Xie Jing’s experience with long-distance travel was actually not much richer than that of Lu Lingzhang, who had lived in the deep palace for a long time. The few long trips he had taken since childhood were merely back and forth between Jinling and the Chen Commandery. The prices, rules, and local customs inside and outside the capital were entirely different; Lu Lingcong only had a superficial understanding of them, and Xie Jing was even more like the naive Lu Shuqing, only knowing how to follow behind others to watch the excitement; wanting to eat what he hadn’t eaten and play with what he hadn’t played with since he didn’t lack money anyway.
However, Xie Jing did have serious business on this trip after all, and it was not ideal to make his clansmen in the Chen Commandery wait too long, so he could not afford to delay much on the road.
By the time the boat reached Yangzhou, the night was already deep. It was inconvenient to go ashore to find an inn so after discussing it, the two decided to moor at the pier and make do for the night on the boat and enter the city at dawn the next day.
In the middle of the night, Xie Jing felt Lu Lingcong tapping him gently in a daze. Just as he was about to mumble, “What is it,” Lu Lingcong suddenly covered his mouth, signaling him to be silent. Immediately after, he used his finger to write two words on Xie Jing’s back: “There’s a thief.”
Xie Jing woke up instantly with a jolt, but Lu Lingcong immediately stroked his shoulder to tell him to relax his body and not to panic.
He wrote two more words—”I’ll handle it.”
Xie Jing held his breath and quietly pulled Lu Shuqing tightly into his arms. He sensed the person beside him silently lifting the quilt; the movement was masked by the rustling sound of the “thief” rummaging through things. Lu Lingcong got out of bed with lithe and swift movements like some kind of nocturnal animal.
A startled cry rang out from within the cabin followed by the dull thuds of limbs tangling and striking the floor; within about three exchanges, the disturbance died down, and soon after, a candle was lit. Xie Jing rose and looked closely, discovering a dark figure tied up and half-kneeling before the bed; the thief had been bound using the robe sash Xie Jing had left draped by the bedside.
Lu Lingcong looked down at the intruder. “Decent skills.”
The thief was young and gaunt, his face betraying unmistakable panic; with the boatman outside snoring like thunder, Xie Jing surmised he had used the cover of the dark, wind-lashed night to slip aboard at random among the many vessels docked at the pier.
Lu Lingcong asked again, “Are you new to the trade? Is this your first time?”
Seeing the thief nod like a pestle pounding garlic, he laughed. “I figured as much. It might pass unnoticed in a house, but on a hollow-hulled boat, your footsteps were loud enough to rouse the dead.”
He was exaggerating, of course. The thief had simply been unlucky enough to run into Lu Lingcong, who had practiced martial arts for years and was extremely sensitive to sound. Had it been anyone else like Xie Jing, they wouldn’t have noticed anything amiss at all.
“Enough talk, Qing’er’s awake,” Xie Jing said, a trace of lingering fear from a robbery year ago still clinging to him. He asked warily, “Where are you from? What made you resort to this?”
The candlelight was dim. Seeing Xie Jing sitting up from the inner side of the bed with long hair draped over one shoulder and a child in his arms, the thief naturally assumed he was a woman. Startled by the sound of his voice, the thief froze for a long moment before speaking:
“This lowly one is from Hedong. I followed some fellow villagers onto a merchant ship to work, but I was swindled. Upon reaching Yangzhou, I was kicked off, and the shipowner swallowed all my travel funds. I haven’t eaten in three days, that’s why I resorted to something so foolish. I beg you both to show mercy; since it’s my first offense, please let me go.”
Yangzhou had been prosperous since ancient times, and because it sat adjacent to the Grand Canal, the flow of people was frequent; it was common for those with ill intentions to target the area for theft and fraud.
“I’ll consider this an act of charity to earn merit for my son and spend silver to avert disaster. This silver will be enough for you to hire a boat to Jinling. Once you arrive, go to any Wu Family Trading House, present this letter to the manager, and ask for work to make your living,” Lu Lingcong said as he sat at the table and wrote a few lines. “Of course, if you don’t want to go, you can find honest work within Yangzhou just as well. But if you return to petty thievery and get caught again, it won’t be settled this easily… What is your name?”
