第一章 . BACOPA ( 假馬齒莧 )
- summary: when you last set foot inside the palace seven years ago, your heart was shattered into a thousand pieces. now, after the dowager empress’s death, you find that you still cannot even dare to hope.
- pairing: yanjun x f!reader
- genre: historical, royals au
- word count: 6855
- a/n: please expect a lot of artistic license in terms of historical accuracy and medicine i am neither a doctor nor an expert on the song dynasty :’)
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YOU HAD ALL THE MAKINGS of a rags-to-riches story.
Born a month and a day before the summer solstice, the town shaman told your father –– a man of science who made this augury his one exception –– that you would bring great change. As you grew older, her prediction became less and less likely. Your father once muttered that he should’ve known better than to put stock in “that hogwash.”
Your family was poor, relying on both your parents to make ends meet. Your mother died not long after you were born, leaving you in the care of your father. He was well-meaning but lacked the emotional competence to navigate raising a child, precocious as you were, alone. More instructional than nurturing, you grew to maturity spending half of your life helping him in his shop. Your father was confident that you would follow in his footsteps and become a healer. That was his anchor.
You spent the other half of your childhood frolicking by the stream on the outskirts of town. In those nearby woods dwelled the boy you loved. You first met him when you were but four years old, washing bloodied linens from an operation the day before. He peered at you from between the trees. When you first noticed him, he fled.
There are a great many places where your life would’ve been better had things just ended there. This was one of them.
But the boy came back a week later.
Bolder, he came to a stop beside you and asked what you were doing. Your father told you once never to speak to strangers. He also saw no problem, however, allowing a small child to travel all the way across town to do laundry, so you can somewhat blame him for your lack of prudence. You can still remember the boy –– “Yanjun,” he introduced himself, chest puffed outward in pride –– and his tone. Painfully posh, he didn’t hold a lick of the drawl you became accustomed to from your small town. He spoke like the people from the capital, and you were instantly entranced. You had never met a child from Lin’an before. You decided you liked Yanjun very much. If your father noticed that you stayed out longer to play with the boy by the river, he never commented on it. After all, he was just a child. It took you six years to find out who Yanjun really was.
Given that he only spent summers in the so-named palace –– a sprawling villa on the hill that overlooked your hometown –– you hadn’t really known him for all that long. For roughly three months of every year, the two of you (Yanjun, mostly) would get in as much trouble as you possibly could. From playing in the river to snatching low-hanging apples from a nearby (privately owned) orchard, the two of you were nearly inseparable. On the days where Yanjun didn’t come to play, you were miserable. And it wasn’t until your tenth year that you learned just why he was sometimes nowhere to be found.
It had been twenty-four days since you two last met before your father was summoned to the Summer Palace. He brought you along on a whim, not knowing how long he would be gone and reluctant to leave you in the care of your gossipy neighbors. He did not expect your gasp of recognition when you laid eyes on the frightfully pale Crown Prince lying in his bed. His younger brother Chaoze sat by his side and shook him awake. When your eyes met, you felt your stomach drop.
You had spent your summers for the past six years befriending the future Emperor. And his illness, a cold from too many hours spent in the stream, was your fault. Perhaps this was when his mother started to hate you.
You thought that compromising his health would have you forbidden from ever seeing him again, but he sought you out the moment he recovered. He told you that he never meant to lie to you –– and he didn’t, really, only by omission –– and that nothing had changed. “I hope we can still be friends,” Yanjun said, earnestly taking your hand.
But things had changed, although you couldn’t be sure if it was for better or for worse.
When puberty hit, things only got more confusing.
In your current opinion, at all of twenty-five years old, it’s when everything started to go downhill.
You always liked Yanjun. He was funny, smart, and cultured. He would tell you about Lin’an and, after you discovered his identity, he would relay funny anecdotes about his tutors and the goings on of the Imperial Court. As he got older and his voice deepened, he suddenly became more interesting to listen to. And while Yanjun had always been good looking, he was especially handsome when the baby fat left his face and granted him those killer cheekbones portraits still fail to replicate. In a year, you had begun staring at his plump lips more and more.
You didn’t miss the way he’d been looking at you too.
He first held your hand when you were thirteen, shyly brushing his thumb across your knuckles, and you pressed your lips to his cheek in return. He kissed you on the lips at fifteen, and you told him that you loved him the next year. At eighteen, his father died, and you held him in your arms as he cried. A week later, his mother declared that Yanjun needed to marry in order to inherit the throne, and he asked you to come back with him to Lin’an.
