Cunning
The man who had removed his hat in the wind was Gao Sheng, one of Prince Liang's men. Feeling the cold murderous intent radiating from him, Jin Dexiao's heart pounded faster.
Struggling to keep his composure, Jin Dexiao stood with his hands clasped behind his back, refusing to lose his air of dignity as he spoke.
"Lord Gao, please carry a message to Prince Liang for me. Bai Jingyan holds the registry of everyone who touched the army provisions. It seems she intends to stir up trouble at this very moment—tell His Highness to be prepared."
Gao Sheng looked at the water and food left untouched by the cell door.
"My, my. Does the Young Master Jin know that the registry *he* handed over was carried by young master Jin Lang, who gathered the Jin family's loyal retainers and beat the drum before the gates of the Court of Judicial Review? And you claim you moved this quickly without receiving any orders from me?"
Jin Dexiao's face drained of white. He realized that Jin Lang had been deceived by Bai Jingyan.
"Lord Gao, watch your tongue! I did not give that registry to the eldest Bai young lady. She came to see me today, copied it over, and left without a word. The Bai family has had this registry in their hands all along. His Highness should be wary of the eldest Bai young lady!"
Jin Dexiao spoke as though deeply concerned for Prince Liang.
"And as for what that unfilial wretch of a son has done... even if I am put to interrogation, I will never breathe a word of it! This matter has nothing to do with me. The provisions I sent out were perfectly sound when they left my hands!"
"So you are saying that I am serving His Highness out of wholehearted loyalty?"
There was no trace of emotion in Gao Sheng's cold voice.
"Loyalty to His Highness is all well and good, but I have to live too! If I admit to it, there is nothing but death! If I deny it, I may live a wretched life, but at least I keep my head."
Jin Dexiao stared hard at Gao Sheng. Loyalty alone could easily come across as mere pretense. A plea for survival would ring far more true.
Gao Sheng drew a short blade from his waist, and Jin Dexiao recoiled in shock, stumbling backward until he struck the wall.
"Lord Gao!"
"His Highness once said something to me, did he not? That in this world, only the dead can keep a secret."
The moment the words left his mouth, Gao Sheng closed the distance in a flash and drove the sharp blade into Jin Dexiao's abdomen. Jin Dexiao's mouth gaped wide, but no sound came out. All he could see before his eyes was the flickering of candlelight against the wall.
Gripping Jin Dexiao's throat, Gao Sheng lowered him to the ground with painfully slow movements, easing him down until his knees folded beneath him. Nothing could be read in Gao Sheng's eyes.
When the hand clutching the hem of Gao Sheng's robe finally went slack, only then did he release his hold. He slid the jeweled sheath of the dagger into Jin Dexiao's deerskin boots.
The blade had been of exceptional quality. It had pierced flesh without the slightest effort, and the hilt sealed the wound so tightly that not a single drop of blood escaped.
Gao Sheng donned the bloodstained hat and walked out. The jailer, arriving to lock the door, saw nothing amiss and left again.
* * *
On the last day of the twelfth month, after news arrived of the war in the Southern Border, one incident after another erupted across the capital of Dadu, leaving no one a moment to breathe.
Jin Lang, who had stepped down from his position as Crown Prince's man before the festival, was now being escorted by soldiers guarding the Zhongyong Marquis estate. He knelt with the Jin family's retainers before the gates of the Court of Judicial Review, the registry in his hands. He cried out at the top of his voice that he would submit the evidence for the sake of righteousness, to resolve the Southern Border provisions scandal.
Because the Emperor had taken particular interest in this matter, Yu Zhen, Chief Minister of the Court of Judicial Review, sent men to bring Jin Lang and the Jin family retainers inside for a thorough questioning.
When the Jin family retainers saw that registry, they believed Jin Lang. They assumed that Jin Dexiao had sacrificed them to send his eldest son in his place and preserve the Zhongyong Marquis estate's honor. They regarded Jin Lang as the new master of the Jin family. And so they repeated, word for word, everything they had rehearsed with him in the study.
