The Moon in the Palace (The Empress of Bright Moon Duology) (27 page)

“I hope he wins,” I said.

“I should hope so.” The shadow of the tree swayed to the side, and her gold necklace glittered in the sun. She looked proud, and rightly so. Jewel’s death had made the Emperor realize how valuable the Noble Lady was, and if ever he deposed Taizi, Prince Ke would no doubt become the heir. “Have you prepared what to say when the One Above All comes?”

Before I replied, a white shape landed on my shoulder. A furry paw with claws swiped at my face. I gasped, flinging my arms. Those claws. They had attacked me before… Not the same ones…but similar.

And there was a deafening growl, followed by a heartrending shriek, and the sky seemed to spin, while a storm of leaves blasted around me… “Mei!” Father’s voice!

“Mei?”

I jerked. It was only the Noble Lady. But I could not understand. Those images. Where did they come from? But wait! The beast was still perched on my shoulder, growling. I cried out in fear.

“Go away,” the Noble Lady said, waving her hand, and the weight left my shoulder. “Are you all right?” She held my shoulder, and I panted in relief. “Are you all right, Mei? Did it frighten you? It’s only a cat.”

I tried hard not to tremble. “I know, my lady…I know.”

The Noble Lady turned to the Pure Lady, who was stroking that cat. “Did you see what your cat just did, Pure Lady? You should be more careful,” she said. It was the first time I had heard her speak to the Pure Lady in a disapproving tone.

The Pure Lady shot to her feet and dashed toward us. “Now you would chide me over my cat? My cat? You’re very proud of yourself, aren’t you, Noble Lady? Everything works out for you. My son is exiled, and yours stays here shooting animals. What else will you do to me?”

“How could you say that, Pure Lady—”

“And look at you, wearing all this gold and jewelry, looking so splendid and superior. You think you’re better than me? You’re nothing without your son, and you don’t deserve to wear this.” She yanked the gold necklace off the Noble Lady.

The Noble Lady gasped, her hands flying to her neck. “You can’t blame me for your son’s exile, Pure Lady.”

“Is that what you think? But you must pay.” She thrust her head back, and her long arm lashed out to point at me and then the others. “You, and all of you.” She stormed away.

“You’re bleeding, my Noble Lady.” I held her arms. The necklace had cut deeply into her skin, and two gashes had appeared on either side of her neck, so it looked as though she had been wounded by two swords crossing under her chin. I felt terrible for involving her in this.

She did not seem to hear me. “Did you hear her? Did you hear what she said?”

“I did.”

“She said she would make us pay, but what did we do? It was not my fault her son was exiled.”

“She was angry.” Blood was trickling down her neck. “Would you like to go see the physicians, my lady?”

“Physicians?” Her plump cheeks had turned pale. She looked as though she would faint. “Oh, yes. Take me to the physicians.”

We would need to talk to the Emperor some other time. Hurriedly, I left the shade of the ginkgo with the Noble Lady and her maids. Behind me, Rain made a sound like she was suppressing a chuckle. My heart tightened. I could not explain it, but I felt the worst was yet to come.

the
Seventeenth Year
of
Emperor Taizong’s Reign
of
Peaceful Prospect

WINTER

“Rise.” A hand shook my shoulder.

It was the Emperor. I rose from my mat and rubbed my eyes. Around me, the other Talents were still sleeping. The night before, we had gone to the Emperor’s bedchamber, but as usual, he had not favored us; instead, he had passed the night drinking in the circle of candles. According to the protocol, we were supposed to leave once he finished with us, but lately, he always ordered us to stay. I could not understand why, but at least he still followed the bedding schedule.

“Follow me.” He woke Daisy too, who had recently been demoted to a Talent for her clumsiness, and then the three of us, with Daisy and me holding lanterns, left the compound.

