A Sorrowful Heart
Wei Zhong, who had been standing to one side watching Nanny Zhang prepare lunch for the two young ladies, spoke to her.
"Nanny, there's no need to rush about so. The Eldest Miss won't be staying long."
At those words, Nanny Zhang's smiling face stiffened for a moment—then broke into a wide smile again.
"Whether the Eldest Miss stays long or not, we servants must see to her properly, mustn't we?"
Wei Zhong made no further attempt to dissuade her. He simply shook his head and resumed his place at the side.
The Grand Princess, her silver hair neatly combed and gathered up, sat before the Buddha statue, turning her prayer beads and murmuring sutras. White smoke curled upward from an incense burner cast in the shape of an auspicious beast, and the fragrance of sandalwood drifted through the chamber, quieting the heart.
The night before, the Emperor had announced that he would come to the nunnery dressed as an ordinary commoner, under the close guard of his escorts, to see the Grand Princess. Of course, the Grand Princess knew full well that he was coming to see the young lady who resembled Bai Xiaoqiu.
But she had shown him no such person. That young lady, she told him, had gone into the mountains to gather medicine on her behalf and would not return for two or three days. The Emperor finished a cup of tea, asked after the old girl's circumstances in detail, and departed with a promise to come again in three days.
The Grand Princess knew her nephew too well. To the Emperor, the most precious thing was always the one he could not have.
He had to be kept thinking of it—kept wanting it—while never, ever being allowed to possess it.
If the Liang King had not sent that fake Bai Xiaoqiu, the Consort Chu, into the palace, the Grand Princess would never have wished to go this far. But the Liang King's conduct had finally turned her stomach.
He was a man with a vicious heart. If she did not do this, there was no telling what the Liang King might do with a woman like Consort Chu at his disposal against the Bai family.
Nanny Zhang glanced at the hourglass. The time had come. She lifted the curtain and stepped inside, where the Grand Princess was already rising from her seat.
Hurrying forward on quick feet, Nanny Zhang steadied her by the arm.
"Has Aiyan not arrived yet?"
the Grand Princess asked, rising with a face full of compassion.
Nanny Zhang was a very perceptive woman, and she caught the thread of anxiety woven into the Grand Princess's voice. She smiled lightly and answered in a bright, cheerful tone.
"She'll be here any moment! Did I not tell you, Madam, that the Eldest Miss has come back from the Southern Border looking healthier than ever? You didn't believe me then—but when she arrives, you'll see I was right."
The Grand Princess smiled. The majesty of accumulated years lent her presence a formidable weight, yet softness still lingered in her face, and a deep tenderness could be heard in her voice.
"Who knows how that child has suffered this time. Of all the siblings, Aiyan was always the strongest, even when she was little."
"Since her return from the Southern Border, His Majesty has conferred a commandery title upon her. Her life will only grow better from here."
Nanny Zhang supported the Grand Princess as she walked out of the chamber.
Wei Zhong was about to pay his respects when the courtyard gate swung wide, and Bai Jingyan and Bai Jinchi entered slowly, attended by their maids.
"Grand Princess, the Eldest Miss has arrived."
Wei Zhong announced.
The Grand Princess tightened her hand inside her sleeve. Then, gripping the prayer beads draped over her wrist, she turned her head toward the entrance. In that instant, the rims of her eyes reddened, and she gave her order to Wei Zhong.
"Go and bring the Eldest Miss to me."
Wei Zhong answered, bowed his head, and hurried out with quick steps.
Bai Jingyan entered with Bai Jinchi in tow, and her gaze fell upon the Grand Princess smiling beneath the eaves as she watched the two of them.
In the months since they had last met, her grandmother had grown thinner, more worn. The air of commanding dignity had not changed, but even the archaic elegance of her robes could no longer conceal the stoop that was slowly creeping into her back.
To lose a husband in the twilight years past sixty, then a son, then grandsons—no matter how weathered and seasoned a matriarch might be, after sorrow upon such sorrow, one could not help but weary and grow suddenly, utterly old.
Bai Jingyan led Bai Jinchi in from the entrance and bowed low to the Grand Princess.
"Grandmother. I have returned—safely, and in good health."
"Good. Safe is all I asked."
The Grand Princess's voice was as gentle as ever, though tears welled in her eyes and made them glisten.
"Come inside. The air is still cold."
"Eldest Miss, Fourth Miss, come in from the cold at once! I've had jujube milk tea simmering since early this morning. Drink a cup each and warm yourselves through."
Bai Jinchi stood behind Bai Jingyan and lifted her head meekly, as though waiting for her elder sister's instruction.
The Grand Princess had never once imagined such a scene. Who could have foreseen that she would drift this far from the granddaughter she had cherished and pampered since the cradle?
Taking Nanny Zhang's arm, the Grand Princess went into the chamber ahead of them and seated herself upon a yellow cushion embroidered with passionflower vines.
The moment Bai Jingyan and Bai Jinchi stepped through the door and moved to kneel, Nanny Zhang called for cushions to be brought.
As the two granddaughters knelt and performed three formal kowtows, the Grand Princess's eyes grew misty. Smiling, she bade Nanny Zhang help the girls up.
"Aiyan, you really do look stronger. And Jinchi—how is it that one trip outside has turned you dark as a boy?"
Bai Jinchi was always careful in front of the Grand Princess, so she answered in a small, embarrassed voice.
"I know! I thought the same thing. I rode out and about exactly the same as Eldest Sister, and her skin is still white as snow, while I alone got roasted like this."
Nanny Zhang hid her laugh behind her handkerchief.
When the old girl entered carrying the jujube milk tea, Nanny Zhang ordered all the maids to withdraw and directed Wei Zhong to stand guard outside.
