at first, chatting instead about small family matters. After a while, Jun Wu finally brought up matters from the north. “…As for the affair in April, Wang Zhongqi impeached Yue Fei for recklessness — I let it go, docked his salary and left it at that. But it just keeps getting worse and worse. What’s going on. If it weren’t for this new mess, I wouldn’t have wanted to come out here at all. Father, being the way he is… I really…”
As he spoke of this, his temper flared. When the Jurchens had combed the mountains and searched the seas, their father, Zhou Yong, had thought only of fleeing; after father and son had spoken, the army had come to hold their father in some measure of respect. But now that the realm had settled somewhat, this emperor remained forever the same lukewarm figure, smoothing things over, listening to everyone talk. No matter what matter Jun Wu brought to him, his father would only ever show “you are my son” rather than “you are in the right,” and it was enough, at times, to leave one truly resentful.
Facing his anger, Zhou Pei fell silent for a moment. “You know why.”
“Yes, everyone knows why… but is that something to be proud of!?”
“The preparations still aren’t enough. No one wants to provoke the Jurchens into coming again.”
“If we never fight, when will we ever be ready?”
“The court’s position… is that we should be cautious, and take things slowly, step by step…” Zhou Pei said this, too, somewhat lightly.
Jun Wu struck the tea table beside him.
“Of course, now that you’ve come in person, they’ll yield some ground…”
“This realm — going on like this — there truly is no saving it…” Jun Wu said through gritted teeth.
Zhou Pei shook her head, her tone gentle. “After all, we still haven’t found solid footing. These days, things look prosperous on the surface, but in truth refugees keep pouring south, and we still haven’t secured our own position. The foundation below us isn’t stable — this isn’t something a few impassioned words can solve. The ministers at court aren’t unwilling to push north, but with the greater trend leaning toward peace, all they can do for now is preserve what stability we have…”
“The greater trend leaning toward peace — the people coming from the north all want to fight their way back. The greater trend leans toward war, that’s the truth of it. Such a good opportunity, and no one wants to seize it…”
“If the Jurchens come again, all of Jiangnan collapses. Jun Wu, can General Yue, General Han, and the others give the court the confidence to hold off the Jurchens even once? We need to at least be able to hold them off once, don’t we? How would we even hold them off? Send Father out to sea again?”
“Nothing in this world is ever certain.” Jun Wu looked at his sister before him, but after a moment, still looked away. He knew that what he ought to be looking at was not his sister — Zhou Pei was only, in essence, laying out other people’s reasons for them, and behind those reasons lay far more complicated ones, some that could be spoken and some that could not. Both of them, in truth, understood this perfectly well, even without saying a word.
In the afternoon courtyard, the sun no longer carried the blazing heat of noon, and a cool breeze had begun to stir within the room. Her brother stood up and went to stand by the window, looking out at the bright, radiant lotus pond outside, the cicadas calling without pause. The two of them chatted idly a while longer, and then Jun Wu suddenly said, “…I received some news from the northwest earlier.”
“I don’t want to hear it,” Zhou Pei answered immediately.
“It was a terrible defeat.” Jun Wu leaned against the window frame, looking outward, and said this in a low voice. After a moment, he turned back. “I’ll head into the palace shortly — I may dine there.”
Zhou Pei nodded. “There’s a banquet at the Xu household this evening. Madam Xu has invited me repeatedly, and I’ve agreed to go.”
Jun Wu nodded, fell silent a moment, then said, “I should be going.”
“I’ll see you off.”
The sister walked her brother to the gate of the residence, and as they parted, Zhou Pei said, “Now that you’ve come in person, Father will agree to what you want.”
Jun Wu gave a faint smile. “It’s only a pity he’ll never agree to push north.” There was a hint of mockery in that smile. “…He’s afraid.”