I wished to know where we were going and why we had to leave the bedchamber on the cold night. I would rather have gone back and slept, but he needed us to hold the lanterns for him. Shivering, I walked in front of the Emperor, holding the lantern with my right hand and wrapping my coat around me with my left.

It was very early in the morning. The sky was dark as ink. Snow drifted. The court was quiet, and most servants were still asleep.

We walked until we reached the Xuanwu Gate at the back of the Inner Court, where a group of guards were waiting for us. The Emperor beckoned them to follow, and together we passed the Gate and went into the woodland that was part of the Forbidden Park. For hours, we trudged through the snow-sodden, knee-high thickets. I had never set my foot on that part of the Forbidden Park before. The area was vast and hilly, challenging to climb.

The dawn’s light appeared, and the trees and hills revealed themselves. Daisy and I extinguished the lights inside the lanterns. When we reached a clearing near a valley, the Emperor stopped under a poplar near a giant rock with a steep front and a pointy tip. He ordered the guards to spread out nearby. “And do not approach unless I give you an order.”

The guards left, and Daisy and I stood close together, waiting for him to dismiss us too. But he did not say anything, his head raised at the sky where two hawks soared.

Why did he want to come here in the early morning?

The warmth quickly escaped me, and the chilly morning air plunged savagely into my throat. My nose was runny; my face was chilled. I rubbed my hands and looked around. The frozen land, covered with towering trees and thorny bushes, stretched endlessly before me, while at my left, a deep valley, its rugged surface sprinkled with white, cut through a grove of fallen trees and disappeared behind snow-dusted spruce.

I shivered. The frosty sheet buried the tracks ahead of me but could not hide the crackling bark of the trees and the stark barrenness of the land. There was no man or animal as far as I could see, and the only sound I heard was water gurgling in the distance near the valley, perhaps from the canal that ran through the palace.

The Emperor was still standing there, his hands crossed behind his back. I stamped my feet to keep warm. If we stayed any longer, we would miss our morning meal.

A faint screech came from the sky. A hawk, or something similar, plunged.

“Stay here,” the Emperor ordered us. He walked along a trail near a steep rock and disappeared behind it.

“Where is he going?” I asked Daisy, tucking my hands under my arms.

She shook her head, her face buried in her scarf, her breath puffing near her ears. For a long time, we simply wrapped our arms around our bodies and jumped to keep warm. I kept checking the rock, hoping to see the Emperor return.

“Ah…” A faint voice, guttural and masculine.

I stopped jumping. “What was that?”

Daisy shook her head before lowering it farther into her coat.

I hesitated. It sounded like it had come from where the Emperor had gone.

“Ah…” Another cry.

I made up my mind. “I’m going to take a look. I’ll be right back, Daisy.”

“What?” She stared at me, her face bearing the usual look of confusion.

“It could be the Emperor.”

“Don’t leave me alone.” She looked around, the flaps of her hat shaking like two ears. “Wolves will come. Nobody comes here but wolves. And snakes! I’m afraid of snakes.”

“Follow me then. I won’t go too far.”

We went to the steep rock, following the Emperor’s trail. Behind it was the valley, where the woods were dense and the tree branches were laden with layers of snow. I paused, searching. A gentle slope with tall reeds and dead trees rose ahead of us, and I glimpsed some water in a distant section of the canal that ran through the palace. There was no Emperor, and the faint cries had vanished. I was about to turn back when I saw a boat appear in the canal. Inside it stood a hooded figure.

The Duke. Rather than wearing his usual ornate court regalia, he had donned a black tunic like a monk’s stole. The tunic clung to his legs and chest, looking wet, as if he had waded through water. Some black animals, small, like dogs, were wriggling near his feet. He lowered his head and kicked them.

I frowned. Did the Emperor come here to meet the Duke? Where was the Emperor? I stood on tiptoe, searching hard. I found him, standing below a jutted rock some distance before me. His back facing me, he waved at the Duke in the boat, as though giving him a signal.

I raised my head toward the Duke, but his boat had moved out of my sight.