Though no introduction had been made, Bai Jingyan understood at once that the woman bowing her head as she offered the tea was the old girl in question. She studied her from the corner of her eye.
The Grand Princess slipped the prayer beads from her wrist and set them on the square black table. Then she lifted her cup of jujube milk tea and took a small sip.
"This is the old girl. If I take her in as my physician, by the generational rank you would have to call her Aunt."
Only then did Bai Jingyan raise her head and look properly at the woman. Watching her stand at the Grand Princess's side—neither proud nor overly humble—Bai Jingyan asked,
"Is the resemblance strong?"
Bai Xiaoqiu had died long ago, when Bai Jingyan was still too young to hold many memories of her aunt. But if anyone knew her aunt's face best, knew it most intimately, it would be the grandmother who had been her mother.
"Six parts in ten, perhaps seven. The remaining three or four can be covered by dress and manner."
The Grand Princess raised her tea bowl, its glaze shining faintly blue.
"Nanny Zhang has been coaching her these past days. The time is short, but she must move with steadiness."
The Bai family had enjoyed a hundred years of glory, yet now every man of the name was gone from the world. Still, the Emperor remained uneasy at the sight of a Bai house of women alone, and the Liang King persisted in his scheming to make use of them. And so the Grand Princess had no choice but to walk forward, careful and calm, one measured step at a time.
Bai Jinchi held her milk tea in both hands and watched the old girl with eyes full of curiosity. Whatever her eldest sister and grandmother were discussing, she could not follow it at all.
"Can she practice medicine?"
It was Bai Jingyan's question to the old girl.
The woman faltered for a heartbeat, then bowed in obeisance and answered.
"To this humble one's fortune, Madam—my mother's family was a household that studied the healing arts, so I know a little."
So that was it. There had been a reason the Grand Princess chose her.
If matters had not come to such a pass, her grandmother would never have gone so far as this.
"If His Majesty gives his consent, Grandmother, it would be best to take her in as an adopted daughter and keep her close at your side to attend you. As for Third Sister, she need only say she will return to Suyang with us on the first day of the fifth month."
Bai Jingyan said.
A wife is not as good as a concubine, and a concubine is not as good as a stolen tryst—and nothing, nothing at all, is as good as what can never be touched….
If the "reborn Bai Xiaoqiu" that Nanny Zhang and the Grand Princess had trained sat here, then the Emperor's heart would sit here too—and Consort Chu, waiting in the palace, would surely lose her favor.
Of course, once "Bai Jindong" returned to Suyang, the world would have to be told that she had fallen ill.
"Counting the days, your fifth aunt ought to be making her preparations soon enough."
The Grand Princess was waiting for the child in Fifth Madame Lady Ji's womb. She had pinned great hopes on that child. If Lady Ji bore a son for the Bai family, the house would have a man again—and then Aiyan would no longer have to bear the family's weight on her shoulders like this.
"Mother has already prepared a birthing room and a midwife. Physician Hong is standing by at the estate as well. Fifth Aunt chose two wet nurses herself, but she says that after consulting Mother, she means to nurse the child at her own breast."
Bai Jingyan answered.
Bai Jingyan understood fully why her fifth aunt wished to nurse the child herself. That child was the posthumous son of her fifth uncle, born after his father's death—the only child Fifth Aunt would ever have.
Sorrow welled up in the Grand Princess. She gave a small nod.
"Then let your fifth aunt do as she wishes."
Nanny Zhang urged Bai Jingyan and Bai Jinchi to stay for lunch and eat the nunnery's simple rice, but Bai Jingyan declined.
"No. I must go and see Qi Zhengyu. And Jinchi has been saying she wants to try the Baoxiang Roast Duck at the temple fair in Guping Town."
At the mention of Qi Zhengyu, the Grand Princess's lips trembled faintly. He was the reason for the distance between her and her granddaughter.
Turning the beads wound about her hand, the Grand Princess closed her eyes and nodded. Then she gave her instruction to Nanny Zhang.
"Prepare five hundred taels in silver notes and give them to Aiyan. She is to carry them to Qi Zhengyu."
Bai Jingyan did not refuse. She thanked the Grand Princess on Qi Zhengyu's behalf, then led Bai Jinchi out through the graceful little garden behind the Imperial Nunnery.
Nanny Zhang saw the two of them all the way to their carriage. Her eyes were rimmed with red, and again and again she tried to speak—but she did not know what to say, or how.
With the carriage curtain between them, she finally forced the words out.
"I understand it all, Eldest Miss. You think of the greater realm, and yours is a discerning eye—how else would you have gone all the way to the Southern Border when Jin stood in crisis, and turned that crisis back? And yet—yet a grandmother like the Grand Princess you cannot bring yourself to understand? The Grand Princess cherishes you beyond all measure! She raised you so preciously you were the apple of her eye! She has lost her husband, her son, her grandsons—one after another. It is the Grand Princess, Eldest Miss, who is the most pitiable of all, her heart rotted hollow with grief!"
Bai Jingyan had not gone to the Southern Border for the sake of the Jin royal house. She had gone because the very root of the Bai family's survival in this world lay there—and for the sake of the pitiful common folk of the borderlands, who had no one else to fight for them.
But the truth was something she could no longer speak plainly to her grandmother.
Now, every time Bai Jingyan thought of her, her chest tore open and a tangle of emotions came crashing over her, and she had to endure a grief she could not suppress. Not once had the thought of her grandmother come to her in peace.
It was not that she could not understand the Grand Princess. But as one who had been raised beneath her grandmother's teachings, as family who had shared the deepest bonds of affection with her—precisely because of that, she found her grandmother all the harder to forgive.