Jin Dexiao's aide testified that he had grown greedy after watching Jin Dexiao profit from escorting the army provisions. But the man had carried a burden of guilt, and this being his first foray into such immorality, he had left gaps at every turn—gaps that his underlings had seized upon and used against him.
At first, everyone thought they could simply pass the provisions along unscathed. But to their astonishment, at every waypoint along the route, the local officials dangled Jin Dexiao's weaknesses over him and siphoned off a little more of the provisions each time. The further the convoy traveled, the bolder the officials grew, until the finest military grain had been replaced entirely with buckwheat husks.
In the end, even the husks were swapped out for silver before reaching Fengcheng, and once the affair grew too large, the Zhongyong Marquis estate—terrified of being implicated—began killing people to bury it.
The aide recounted in detail the methods he had proposed to Jin Dexiao, and testified truthfully as to how the estate's guards had murdered these people.
Having secured the testimonies of the Zhongyong Marquis household, Yu Zhen had the marquis's retainers thrown into prison and prepared to enter the palace to report to the Emperor.
Everyone already knew that Jin Lang's relationship with the Zhongyong Marquis estate had been poor long before he left it. Moreover, the Emperor and Empress had once praised Jin Lang as a model for the sons of noble families. Above all, the Bai family had specifically asked that he be protected, so the Chief Minister could hardly treat him with disrespect. He first led Jin Lang to the side chamber and asked him to wait a while at the Court of Judicial Review.
Jin Lang complied. Before the Chief Minister departed, Jin Lang knelt. He begged him to relay a message to the Emperor: that he would donate the entire fortune of the Zhongyong Marquis estate to the imperial treasury, if only his father's crimes might be lightened even a little.
Watching the guilt on Jin Lang's face, and recalling what the Bai family's steward had said when he came to visit, Yu Zhen nodded.
"Do not trouble yourself, Young Master Jin!"
The Chief Minister had expected this case to be an enormous headache. Yet before the formal interrogation had even begun, the marquis's own son had come forward bearing evidence.
Grateful as he was to Jin Lang, Yu Zhen kept his favor discreet, mentioning only modest words of praise for the young man when he made his report to the Emperor.
The Emperor did not read the testimonies Yu Zhen submitted. He simply closed his eyes and listened as the Chief Minister laid out the origins and course of the affair—then suddenly flew into a rage.
"That Zhongyong Marquis—has he no fear of Heaven at all!"
The Emperor clenched his teeth, seething with fury, on the verge of cursing Jin Dexiao outright—then something suddenly occurred to him and he shot to his feet.
"Liu Huanzhang deceived King Xin with the provisions. But Liu Huanzhang was at the front lines. How could that man have known the provisions would never reach Fengcheng?"
The Emperor's brow furrowed.
The Chief Minister bowed respectfully before answering.
"According to the servants of the Zhongyong Marquis estate, everyone recorded in this registry is an official who died an unnatural death! One man survived among them—a certain Sun Yiming, Liu Huanzhang's brother-in-law. On the first day of the twelfth month last year, the men Jin Dexiao sent failed to kill Sun Yiming; instead they exposed their own traces, and two of the guards died. As it happens, this very incident was once mentioned to me by An Jingguo, the Capital Magistrate. At the time, every person who held a grudge against Sun Yiming was investigated one by one, and no lead was ever found. It would seem that the Capital Magistrate's case may now finally be closed."
"Liu Huanzhang's brother-in-law?"
The Emperor bent his fingers and struck the table with all his strength. A faint murderous aura seeped from him.
"This is only my speculation, but it seems Zhongyong Marquis Jin Dexiao committed this crime for silver, just as his aide described. It was the first time Jin Dexiao did anything of the kind, so he could hardly have imagined his own underlings would trip him up. And those beneath him, knowing so great a figure as the marquis was shielding them from above, must have acted with steadily diminishing restraint. Then, when the affair grew too large, Jin Dexiao apparently took his aide's counsel and went so far as to murder people to protect himself."
The Chief Minister continued.
"Moreover... the Zhongyong Marquis estate and the Duke's estate are bound as in-laws through their children's marriage. If only for his son's sake, Jin Dexiao would never have plotted against his own in-law."
