Lu Lingzhang reclined in Shenlong Hall while resting his temple on one hand as he dozed lightly. Suddenly, something in his dream startled him; his elbow jerked, and he accidentally knocked over a half-finished cup of cold tea on the desk.
The brown liquid spread instantly, soaking through memorials, scrolls, and a sachet he had unfastened and tossed there at some unknown point.
A palace eunuch hurried forward to clear the mess in silence. Lu Lingzhang rubbed the space between his brows with a certain dullness before leaning back into his chair. He idly picked up the sachet to shake off the water, pulled open the drawstring, and peered inside.
It contained nothing more than some spices and a talisman—items the emperor could replace with countless substitutes from the palace stores. Even if it were soaked through, it should have mattered little…
Yet Lu Lingzhang’s gaze abruptly locked onto a single, unremarkable sheet of paper, now faded and yellowed with age. He recognized it at once: he remembered this protective talisman. Many years ago; exactly how many he could no longer recall, he had received this paper from Lu Lingzhen’s hand.
His sister had once been swindled out of gold while trying to buy a Hu-style blade she adored, and she had brought back a pile of colorful talismans inscribed with the names of everyone in the family. He had stared at the three characters for “Lu Lingzhang” for a while before personally placing it into this sachet. Lu Lingzhen had been delighted, surreptitiously cupping her hands in a respectful salute to him under the table.
It had only been yesterday that he passed by Hanzhang Hall. The palace doors had been sealed for nearly half a year, but with the war and the disasters in Yongzhou recently easing, he had received a memorial from Lu Lingzhen requesting permission to return to the capital. He expected she would be back soon.
When Lu Lingzhang first ascended the throne, this palace building had very nearly been renamed. “Hanzhang Hall” followed an ancient name that had been famous since the Liu Song dynasty of the Southern Kingdoms, when Princess Shouyang fell asleep before the hall and a plum blossom landed on her forehead, creating the “plum blossom makeup.” Yet, regardless of its prestigious origins, the name ultimately shared a forbidden character with the new emperor’s given name.
The Department of State Affair had already prepared a basketful of alternative names to present to him. His maternal uncle and the empress dowager had pressed him relentlessly to change it immediately, and even Lu Lingzhen had said, in her habitually blunt tone, that she didn’t care; in fact, she’d prefer it if he just let her move out entirely.
But Lu Lingzhang had been remarkably steadfast, almost paranoid in his refusal to change it. He didn’t want to add any more chaos to the small family of his elder siblings, who had already endured such upheaval—even if this bit of “chaos” was trivial compared to the tragedy of families being torn apart and scattered to the winds.
The talisman was soaked in tea, and the ink had blurred until it was completely illegible. Lu Lingzhang sighed and was about to hand it to the sweeping eunuch to be discarded. On a sudden impulse, he hesitated, withdrew his hand, smoothed the paper out, and left it dry on a corner of the desk.
Then, he reached for the first memorial that had just been presented. He flipped it open absentmindedly, and the handwriting of He Gao, the prefect of Yongzhou, came into view.
Lu Lingzhang stared at those few lines of text for a very long time. He murmured, “…Go invite my Imperial Brother to the palace. Immediately.”
Xie Jing stepped into the study of the Prime Minister’s Mansion half an hour earlier than usual, only to find the room already crowded. Wang Chu, the brothers Wang Qi and Wang Xi, Cui Shushi, and several aides and disciples were all present. As he entered, several strange looks immediately fell upon him.
Having long grown accustomed to such treatment in the Prime Minister’s Mansion, he simply walked to the empty seat below Wang Chu and sat down. He listened as the other man spoke with practiced indifference:
“A memorial came up from Yongzhou this morning. Have a look at it.”
Upon hearing the word “Yongzhou,” Xie Jing’s mind tightened with focus, but suspecting nothing else, he simply lowered his eyes to read.
Everyone seemed to be expecting some sort of special or subtle reaction from him; however, Xie Jing showed no response at all while maintaining that posture of a slight nod without moving a muscle. After a long while, he simply raised his head and returned the memorial with an expressionless face.
Cui Shushi glanced at him sideways, furrowed her brows imperceptibly, and shifted the conversation: “Father, this is precisely our opportunity. The priority should be to take advantage of Prince Zhao being preoccupied with this matter and swiftly deal with the armed force the Eldest Princess brought to Yongzhou. We must not repeat the mistake of losing the Tiger Division back then.”
