“—Royal Father!” Zhu Helin cried out suddenly, jolting awake and tumbling off the couch.
The attendants hurried to help him up. Zhu Helin asked in quick succession, “Why did I faint? Where is Royal Father? Where is Su Qinghe?”
A eunuch answered tearfully, “Please restrain your grief, young master. Doctor Chen said you and Lord Su fainted because your hearts were overcome by shock and emotion. Lord Su has not yet woken in the side hall. His Majesty… His Majesty has been placed in the imperial coffin and moved overnight to Renzhi Hall.”
Countless emotions churned in Zhu Helin’s chest, grief, anguish, the terror and despair of losing his last kin. The suffocating turmoil twisted through his lungs and gut until it burst from his throat in a hoarse, skyward wail.
“Ah, ahhh!”
He tore himself free from the attendants and bolted out of the hall, running madly down the corridor toward the breaking dawn, straight into Su Yan, who had just awakened and stumbled out.
It was as if Zhu Helin had grasped the last piece of driftwood in a boundless sea. He clung to Su Yan’s arm tightly. “Qinghe…”
Su Yan’s face was deathly pale. Waves of dizziness and nausea rose and fell, as if his organs were being squeezed from his chest up through his throat. He bent over, retching dryly, cold sweat soaking through his inner robes. The retching turned into wheezing, each breath rasping shallow and painful, like a fish gasping on land, tormented by invisible pain.
Seeing him like this, Zhu Helin forgot his own grief and shouted anxiously, “Where are the physicians? Fetch the physicians, now!”
Two imperial doctors, already on standby, rushed in with medicine chests. After taking Su Yan’s pulse, they quickly slipped a calming pill beneath his tongue, then reported, “Lord Su suffers from an injury of the seven emotions. His internal organs show no disorder, but ‘shock injures the heart and gall, sorrow injures the lungs’, hence his current state. Once the medicine takes effect and his emotions settle, he will recover gradually.”
The fright calmed Zhu Helin’s own agitation somewhat. He took a deep breath and patted Su Yan’s back gently. “Qinghe, don’t be afraid… breathe slowly, in and out…”
When Su Yan’s breathing steadied and the dry heaving ceased, Zhu Helin helped him to his feet. “Let me take you back to rest.”
Su Yan’s face regained a little color. His body was soothed by the medicine, yet his heart burned like fire. Beneath the stillness of his limbs, his blood ran wild, like a deep pool hiding a fierce undertow, appearing calm on the surface yet roiling within.
“I want to see His Majesty one last time,” he said, straightening his pain-stiffened back. He turned to Zhu Helin. “The Crown Prince and I will go together.”
The night had already receded, and the palace seemed to be steeped in a hazy, watery blue, though the sun had yet to rise.
At this boundary between night and dawn, along the corridor before Yangxin Hall, a corridor he had walked countless times, Zhu Helin looked at Su Yan’s face and suddenly felt as if Su Yan, too, had been split in two. One half was young, sorrowful, and trembling, swallowing his blood and tears in silence; the other half was heavy, sharp, and unyielding, enduring blow after blow yet remaining steadfast.
That sense of contradiction awakened in Zhu Helin a powerful, unfamiliar realization: I must grow stronger, strong enough to soothe one half of him, and be worthy of the other.
The crown prince, not yet seventeen, at this moment of unbearable pain and loss, felt a spark ignite from the ashes of his grief.
He stepped forward and took Su Yan’s hand. “Let’s go.”
—
Only a single night had passed, and Renzhi Hall, now serving as the mourning hall, was still not fully arranged. Morning light filtered in, illuminating the tear-streaked faces and hurried movements of the palace attendants.
The emperor’s coffin rested there for the wake. The rituals of mourning, the establishment of the spirit hall, and the offerings would last for days or even weeks before the coffin was finally carried out of the capital to the imperial mausoleum.
When Zhu Helin and Su Yan arrived at Renzhi Hall, they found that the Empress Dowager had already arrived ahead of them. Several eunuchs and maids by her side were arguing with the imperial guards stationed at the gate.
The Empress Dowager sought to enter the mourning hall, but Shen Qi, dressed in a flying fish uniform and holding his embroidered spring blade, stood firmly before the doors, barring her path.
“…I am the Empress Dowager! To deny me even a last look at my own son, what ancestor’s rule decrees such a thing? Who gave you the courage? Are you trying to rebel?” The Empress Dowager pointed furiously at Shen Qi’s nose, her tear-streaked face contorted with rage. “You dog slave, get out of my way at once!”
Shen Qi’s expression did not change; his voice was calm. “This minister acts on His Majesty’s final command. I beg the Empress Dowager’s understanding. Please, return.”