“I don’t see anything,” Daisy said. “Let’s go back.”

“Wait,” I said. Those black animals in the boat must have been important or the Emperor would not have ventured out in the cold to see them. And the Duke. He looked furtive, dressed in a hooded black tunic. What were those animals?

“I want to go, Mei.”

“Just a moment, Daisy.” I wanted to take a closer look, but I dared not walk too close. So I waded through the snow to my left and tried to climb a tree. The trunk was slippery with frost, but eventually I grabbed a thick branch over my head and found a firm footing. I hoisted up and peered at the canal. There, I got a better view of the canal and the Duke, and I could see clearly that those animals—there were at least twenty of them—were not dogs but men with their heads covered in some black cloth. Their arms and legs trussed, they struggled frantically. Some boulders were attached to their necks and feet, and a rope wound around their waists, tying them together. My heart raced faster. What was the Duke going to do with these men?

“Get down, Mei! Why are you climbing on a tree?”

“Be quiet, Daisy,” I whispered, hoping she would lower her voice. The Emperor and the Duke would kill me if they found out I was watching them.

“I’m leaving, Mei. Are you coming?”

I could not reply, because at that moment, the Duke kicked a man near him and shoved him to the edge of the boat. The man cried out, his voice muffled, but the Duke continued to shove until he dropped into the canal. He sank into the water instantly, weighed down by the boulders tied to his body. The rope, linked to another man, pulled him to the edge of the boat as well. Sensing danger, the man struggled, his body twisting. The Duke unsheathed his sword and thrust it into his chest. The man slumped and fell into the water.

I lost my grip on the branch and dropped to the ground. My face was chilled, and my teeth were chattering. I wanted to call out for Daisy, but I could not find my voice. My hands trembling, I climbed the tree again. But my legs were too weak, and I could not pull myself up. I could hear, however, the desperate cries and the loud splashing coming from the canal. When I was able to hold on to a branch again, I peered at the canal.

The men were all gone, and the Duke was alone in the boat. On the surface of the water, some black cloths popped like bubbles and sank slowly as I watched, and a carpet of broken floes, thick heaps of algae, dead leaves, and grass floated over to cover the spot where the men had sunk.

And the Emperor nodded as though he was greatly pleased.

“D-Daisy? Did you…did you see that?” I whispered. “Daisy?”

I did not hear her answer. She had already gone ahead of me, but she turned around and came back to me. “What? A snake? Did you say a snake? Where?”

I slipped off the tree. “No. Not snake.”

“Then what is it? We better go, Mei. The guards will find us gone. Are you coming?”

“Yes, yes, but…” I swallowed the rest of my words. From behind, the Emperor’s voice drifted toward me.

“How many left?”

“About one hundred and fifty.” The Duke’s voice.

“You will take care of them?”

“I shall be honored, the One Above All.”

There was heavy breathing as the Emperor climbed uphill. “…so that should take care of the prophecy…”

I stumbled. My hand swept a branch, a shower of snow raining down on my head. Shivering, I hurried to catch up with Daisy.

the
Eighteenth Year
of
Emperor Taizong’s Reign
of
Peaceful Prospect

SPRING

The Emperor was desperate. The demeaning ballad was sung in many corners of the kingdom, rumor said, and still the Emperor had not captured the man who had spread it.

And he was running out of time. Revolts from many regions of the kingdom were reported, each claiming their leader was the man in the prophecy. The peasants in the south, led by a woman general, were said to be most threatening.

Every week, messages sent by horse relay were placed on the Emperor’s table, indicating the progress of the thousands of peasants who had joined to attack the local
yamen
and officials. Every day, the woman general gained more support. The army overtook Yangzhou and controlled the Grand Canal. The Emperor dispatched five thousand men to quench the revolt but failed. The peasant army was marching north to Jingzhou. In two months’ time, the army, if not stopped, would reach Chang’an.