“His Majesty’s wings have hardened now, and he has developed other ideas,” Wang Chu said leisurely. “I fear we cannot obtain them through open requests.”
Wang Qi said, “What my younger brother’s wife says is correct. Even if we cannot take them over, we must also find a way to suppress them. We cannot let His Majesty use them as a favor to hand over to Prince Zhao’s Mansion. I heard those people are the Eldest Princess’s personal guards raised in Jinling. Since they were kept secret before, they were likely intended to be used as death soldiers.”
“Such a troop is more trouble in the capital than in the frontier, and in Lu Lingcong’s hands, they would be even more trouble than in the capital.” Wang Chu pondered for a moment, then suddenly asked Cui Shushi, “Is your brother still serving in the Imperial Guard?”
Cui Shushi immediately replied, “My third brother, Jishi, is currently serving as an External Adjutant of the Yulin Guard. None of the others are in the military.”
Wang Chu nodded and said, “It is better to take an unconventional path, to give in order to take. Under the banner of offering rewards, we shall requisition them and first incorporate them into the Yulin Guard. Once that is done, it will be much easier to reassign them. Tell your third brother to stay sharp and be prepared.”
Hearing this, Wang Xi said indignantly, “Father, the Right Junior Adviser promoted last month was also a nephew of her Cui family!”
Cui Shushi shot a cold glance at Wang Xi and retorted sharply, “If you are so dissatisfied, feel free to find someone to test their skills against him yourself. My cousin may not be a great talent, but his martial arts skills are superior even to mine. Oh, I nearly forgot; can the Second Young Master even defeat me these days?”
Wang Xi glared at her but remained silent.
It was precisely because Wang Chu did not care whether she and Wang Xi were on harmonious terms that Cui Shushi dared to be so arrogant. Since Wang Qi had a legitimate son, Wang Chu did not rely on Wang Xi to carry on the family line. Consequently, he was very indulgent towards his second daughter-in-law in her role as a “strategist”; as long as she was sufficiently loyal and intelligent, he did not force her to maintain the facade of marital affection.
Thus, taking advantage of the moment when Wang Chu was too annoyed to deal with his second son and the advisors were awkwardly forced to witness the Prime Minister’s family matters, she checked Xie Jing’s expression again.
It was still indifferent.
It was not until Wang Chu dismissed everyone that Cui Shushi found a moment when no one was around. She caught up with Xie Jing on his way out of the mansion and grabbed his sleeve, forcing him to a halt, “You…”
Xie Jing’s pupils were not focused at all. He stood on the steps like a stringed puppet while staring vacantly and coldly at the bricks ahead. Forget hearing Cui Shushi call him, it seemed he was entirely unaware of anyone else’s presence.
Helpless, Cui Shushi could only instruct the maidservant behind her, “Escort Lord Xie back through the back gate.”
On the way back to his mansion and into his room, Xie Jing did not utter a single word. His gaze remained frozen on a point in the void for a long time, and only after a great while did he blink as if startled. This was actually not very different from his usual demeanor, so much so that the servants did not notice anything unusual at all.
As soon as the door closed behind him, a slip of paper drifted down slightly from the eaves above his head. This was a mechanism Xie Jun habitually used, designed to be triggered only by Xie Jing’s specific height and his particular habits of opening doors and stepping forward.
Xie Jing lowered his head and stared straight at the content on the paper.
The ink was still fresh and the handwriting rushed, yet it yanked Xie Jing’s hollow, suspended heart straight back into the present, and then mercilessly smashed it down, grinding it into a pulp of blood and pain.
“I implore Little Uncle and His Highness to restrain your grief. Only when the great plan is settled can we avenge the Eldest Princess.”
Xie Jun had a direct line to the Xuanshi, and news confirmed by the Xuanshi was almost never false or mistaken.
Xie Jing stood frozen in place, lost and helpless for what felt like a lifetime. Then, he suddenly lunged toward the tall standing mirror in the corner, reaching up on his tiptoes to open the door leading to the secret chamber. He had to find Lu Lingcong; he needed to be with Lu Lingcong.
However, as it was currently the flood season, this path was blocked. The mirror frame had been locked some time ago and could not be opened in an instant. Xie Jing began to strike his head against it; after a few blows, the world began to spin. He suddenly jolted, a cold sweat pouring over his entire body. Even if he saw Lu Lingcong, what then? What use would it be? Even if they were together, what could they possibly do?
Nothing could be changed.
