Chapter Twenty-Eight
What Prince Wei asked about was not that at all. “What about that kick?”
“Er… It was an extraordinary situation, so I had to do what was necessary,” Cui Lanyin said with an awkward chuckle.
“Smooth-tongued and ingratiating.”
“Her Majesty the Empress Dowager just praised me for being honest,” Cui Lanyin muttered.
“You’re not cultivating the Dao anymore?” Prince Wei still refused to let her off.
Cui Lanyin knew he was mocking her for no longer wearing her Daoist robes. Wasn’t this man usually so quiet? Why had he suddenly become so talkative these past two days—and why did he keep bringing up all the foolish things she had done?
Fortunately, she had lost face in front of Prince Wei more than once or twice already, so her cheeks no longer reddened. “Uncle, we’ve already offended Prince Duan and Prince Kang, and there’s no way to smooth things over now. Since that’s the case, why should I worry about so much? Didn’t the poems say, ‘When life is going well, one should make the most of it’? While I still have good days ahead of me, I ought to enjoy myself to the fullest. Why would I continue cultivating the Dao? I’ve already made up my mind. With you backing me, I’ll be able to swagger through Ying City from now on.”
She had thought that after hearing such brazen words, Prince Wei would at least scoff at her. Instead, he nodded. “The child can be taught.”
Cui Lanyin blinked twice, then eagerly took a bolster and placed it behind his back. “You really are the best uncle in the world.”
When she thought well of him, she called him “you” with the respectful form; in ordinary times, she addressed him more casually. Prince Wei had long since given up caring about her lack of manners. Still, seeing the sly smile on her face, he tapped her once on the head.
That tap did not hurt, but the two chess pieces he had flicked at her yesterday certainly had. Cui Lanyin still covered her head warily. “I didn’t break any family rules.”
“My hand was simply itching.”
This man really couldn’t stand being praised. Cui Lanyin pouted and took another bolster to lean against. Thinking of the post Cui Sheng had received, she realized that the Cui family’s main branch could no longer avoid being tied to Prince Wei.
“Uncle, can I go home now?”
“Not until you’ve sorted out the accounts.”
Cui Lanyin thought of the accounts from the first three years that she had been examining these past few days. Prince Wei appeared to have a considerable income, but every month there were large expenditures marked with the character “secret.” As a result, the accounts showed a deficit.
She was certain that he had not taken the money and secretly put it away somewhere else. He had truly spent it. But what could he possibly be spending so much money on?
She had been coming over in the afternoons to work on the accounts, which made progress painfully slow. It would be better to stay here for a while and finish them sooner, so Cui Lanyin agreed. “Oh. Then can I go home to take a look whenever I want?”
“Yes.”
Since she could return home whenever she wished, Cui Lanyin had nothing else to worry about, and her mood brightened again.
By the time their carriage arrived at Prince Wei’s residence, Bailin, Qinglin, and the others saw that the uncle and niece had already returned to their usual harmony and intimacy.
Cui Lanyin did not turn toward the rear courtyard. She simply followed Prince Wei toward the study.
When she saw the smiling chief steward, she found him much more endearing than before.
“Thank you, Chief Steward, for running around on my behalf.”
The chief steward smiled and stepped aside, avoiding her courtesy. “Second Miss, you’re too kind. It was only my duty.”
The uncle and niece sat opposite each other in the study and drank a cup of tea. Then Cui Lanyin rose. “I’m going to sort out the accounts.”
Prince Wei flicked two fingers at her, having already returned to his former taciturn self.
Cui Lanyin secretly curled her lips and was about to leave with Buyu when she opened the door and saw the chief steward hurrying up the front corridor.
“Second Miss, the gifts from Empress Xu and Empress Dowager Chen have arrived.”
She knew about the gifts from Empress Xu, but why were there gifts from Empress Dowager Chen as well?
Following the chief steward over, Cui Lanyin discovered that the person sent by Empress Dowager Chen’s palace was actually Qi An. Since he had come in person, Leping, who had been sent by Empress Xu’s palace, followed behind him and did not dare take even one step ahead.
Cui Lanyin quickly went forward. “Why has Eunuch Qi’an come personally? You could have simply sent someone from below.”
As she spoke, she did not forget to offer Leping, who had come from Empress Xu’s palace, a formal greeting.
Qi An smiled and replied, “I wasn’t able to bring it up while the Prince was here. Last time, Empress Dowager Chen asked me to select some things suitable for Second Miss to wear and enjoy, but I forgot to take them out. So I hurried over.”
As Qi An spoke, he treated Cui Lanyin entirely like one of his own young ladies. Leping’s manner consequently became even more cautious.
