Chapter 66
JINGYI
Outside, the afternoon air had turned crisp, the early winter chill turned every breath into a faint plume. The cold here never cut deep. It crept, sly and dry, threading through the folds of her robe.
The gardens, though still green in places, were paling. Pink and light green plum blossoms provided the colours. The lake beyond the inner court shimmered under a film of cold, its surface touched by falling leaves, golden carps moving sluggishly beneath.
So different from Tremore, she thought. There, the skies had deepened to slate when she left, and the first frosts had turned the ground brittle beneath horse hooves. Parandor must be cloaked in white by now.
It was strange how often her thoughts returned to that northern fortress, to its worn stone and rough woollen tapestries. To communal meals taken beside a crackling hearth. To a certain kind of robust productivity she hadn’t known she missed—until it was gone.
“Shall I call for a palanquin, Princess?” Yīng asked, falling into step beside her.
JingYi shook her head. “No. Let’s walk.”
“But it’s so cold today. You’ll catch a chill!”
A small smile touched JingYi’s lips. What would the girl say if she knew she missed the cold? That she craved the bite of the northern wind? The air here merely pinched, raising gooseflesh. She welcomed even that. It reminded her of . . . him.
Funny, how the thought of frost could warm her more than any brazier.
“Seasons change,” she said. “Cold and warmth come and go. Letting the wind touch your skin helps the body learn how to bear both.”
They strolled along the paved path, JingYi’s pace naturally slower.
The garden stretched ahead in interwoven terraces: gazebos standing over small ponds, bridges of red lacquer crossing narrow streams. She was turning a corner when soft laughter cut through the bamboo.
Three women stepped into view, their silks a bright foil to this muted landscape.
LánYàn, RenHuā, and MeiYün.
JingYi stopped, keeping her expression serene as their gazes swept over her, sharp as a fan tipped with needles.
“Well. If it isn’t the phoenix reborn,” LánYàn said, delicate and mocking. Nothing much had changed here, it seemed. “How fortunate you are. Not every fall ends in a rise.”
“Yet some are more fragrant than others,” JingYi replied calmly. “I do recall the last time we shared a path, you were deep in manure. Have you recovered from that fall?”
Colour flared across LánYàn’s face. RenHuā’s eyes were alight with faux concern. “Have you heard the court whispers? Some wonder if you’ll remain unmarried forever, as if your name were of no consequence. Just another tile to shuffle.”
“Cruel,” JingYi concurred. “But then, I’ve had plenty of experience with cruelty. Don’t you agree?”
Their smiles faltered. MeiYün reached out as if to touch JingYi’s arm, then thought better. “Did you miss us after we left?”
JingYi looked at them, remembering the bandit attack, the shove out of the carriage, then put on a mild smile. “Does a stone miss the hand that casts it out, I wonder?”
The silence, the shock in their eyes, brought some satisfaction. Then, murmurs rose among the gardeners and attendants nearby. Gazes dropped. Bodies parted. A sedan chair approached—elegant and austere in black lacquer and silver trim, borne on the shoulders of four indigo-robed footmen.
The silk curtains were drawn aside just enough to reveal the woman seated within, upright and composed, her hands resting on a fur-lined lap cover.
The Dowager ShunMīn—the new emperor’s mother.
She had been moved to the Silver Court—the place where consorts went to retire, to tend gardens and fade into comfortable obscurity.
But JingYi knew now what retirement meant for women like her: nothing.
Power like the Dowager’s didn’t fade. It went underground, where it could simply watch from a hiding spot.
The procession stopped before JingYi. Along with the others, she stepped aside and curtsied. In unison, they greeted, “May a thousand years of peace grace Your Imperial Highness, the Dowager Consort.”
JingYi saw her then. A face carved from pale marble and years of unchallenged command as the most powerful woman in the harem. The Dowager’s stony gaze passed over LánYàn, RenHuā, and MeiYün and settled on her. There was no welcome in it, no disdain. Only a leisurely, meticulous calculation.
A cold ripple spread beneath her skin. This was the woman whose words had sealed JingMei’s fate, and by extension, JingYi’s own.
It had all begun here.
With this face. With this gaze.
“I was told you still practice medicine,” the Dowager said. Her voice was neither loud nor soft, but the garden seemed to quiet itself to hear. “Come to my palace before the Hour of the Phoenix. I would like you to take my pulse.”