Xie Jing did not doubt for a moment now that he must have deserved to die in his past life. Otherwise, he truly did not know what sins or blood debts could cause him to suffer such divine retribution time and time again in this life!
His thoughts were in a state of chaos. Unable to stand steadily or sit down, he paced back and forth in the room like someone suffering from a manic delirium as if flames would sear the soles of his feet the moment he stopped. His vision went dark in waves; not the dizziness of standing up too fast after sitting, but the sensation of heaven and earth turning upside down around him. And he realized, to his horror, that he was thinking of death.
Xie Jing searched through his mind with all his might only to discover with a start that he could not grasp even a shred of the desire to survive. It was not that he did not want to but that he was incapable; he simply could not do it. The vivid, luminous scenes of the past were etched clearly into his memory, yet he could no longer draw even the faintest trace of joy from them.
In the moment the Xie family was executed to the last man, in the moment he took Lu Shuning away from Prince Zhao’s Mansion, and in the moment he let Lu Shuqing leave first at Mount Tang, he had not been without wavering; he had not been without thoughts of this word. But what terrified him at this instant was that even desperately thinking of the two children could hardly reignite his longing for “life.” The children had experienced days without a mother before; Lu Lingcong would take excellent care of them, and with Consort Dowager Wu and Yin Chou there, they would not lack care and love. There were thousands upon thousands of pure, kind, intelligent, and gentle young ladies in Jinling; anyone at all could become a competent and proper stepmother for the children… Xie Jing realized in a daze that he actually did not mind at all.
In the midst of death, he thought only of death.
Freshly cut peonies stood in a porcelain vase on the desk, their petals still heavy with dew, lush and almost dripping with life and beauty. Xie Jing reached out and touched them lightly with a cautiousness as if fearing to startle the gods above as though brushing against the delicate, radiant, and sun-bright face of the young girl Lu Lingzhen.
He suddenly felt a boiling heat on his face. Blazing flames flowed down his cheekbones and jawline, hacking through and shattering the countenance that time had treated so kindly. He wiped it away subconsciously only to find a shocking crimson in his palm. Xie Jing slowly raised his head to look into the mirror—
There were two streaks of bloody tears.
Lady Wang’s hand loosened, and the memorial slipped from her fingers onto the desk, making a soft “tap” as it landed.
She randomly pointed at a palace attendant before the steps: “You, go, go to Mingluan Hall…”
Then her hand froze in mid-air, her lips parted as if she had been placed under a binding spell, and she stood dazed in the hall for a long while.
The attendant waited in terror and was eventually forced to respectfully prompt her: “…Empress Dowager?”
Lady Wang’s hand abruptly dropped back onto her lap. She shook her head blankly: “No, it is nothing. You may leave.”
Lu Lingzhang watched his mother’s expression and behavior in silence before finally giving the order: “Pass down Zhen’s decree: the matter regarding the Eldest Princess must be kept from Mingluan Hall. If there are any rumors in the palace, those responsible are to be executed without mercy.”
Before he had even finished the sentence, Lady Wang had already stood up and strode out of the great hall as if escaping only to come face-to-face with Lu Lingcong right beneath the palace gates.
Lu Lingcong had not expected to run into the Empress Dowager, but he saw her startled in horror. She gave him a long, deep look with an expression he had never seen before in his life—a strange mixture of satisfaction, pity, and the shared sorrow of those of the same kind; then quickly turned and left.
However, he had no time to overthink it and simply asked Lu Lingzhang, “Is it a military report? Where has the Hewei reached?”
Lu Lingzhang took a deep breath, dismissed the eunuchs serving in the hall, and walked up to Lu Lingcong to face him. His brother was very tall, lithe, and upright; he had been used to looking up to him since childhood, and it remained so even now.
“I know that Imperial Brother does not believe in things on paper like official dispatches and memorials.” He said, then looked back and gestured.
Lu Lingcong saw a person emerge from behind the curtain with a leg injury and a haggard face. It was Lu Lingzhen’s deputy general, one of the leaders of the Hewei.
“Therefore, I asked Xie Jun to bring him into the palace. There are some things that are perhaps only appropriate if he tells Imperial Brother himself.”
Lu Lingcong fixed him with a gaze as sharp as a hawk’s: “You have already returned, so why did you not return to the Prince’s Mansion to report? Where is the Princess?”
The deputy general looked toward Lu Lingzhang with difficulty; the latter turned his gaze away helplessly before signaling him to say what he must.
