“You’re about to be emperor, how can you still come to such a dangerous place?” Qian Jiaoniang scolded him with her mouth, but her arms only tightened around him.
Xing Muzheng touched her forehead and frowned at the heat. He scooped her up and carried her to the bed. “If I hadn’t come, wouldn’t you have just been crying alone in secret?”
Caught red-handed, Qian Jiaoniang was a little embarrassed. “I… that was…”
Xing Muzheng tucked her in, kissed her brow. “I’m here. Whatever happens, we’ll face it together. No more crying, alright?”
Qian Jiaoniang gazed straight into his handsome face and slowly nodded. At last her mind began to clear, but her heart pounded faster and faster. She understood well the risk Xing Muzheng had taken barging into a plague-stricken city. In the face of pestilence, even kings and nobles were fragile and helpless. Even a body as strong as his could still die!
And he was the man about to sit on the dragon throne, to be emperor! The supreme sovereign above all, master of the realm! Yet he had cast everything aside, and entered Pingchuan just for her!
Qian Jiaoniang lifted her hand to gently caress his face. “You’ve grown thinner… why are you so foolish?”
Xing Muzheng caught her hand and kissed it. “How am I foolish?”
How could Xing Muzheng not know what kind of choice he was making? But he had never once hesitated. After a life of death and splendor, power and rank were emptiness. To save others, one must first save oneself. He only knew that Qian Jiaoniang was trapped alone in a plague city, her life hanging in the balance—he had to be with her, to live or die at her side.
The only thing Xing Muzheng regretted was coming too late, letting her suffer fear and weep a whole night, weakening her even more.
Qian Jiaoniang gazed at him in a daze. “By coming here, you may not even get to be emperor. Perhaps we’ll just become a pair of fugitive mandarin ducks. Truly the greatest fool under heaven.”
Xing Muzheng said, “I never wanted to be emperor. Now it’s just as well—quiet and peaceful.”
“Peaceful what…? Didn’t your men try to stop you, tell you not to come?”
Xing Muzheng said, “How could they not? Every one of them nagged endlessly. I just couldn’t be bothered to argue with them.” He knew no one could understand his feelings.
“So you didn’t argue with them—don’t tell me you came secretly?”
Xing Muzheng fell silent—that silence was as good as admission.
Hearing this, Qian Jiaoniang was both angry and amused. “How old are you already, and still doing such things! Isn’t the world outside in utter chaos right now? Where’s Chou’er, what about him?”
Xing Muzheng said, “Chou’er is outside, don’t worry. I’ve already given him instructions, and written a letter as well. If anything happens to us, then let Chou’er decide for himself. If he wants the throne, let him fight for it. If not, then let Wu Jian and Wu Ze father and son take it.”
Qian Jiaoniang’s eyes widened. “You… this way you’ve just—!” She truly couldn’t find the words. For him to dump such a weighty matter all at once onto Chou’er, without even caring whether he could bear it?
Xing Muzheng said, “Don’t worry. He can handle it. He’s our child.”
Qian Jiaoniang sighed. “Chou’er must be heartbroken, isn’t he?”
“He cried once.” Xing Muzheng would not tell his wife how their son had sobbed till he was a mess. Instead, he studied her face and asked, “How do you feel right now?”
Qian Jiaoniang said faintly, “In my chest is a jumble of flavors, five mixed in one—I really can’t tell what I feel. Let me settle myself first.”
Xing Muzheng tugged his lips, scraped her nose lightly.
“Rest now. Whatever needs saying, we’ll speak tomorrow.”
“Where are you going?”
“Nowhere. Just staying with you.” Xing Muzheng tucked in her quilt corners and patted gently. “Sleep.”
Qian Jiaoniang gazed at him blankly in the backlight, afraid this was a dream, yet wishing it were a dream.
Of course Xing Muzheng saw the struggle in her eyes. With a sigh, he lay down beside her, covering her eyes with his broad palm. “Sleep. We’ll both be fine. Once we leave Pingchuan, you must obediently sit in the bridal sedan, no more excuses.”
The sorrow was scattered by that one line. Qian Jiaoniang’s lips curved. “Once we’re out, I’ll listen to you, to everything you say.”
After that, she turned over, back to him, and pushed him with a hand behind her. “Go out, don’t sleep in the same room with me. If you fall ill, who will I have to look after me?”
Hearing this, Xing Muzheng chuckled softly. He pinched her shoulder, then rose and let down the bed curtains.
***
Xing Muzheng’s arrival gave Qian Jiaoniang a settled heart. Even when the physician declared she had contracted the plague, she accepted it calmly.
Xing Muzheng said nothing. He went out for a while, and when he came back, he too was calm.
Xing Pingchun, upon receiving the message Lielei passed out, hid inside and wept bitterly.