Zhou Pei said nothing. The mountain-combing and sea-searching of years past, and further back, the Jurchens’ overwhelming devastation, were etched into everyone’s minds, and in all the time since, though generals like Yue Fei, Han Shizhong, Zhang Jun, and Liu Guangshi trained their troops while pressing forward north of the Qinhuai River into the chaos-ridden regions, winning battle after battle, reclaiming several prefectures and counties, every time they achieved a great victory, the peace faction at court would inevitably move to halt them. What, at its root, was the real reason for this…
…He was afraid.
This was… something that could never be spoken openly.
Zhou Yong could smooth things over without principle, could, on the surface, support his son or daughter’s every unconventional act, and yet, at the very core of it, deep within himself, he was afraid. During the Jurchens’ third southern campaign, he had twice sent letters to Jin Wuzhu suing for peace; and when Shuliesu launched his surprise attack on Yangzhou, Zhou Yong, unable to wait for his son’s arrival, had ultimately set sail before him. In the deepest part of himself, he was, in the end, not a strong emperor — indeed, he barely had much of a will of his own at all.
Having seen her brother off, Zhou Pei walked back to her study. The afternoon breeze had begun to turn gentle. She sat quietly at her desk for a while, then reached out and opened the bottom drawer of her desk. Inside lay a good many slips of paper recording intelligence reports, still unfiled. She sifted through them; one report sat partway through the stack. She drew it out, pulled it halfway free, then paused.
It was a piece of news that had come from the northwest not long ago. She had already read it once. She kept it here without wanting to give it any special classification, and now, she even resisted looking at it again. It was not some strange or unusual report — over these years, news of this kind had come, again and again, quite often.
She sat there, lowering her head, closing her eyes, trying hard to make this feeling seem ordinary. Before long, Zhou Pei composed herself, put the reports back in order, and returned them to the drawer.
It was nothing but an ordinary report; this was an ordinary day; she had not thought of anything especially unusual… With this thought, her attention returned to the present, and she called for her attendant Yiren, and after a brief bit of preparation, boarded her carriage and set out.
The Princess’s residence’s procession drove through the streets of what was now called Lin’an — once Hangzhou — passing through the dense crowds, toward the residence of the current Right Chancellor, Xu Lian. Xu Lian’s wife came from a great clan of Jiangnan, one with vast landholdings and many members who had entered office, and their influence ran deep. Once they had made a connection with Princess Imperial Zhou Pei, they had invited her repeatedly, and she had finally agreed to attend this particular gathering of the ladies at the Xu household.
By the end of summer in the sixth year of Wu’s Jianshuo era, all of Jiangnan, including the city of Hangzhou, showed a vibrant, thriving vitality — enough, at times, to make one wonder in a daze whether the fall of the Central Plains might, in some way, have been a good thing after all.
Within the Xu household, a great many wives and daughters of officials came out to welcome the Princess Imperial’s arrival. As the sun set, the banquet began in the fragrant pavilion of the Xu household’s rear garden. For Zhou Pei, this was as simple a social occasion as could be; she conversed skillfully with the women around her, watching the performances with elegant, slightly detached grace, occasionally speaking up to guide the conversation. The many women present, looking at this princess of the realm who was not yet even twenty-five, longed to grow closer to her, yet all carried a trembling reverence as well.
The woman before them was not the sort of imperial lady untouched by worldly affairs — in her hands she held half the fortunes of the imperial clan. Most of the time her methods were gentle, and in name she was involved in no court affairs whatsoever, yet in the various famines and chaos of the past two or three years, the hand of the Princess’s residence had also produced no small number of ruthless examples.
A group of noblewomen accustomed to the scheming of grand households found themselves, before such a woman, possessed of a natural sense of inferiority and longing. Though there were plenty who privately grumbled that this Princess Imperial was far too dominant within her own household, even driving her husband to abandon himself to dissolute living throughout the city of Lin’an, when they saw that she paid such rumors no mind whatsoever, their fear of Zhou Pei only grew all the greater.
