Tie Lanshan stood atop the city wall as snow and wind raged around him, yet he was handling the thin sheet of white paper with extraordinary care.
He read it again and again, and the reverence in his eyes grew deeper with each reading.
His personal guard commander, Yang Cang, trudged up through the wind and snow. Following Tie Lanshan’s gaze, he looked toward the vast, snow-covered road beyond the city.
“Marshal, the imperial commissioner’s convoy has already disappeared from sight.” Yang Cang shook the snow from his shoulders, his voice filled with undisguised admiration. “That Magistrate Xu truly is a celestial being come down to earth. She pulled forty thousand brothers back from the gates of hell, yet when she left, she wouldn’t even stay for a single toast of thanks.”
Tie Lanshan said nothing. With solemn care, he folded the sheet of white paper and slipped it through the gaps in his armor, tucking it close to his chest.
He raised a hand and patted the cold iron breastplate, then turned to look at Yang Cang.
“What do you know?” Tie Lanshan lowered his voice. “Do you really think the reason this old man has treated her with such deference these past few days, honoring her as though she were a deity, is merely because she came up with a way to prevent smallpox?”
Yang Cang froze and scratched at his helmet. “Isn’t it? Magistrate Xu saved the lives of everyone in the city.”
“I am naturally grateful for a debt of life-saving kindness.” Tie Lanshan turned back toward the swirling snow. “But what I truly respect—and fear—is the mind of this female imperial commissioner. She knows when to advance and when to retreat.”
Yang Cang understood even less and could only stand there blankly.
Tie Lanshan let out a cold snort. Raising one thick finger encased in a leather glove, he pointed toward the city.
“She saved lives, distributed grain, and issued a strict order to seal the city. That is the imperial commissioner governing affairs on the emperor’s behalf—lawful and justified.”
He continued, “But look at her conduct these past few days. Other than the main hall of this commander’s residence and the several epidemic wards, has she ever gone among the military households at the bottom of the city? Has she ever privately taken out so much as a single coin to reward those veteran soldiers who lost arms and legs?”
Yang Cang thought for a moment, then shook his head.
“That is precisely what makes her frightening.”
Tie Lanshan lowered his hand. “Military authority in a frontier garrison is the emperor’s forbidden ground. This Northern Garrison Pass belongs to the imperial court, and these forty thousand soldiers can acknowledge only one master: the Son of Heaven. If she had lost her head and taken advantage of the gratitude of the soldiers and common people after the epidemic had just been brought under control, privately distributing money and favors throughout the city to buy their loyalty…”
Tie Lanshan paused, his voice turning glacial.
Yang Cang drew in a sharp breath. A layer of cold sweat instantly broke out across his back.
He had thought the imperial commissioner was simply a selfless woman who wanted no reward. He had never imagined that everything she did was calculated with such exact regard for the boundaries that could not be crossed.
“She saw through everything.” Tie Lanshan gazed toward the southern horizon and exhaled a long breath of white vapor. “That is why she left so decisively, without a trace of stain.”
The scene shifted.
On the snow-covered road outside the city, the convoy’s carriages rolled steadily onward.
Xu Zhan, the newly enfeoffed Marquis of Pacifying the North, was a man who could never sit still.
The carriage felt too stifling, and the heavy smell of medicine and blood still clung to him. So he simply asked for a tall warhorse.
With only one arm on the reins, he rode through the wind and snow, leading the way several dozen yards ahead of the carriage.
“Cao Kuo!” Xu Zhan turned and shouted, his voice carrying over the howling snow.
Cao Kuo quickly urged his horse forward until he was half a horse-length behind him. “What are your orders, General?”
“That eunuch who came from the capital to deliver the imperial edict ran faster than a rabbit. Tell me, with this hereditary marquisate, will I still have to report to the Ministry of War every day after I return to the capital?”
Xu Zhan furrowed his brows, his face plainly displaying his displeasure.
“It’s much more satisfying killing barbarian dogs in the north. Once I’m back in the capital, I’ll have to deal with nothing but endless arguments and empty talk.”
Cao Kuo offered him an ingratiating smile. “My lord, the achievement you’ve made this time is truly unprecedented.”
He rubbed his hands together and continued, “His Majesty has summoned you back to the capital in haste. There must be an immense reward waiting for you. Surely he won’t send you there just to endure the Ministry of War’s bureaucracy.”
Xu Zhan curled his lips and did not reply. He merely urged his horse to quicken its pace.
…
Inside the carriage at the rear of the convoy.
A delicate brazier sat in the middle of the carriage, its coals burning brightly.
Xu Qinghuan raised a hand and pulled the silver hairpin from her coiffure. She casually removed the heavy official crown and dropped it onto the small table beside her with a clatter.
Then she leaned back and collapsed onto the soft brocade pillow.
Qingque hurried forward, picked up a thin fox-fur blanket, and carefully draped it over Xu Qinghuan’s legs. She then lifted the hot tea from atop the brazier.
“Miss, have some tea to soothe your throat,” Qingque urged softly.
Xu Qinghuan did not take the cup.
She let out a long, weary sigh and stared at the ceiling of the carriage as it swayed with the wheels, her delicate brows drawing together slightly.
She picked up two pine nuts from the table and tossed them into her mouth.
At once, bitterness filled her mouth, and an irrepressible wave of pain and frustration churned in her heart.