The Emperor gathered the cavalry from the west border and sent them to the south, leaving the border towns vulnerable to the Western Turks, who seized the chance and attacked, rampaging from one town to another. While our people on the border writhed in fire and smoke, it was Taizi who saved them. He led his cavalry and drove through the Turks’ yurts in the moonlight. With the camp in disarray, the heir captured their leader and asked to wrestle him. If the Turkish leader won, they would stay; if they lost, they would return to their territory for good. The Turks agreed, and the wrestling started with men’s shouts. But it ended quickly, as Taizi threw the Turkish leader off the ring after only three shoves. Forced to honor their bet, the Turks withdrew in shame.

Taizi did not stop there. He continued south and vowed to crush the peasant army. The slight-framed southerners, who had never seen a man of such a stature, believed they had seen a god. They scattered with their hoes and rakes as the prince galloped toward them. In that strange manner, the rebels were defeated, and Taizi returned home, where the Emperor accepted him with a much-softened face.

• • •

Sickness ravaged me after my return from the park that morning. For weeks, I lay in bed. My limbs felt wasted, my joints hurt, and I was hot and cold intermittently. The imperial physicians said my vital force,
qi
, was disturbed. “An evil wind has attacked your body and enfeebled your mind. Once you regain the balance of your yin and yang, your
qi
shall be restored.” They advised me to keep the chamber’s door closed and remain inside. They also prescribed drinking hot water steeped with ginger and cane sugar. “That will increase the flow of your jade liquid, which will help stimulate your internal organs and facilitate
qi
to travel through the rest of your body.”

Jade liquid was saliva, one of the three vital elements, the physicians believed. I did not understand the importance of the elements, but I was glad to see the dryness in my throat went away after a few days. A few weeks later, my strength returned, and my head was clear again.

But I was unable to rid my mind of the sight in the canal.

• • •

Sitting in front of a bronze mirror, I drew the shape of moth wings on my eyebrows with a kohl stick. The line looked squiggly. I wiped it away and began to draw again, slower that time.

When I finished, I stared at my face in the mirror. The sickness had sharpened my chin. My oval face had lost its softness, and my cheekbones protruded. Around my eyes, the skin looked brittle, like cracked ice, and some creases had appeared.

Had I grown old?

I was only eighteen, but I felt more like an old woman on her feeble march to her grave. The dreadful feeling crept over me like mists enveloping the woods. Life was meaningless. When I walked in the garden, the trees looked pale, the grass silvery, and the flowers blanched. The birds swung in a sad motion, and the winds moaned poignant melodies. I missed Pheasant. I wished I could hold his hand and talk to him again.

I put down the kohl stick, dipped a brush in red cream, and began to draw the beauty mark. Should I try a hawk or a kite? But why bother? A different bird might appear on my face, but the only bird of my affection would not leave my heart.

Urgent footsteps pounded in the corridor. The doors swung open.

“Plum?” I raised my head. “What’s wrong?”

I had not told her about what had happened in the canal, although I really wished to. But for her own safety, it was better she did not know.

“Mei, something happened in the Eastern Palace. The Noble Lady asked you to go there.” She was panting, pulling at my sleeve.

“Let me finish.”

“There’s no time. You must hurry.”

I put down the brush and draped a shawl on my shoulders. “What is it? Why are you so frantic?”

She wiped her face. “I don’t know, but she said it was urgent. You must go there now.”

“Is she there too?” I asked as we scurried down the courtyard.

“Yes. She sent me to fetch you.”

We left our compound and went down the path that led to the east side of the court. Many servants were also headed toward the Tongxun Gate, the only entrance to the Eastern Palace.

When we arrived at the palace, many ministers had already gathered there. Some shook their heads, whispering, while the others surrounded the Emperor’s uncle, who stood in the corridor of the library.

“Disgrace! May our ancestors forgive us,” he shouted, waving his fists at the people around him. His position in the court had been resumed, but the ministers looked reserved. They only nodded politely. The Uncle turned to the hunchback man, Wei Zheng. “I warned you, Chancellor. He can’t be trusted. What would you say now?”