The thief hurriedly replied, “This lowly one is called Zhang San.”
With a couple of swift strokes, Lu Lingcong added the name, then took out Prince Zhao’s seal from his luggage and turned to Lu Shuqing. “Qing’er, take a look at what Father is using.”
Lu Shuqing had been nesting drowsily in his mother’s arms, upon hearing this, his invisible ears seemed to prick up. He poked his head out and saw that Lu Lingcong held the small, colored, glass-glazed jar containing the pomegranate inkpad he had made himself. He immediately demanded, “I want to stamp it!”
“Alright, alright,” Lu Lingcong indulged him and pulled him over. “Let our Little Lord Lu do the stamping.”
With his bonds loosened, Zhang San took the silver and the note; the moment his eyes fell on the three characters, “Prince Zhao’s seal” stamped upon it, he froze, then stammered in disbelief, “Ma-many thanks… you are…”
Lu Lingcong yawned and waved him off. “Go on then. Do you plan on staying for another nap before leaving?”
At dawn the next day, they went ashore and borrowed two fine horses from the courier station. Since the busy market streets were difficult to navigate, they took a shortcut through the outskirts to enter the city. Both Xie Jing and Lu Lingcong had been absorbed in their own official duties lately; it had truly been some time since they traveled together, and a sudden, youthful impulse seized them to challenge each other to a race.
“Qing’er, whose horse are you riding?” Xie Jing asked with complete confidence, relying on the fact that Lu Shuqing had always been the most attached to him.
Lu Shuqing, however, had his own logic: “Cousin says all older brothers are formidable, so I want to ride Father’s horse!”
Xie Jing frowned. “Your father isn’t your ‘brother,’ that logic doesn’t apply to you!”
Lu Shuqing rolled his eyes. “But I’ve heard Mother call Father ‘Gege’ before.”
Over the years, showing off for their child has become routine. Lu Lingcong raised an eyebrow at Xie Jing with teasing air as he lifted Lu Shuqing onto his horse. Xie Jing feigned disdain, saying sourly, “Fine! Winning with a handicap isn’t a true victory anyway. Remember this, Qing’er; only when you can beat your parents on your own strength one day will that be a real accomplishment!”
With that command, he was the first to gallop away.
He couldn’t remember the last time he had ridden a horse so freely, perhaps it was before Lu Shuqing was born. The gentle, warm breeze swept his stray hair back. Buddhists called hair “strands of sorrow,” and as Xie Jing tilted his head skyward, he relished the delight of sending all his worries drifting beyond the clouds.
With the young child in front of him, Lu Lingcong had to be cautious for fear of jolting or bumping him, which left him somewhat constrained. In contrast, Xie Jing was light and unburdened, urging his horse into a full gallop and pulling ahead by a significant margin. Lu Shuqing was deeply disappointed, his little face drooping as he complained, “Cousin is a liar.”
Xie Jing waited at the finish line for the father and son. By now, all past grudges had melted away, and he called out jubilantly, “Lu Zifeng! Gege! Do you yield or not?”
Lu Lingcong twisted his lips in helpless amusement and swung down from his horse, seizing the moment to coax Lu Shuqing: “You mustn’t stay shut up in your room all day; only by practicing your riding diligently can you hope to always come out on top.”
He turned back and saw Xie Jing still sitting high atop his horse. Seemingly bothered by the heat, Xie Jing had gathered his loose, long hair and tied it in a high ponytail behind his head. Before coming ashore, he had changed into a round-collar robe for ease of movement, and his narrow sleeves were rolled up above his elbows. He wiped the light sweat from his brow with the back of his hand while smiling at Lu Lingcong with a look of pure, unbridled lightheartedness.
For a moment, Lu Lingcong was speechless. He felt instinctively dazzled, unsure whether it was the sunlight streaming through the trees or simply the long absence of witnessing such an extraordinarily bright smile from Xie Jing.