The Emperor found the reasoning plausible. As he gazed at the vermilion-lacquered pillars of the great hall, his eyes grew steadily darker.
"What you say is true."
"Before entering the palace, Young Master Jin knelt before me and said he had words to convey to Your Majesty. He would dedicate the entire fortune of the Zhongyong Marquis estate to the treasury, to atone on his father's behalf. It called to mind the words Your Majesty once spoke, praising him as a model for the sons of noble families. To see him forsake his father for the sake of righteousness, choosing loyalty over filial devotion—this is surely a man of honesty and unwavering loyalty. If Great Jin had many more men like him, the nation could hardly help but prosper."
"Yu, my dear minister. Are you defending Jin Lang just now?"
The Emperor could understand what Yu Zhen was saying, but he could not easily accept it.
"Whether he abandoned filial duty out of righteousness and loyalty, or whether it was merely a means of saving his own skin—that remains to be seen."
"Your Majesty, I trust Your Majesty's judgment. You praised Jin Lang as a model to others. In my long years at the Court of Judicial Review, I have seen every manner of man. But a young man of such clear and penetrating mind as Jin Lang is no common find. I wish to believe that Jin Lang is not a cunning schemer, but a man of rare and overflowing loyalty."
Sincerity rang through Yu Zhen's words. Jin Lang's eyes were clear and limpid—entirely unlike the sly, scheming young nobles of the capital.
Having heard the Chief Minister out, the Emperor deliberated for a moment, then turned his head and issued an order to Gao Demu.
"Send the Commander of the Imperial Guard to drag Jin Dexiao here. I will interrogate him personally."
"Yes, Your Majesty!"
Gao Demu hurried out of the great hall and gave the command to the Guard Commander to bring Jin Dexiao in.
Before long, however, the commander returned alone, reporting to the Emperor that Jin Dexiao had taken his own life in his cell.
Yu Zhen's eyes went wide with shock, and he dropped to his knees at once.
"Your Majesty! Your servant has failed in his duty. Your Majesty, I beg your forgiveness!"
The Emperor ground his teeth and held a long silence before asking.
"Any last testament?"
"Nothing at all. When I entered, the body was still warm—by that, he cannot have been dead long."
The commander answered.
The Emperor leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. A suffocating heaviness closed in around him.
* * *
The news that Zhongyong Marquis Jin Dexiao had taken his own life in a cell of the Court of Judicial Review sent yet another ripple of upheaval through the capital.
When Jin Lang heard inside the court that his father was dead, the strength drained from his hands and he nearly dropped the teacup he was holding.
And he had thought himself swift enough. After receiving the registry, he had gone straight back to the estate and coordinated testimony with his father's aides. He had even held blades to the aides' throats, mixing threat with persuasion, and led his father's retainers and guards to the Court of Judicial Review to confess their crimes. He had believed that if the matter reached the palace before nightfall, his father would live at least a few days longer.
But he had been too late.
If his father had truly died not by murder but by his own hand, then he must have resolved to die the very moment he decided to protect the honor of the Jin family.
Before long, Yu Zhen returned. Seeing Jin Lang's ashen face, he offered his condolences.
"His Majesty has ordered the arrest of Sun Yiming, Liu Huanzhang's brother-in-law. Once Sun Yiming has been interrogated, if no collusion is found between Zhongyong Marquis Jin Dexiao and Liu Huanzhang, the marquis's family will be free to come and go as they please. Return to the Zhongyong Marquis estate for now, and go nowhere else."
Jin Lang bowed respectfully to Yu Zhen.
"May I take my father and bury him at the estate?"
Yu Zhen shook his head.
"His Majesty intends to investigate the cause of Jin Dexiao's death. The body cannot be moved yet."
Jin Lang clenched his fists, then bowed once more to the Chief Minister.
After leaving the Court of Judicial Review, Jin Lang instructed his servant to carry this news to Bai Jinxiu. He had to return to the Zhongyong Marquis estate and prepare his father's funeral. Once he entered the estate, there would be no leaving it—so he sent word to Bai Jinxiu to remain at the Bai estate and look after the Duke for him.