Empress Xu’s circumstances in the palace were awkward. Taking pity on her frail health, Empress Dowager Li had handed the palace affairs over to Concubine Li Shu. Empress Xu occupied the title of empress in name only and held not the slightest bit of authority.
Only on occasions like this would Emperor Xuanning remember her and issue rewards in her name.
The gifts consisted of ten bolts of court-made fabric and fifty taels of gold, which was already considered a generous reward by palace standards.
After Cui Lanyin had expressed her thanks, Qi An finally instructed the eunuchs who had come with him to carry in the things they had brought.
They made trip after trip. There were so many gifts that no one’s eyes could keep up. When they counted them, there were no fewer than twenty-eight bolts of fabric for all four seasons. There were also more than a dozen boxes of various sizes made of huanghuali wood, sandalwood, and painted lacquer with gilt decoration. The boxes alone were worth a great deal. Even without opening them, the gifts Leping had brought from Empress Xu’s palace were completely overshadowed.
Everyone knew that Empress Xu had merely been the intermediary, so Leping did not feel humiliated.
Qi An took only the sandalwood box placed on top and opened it. Inside was a complete set of gold filigree jewelry inlaid with red coral. The hair ornament, earrings, and bracelets all featured delicate lilac blossoms, small and exquisitely charming.
“The others contain things suitable for unmarried young ladies as well. Second Miss may wear them or simply play with them as she pleases,” Qi An said with a smile. “Her Majesty the Empress Dowager also said that she will continue selecting things and sending them over later. Once Second Miss has worn these enough, they can also be given away as gifts.”
Cui Lanyin knew at once that Empress Dowager Chen had heard that her elder sister had returned home and had even prepared gifts for her to use in winning her sister’s favor.
After seeing Qi An and Leping off and having the gifts stored in Qingxi Pavilion, half the afternoon had already passed.
Cui Lanyin had originally planned to find time to return home and have a look around, but she had not even finished examining the accounts. She could only wait until she went to the Duke Dingguo’s residence the next day.
She worked on the accounts until evening, then took Buyu with her and went to Prince Wei’s study once more.
When she arrived, Prince Wei was meditating. She did not bother with any roundabout explanations and asked directly, “Uncle, aren’t we going to the Duke Dingguo’s residence tomorrow to return Empress Dowager Chen’s dowry? I need to know what happened between Her Majesty and the Chen family so I can deal with it properly. Otherwise, if I fail to hit the right points, it won’t be satisfying.”
Prince Wei glanced at Qinglin. “Call Bailin.”
Qinglin let out a sigh of relief. Matters concerning the past were not something he could handle.
Bailin arrived shortly afterward. Qinglin had already told him why Prince Wei had summoned him, so there was no need for Prince Wei to explain anything further. Bailin sat down and began to speak.
Although Empress Dowager Chen had let some hints slip in her earlier words, the truth was still far more complicated and convoluted than the fragments Cui Lanyin had pieced together.
It turned out that, back then, Emperor Gaozong and Empress Dowager Chen had been deeply in love. Their devotion was rare among imperial couples. In order for Empress Dowager Chen to give birth to the emperor’s eldest legitimate son, the two had been married for three years. Emperor Gaozong was already twenty-one, yet they still did not have even a princess.
But as emperor, he bore the Zhao dynasty’s realm and its future on his shoulders. If he continued to have no sons, the court and the country would both become unstable. He had no choice. He began taking women with auspicious signs of fertility into the palace.
Emperor Gaozong had done everything he could. Faced with this outcome, Empress Dowager Chen, no matter how painful it was, accepted it calmly on the surface.
At that moment, however, the Li family suddenly proposed that Empress Dowager Li enter the palace and bear a son for Empress Dowager Chen. The Chen family thought it was a good idea as well. Without consulting Empress Dowager Chen, the two families decided the matter between themselves.
The moves the Chen and Li families made were no different from pouring salt straight into Empress Dowager Chen's festering wounds. She could accept any other woman bearing children for Emperor Gaozong, but she could never bear to see her own cousin, whom she had loved and cared for as if she were her own sister, enter the palace and share the same bed as her husband. To her, that was nothing short of betrayal, a knife twisted deep into her very heart.
Emperor Gaozong did not wish to see Empress Dowager Chen hurt, so he refused to let Empress Dowager Li enter the imperial harem.
Yet strangely enough, none of the women he had taken into the palace over that whole year conceived a child. It was at this point that the Chen and Li families brought up the proposal of Empress Dowager Li entering the palace once more. With the well-known fact that women of the Li family were blessed with many children, and all the court officials joining in to press the matter, Emperor Gaozong finally caved in.