Looking at that face, no one would ever imagine he was already a mother; they would never know that breaking down, losing control, and hysteria had once possessed him, nor would they dare believe he was once on the brink of despair, even… harboring a wish for death.
Lu Lingcong was dazed for a moment and involuntarily took a few steps forward until he reached Xie Jing and opened his arms toward him.
Xie Jing’s eyes widened slightly in surprise, but he quickly realized Lu Lingcong wanted to help him dismount. Though a bit embarrassed, he still leaned forward generously and cast himself into his embrace.
Lu Lingcong pressed Xie Jing’s head into the crook of his neck and whispered in his ear, “I am especially, especially happy today.”
Unaware of the deeper meaning, Xie Jing echoed him, “Of course! I’m especially happy today too! Who wouldn’t be happy going out to play?”
Lu Lingcong didn’t explain further; he only thought silently to himself: I am both happy and grateful that I can still see you smile like this.
As evening fell and lanterns were being lit while the night market came alive, Lu Lingcong took Lu Shuqing for a few laps around the pier and picked up some curious little trinkets. When they returned to the boat, Xie Jing was nowhere to be seen; upon asking the boatman, they learned he was hiding at the stern, drinking from a jar of freshly brewed wine.
Lu Shuqing’s ears were sharp. He let out a small “Oh?” and said, “It sounds like Mother is singing.”
Lu Lingcong was no stranger to Xie Jing’s singing; back then, he often heard Xie Jing sing lullabies to Lu Shuqing; songs without any real technique, deliberately slow and gentle, quite unlike the clarity of his natural voice. This so-called “singing” now was merely an intermittent melody hummed from the back of his throat; not much of a tune but steeped in the contentment of having nothing to do.
Lifting the curtain, Lu Lingcong saw Xie Jing lying on his side at the stern with his head resting on his arms, cheeks flushed, and eyes narrowed to thin slits. His slender spring robes draped gracefully over him, the cicada-wing gauze of his overcoat pooling in layered folds at his feet, softening the lines of his body into a wash of pale apricot, like a crescent moon of yellow and white descended into the mortal world.
One look and Lu Lingcong knew: Xie Jing was a little drunk.
Neither of them had a weak constitution for drink, and sharing a hearty bout at the Prince’s Mansion was nothing unusual; yet Xie Jing always carried a host of “what-ifs” in his mind—what if the emperor suddenly summoned them, or what if Lu Shuqing were to fall ill? Consequently, he never allowed himself to actually get drunk either.
But now, he had evidently let that tension slip, whether because they were no longer at the Son of Heaven’s feet or because of the unrestrained, joyful race earlier that day. If the Xie Jing of that afternoon had only gathered the remnants of his former impulsive self, then the Xie Jing of this moment had truly fallen back into the romantic, carefree dreams of his youth.
Lu Lingcong sat down beside him and finished the last bit of cold wine in the jar. He wondered if he was allowed to think it: that this journey north to the Chen Commandery was, for Xie Jing; a consort never meant to be confined within palace walls, a return to freedom.
Sensing Lu Lingcong’s approach, Xie Jing eased his eyes open slightly and regarded him in silence. Suddenly, he asked in a low voice:
“Will you become the emperor?”
Lu Lingcong was visibly stunned by the suddenness of the question. This was a delicate, sensitive matter. They had once joked about it before fully trusting each other, and after their marriage, they shared a tacit understanding never to mention it—though Lu Shuqing’s position, Shenlong Hall’s stance, and the empress’s hostility all ultimately traced back to those two words: “Crown Prince.” Both had clung to a fragile thread of escapist fantasy.
The emperor was in his prime, free of illness or misfortune. Barring any unforeseen mishaps, by the time they were forced to confront this matter, Lu Lingzhang would be grown, and who could say what the circumstances would be then.
Lu Lingcong simply shook his head and said softly, “I don’t know.”
But in truth, both knew without saying that there was at least a fifty percent chance the answer was yes. If the emperor had absolutely no intention of Lu Lingcong succeeding him, he would neither have given him the freedom to act nor have refrained from stripping him of his power.