The Chancellor only leaned over his cane and rubbed his eyes, his jade pendants clinking at his belt.

What could the matter be? Had Taizi hurt anyone? He was a hero after his victory, and the Emperor seemed to accept the fact that he would make a decent heir. He had ordered Taizi to study classical music and learn how to govern. The heir had obeyed. He had dispersed his wrestlers, hired troupes of musicians, and spent mornings playing music and afternoons reading Confucius and even books by Han Feizi, who drew up the legal system that our kingdom had adopted eight hundred years ago. He even accompanied the Emperor to the morning audiences and attended discussions on how to restore peace to the south. None of his brothers, even Prince Ke, could find any fault with him.

“Mei,” the Noble Lady called to me from under a cinnamon tree. When Plum and I approached, she studied my face and nodded. “You painted only one beauty mark. Other than that, you are groomed well.”

I was surprised she still cared about my appearance. “I didn’t have time for more, my Noble Lady. What’s going on?”

“The Emperor had a meeting with his advisers a while ago, and then he decided to visit Taizi during his music lesson.”

“And?”

“He found out the heir was not learning music.”

“So what was he doing?”

She paused. “Something unspeakable.”

Something in her voice forced me to stare at her. She sounded uneasy, rubbing her plump cheeks. What event in Taizi’s residence could upset the Noble Lady like that?

She turned around, and I followed as she went down the trail in a garden and led me to the private residence of the heir. We had just passed the building that housed the imperial academy when two ladies in indigo gowns, members of Taizi’s household, rushed from the building on the left. Their faces stark white, they tripped over the stairs and looked back in fear, as if running away from something.

Almost at the same time, the Emperor’s voice rang out. “Who are you?” His voice was laced with danger. “Who are you? Halt! Who are you?”

“Who is the Emperor shouting at, my Noble Lady?” I whispered.

“A flutist. I shall take my leave now.” She hesitated, then turned to leave.

A lady of her rank could not come to the heir’s bedchamber without an invitation, I understood. But if I were she, I would have let the rule of propriety slip once and stayed to see what would happen next. “I shall report to you once I know more, my Noble Lady.”

Nodding, she left, and I entered the prince’s private building. Plum, already ahead of me, raced toward the corridor near the front parlor and squeezed through a crowd that had gathered there to get to the front. I followed her and stood next to her.

The courtyard before me was empty and quiet, but the prince’s bedchamber across from us, which people were staring at, was open, and the Emperor was roaring from inside.

“All these days you said you were studying classical music, you were fiddling with this thing? This horrid thing?”

A boy, disheveled, bolted out of the bedchamber and pressed himself against a pillar. I could not believe my eyes.

“Who’s that?” Plum’s mouth was open. She did not seem to understand either.

“Is he the flutist?”

“I don’t know.”

I stared at the flutist in shock. The boy and Taizi, a mighty wrestler? How could that be possible?

“Where is he? Where is the flutist?” The Emperor appeared in the corridor outside the bedchamber, his sword in hand.

Behind him, Taizi emerged. He looked his usual self, shirtless, his body covered only by a piece of loincloth. “Father.”

“And you? Who are you? A sodomist?” The Emperor was shaking. He looked terrifying.

“Father!”

Was that why the heir had never fathered a child?

“You make a fool of me for this horrid thing? I can’t stand it! Get out of my face. Get out of my palace. Get out. Get out!”

The boy bolted toward me. The floor of the corridor vibrated under my feet. He had a young face, distorted like a melted silver cup. His robe hung loose on his bare chest, and his underpants slipped down to his hips.

“Run, you want to run? You want to run away from me?” The Emperor unsheathed his sword. “Guard the door, Captain! He’s not going anywhere!”

The Captain answered and came to the parlor. The boy stopped, gulping in fear. Then he leaped into the courtyard and ran to the other side of the corridor.