And just as everyone had expected, Empress Dowager Li conceived within a month of entering the palace. After ten months of pregnancy, she gave birth to a son, making him Emperor Gaozong's first-born prince.
What no one could have foreseen was that after Empress Dowager Li gave birth to her son, the imperial concubines in the palace began to get pregnant one after another, eventually giving birth to two more princes and a princess. All at once, Emperor Gaozong had a full house of children.
The earlier rumors that the Chen and Li families had meddled to prevent the imperial concubines from conceiving were now completely disproven.
What happened next was known to all the world. The Li family and Empress Dowager Li kept their promise, and handed the first-born prince over to Empress Dowager Chen to raise. No matter how cold Empress Dowager Chen treated her, Empress Dowager Li always served her with utmost care, putting her interests above everything else. With all their worries put to rest, the Chen family gathered the court officials to submit a joint petition asking Emperor Gaozong to name the prince born to Empress Dowager Li as the crown prince. Emperor Gaozong agreed almost immediately, and the prince was formally appointed as the heir apparent — the very Emperor Xuanning who sat on the throne today.
If Cui Lanyin had never spent time with Empress Dowager Chen in person, she would have believed, just like everyone else outside the palace, that Empress Dowager Chen was a narrow-minded, jealous woman who could not appreciate the kindness the Li family and Empress Dowager Li had shown her.
But now she knew better. She glanced over at Prince Wei, looking as if there was something on the tip of her tongue that she hesitated to say.
Even with his eyes closed, not a single movement in the room escaped Prince Wei's notice. He flicked his fingers slightly, a gesture that in the moment clearly meant "Speak freely."
Cui Lanyin then went ahead and asked the question that had been on her mind: "Uncle, given how open and magnanimous Empress Dowager Chen has always been, there must be more to the history between the Chen and Li families than what the public sees, right?"
"Mn," Prince Wei acknowledged her, and flicked his fingers once more.
Bailin understood his signal, and spoke the truth: "Back then, the reason none of the imperial concubines could get pregnant was indeed a scheme orchestrated by the Chen and Li families."
"There's more to it than that, isn't there?" Cui Lanyin could tell the full story had not yet been told.
Bailin looked toward Prince Wei, and when the prince gave an almost imperceptible nod, Bailin was secretly surprised that Prince Wei would reveal such a major secret to the second young lady, but he kept a calm facade and continued. "Empress Dowager Li was as gentle as water in those days. Even when Empress Dowager Chen treated her unfairly, she would do no more than shed a few quiet tears where no one else could see, and always put on a cheerful, happy face in public. If Emperor Gaozong had not stumbled upon her in private a few times, no one would ever have known how harsh and difficult her life in the palace really was. Since she was the mother of his eldest son, every time he saw her wronged, he would step in to protect her. As time went on, rifts began to form between the emperor and the empress, and they grew further and further apart. Soon it was Empress Dowager Li who was always by Emperor Gaozong's side, and it was only when Emperor Gaozong was on his deathbed that he finally felt remorse for how he had treated Empress Dowager Chen."
Everything now lined up. If such a heap of cruel, hurtful secrets had not happened, Empress Dowager Chen would never have carried such bitter resentment in her heart all these years.
Cui Lanyin felt a wave of deep, heavy sadness. To be schemed against by both her own closest relatives and the person she had loved like a sister — that pain was far worse than any wound that could pierce the heart. Empress Dowager Chen had managed to endure all these years, who knew how much suffering she had to go through?
Lost in the weight of that shared empathy, she forgot she was in Prince Wei's private study. She balled her fist and banged it hard on the arhat couch, speaking in a fierce, angry tone: "The Chen family is so stupid and greedy. I'll go teach them a lesson tomorrow."
She caught Bailin's gaze, who was already looking for a chance to slip away, and turned her head to see Prince Wei. The force of her knock had jolted him so hard that he could no longer rest comfortably on the couch, and he was staring back at her with a cool, unamused look in his eyes.
Cui Lanyin paid his no mind, picked up a piece of mung bean cake and held it to his mouth. "Uncle, this was made by my family's Sangzhi. She learned how to make it from my father himself, and mung bean cake is the pastry she makes best."
That bright, endearing smile of hers was enough to make anyone soften. Bailin watched as Prince Wei, who never let anything ruffle his composure, finally gave in. He opened his mouth to take the pastry, chewed it a couple of times, and swallowed it.
Bailin could not help but snicker to himself. No one would ever imagine that the unshakable, unflappable prince could one day be brought to his knees by a simple piece of mung bean cake.
