Birds of a Feather
Bai Jingyan stood off to one side and watched in silence. Xiliang, the mighty power that had once stood shoulder to shoulder with Jin, had now dwindled into something barely worth a glance in Jin's eyes.
The tides of the world turned faster than anyone could predict.
Xiliang was no threat for now — but there was no telling what the future might bring.
"Then let us do this! We will station troops on Mount Chunmu to keep Liang cowed, and at the same time dispatch an envoy to demand of the Emperor of Liang his intentions in placing soldiers along our shared border. It would be best to make it clear whether or not he means to go to war with our Jin."
The Emperor delivered his decision in a firm, resolute voice.
"Your Majesty, how wise you are!"
"Your Majesty, how wise you are!"
The Emperor half-lifted his eyes and gazed at Bai Jingyan, kneeling and crying out his wisdom. And once again, Bai Xiaoqiu came to mind.
"All of you, withdraw. Bai Jingyan, stay behind. I have questions for you."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Having answered, Bai Jingyan turned her head toward Chu Zhongxing, the Minister of Revenue, who was bowing at the waist and on the verge of withdrawing from the hall.
"Minister Chu, are you leaving the palace right away?"
Chu Zhongxing had never had any particular dealings with Bai Jingyan, and he looked at her in some bewilderment at her addressing him before the Emperor. He glanced once at the Emperor, then turned back and answered her.
"His Majesty has given no further instructions, so naturally I must leave the palace. Did you have words for me, my lord?"
"Please wait a moment, Minister Chu. There is something I must tell you."
Bai Jingyan replied.
Chu Zhongxing stole another glance at the Emperor, then nodded and stepped out of the hall.
"What business could you have with Chu Zhongxing?"
The Emperor tossed out the question idly, without much thought.
"A maidservant who waited upon me in my courtyard came to me asking for the release of her indenture, saying her parents had arranged a marriage for her. When I pressed her for details, it emerged that an official from the Ministry of Revenue had gone to visit the girl's mother and declared that the Ministry intended to take her into the household as a proper concubine. I found it strange that a ministry of such power would take a mere maidservant as a concubine, but I thought it might simply be fate, and so I consented."
The Emperor frowned. He had taken it that Chu Zhongxing meant to take Bai Jingyan's personal maidservant and keep her as his concubine.
The crease between the Emperor's brows deepened further.
What a taste the man has. Why, of all people, Bai Jingyan's maidservant? Is he trying to deliberately provoke her displeasure, or is there…
some other scheme at work?
While the Emperor sat lost in thought, Bai Jingyan continued.
"But then that graceless girl stole the ruby hairpin my grandmother gave me, without my knowledge. She didn't even know it was a relic of the late Empress. She assumed I had simply forgotten a keepsake I so treasured that I had tucked it safely away in a box — and stole it to prepare her dowry! Since she is to become a concubine of the Ministry of Revenue, and since she came out of my own household, I judged I ought to inform Minister Chu. Should any misunderstanding arise later, I would at least be spared the charge of having raised a servant poorly."
As he watched Bai Jingyan speak so meekly, for an instant the Emperor felt as though he were looking at Bai Xiaoqiu again. The image of Bai Jingyan glaring with fierce, venomous spirit grew dimmer and dimmer, until only that exquisite face remained.
His throat felt as though it were burning. He shifted his position and asked again.
"Have you ever laid eyes on this Nuo Guonang your grandmother wished to take in as a physician?"
From the moment the Emperor had ordered everyone else to leave and bade her stay, Bai Jingyan had known questions about Nuo Guonang would come.
"Yes, Your Majesty. I have seen her."
"Does she truly resemble your aunt so closely?"
The moment the question left his lips, the Emperor felt he had asked wrongly. When Bai Xiaoqiu had left this world, Bai Jingyan had still been very young.
"Your Majesty, she looked remarkably like my aunt as she appears in her portrait. According to Nanny Zhang… Nuo Guonang is skilled in the art of medicine as my aunt was, and my grandmother seems to cherish her all the more for it."
Bai Jingyan answered.
Skilled in medicine as well?