“Your Highness should have already seen that letter sent to the Eldest Princess written under the forged name of the Princess Consort, right?”
Lu Lingcong froze upon hearing this, “I heard from the Imperial Study that after Lord He sensed something was wrong, he immediately sent men to call back the Eldest Princess. What, did you not encounter the scouts?”
The deputy general slowly shook his head: “We were one step too late. The messenger was detained by Ding Jian.”
“Ding Jian? Has he not already withdrawn his troops?”
The deputy general explained with great difficulty: “…When the Hewei reached the banks of the Wuding River, we discovered Ding Jian leading his troops back toward Yongzhou. Fearing that the city’s defenses were insufficient, the Eldest Princess ordered the Yongzhou soldiers, who were escorting us on Lord He’s orders, to return first with the Hewei following to provide support just in case.”
“But Ding Jian’s target was not Yongzhou, nor even the Hewei, but … it was the Eldest Princess. By the time we realized this, we were already trapped on the mountain. The Princess ordered us to escape from the north first, while she herself went south to face Ding Jian. The Northern Desert reinforcements arrived just as we cleared the mountain; it was only by a fraction. If the Princess had not sent us away immediately, the Hewei might… none of us would have returned.”
“Later, Lord He found out that the reason the Northern Desert sent more reinforcements was that Ding Jian had signed a military pledge, vowing that he would certainly…” The deputy general could not voice those words, only choking out, “It was the Princess who saved us.”
“The Hewei, along with Lord He with the garrison, and the elders and commoners of Yongzhou City searched the Wuding River area for five days… but we still failed to find the Eldest Princess’s remains. We dared not delay any longer and had no choice but to set out for the capital.”
As his voice trailed off, the vast Shenlong Hall fell into a long silence. The wind leaked in through a window frame that wasn’t fully closed, swirling the thin, hanging curtains; it was just an utterly ordinary late-spring afternoon.
Lu Lingcong furrowed his brows blankly and said slowly, “…Whose remains?”
The deputy general did not dare make another sound.
Lu Lingzhang waved his hand to dismiss him. He gazed at his elder brother’s back and opened his mouth, but no words would come out.
After an unknown amount of time, Lu Lingcong suddenly brushed his sleeves and turned around, striding swiftly out of Shenlong Hall like a gust of wind. Lu Lingzhang was momentarily dazed before he snapped back to his senses and gave chase. He caught up with him in the Eternal Alley, only to realize that his brother’s destination was in the direction of Hanzhang Hall.
The Eternal Lane was long and narrow; it was where the three siblings had grown up. On the eve of the Winter Solstice in the eighth year of Zhenyou, it was on this very path that Lu Lingzhang had been led by his sister to quietly slipping past sentries and night patrols with a picture book stolen from the market tucked in his arms, returning to the deep, dark Linhai Hall.
He had peeked his cheeks, reddened by the cold wind, out from his collar and asked timidly, “…What if Empress Mother finds out?”
Lu Lingzhen glanced at him, her gaze like a shooting star flashing past his ear: “You are my brother. I will protect you.”
The location of Hanzhang Hall could not be considered remote, yet lacking the breath of the living, it appeared somewhat desolate even under the sunlight. Lu Lingzhang’s decree was being carried out with tacit understanding; the tragic news clearly had not yet reached the depths of this palace. The idle eunuchs rubbed their bleary eyes in confusion, only to realize in astonishment that Prince Zhao was walking straight toward them, followed closely by the young emperor.
Lu Lingcong stopped outside the hall, his clenched fists pounding out a chaotic, disorganized noise. He roared almost impatiently, “Lu Lingzhen! Open the door for me!”
The eunuchs stared in stunned silence. No one understood why Prince Zhao had suddenly rushed to the Hanzhang Hall, which had been vacant for half a year, to look for the Eldest Princess. To put it mildly, his behavior was unseemly; to put it bluntly, it was a descent into madness.
Yet the emperor did not stop him. He merely stood a short distance away while watching in a calm yet tragic silence.
“Lu Lingzhen, open this for me! It is useless to lock Gege out! I know you are in there!”
Naturally, no one opened the door. There was no one like the young, twin-bunned Lu Lingzhen to put away the wooden sword she used to wedge the door shut and come out reluctantly to greet her brother while pouting, “I knew you weren’t truly angry!”
