In the dim darkness, Princess Baohua’s eyes gleamed like precious gems — beautiful yet cold, and so still they seemed drained of life.
Lin Fei felt her heart pounding with dread.
She had grown up accompanying Xie Yuzhang, and over these past years her very life had been bound to Xie Yuzhang’s. She knew Xie Yuzhang better than Xie Yuzhang knew herself. Yet she had never seen Xie Yuzhang like this before.
Lin Fei did not waste words arguing over what was possible or impossible. She lowered her gaze in thought for a moment, then raised her eyes and asked, “The Hu people have no concept of legitimate versus base-born children. Why would they insist on seeking a legitimate princess?”
Xie Yuzhang felt as though she could not breathe.
In her previous life, in the Mobei Khanate, her tears had soaked Lin Fei’s sleeve as she wept and asked, “Why me? Why do they have to demand a legitimate princess?”
What had Lin Fei said?
She had said it was fate, and since it was fate, there was no point dwelling on it.
But in truth, A’Fei had already thought it through long before, hadn’t she? She had already figured it all out.
It was just that by then, tracing back those reasons held no meaning — it would only deepen the hatred. So she had not let her dwell on it.
Xie Yuzhang’s breathing grew heavy.
“Your Highness?” Lin Fei, sensing the shift in her emotions, pressed her hand against Xie Yuzhang’s arm and called out softly.
Xie Yuzhang steadied her breathing, pressed down the turmoil in her heart, and said quietly, “I have a guess. A’Fei, can you guess what my guess is?”
Silence fell inside the tent for a moment.
Lin Fei said, “If this matter is real, and Your Highness received word of it in advance… others might have as well.”
So this was not fate after all.
This was the difference between a girl with a mother to protect her and a girl without one — the one chosen and the one cast aside.
This was a mother who wished to protect her own daughter.
Noble Consort Chen, the Emperor’s most favored consort, mother of Princess Anle.
There had always been a saying in the palace that the Emperor cherished Noble Consort Chen so deeply he wished to name her his new Empress.
But to elevate a concubine to the rank of wife went against propriety. If the Emperor wished to install a new Empress, the court ministers would force him to take a new bride from outside the palace. The Emperor was unwilling, and Noble Consort Chen and the Chen family were even more unwilling.
So the position of Empress had long remained vacant. Yet the Emperor had handed the management of the inner palace to Noble Consort Chen, allowing her to oversee it “in place” of an Empress.
In an age when the realm was riddled with upheaval, when the military governors carved up their territories and held imperial authority in contempt, the palace still clung with solemn gravity to ritual and propriety, still gravely and earnestly observed every elaborate ceremony that was forbidding in its complexity.
The more the realm descended into chaos, the more desperately the Emperor clutched at propriety.
For what else could he do? There was no other place left to demonstrate the legitimacy and prestige of imperial power.
It was absurd, really. In this grotesque reality, Xie Yuzhang was one of its beneficiaries.
An Emperor and a Noble Consort who prized propriety — how could they not outwardly elevate the legitimate princess born of the late Empress? Without that performance, the entire illusion would collapse.
Of course, the moment the Emperor issued the decree ordering Xie Yuzhang to marry into the Mobei Khanate, that illusion naturally shattered.
Noble Consort Chen’s daughter, Princess Anle, was two years older than Xie Yuzhang. She had just come of age and was not yet betrothed. In Da Zhao, girls usually began receiving marriage proposals after coming of age, and were wed at seventeen or eighteen. Princess Anle had only come of age a little over a month ago and had no betrothal yet arranged.
As the eldest princess, if the Mobei Khanate’s envoy delegation was determined to bring back a true princess, the natural choice would be Princess Anle.
To protect Princess Anle, making an issue of legitimate versus base-born status was the most convenient justification. If the Hu people learned that one princess carried a more exalted rank, they would surely be all the more eager for the more prestigious one.
Xie Yuzhang, whose mind had been in chaotic disorder all night, cleared somewhat. She realized that her thought just now — of asking the Emperor to arrange a marriage for her early so she could escape the marriage alliance — was not actually feasible.
With Noble Consort Chen present, she would never permit that to happen.
Xie Yuzhang was destined to be the princess pushed out for the marriage alliance.
This was also why Xie Yuzhang had refused to see anyone in the palace for these past three days. Those who lived within these palace walls — she either knew their later tragic fates, or she had this or that entanglement with them.
But hiding was useless, she said softly to herself. Useless.
The next day, Lin Fei’s dark circles were even heavier than hers.
“Is there any other news?” she asked. “Your Highness, if you know, please don’t hide it from me…”
“There isn’t.” Xie Yuzhang shook her head. “I only know the Mobei Khanate’s envoy delegation is on its way, but I don’t know when they’ll arrive.”
It was only mid-June. Xie Yuzhang’s memory told her it should be around this time.
Lin Fei was very quiet throughout the morning.
They had barely finished breakfast when a palace attendant came in with a smile to report: “That Fuchun has come to give thanks for the reward.”
For anyone else, the palace attendants would simply have the person kowtow at the palace gate and be done with it. But this Fuchun was one of the Emperor’s people, and it was Xie Yuzhang who had personally ordered the reward sent to him the previous day, so the attendants dared not make the decision themselves.
The name Fuchun stirred Zhaoxia Palace like a stone cast into a still pool. Lin Fei saw a flash of light pass through Xie Yuzhang’s eyes, and she said, “Summon him in.”
Lin Fei glanced at Xie Yuzhang.
She had chosen not to say where the information had come from, so Lin Fei did not press. In the inner palace, knowing less sometimes meant living longer.
“Should I withdraw?” she asked quietly.
Though she was of lowly status, Xie Yuzhang had never allowed her to call herself a servant girl. So she had continued, as in the days when she was still the princess’s study companion, to refer to herself as “I” in the familiar way.
Yet though Xie Yuzhang treated her with warmth and closeness, she herself adhered scrupulously to her own place, never overstepping. Given Xie Yuzhang’s rank and the degree of her favor, why would she need to personally receive a minor eunuch — unless…
Living in the inner palace meant Lin Fei could not help but think more deeply. Caution was only natural.