Saying yes was one of the worst decisions you ever made.
Somehow, you’re back here seven years later, staring at the palace gates as your luggage is wheeled in behind you. Your father had succumbed to cancer just as spring began to wane into summer, so you have nothing keeping you in Changqi. Not long after his death, you received a letter with the imperial seal requesting that you take on the now vacant role of the royal doctor, as well as requesting that you work on a cure for one of the nation’s deadliest plagues. Imperial patronage was a stunning offer few could even dare to deny. But you still have to wonder why you would return when you had tried so hard to run away after a short five months within the palace walls.
The answer is rather simple: because Yanjun asked you to.
On a broader scale, it was easier to provide excuses. No one in their right mind refuses the Emperor. There is a vacancy in the staff. The Court is in need of a healer, and you earned yourself quite the reputation for your innovative herbal remedies. Only the best of the best can serve the Emperor, and you more than enough deserve that title. It has nothing to do with the fact that Yanjun once loved you and that you loved him just as much.
That time is long gone, and nothing displays that more than how much the palace has changed since you left it.
It’s certainly livelier, more colorful than it was when you departed. Having come when it was in a period of mourning, though, that is to be expected. Observing servants as they move pots and crates around, you presume Yanjun is doing a bit of remodeling as well. It’s a bold choice for an emperor whose nation is currently at war.
“There’s no view quite as magnificent is there?” Honglin, the page sent to fetch and safely deliver you to the palace, hands the reigns of his steed over to a stable boy. The fortnight of travel didn’t afford you an extraordinarily close friendship with the young man, but he was currently the only friend you had in Lin’an. You know that he is mixed, his father being a Jurchen defector and his mother a Han woman. Honglin is incredibly proud of his heritage, bearing a zealousness you find endearing. That’s about all that you know about him. “I came here with my father when I was seven and I’m still in awe every time I return.”
You don’t have the heart to tell him that you have very few memories of the palace to look fondly upon. You smile instead. “Indeed. It’s a testament to our great nation.”
Honglin seems pleased by your response. He gestures toward the Western Wing, which houses most of the residences of the staff. You’re surprised that your brain has retained that information, considering how you tried to forget everything that you could. “I’ll direct you to your rooms, let you get settled in before I bring you to meet His Majesty. Would you like me to do anything with your supplies?”
“No,” you say, shaking your head and following Honglin as he starts down the palace’s winding halls. “Just leave them in their crates in the infirmary. I’ll organize them myself tomorrow.”
“As you wish.”
Honglin deposits you in front of a bedchamber only marginally smaller than the one from nearly a decade ago. How interesting it is that the quarters of the presumed future empress were roughly the same size as the royal healer’s –– or, rather, how interesting it was that the Dowager Empress thought to give her successor such lackluster accommodations. Both rooms are just as lifeless and empty. Only a desk, a table with which you could receive visitors and dine, a bed, and one of the trunks containing your clothing served as furnishing. They couldn’t even afford you a wardrobe. Honglin chirps that he’ll be around and that you only need to holler for him to come running. He leaves you to decompress, and you collapse on your bed the moment he shuts the doors behind him.
You don’t plan to lay there longer than twenty minutes, but you’re exhausted. You know that coming to Lin’an was for a good cause. Aside from the honor of being the royal family’s sole physician, imperial support allowed your research to flourish. The royal summons didn’t mention how much of it Yanjun was willing to finance, only that he would give as much as it took to eradicate tianxing illness. You also knew that anything was better than your lack of funds back at home.
You wonder if the ladies of the court are still here. At least one of your tormentors is gone. Though you feel terrible for being relieved that the Dowager Empress is dead, you still find yourself consoled by the fact that you don’t have to deal with her. You’re terrible, and you have to force yourself to fight the instinct. Horrible to you she might have been, she was still Yanjun’s mother and is apparently the current reason you are employed by the court. Your hopes that the volatile atmosphere of the palace had vanished were dashed by the rumor that your predecessor killed himself for failing to cure the Dowager Empress of her ailment. Is Yanjun really that foul-tempered now? Perhaps this is what his mother was trying to save you from.
“This is no place for a commoner,” she had said when Yanjun first announced his intention to take you to wife. You wanted to protest at first. You loved Yanjun and Yanjun loved you –– surely such a fairytale romance would triumph over all else, wouldn’t it? You weren’t in control of the circumstances of your birth. It wasn’t like you chose to be born beneath Yanjun’s station. You were naïve to think that the strength of your character would prove you worthy of the role of empress, particularly because you weren’t as strong as you thought.