Receiving no response, Lu Lingcong lowered his voice while murmuring a soft call of “Zhenzhen.” Then, he suddenly snapped his head up, staring intently at the heavy lock, and his long blade unsheathed with a hiss.
Lu Lingzhang shivered and instinctively shouted, “Imperial Brother!”
But it was too late. With a flash of cold steel, Lu Lingcong swung his blade and shattered the lock; the bronze chains fell to the ground with a rhythmic clang.
The palace doors swung wide. Sunlight poured in, sending dust swirling everywhere. The withered branches of white plum trees leaned precariously; the central courtyard was completely empty.
Lu Lingcong looked as if he had been struck by a heavy blow. His entire body jerked violently, and he began to pant in short, sharp breaths. After a long while, he stumbled back several steps and stood frozen, looking as though the strength had been drained from his body in an instant.
How can one say the west wind fails to destroy all? Hanzhang still awaits the return of its master.
After a long silence, Lu Lingcong spoke in a soft voice, “Do not bury her in the Imperial Tombs.”
“Do not grant her posthumous honors, do not issue imperial decrees of title, and do not give her a posthumous name. Whether it be that of a general or a princess, do not pile anything upon her. Let her leave cleanly, carrying only her name.”
“Release her from any connection to the Imperial Family and from any ties to you or me. Do not let the ancestors recognize her. She could not escape being the daughter of an emperor in life; so let her not remain burdened by shackles and locks at the Yellow Springs, unable to sleep in peace.”
Lu Lingzhang hesitated, “But Imperial Sister requested of her own accord…”
Lu Lingcong simply said, “This is what she wanted.”
On the day Lu Lingzhen defeated him for the first time, the whole family sat under the corridor after dinner to enjoy the cool air. Xie Jing was tuning the strings of a Yueqin lute that Consort Dowager Wu had recently acquired, providing accompaniment to the nonsensical nursery rhymes Lu Shuning was making up. While Lu Lingcong leaned against a pillar with his arms crossed, feeling the breeze and listening idly.
Then, through the separation of a window, he heard Consort Dowager Wu, who was helping Lu Lingzhen wash her hair, ask tentatively, “Zhenzhen has surpassed your brother now and is quite formidable, but there is one thing Mother does not understand: you have aspired to join the military since you were a child; is it because you want to serve the country, achieve great feats, or save the world?”
Lu Lingzhen replied, “I don’t want any of that. I’ve never thought about it either. Why ask this all of a sudden?”
Consort Dowager Wu went quiet for a moment, then asked another question instead of answering: “Then, if you were like the princes, marquises, generals, and ministers of old and new, enshrined in the ancestral temple and leaving a name in the history books, would Zhenzhen be happy?”
Without the slightest hesitation, Lu Lingzhen countered, “Who would bother with the redundancy of writing a separate biography for a princess? Who would break all traditions to ‘invite’ the spirit tablet of an imperial daughter into the ancestral temple? Even if we take ten thousand steps back, to be recorded in history or entered into the temple, is that truly a glorious posthumous honor worth boasting about? Am I supposed to be profoundly grateful for such an ‘elevation’ and joyfully turn into a line of text or a piece of wood, surrendering the thousands upon thousands of years after death to this palace as well?”
Lu Lingcong heard the sound of splashing water and an “Aiya!” from Consort Dowager Wu; he imagined Lu Lingzhen had suddenly straightened up, flicking water from the tips of her hair onto her mother’s clothes.
She raised her voice with utter indifference, “Then again, thousands of years from now, who knows if Taichu Palace will even still be standing? Perhaps it too will have long ago turned into a handful of ash and a mound of dirt!”
Xie Jing had also heard this; he looked over and met Lu Lingcong’s eyes, and they both broke into a smile.
Consort Dowager Wu could only chime in to keep the peace, “Alright, alright, Mother has been taught her lesson. Hurry up and finish washing.”
After hearing Lu Lingcong’s brief recount, Lu Lingzhang asked no more. The two brothers stood still for a while before Lu Lingcong turned around and left in an ordinary, silent, and solitary manner.
One elder brother slumped down in dejection, while a son, a husband, and a father rose in silence.
Lu Lingzhang still followed behind and accompanied him all the way into Mingluan Hall. He waved his hand to stop the attendants from announcing them and stood far off in the courtyard. He saw the sun’s orange-red glow spilling across the plain window screens of the sleeping quarters beneath the eaves; in the place where a mother had once washed her daughter’s hair, he wondered who now sat there idly.