Her distress had nothing to do with the tragedy of soldiers dying on the battlefield. It was purely because she felt that, on this journey to the northern frontier…
She seemed not to have made the most of her opportunity.
“I lost out. On this trip to the northern frontier, I lost out terribly.” Xu Qinghuan complained indistinctly as she chewed the pine nuts.
Qingque’s hand froze around the teacup, and she stared at her in astonishment. “What nonsense are you talking about, Miss? The Northern Garrison Pass has won a great victory, the Eldest Young Master has been made a marquis, and you’ve received a first-rank imperial honor. The Xu family is now enjoying His Majesty’s utmost favor. How could we possibly have lost out?”
Xu Qinghuan spat the pine-nut shells into a small dish and turned to look at Qingque.
“You don’t know a damn thing.”
She gave a merciless scoff.
“What is that imperial honor, anyway? Just a piece of paper hung on the wall.”
“Let me ask you: When I left Jiangning and Peach Blossom Haven, what did I leave behind?”
Qingque had naturally looked into her mistress’s past. Without hesitation, she answered, “You left behind newly repaired city walls, tens of thousands of mu of newly cultivated farmland, and more than a dozen charitable schools. The local people still worship memorial tablets bearing your name.”
“Exactly!” Xu Qinghuan slapped her thigh, her heart aching.
“That was real substance! A foundation capable of bringing blessings for decades to come!”
“But what about the Northern Garrison Pass? I risked my life there, fought the He Lian people, fought Chen Changfeng—that madman—and what did I leave behind in the end?”
She began counting on her fingers, growing angrier with every item.
“More than a dozen pits outside the city where poisonous corpses were buried. The entire city reeking of lime. The medical workers nearly worked themselves blind.”
“And what did I accomplish? I couldn’t even establish a single school to educate the children. I couldn’t distribute even one extra dan of grain to the people!”
Qingque was even more confused. “But… I saw how grateful Marshal Tie and the others were to you.”
“The craftsmen of the various manufacturing bureaus even kowtowed until their foreheads bled. Doesn’t that count as winning people’s hearts?”
At those words, the chill at the corners of Xu Qinghuan’s lips deepened. Her eyes instantly became lucid and penetrating.
“People’s hearts?” She sat upright and drained the now-warm tea in one gulp. “Qingque, remember this. In a frontier military garrison, the least valuable thing is people’s loyalty—and the most dangerous thing to touch is people’s loyalty.”
Qingque was cowed by her mistress’s sudden stern expression and did not dare interrupt.
“Do you really think Marshal Tie has been treating me with such courtesy these past few days because I won him over?”
Xu Qinghuan set the teacup down firmly on the table.
“That old marshal’s heart is harder than the ice on those city walls.”
She stared at the carved patterns on the carriage wall and began to dissect the matter layer by layer.
“He treats me with such deference because I followed the rules.”
“I purged his poison and arranged the transport of provisions. That was simply the duty of an imperial commissioner sent to deal with an emergency.
“I did what I had to do, then dusted off my hands and left. That is what it means to avoid entangling myself in the consequences.
“Do you believe that if I dared to promote any sort of enlightenment or education among the people here in this garrison of forty thousand seasoned troops—
“and then, without going through the Commander-in-Chief’s Office, dared to hand even a single copper coin of loose silver to the lowest-ranking military households…”
Xu Qinghuan slowly laid out the facts, each word striking at the heart of the matter.
“Tie Lanshan would turn against me at once. No, that would merely be him doing his duty.
“He would write a secret memorial that very night and send it to the imperial court by an eight-hundred-li express courier. The memorial would contain only one sentence: ‘Imperial Commissioner Xu Qinghuan intends to buy the loyalty of the army and plot treason.’”
Qingque drew a sharp breath. The teapot in her hand nearly slipped to the ground.
“How could that be…? Miss Xu just saved their lives!”
“Before imperial authority, a debt of gratitude for saving their lives is worth less than a fart.”
Xu Qinghuan leaned back against the bolster once more.
“The military command of the Great Qian is the emperor’s greatest taboo. For a military commander to survive, he can show loyalty only to the fool on the throne.
“They must stamp out every sign of anyone overstepping their authority to win the soldiers’ favor before it can take root.
“That is the most inviolable law of the Great Qian court. So here at Zhenbei Pass, I have no way to make a move. All I can do is watch helplessly, then slink away in disgrace.”
After hearing this, a chill crept up Qingque’s back. At last, she understood why her mistress considered this trip “the most stifling and disastrous move since coming down from the mountain.”
The languor and melancholy vanished from Xu Qinghuan’s face.
She raised a hand and lifted the heavy curtain, which had been blown up at one corner by the cold wind.
Through the falling snow, her cold gaze fixed on the direction of the capital to the south.
At the far edge of her vision, her second brother, Xu Zhan, was riding horseback, waving his whip. Every so often, his hearty laughter drifted over.
Xu Qinghuan watched that retreating figure and slowly shook her head.
“Foolish second brother,” she sneered inwardly. “You still think that inheriting the title of Marquis of Pacifying the North is some heaven-sent blessing. The old emperor has hurriedly issued three imperial edicts in succession, urging us to return to the capital and recuperate.”
A fierce gust of wind swept past, making the curtain billow and crack.
“On the surface, it looks like a reward so lavish it has made us all too powerful. In truth… it is already an attempt to disarm us with a cup of wine.”
Xu Qinghuan let the curtain fall.
The great game in the capital had only just begun.