JingYi’s heart stuttered. She recognized a command when she heard one—the first move on a board that had already claimed too many pieces.
Lowering her head, she said, “As Her Highness wishes.”
At the Hour of the Phoenix, JingYi and Yīng arrived at the Palace of Tranquil Radiance.
Once a place of serene retirement, it now felt more like a dragon’s roost—hushed, lofty, shadowed by power.
The interior was beautiful but spare. Pale porcelain floors gleamed, the large ivory rug softened it.
Embroidered silk cushions—white cranes, peonies, and waves stitched in silver threads—rested atop low sandalwood settees carved with curling clouds.
The Dowager was already seated, spine perfectly straight, a small bronze brazier glowing white-hot at her feet. Another one, the same in appearance as the first, had been set to her left. JingYi curtsied, murmured her greeting, and took the seat beside it.
A maid entered with a tray and two cups of tea in matching celadon porcelain.
“This tea is from the old groves near the Yùlián Pass,” the Dowager said, accepting hers with a graceful lift of the wrist. “I assume you haven’t sampled such delights since you left for the North.”
JingYi lowered her gaze with careful poise. “Such luxuries were beyond my reach even during my days in the palace. It is too rich for my blood.”
A beat passed. Her words were polite, but she meant the sting. Let the Dowager remember: if she was too common for this tea, it was only because the woman herself made her so.
JingYi lifted the cup, letting it warm her fingers and bowed her head. “I thank Your Highness for the generosity.”
She didn’t glance up as she sipped, though she felt the Dowager’s gaze—the appraising look of a jeweller re-examining a flawed stone, wondering whether it was salvageable after all.
“So the little ghost in the walls has grown a tongue,” the Dowager said coolly, setting her teacup down with a soft clink. “Good. I would have been disappointed if the North returned you to us still mewling and dull.”
The Dowager’s lips curved, but it wasn’t quite a smile.
“You were not raised to be bold. I see you’ve learned to wield your silence.
Your mother understood none of that. She simpered and wept and thought the emperor’s favours would shield her from palace machinations.
But you, at least, understand how to endure, perhaps even to bite back. ”
JingYi sipped her tea and said nothing. A compliment from a two-faced viper was still a compliment, though it tasted no sweeter for the honey coating.
The Dowager studied her a moment longer. She extended her wrist over the lacquered table between them.
“Well?” she said, a tinge of imperiousness returning to her tone. “You came to take my pulse. Or have you forgotten how to?”
JingYi set her cup down and reached forward to press her fingers against the Dowager’s wrist. Beneath the pale skin, the rhythm was strong, almost erratic. Her breathing was rapid, and the tension in her shoulders suggested more than age.
“Your Highness is in fine health, but your pulse is agitated,” JingYi murmured, withdrawing her hand. “Your system is burdened by anger and restlessness. It has settled in the liver, disturbing your rest. A decoction to drain the fire and ease the mind would be wise.”
“Anger,” the Dowager echoed, tone dry. “Tell me, Physician’s Attendant JingYi, what might I have to be angry about?”
JingYi flicked her gaze to meet the older woman’s. “A simpleton like me wouldn’t presume to guess.”
Another pause. Then, a chuckle escaped the Dowager.
“Ah. You’ve learned restraint. Yet another thing your mother never did.
Her tongue danced like a bell even when she should have held it still.
She thought beauty would save her. She thought an emperor’s love could be earned and, more foolishly, kept. ”
She leaned closer. “I hope you have grown out of such delusions.”
When JingYi gave no reply, the Dowager exhaled—a soft, withering sound that made the silence feel intentional.
“Let me tell you what angers me,” she said.
Her enamel nail guards, the colourful accessories the court ladies wore to protect their well-manicured fingers, clicked against the table in a rhythm.
“After decades of maneuvering, I finally placed my son on the throne. Decades.” Her gaze flicked to JingYi, hard and gleaming.
“All he needed to do was reign with dignity, uphold the Tsaiqun legacy, and fulfill his duty to blood and country.”
Her voice dropped, edged now. “Instead, he broke custom. He ignored every eligible match from Tzadun-Khor—our most important alliance—and betrothed himself to a foreign Omega. Without sanction.”
The Dowager’s lip curled. “I heard she is fat. Is it true?”
Heat flared behind JingYi’s ribs. Fat? As if Adelise’s worth—her kindness, strength, and vivacity—could be measured by a single physical trait. As if a future Empress could be weighed by that single cruel syllable.