You could stand ridicule from one person. Yanjun, young and headstrong, had a rebellious streak that reinforced his insistence that you disregard his mother’s protests, that you two were soulmates and nothing could come between that. However, you weren’t prepared for the near-ubiquitous vitriol and abuse sent your way. You expected jealousy. You weren’t a fool. The Crown Prince was going to be sought after no matter who he was. To marry the future emperor was the easiest way to secure one’s future. In some respects, you could understand the utter incredulity that a random girl from the country managed to snatch Yanjun away from the noblewomen who knew him all their lives. That didn’t justify their cruel words, though. Of how you didn’t belong, of how Yanjun deserved someone of higher status who wouldn’t pollute the royal bloodline. Of how he was making a terrible mistake by choosing you and how he would come to regret this decision for the rest of his life. Of how you would be an unfit mother to his children, passing on both stupidity and inferiority to his heirs.
You thought yourself a strong girl. But there was only so much even the strongest could take.
At least now, you’re not a threat. You don’t mean anything to Yanjun anymore. They have no reason to snap at you, broad as his harem is.
You spend so long in your miserable reminiscence that you don’t realize how much time has passed. Honglin has to knock on your door and snap you out of your self-pity. “Just a moment!” you shout, scrambling to your trunk and throwing on your nicest gown. You comb your hair as quickly as you can and hope that minimal makeup will be enough. Honglin smiles and tells you that you look nice when you open the door. You slip your hand into the crook of his elbow when he offers his arm, taking a deep breath.
Chuckling, Honglin begins to guide you toward the Great Hall. “You don’t need to look so nervous,” he tells you, patting your hand gently. “His Majesty isn’t going to rip your head off for being late. His meeting with the Ministers of Defense ran a little long, so I doubt he’s noticed anyway. Between them and the men of the Inner Court, I’d be surprised if he actually gets a word in beyond granting or denying their absurd requests.”
“Is he really so busy?”
“Oh, of course. The nation is on the brink of war at all times, miss, no matter what harebrained but effective schemes General Cai has up his sleeve. Invasion is a constant possibility. The Jurchens simply refuse to let up.”
You pretend to know what he’s talking about. “Right.”
“Well, whatever the case, I’m glad we have Yanjun leading us. With him, I feel as though victory is just around the corner.”
“I see,” you murmur. You hadn’t thought much of public opinion on the current administration. Politics were less your forte. You simply followed your moral compass, bureaucracy be damned. Honglin might be a little biased, but you still find yourself fascinated by the open admiration in his tone. It seems Yanjun is the great leader you always thought he’d be, bringing to life the praise you’d whisper to him late at night as he laid his head in your lap and voiced his doubts. “You think very highly of him.”
“He deserves it.” Those three words settle the matter.
After what seems like an eternity navigating the palace’s endless corridors, Honglin stops in front of the large crimson doors of the Great Hall. Covered in gold decorations, it’s even more ornate than you remember. The phoenixes and floral imagery are new, somewhat clashing with the preexisting spiraling dragons and flamboyant clouds. Somehow, though, the doors seem smaller than you remember them last. Perhaps you’re no longer as intimidated by them and the secrets they hold. You know what type of vipers dwell within. There’s only the one on the dais that you’re still apprehensive of. There is still the slight chance that Yanjun is still as harmless as a garter snake. In your infinite maturity, though, you know better than to hope.
“Are you ready?” Honglin asks. You don’t give yourself room to hesitate. At your nod, he smiles encouragingly and pushes the great doors open. Voice booming, he calls out your presence. “This humble servant presents the new imperial healer to His Majesty the Emperor, Son of Heaven and Ruler of the Earth, He of Ten Thousand Years.” Bent at the waist, he shuffles forward. You follow him, head bowed and hands folded in your sleeves.
Yanjun says your name when he tells you to rise. As you obey, you force yourself to suppress a shudder. If even such a short vocalization can send shivers down your spine, you can’t imagine what a full sentence will be like. “Look at us,” Yanjun says. A rustle of silk indicates he beckoned you with a finger. You raise your head to fully look at Yanjun –– Emperor Qiànzо̄ng, you remind yourself –– for the first time in seven years.