“So you think you can run? I’ll run with you.” A shoe smacked the flutist’s back. In a moment, the Emperor ran down the corridor too.

The boy yelled shrilly and slowed.

“Run, run again. Do you want to keep running? Do you think you can run away from me?” The Emperor caught him and stabbed his shoulder with his sword.

The boy fell off the stairs to the courtyard. Rolling on the ground, he groaned, blood spurting from his wound. My stomach clenched, and I covered my mouth.

“I order you, now.” The Emperor’s voice sounded like venom as he stepped into the courtyard. “Get up. Run until the last drop of blood drains out of you.”

“Father.” Taizi stomped across to the courtyard. He was so tall, his head nearly reaching the eaves of the building behind him. He had always been a towering, terrifying presence each time I saw him, but now he drooped his head, looking small and pitiful.

“You’re going to kill him, Father.” He balled his fists and loosened them. Again and again. The muscles of his bare chest and shoulders bulged. He looked as though he had just stepped off a wrestling ring, but there was something different in his eyes. Those were not the eyes of a fighter but an injured man.

“I will kill him.” The Emperor pointed at the boy. “This thing shames me. What he did in my court, under my nose. I shall kill him a thousand times; still, a thousand deaths of this thing doesn’t make me feel better. I do not feel better.” He pointed his sword at his son. “I shall kill you too, so nobody knows what an ignominy you are. You are my son, my heir, yet you’re an abomination—you shame me.”

Taizi’s bloodshot eyes remained fixed on the figure on the ground.

“Confess now. Why did you do this to me? Why?”

The heir did not answer.

“Did he tell you to do this to me?”

“No one told me, Father.”

“He.” The Emperor breathed hard and waved wildly, pointing at something in the air. “He! Did he tell you to do this to me? He said this would happen. He said he would shame me!”

The Emperor was trembling, the skin on the right side of his face stretching longer, and suddenly the corner of his mouth twitched, and his whole face contorted. So familiar… He looked just like that when he had talked to me in the ring of candles…and I could even hear a thread of fear in his voice that I had never before heard during the daytime.

“It has nothing to do with anyone. It’s my fault, Father. Let him go.”

The Emperor stood perfectly still. Then,
clang
. His sword slipped to the ground. His shoulders slumped, and his head drooped. He looked as if he had aged ten years.

“Wake him up, Chengqian.” He picked up his sword, calling Taizi’s given name. “He’s losing consciousness.”

He sounded resigned. I breathed out in relief.

Casting a grateful look at his father, Taizi tore a strip of cloth off the boy’s pants, knelt down one knee, and wound it around his shoulder. There was tenderness in Taizi’s eyes that I had never expected to see from him, the mountain-size wrestler.

“Look into his eyes, call his name, make certain he sees you and knows it’s you.” The Emperor tossed his sword to the heir. “Then kill him.”

I shuddered, and the stark light reflected off the blade and pierced my eyes. I shielded them with my sleeves. When I put down my sleeves again, Taizi, his hands trembling, was still winding the strip of cloth, his movement slow and broken.

“Do it.”

“Father—” Taizi’s voice cracked.

He would not do it, I was sure of it. He would plead with the Emperor and make him change his mind. I did not know what the heir would say, but he had to.

“Do it! Or you are no longer my son.”

Taizi lowered his head. The muscles on his back swelled to form round mounds, those on his shoulders hardened, his skin glittered, and his eyes were still like death.

Then he picked up the sword and slid it through his lover’s heart.

There was a moment of silence, so long that it seemed it would never end. Taizi howled, pounding his chest. The crowd murmured. Plum whispered something. I turned away and wiped my face, pushing back the moisture welling in my eyes. I might never understand why the heir loved a boy, and I might never know how it felt to kill a beloved person—I hoped I would never have to do that—but his helplessness and anguish thrust deep inside me like that sword.