A woman who cared little even for her own household and reputation — if she truly lost her temper, what might she not be capable of?
And so, the grumbling remained nothing more than grumbling, whispered and never spoken.
As the banquet went on with cups and dishes passing back and forth, the women spoke of poetry and talented young men, of music, and eventually of whether the Princess Imperial might join them for the Qixi Festival’s plea for skill, a month or so away. Zhou Pei took part in all of this with perfect grace. Partway through the banquet, one frail official’s wife fainted from the heat, and Zhou Pei went over to check on her herself, briskly having people carry the woman off to rest.
By the hour of xu, as darkness had just begun to fall and the banquet was more than halfway through, with the singing girls of the Xu household performing, Zhou Pei sat there, her mind having already begun to wander idly elsewhere. Without meaning to, she found herself thinking of the dream she had had at midday.
How long had it been since that nightmarish war? In the summer of the third year of Jianshuo, the Jurchens had crossed the river at Huangtiandang; now it was the sixth year of Jianshuo. In memory, so much time seemed to have passed. And yet, thinking it over carefully… it had only been three years.
Three years… Looking at this scene of song and dance, of peace and prosperity, she felt, for a moment, as though a whole lifetime had passed.
A servant came in from outside. Seeing this, the attendant Gong Yiren went over silently, exchanged a few words with the servant, and returned with something in hand. Zhou Pei noticed this out of the corner of her eye; nearby, Madam Xu, wearing a fawning smile, spoke to her, and Zhou Pei smiled and responded in kind, while Gong Yiren quietly slipped a folded note into her hand. Zhou Pei, still speaking, glanced down at it.
Her smile faded without a sound, gradually draining into blankness.
An emptiness that no one could have described appeared on the Princess Imperial’s face. Everyone was still listening to her speak — though what she’d been saying had held little substance — but her words cut off abruptly. They saw Zhou Pei, seated at the very center of the front of the pavilion, slowly rise to her feet, her face utterly expressionless as she stared at the note in her left hand, her right hand resting lightly on the table’s surface.
No one dared say a word. That empty expression might also have been coldness, might have been terror — this Princess Imperial before them had commanded men to kill, had even once killed with her own hands — there was no sense of overwhelming presence about her, and yet coldness, rejection, and every unwelcoming feeling imaginable seemed, for the first time, to be pouring out of her without restraint. If that note contained news concerning the Xu family, if she meant to suddenly turn against them, that, perhaps, would not have been so strange after all.
“Your Highness…” Gong Yiren tried to come support her. Zhou Pei’s left hand gave a light wave, and she was heard to say a single word: “Fake.”
Madam Xu came over as well, about to ask a question, only to be met with a fierce, sharp reply from Zhou Pei: “Get away!” The words seemed to drain every last bit of strength from her. Madam Xu felt a chill run through her, her face going pale as she froze in place.
Before them, that figure swayed — though she did not feel it herself — those wide-open eyes were already brimming with tears, streaming down her whole face. She stepped back, her gaze sweeping across the room, her left hand crushing the note. “Fake…” The word did not come out clearly, for blood had begun to flow from her mouth, and she toppled backward into her seat.
Three years…
Her gaze passed above the fragrant pavilion; in the sky, the night was swallowing the last strip of evening glow, the clouds a dull orange-gray, drifting slowly by. Three years… something black seemed to fall, the message she had pressed deep into her heart now surging forward violently — blades and spears, tens of thousands facing tens of thousands, iron horses over icy rivers, that surging roar and the spreading blood, corpses filling the cities, fire seas covering the sky, that towering figure, gripping the polished heavens and the yielding earth with his fierce, unyielding stance… like a volcano erupting, it all came crashing toward her, overwhelming everything in its path.
Jiangnan, an ordinary, sweltering day, the clouds drifting on and on.
Zhou Pei sat in her chair…
The greatest nightmare of all had arrived.