He’s just as beautiful as he was back then. No longer boyish, he’s replaced that youthful charm with a regal and dignified demeanor. His hair is longer and spills over his shoulders, flesh paler presumably from years indoors. He waves at you almost teasingly, fingers still slim and pretty. It’s a wonder he can still move with the heaps of fabric atop him. He’s always been scrawny, but you see that he’s filled out his robes. The rich silks are adorned with golden embroidery depicting his family crest, the Phoenix –– so, it was his addition to the doors after all –– along with, you notice on his sleeves, tangerine and citrus trees. To reflect the flourishing growth brought about by his reign, you suppose. He truly is an emperor now.
“It’s good to have you back,” Yanjun says. For all the refinement in his dress, he still slouches a little, shoulders raised as he cants a hip to the side –– the way he used to when the two of you were still kids. He’s twenty-five now. Handsome as ever. Voice still rich and soft and tender when addressing you. One would think that his father-in-law isn’t standing less than a foot from him. For all your avoidance of all things imperial, you can remember the beady eyes of Lady Pingting’s father easily. The emperor’s Right Hand eyes you with obvious distaste, sleeve already raised to his mouth as if he is mere seconds away from whispering disparaging comments about you into Yanjun’s ear. You have no doubt that he will as soon as you are out of sight. Seven years have brought very little change to Lin’an.
In the wake of your silence, the emperor looks at you expectantly. You have to remind yourself that this isn’t the little boy who used to fish your ribbons out of the river for you, who would stand on his tiptoes to pick the ripest fruits to share. You doubt he is still the same man that you loved. He is a man of power, now. He is atop the world’s finest nation. He is expected to lead it in war, to reclaim the lost North. “This humble servant thanks the crown,” you tell him, lowering yourself to your knees. Gripping the insides of your sleeves so tightly you dig crescents into the fabric, you bow once more and press your forehead into the velvet carpet so hard you think it may leave marks. “It is an honor to serve the great Dragon Emperor.” When you dare to meet Yanjun’s eyes, his mouth is drawn into a tight line. Perhaps that was the wrong thing to say.
For a long, tense minute, neither of you speak. Honglin looks nervous on your behalf
Yanjun’s gaze switches to something akin to… disappointment. Something else you can’t name flutters in your stomach. You’ve felt it before when looking at him, you just refuse to acknowledge it as affection. You like Yanjun. But you don’t love him anymore. You can’t. So, while you can care and fret over why he seems disappointed in you, you are not allowed to bend over backward to try and please him. That’s not your job anymore, assuming it ever was.
The emperor clears his throat, snapping you back into reality. “How do you feel, coming back to the capital after all this time?” He pauses. “We’re sure you must’ve had some reservations, clean and… succinct as your parting was.”
If you were more naïve, you might dare to presume that there’s a hint of regret in his tone. Yanjun as a prince was sentimental. Soft. As an emperor, he is not allowed to have such unnecessary inclinations. And you, though not quite the commoner girl you once were, are still light years beneath him. You are a healer, not the daughter of a nobleman or a foreign princess or his empress. You have a place –– one that is not with him. “Not at all,” you say, feigning ignorance to the way he leans forward in interest. “Whatever my previous feelings for the palace were, I have grown in the past seven years. And I would be foolish to disregard a royal summons. I thank Your Majesty for your generous offer. I know that with imperial support, I will be able to complete my research and create a better standard of living for our people. Improving the health of our citizens is my greatest priority and I am grateful that Your Majesty has deigned to allot such a great sum to such a wonderful cause.”
You’re suddenly made aware of the dozens of pairs of eyes on you. Though the throne beside Yanjun is empty, his many advisors are all around him, among other members of his staff like scribes and entertainers. To say nothing, as well, of the diplomats and bureaucrats from afar. How many of them know who you are and what you once meant to him? How many are willing to use that and this lackluster reception against you?
Yanjun blinks. “We… see.” He opens his mouth to speak further, but his Right Hand cuts him off as the old man lunges forward to whisper in his ear. Nodding, Yanjun waves him back with an arm. “We are terribly sorry to curtail this… long-awaited reunion, but we have some business to take care of.” Glancing at Honglin, Yanjun dips his head. “If you would be so kind as to escort the lady healer back to her quarters. General Zhu and his retinue will be here shortly.”
And just like that, you are dismissed and his attention is elsewhere. You and Honglin bow before you depart, but Yanjun hardly seems to notice as he unfurls a scroll in his lap and listens to the rambling of his ministers. It’s probably for the best.
When the doors of the Great Hall shut behind him completely, Honglin throws you a smile. “That wasn’t so terrible, was it? He’s still fond of you!” It seems he does remember you were betrothed to the emperor. Prior to this, he hadn’t mentioned anything of the sort. Maybe his memory was jogged by Yanjun’s words. Regardless, you appreciate the attempt at levity. “I told you he’s a good man. You had nothing to be worried about.”