“Final command? What kind of command forbids a mother from mourning her son’s body?”
The Empress Dowager tried to force her way inside, but Shen Qi blocked her with the sheath of his blade, his tone turning cold. “Your Majesty is noble. This minister dares not lay hands upon you.”
That “dares not” was clearly a threat that he would if necessary. The Empress Dowager’s heart spasmed with fury, but then a voice came from behind her: “If it was Royal Father’s final order, then Grandmother should obey it. Attend her, escort the Empress Dowager back to Cining Palace.”
The Empress Dowager turned to see Zhu Helin, and rage mingled with heartbreak. But she no longer held any military power; even the guards of her own palace had been taken away by Longquan of the Tengxiang Guards.
Before she could use her seniority to rebuke him, Zhu Helin continued, “By Royal Father’s will, the Empress Dowager is to move to the Eastern Court. I’ve already ordered Longde Hall to be cleaned and prepared for Your Majesty’s peaceful retirement.”
Though Longde Hall was the main hall of the Eastern Court, Consort Wei had once given birth there. According to superstition, such a place, tainted by the blood of childbirth, was unfit for residence. Worse, an official had fallen to his death from an annex nearby, making it an omen of misfortune.
The Empress Dowager’s face turned livid. She raised her hand to slap him, but the Eastern Palace guards immediately surrounded her, not laying hands on her, but enclosing her tightly, like staves forming a barrel.
“Escort the Empress Dowager to her palace,” Zhu Helin ordered, his eyes cold, carrying a faint glint of hatred. The chill of it struck the Empress Dowager like drinking ice in midwinter; she shuddered.
She understood clearly then.
The harem that had once belonged to her was no longer hers. And the front court, which had never truly been hers, would never be.
While Emperor Jinglong lived, she was the mother honored by his filial piety. Now that he was gone, she was nothing but an empty shell of an Empress Dowager, filled only with her grandson’s cold indifference and his righteous resentment.
Even as she was lifted into her phoenix carriage, she was still dazedly wondering, how was this any different from Consort Wei Zhao, imprisoned in the Cold Palace, awaiting death?
Zhu Helin exhaled deeply, his resentment easing a little, and led Su Yan through the doors.
Emperor Jinglong’s coffin rested upon the throne dais in the center of the main hall. Lan Xi was overseeing the servants as they hung white mourning drapes.
Tears welling, Zhu Helin touched the gilded lacquer of the outer coffin and said, “Open it. Let me see Royal Father one last time.”
None of the attendants dared move. All knelt silently.
Suppressing his anger, Zhu Helin stepped forward himself to lift the lid, but another hand pressed down firmly upon it.
It was Shen Qi’s.
Shen Qi said, “Young Master, His Majesty left an order. No one is to disturb him.”
Zhu Helin flared up. “From Royal Father’s deathbed entrustment to the craniotomy, I was there for it all, what final order? Why have I never heard of it? It was one thing to block the Empress Dowager, but now even I am forbidden?”
Su Yan stepped forward, laying his hand on the coffin lid as well. “Qilang, I never heard of such an order either. Don’t be foolish, let go.”
Shen Qi bit down hard, forcing himself to meet Su Yan’s pained gaze. “Qinghe, please understand me.”
Su Yan looked at him in shock, as if he couldn’t believe even he was being turned away.
Lan Xi fell to his knees before Zhu Helin, sobbing loudly. “Young Master, it truly was His Majesty’s command! His Majesty never gave up the idea of cranial surgery, otherwise, why would he have summoned Doctor Chen Shiyu to the palace last year? But Doctor Chen admitted he had no confidence and dared not attempt it.”
“These past two or three months, His Majesty often drifted between sleep and wakefulness. When awake, he still pondered it, but feared that if the procedure failed, all his plans would collapse. So he forced himself to hold on, waiting for Your Highness to return.”
“At that time, His Majesty told this servant that once the Crown Prince was home and all was settled, he would persuade Doctor Chen to perform the surgery.”
“His Majesty also instructed that if it failed, if his skull were shaven and opened and his form no longer human, his body was not to be seen by any subject, lest his imperial dignity be marred. And even less by his loved ones, because His Majesty did not wish his final image in the hearts of Young Master and Lord Su to be one drenched in blood…”
Lan Xi clutched desperately at Zhu Helin’s robe hem, knocking his head against the ground, weeping uncontrollably.