Only then did something that had puzzled the Emperor seem to fall into place. So that was why my aunt said Nuo Guonang had gone out that day to gather herbs. It wasn't an excuse at all.
The Emperor nodded. His expression was that of a man sinking deep into some emotion.
Gao Demu entered and murmured a report to the Emperor in a low voice: Consort Chu had made jujube and lotus pastries with her own hands, and wished for His Majesty to taste them. Gathering himself, the Emperor waved Bai Jingyan away, telling her to go.
After paying her respects, Bai Jingyan emerged from the great hall. Waiting at its entrance were not only Chu Zhongxing, the Minister of Revenue, but the Crown Prince as well.
The Crown Prince had also lingered there out of curiosity about what Bai Jingyan intended to say to Chu Zhongxing.
Bai Jingyan bowed to the Crown Prince, then spoke to Chu Zhongxing.
"Minister Chu, I hear the Ministry of Revenue means to take a maidservant of mine as a concubine."
Chu Zhongxing flinched. It had never occurred to him that she would raise the matter in front of the Crown Prince. The hand tucked inside his official robe's sleeve clenched tight, but the Minister played ignorant as he answered.
"My lord, I believe there has been a misunderstanding. My wife did once speak of taking in a concubine for my unworthy son. But no matter whom she brought in, she would never dream of snatching away a maidservant so close to Your Lordship!"
Bai Jingyan, too, feigned surprise as she spoke.
"Yet that maidservant told me herself that the Ministry wished to take her as a concubine, and asked me to release her indenture. A ministry's household would be beyond reproach, so I granted it at once.
But who could have imagined that the girl would then steal the jeweled hairpin I so treasured? I favor only the finest ornaments, so I suppose she assumed I had forgotten all about that particular pin. She stole it to furnish her dowry — but that hairpin is a relic of the late Empress. She bestowed it upon my grandmother, and my grandmother gave it to me."
Bai Jingyan glanced once at the Crown Prince.
"Because she was a girl you had marked for the Ministry, Your Excellency, I sent her away before my grandmother returned home, and opened a path for her to survive. Her indenture was already sent to her family by midday. My grandmother was deeply displeased about the whole affair, I might add."
Chu Zhongxing hastily performed a fist-and-palm bow and apologized.
"I truly knew nothing of this, my lord. I will return home and question my wife at once. If it is as you say, then such a crooked, thieving creature can never be brought into the Ministry's household. Thank you for telling me, my lord!"
"She has always known her place before now, but the thought of entering the Ministry's household seems to have gone to her head and led her into a grave error of judgment. If the Minister's wife truly takes a liking to the girl, then it should be enough simply to teach her to behave properly from now on."
The Crown Prince shook his head and signaled Bai Jingyan to follow him. As they walked, he said:
"Bold and decisive in time of war — yet so soft-hearted where a lowly servant is concerned? A common slave girl dares steal a relic of the late Empress herself. She should have been beaten to death. And why on earth did you return the girl's indenture?"
"Well… it was partly for Minister Chu's sake, and the Ministry's face."
Bai Jingyan smiled and looked at Chu Zhongxing, who was trailing along at the Crown Prince's right.
Chu Zhongxing abruptly halted his steps, performed another fist-and-palm bow, and apologized all over again — insisting, this time and every time after, that he truly had known nothing.
Scarcely had Bai Jingyan returned from the palace before she was summoned to the Grand Princess.
The Grand Princess had known all along that the Emperor would call for Bai Jingyan and ask her about Nuo Guonang.
"His Majesty has never seen Nuo Guonang, yet it seems his thoughts have already bent toward believing she is my daughter reborn. Otherwise, why would he have gone to the trouble of seeking her out in person, when he could simply have summoned her to the palace by sacred decree?"
The Emperor was the very sky of Jin. Anything he desired, he could have.
The Grand Princess nodded. Then she flicked a silver needle to clear the ash inside the censer, and nodded again.
"There is sense in what you say, A'yan."
"This Consort Chu strikes me as a formidable woman, too. Before I left the great hall today, I heard what Eunuch Gao was saying to His Majesty — that she had made jujube and lotus pastries with her own hands."
A shadow passed over the Grand Princess's eyes.