The river of lanterns was reflected in the depths of Lu Lingcong’s star-bright eyes. Looking at that youthful face, Xie Jing suddenly realized he found it difficult to imagine what this intimately familiar man, the person closest to him in the world; would look like if he truly became the Son of Heaven, the Supreme Ruler.
“If that day truly comes, I still have only one request; establish Lu Shuqing as the heir and let him sit securely in the Eastern Palace.”
Xie Jing didn’t know whether he and Lu Lingcong would have more children, or if their next would be a son or a daughter, but he simply wanted to remove, at the root, any chance that the next generation would suffer the pangs of sibling rivalry. After all, across every dynasty, cases of brothers sharing the same mother turning against one another were far from uncommon.
Lu Lingcong was silent for a moment before saying with certainty, “I also stand by what I said back then; Qing’er will be my only heir, regardless of whether what he inherits from my hands is Prince Zhao’s Mansion or Shenlong Hall.”
Xie Jing nodded, having anticipated Lu Lingcong’s words, and he had no doubt that Lu Lingcong would follow through.
After a long while, Lu Lingcong looked up and fixed his gaze on him. “And you would be—”
Xie Jing shot him with an understanding glance. Lu Lingcong braked before finishing the sentence, but the word “Empress” was already on the tip of his tongue.
That was right.
He would be Lu Lingcong’s empress.
As early as that year, before she had even become Princess Consort Zhao, Xie Jing had glanced back at Linhai Hall in the twilight after dinner, sensing that a day like this might arrive one day. He did not know what Lady Wang had been like as a young girl, but there was no doubt that the girl’s surname Wang had already become a glamorous corpse within this mausoleum built of vermilion walls and green tiles.
A princess consort is not the same as an empress, and his position as a consort was unique—within Prince Zhao’s Mansion, the gap between him and the strictures of “etiquette” was even wider than it had been back in Wuyi Lane. In ordinary noble or official households, even a legal wife would never stay in the same room as her husband every single day, let alone within the deep palace.
If he truly became the empress, what would await him on the road ahead? He didn’t know whether the long nights in Linhai Hall would be spent alone, nor did he know how Lu Lingcong would navigate relations with the Xie clan of Chen Commandery, the maternal family of the Eastern Palace… He did not know if he would be forced to share Lu Lingcong with many others.
When these questions first arose, Lu Lingcong did not yet like him, and it seemed he did not yet like Lu Lingcong either. He was merely speculating on Lady Wang’s thoughts from a bystander’s perspective with a touch of sorrow and pity; even when he inevitably projected it onto himself, it amounted to nothing more than a sigh for his past free and willful life.
But today is different. The relationship between him and Lu Lingcong has changed—they promised to be faithful to the end, did they not?
These problems can no longer be solved by a simple phrase like “He and Lu Lingcong trust each other.” A royal couple is defined by a myriad of complex emotions, including countless worries, suspicions, calculations, concessions, trade-offs, and delicate balances.
In the end, the only thing he could actually control was Lu Shuqing.
The drunkenness made Xie Jing’s phrasing somewhat sluggish, but his mind remained clear. He reached out to grasp Lu Lingcong’s palm, saying sincerely yet blankly, “I want to be with you forever, and a hundred years from now, I want to rest in the same grave as you with dignity. I want to be your empress. Yet perhaps… I am not suited for it.”
In truth, he did not need to say these things. The fact that Lu Lingcong had just fallen silent meant that Lu Lingcong had already considered all of his hesitations and confusion.
“Then you need not force yourself to be ‘suit for it’.”
Xie Jing froze upon hearing this. Lu Lingcong gripped his hand back: “To me, the dragon throne has never been more than just a chair. I can give it up to Lingzhang. If the price is losing you, I simply won’t be the emperor.”
“Why?”
Lu Lingcong raised his arm, using his finger to gently poke Xie Jing’s cheek before slowly pushing up the corner of his mouth to form a somewhat comical smile.
“I don’t want to see a smile like today’s ever disappear from your face again.”