At last, Zhu Helin could no longer hold back. He crouched beside the coffin, choking on his sobs. “If Royal Father does not wish to be seen, then I won’t look. Let him remain forever as he is in his portrait, crowned in gold, robed in dragons, seated in majesty…”
Su Yan laid his hand on the coffin lid. It was as though even his grief had frozen, but from beneath that ice, something strange flickered upward. He blinked in confusion, trying to grasp that elusive, uncanny thought.
He instinctively looked toward Shen Qi.
At that exact moment, Shen Qi turned his head, missing his gaze.
And so that fleeting thought, like a fish gliding through water, slipped away before it could be caught.
Zhu Helin remained in the mourning hall the entire day, leaving the funeral palace only when duty as the young emperor compelled him to take charge of affairs.
Su Yan left the palace, boarded the carriage driven by Jinghong Zhui, and returned home like a wandering soul. When he stepped through the door, he nearly stumbled; his whole being was wooden and numb. He sat motionless in the drunkard’s chair by the window all day, lost in thought, no one knew what about.
Unable to bear it any longer, Jinghong Zhui added some sedative and sleep-inducing herbs into his evening soup, finally making him fall into a deep sleep.
After sitting by the bedside for a long while, Jinghong Zhui suddenly twitched his ears and glanced toward the door.
He rose, walked out of Su Yan’s chamber, and saw Shen Qi standing under the great tree in the courtyard, like a night beast lurking in the shadows.
Jinghong Zhui went up to him and mocked, “Don’t you have grand matters to attend to? What are you doing here?”
Shen Qi said, “I just came out of the palace. I’ll only feel at ease returning once I’ve seen him.”
Jinghong Zhui replied, “I’m here to watch over him. No need for your concern. And that matter, when exactly do you plan to let him know?”
Shen Qi said nothing.
Jinghong Zhui raised his brow, his gaze cold. “If he keeps grieving like this, his body and mind won’t withstand it. When that happens, don’t blame me for breaking my word.”
Shen Qi countered, “And what good would telling him do? Give him a sliver of hope now, only for it to shatter into despair a few days later? Let him endure that pain a second time?”
Jinghong Zhui clenched his jaw in silence. After a long pause, he asked, “What did Physician Chen say?”
Shen Qi answered, “He can’t say for sure. Matters like this, half rely on medicine, half on fate. All we can do is wait. Wait for that day to come—”
Jinghong Zhui was silent for a moment, then said, “Shen Qi, you truly are a madman.”
Shen Qi’s lips curved into a sharp-edged smile, like a blade glinting in the dark. “As long as the conditions are right, I can make a deal with anyone, even the chess player I despise most.”
Jinghong Zhui asked, “How many of those chess players have you struck deals with?”
Shen Qi shot back, “You guess.”
—
In the secret chamber of his study, Yu Wang was polishing an old helmet inlaid with the divine sigil of the Golden Six Armors.
The winter night was bitterly cold. He breathed warm air onto the helmet and continued wiping it with a white cloth.
“…This was the helmet you wore the last time we rode into battle together after you ascended the throne. During the chaos of the Ganzhou mutiny, I took a spear for you, and you held me as we fell from the collapsing gate tower. The helmet was lost then.”
“Later, when I crawled back from the brink of death, I found it amid the ruins. It was smashed and misshapen, unwearable.”
“I secretly took this imperial helmet back with me and repaired it by hand, hoping to return it to you someday. I thought, would Second Brother be surprised?”
“And then you gave me an even bigger surprise, you summoned me back to the capital, and locked me in a cage.”
“Qinghe said the cage was made by Royal Mother. But so what? The key was in your hand. You held it for ten whole years and never once tried to open the lock and let me out.”
“Because it wasn’t just Royal Mother’s will, it was your own.”
“For the sake of a stable empire, you had to erase every possible threat, even if that threat might never come to pass. You would rather kill by mistake than let one slip by.”
“Zhu Jintang, now that you’re finally dead, the shadow that’s hung over me for ten years is gone. I could almost laugh aloud, ha, ha, ha!”
“Your son is still so green. Do you really think that after your death, he can keep me in check?”
“You’ll see. I’ll soon break free from this cage, return to the battlefield, and raise a new Jingbei Army. Beneath my horse’s hooves and spear, no one will stand a chance.”
“Zhu Jintang, aren’t you afraid I’ll rebel against your son? If you are, then crawl out from your grand, gilded coffin and stop me! Just like when we were boys, when words failed, we fought it out.”
“—Zhu Jintang! Get up!”
The room was utterly silent. Only the helmet’s shadow, thrown by the lamplight, lay across the floor.
With a clatter, the helmet slipped from his hand and struck the ground. Yu Wang covered his face with one palm, and from between his fingers came the faintest, lowest sound of weeping.