"Grandmother. Jujube and lotus pastries are what my aunt used to make especially for you, whenever your strength failed you. Surely very few people could know of that. After my aunt passed, Grandfather went so far as to decree that this dish would never again be set on the Bai family's table. So how does Consort Chu come to know even this?"
The Grand Princess took up the agarwood prayer beads she had set on the table, closed her eyes, and began to turn them slowly between her fingers.
"Grandmother, I believe this Consort Chu knows of Nuo Guonang's existence. That is why she has grown so impatient. But if she imitates my aunt too deliberately, it will only look unnatural.
For Nuo Guonang, it is enough that her looks and bearing resemble my aunt. What I intend to do is make her do the things my aunt once longed to do but never did. Or better still, the things you and Grandfather forbade her from doing. Only then will the Emperor believe my aunt has been reborn."
The Grand Princess's hands, turning the beads, went still.
Warm sunlight streamed through the window, casting the flower-shaped shadow of the lattice across the floor in gold. In the room, only the faint smoke of the censer curled upward. An eerily still air hung over everything.
When the sound of Nanny Dong and Nanny Zhang conversing drifted in from outside, Bai Jingyan rose and bowed to the Grand Princess.
"If there is nothing else, I will take my leave first. Rest well, Grandmother."
With that, Bai Jingyan respectfully stepped back two paces, rounded the folding screen, and left the side hall of Longevity Garden.
Only after she had gone did the Grand Princess slowly open her eyes. The things Bai Xiaoqiu had longed to do, which she and Bai Weiting had refused to allow — there had been far, far too many of them.
Nanny Dong was in the middle of telling Nanny Zhang about the visit to Chunxing's home when Bai Jingyan emerged, and the two hurried to bow.
Seeing the brightness on Nanny Dong's face, Bai Jingyan knew at once that the errand had gone well.
Having paid her respects, Nanny Dong said with a smile:
"Eldest Miss, the matter is settled nicely."
Bai Jingyan nodded to Nanny Zhang, then led Nanny Dong out of Longevity Garden.
"When I arrived at that slave Chunxing's house, her mother was in the middle of boasting to the neighbors, if you please. That with Your Lordship's blessing, Chunxing was entering the Ministry of Revenue's household — that she was to become a concubine of the Ministry, no less…"
So Nanny Dong had ordered the carriage halted and stepped down in high dudgeon. Then, dabbing at the corners of her mouth with a handkerchief, she had lifted her chin, swept inside, and announced herself — the steward-nanny who served at a certain lord's side — before demanding to know which one of them was Chunxing's mother.
Chunxing's mother was too frightened to answer, until some busybody pointed the woman out.
Nanny Dong surveyed Chunxing's mother up and down for a long moment, her face gone stiff as stone. Chunxing hurriedly bowed at the waist, saying that Nanny Dong was an honored guest and must be received inside.
At that, Nanny Dong let out a cold laugh.
"Like mother, like daughter, as they say. Does the family think I would dare set foot in a household of that same thieving stripe? Chunxing laid hands on a relic of the late Empress — a gift the Grand Princess bestowed upon our lord — and now that she's entered that household, I suppose every piece of gold and silver ornament there will walk off with her too!"
Chunxing's mother shrieked that Nanny Dong was inventing lies, screaming and raving.
Utterly unshaken, Nanny Dong drew out Chunxing's indenture and sneered.
"The Grand Princess is furious! If you will not admit it, then I will simply take back this indenture, beat Chunxing to death as the Grand Princess commanded, and be done with the whole business."
The moment the words left Nanny Dong's mouth, the Bai family guards who had been ordered to accompany her moved to enter Chunxing's house and seize the girl. Chunxing's mother was startled out of her wits and hastily blocked the door, bellowing that Chunxing was a concubine about to marry into the Ministry of Revenue — did the Zhenguo Commandery Princess have no fear of offending the Minister?
Only then did Nanny Dong step forward, tossing the indenture into Chunxing's mother's hands as she continued.
"It was out of respect for the Ministry's face that our lord spared Chunxing's life. But hear this well: from this day forward, the Zhenguo Commandery Princess's household will never again employ any person with even the slightest connection to Chunxing."