By then, Wu Ze had already arrived at Pingchuan. Standing beneath Xing Pingchun’s window, he heard the muffled sobbing within, his fine brows furrowing. Quietly, he withdrew from the courtyard. His attendant approached, asking whether both Xing Muzheng and his wife had caught the disease, carrying another implication. Wu Ze’s sharp glare sent him scuttling back.
After several days, Qian Jiaoniang’s body grew weaker still. She could no longer leave the bed. Her cheeks thinned rapidly, her features nearly unrecognizable. Precious medicines were sent in ceaselessly, yet they had no effect. At her request, Xing Muzheng covered his face and mouth, and remained by her side throughout—neither anxious nor impatient, as if she suffered no more than an ordinary illness that would soon pass.
Only in the stillness of deep night could the moonlight glimpse the deep, hidden torment in his eyes.
Because of Qian Jiaoniang’s decisiveness, Ah Da and the county magistrate obeyed her orders completely. Those infected were sent to the plague ward; the uninfected were all to stay in their homes, not to go out. Even beggars on the roadside were gathered together and fed by the government. Thus, in Pingchuan County, the plague did not spread further. Still, there were already more than three hundred infected, and so far only two had recovered. Moreover, however much masks and coverings were used, physicians, apprentices, and caretakers were often in close contact with patients, and inevitably some would be infected. At this rate, without effective treatment, there would be no end.
“Great Marshal, this dragging on is no solution. In my opinion, it’s better to…” Ah Da came to report one day, standing behind a screen, drawing his hand across his neck in a cutting gesture.
In the past, Xing Muzheng would have already given such an order. To have dragged it out till today was because he still hoped for a miracle. After a long pause, he said quietly, “Tomorrow, at midnight.”
“Yes!”
“Do not let Madam know.”
“Understood!”
When Xing Muzheng returned to the room, Qian Jiaoniang was still sleeping. Her periods of unconsciousness grew longer and longer. She would not allow anyone to keep watch at her side, only had Suier tie a bell by her bed, saying she would ring it when she woke.
But Xing Muzheng never heeded this. After handling urgent matters, he often sat by her bed, watching her sleep, as though he meant to watch her until the end of time.
When she was about to wake, he would quietly step out, and return again when he heard the bell.
By now, Qian Jiaoniang’s appetite was very poor. At each meal she could only eat a small bowl of congee, her life clinging on only by the old ginseng found in Yongan Palace.
“I have ginseng to eat—but what about the patients in the plague ward? How are they doing?” Qian Jiaoniang placed a slice of ginseng in her mouth and asked.
“Don’t worry about that,” said Xing Muzheng. “For now, don’t waste your strength worrying over others.”
Qian Jiaoniang sighed faintly, her lips white as paper. “If not for others, we can’t not worry about Ni’er. He’s still so little… you’ll have to spend more effort caring for him.”
Xing Muzheng said nothing.
Qian Jiaoniang lay staring at the canopy above for a long while before speaking again: “And Chou’er—we’ve wronged him too. He still has that marriage arrangement, doesn’t he? You must tear up that betrothal contract with the princess as soon as possible, and let him find a good girl to marry. Yes, whichever girl he wishes to wed, let him wed her. You mustn’t force him.”
Xing Muzheng still said nothing.
Qian Jiaoniang went on talking to herself. “I’m not all that worried about Chou’er anymore. He’s grown up now—you know, he can even talk back and curse at people. Hah, really grown… But Nie’er is still too little. If you ever take a new wife, don’t marry one with a temper like mine. Find someone gentle and virtuous, someone who’ll be good to you and to Nie’er as well… They always say stepmothers are harsh, so you’ll truly have to take extra care.”
Xing Muzheng’s voice turned cold. “If you can’t stop worrying about those two brats, then tomorrow I’ll have them both sent away. Save me from hearing more of your nonsense!”
Qian Jiaoniang weakly glared at him. “You… Can’t you speak properly for once? I know my own body better than anyone! I’m afraid I won’t…”
Xing Muzheng covered her mouth, glaring at her fiercely. She glared back, refusing to yield. Their eyes clashed in midair, until slowly the vicious sharpness in Xing Muzheng’s black eyes melted into a deep, aching sorrow. Qian Jiaoniang’s eyes, too, brimmed with tears.
“Jiaoniang, you cannot—cannot have anything happen to you. I… I couldn’t bear it!” Xing Muzheng buried his face in the crook of her neck, his voice hoarse, exposing his weakness for the first time.
Qian Jiaoniang held his head and wept silently. “It’s all right, Yazheng, it’s all right. Everyone dies one day. I’ll just go ahead first and wait for you in the underworld…”
Xing Muzheng shook his head. His hand clenched tight at her waist, veins bulging.
He had seen the life and death of so many, yet this threshold he could not cross.
“Yazheng, you must live well. Raise our children… I have no regrets. With you, with Chou’er, with Nie’er, with Elder Sister and the others—I’m already very, very content.”
“Jiaoniang, you cannot leave me…”
Warm tears dampened her neck. The strongest man in the world, was crying.
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