He’s right, in a way. You didn’t know why you were so worked up over a conversation that took less than ten minutes. What were you expecting? For Yanjun to beg you to love him again, for him to confront you over breaking his heart? Clearly, it wasn’t very broken in the first place, considering the fact that he married Pingting not long after you left and gained a reputation of being something of a womanizer. Not that anyone would ever accuse an emperor of debauchery to his face.
“Would you like to go back to your room, or are there other matters you would like to take care of?”
“Actually,” you say, “do you mind taking me to the infirmary? I think I’d like to begin unpacking.” It’d take your mind off of things, at the very least. And you’d like to get your practice off the ground as soon as possible. Momentarily forgetting about Yanjun is just a bonus.
Honglin eyes your robes with an arched brow, but when you look at him expectantly, he shrugs and grins. “As you wish. Follow me!”
By the time you’re finished with unpacking most of your surgical equipment and organizing your anesthetics, you are sweaty, your hair has come undone, and your arms are sore. Just thinking about having to put away everything else has you sighing in exhaustion. You’re only about halfway done, and remembering that you still have to take inventory of all of your herbs makes you want to quit even before you’ve started, but you grit your teeth and decide to have everything finished by the next evening. The sun has long since set, and the palace has fallen into relative silence. Having removed your shirt jacket for ease of movement, you have to slink back to your rooms with it draped over your shoulders, hoping no one sees you in a state of moderate undress. You breathe a sigh of relief as you successfully make it back to your room without being spotted. Only to scream –– thankfully short and quiet enough not to cause a large commotion –– when you see the scene laid out before you, of course.
Lin Yanjun and an extravagant dinner are at your table, and he looks moderately amused by the sight of your surprise and messy attire. His mother ambushed you similarly seven years ago, but you were wearing more clothes then. You doubt he is aware of how much he takes after her. “Sit,” Yanjun says, sounding more like he’s suggesting rather than ordering. “I wanted to speak with you in a less ostentatious setting.”
And the candles, golden cutlery, and huge roast duck definitely serve to create a more minimalist, humble atmosphere.
Biting back the quip, you do as he says and take a seat across from him. When you dined with his mother (whom you can see in him so clearly with the way the shadows dance across his face), you were expecting an apology. She did a good job of maintaining the impression of civil conversation, though its content was anything but civil.
Without a hint of aggression, she told you, “You must know that you are no good for him.”
You tried to protest, only to get plowed over.
“Look at it this way,” the Dowager Empress had said. You still remember her words and the way her hair decorations clacked as she moved clear as day. “You are doing my son no favors. You may operate under the idealistic belief that true love will conquer all, but I must remind you, young one, that Yanjun will become the leader of a country in the real world. A country at war, constantly being attacked by our enemies to the north. He will reclaim the North and drive the Jurchens out once and for all. What he needs is someone who will provide him with the most aid in his endeavors. What could you possibly offer him that he could not find elsewhere?”
At the time, you weren’t able to speak, tongue stuck to the roof of your mouth. You never needed to challenge such a great authority before. The Dowager Empress took advantage of that.
“Money? Connections? Are you a tactician of any sort?” You had no response. She was right. Yanjun was meant for greater things. And while you thought you’d be with him every step of the way, you knew that it wasn’t practical for him. Lady Yun, whose father was the second largest landowner in the entire country, or perhaps Lady Likun, whose father and brother were prominent figures in the military and who was a capable strategist in her own right, were better matches. He ended up choosing Lady Pingting, the daughter of a high-ranking official in the Ministry of Defense, so Yanjun evidently took his mother’s wishes to heart. What did you have to offer him besides your love? “You are a commoner, my girl. He will be an emperor. Surely you see something wrong with this picture, yes? You may believe that the two of you are in love, but that is only because you don’t know any better. The universe has an order and it will always right itself. This is a lesson you would do well to learn now.
“This is what is going to happen,” said the Dowager Empress then, so sure that she could tell the future. “You are going to tell Yanjun that you no longer wish to marry him. You will then pack your meager belongings and return to Changqi. You will remember your place, and you will never speak of or to him again.”
As it turned out, the old bitch was a prophet.
Except here you are, sitting in front of Yanjun as he places a leg of duck in your bowl. It’s something a husband would do. Is this the universe righting itself? No, it can’t be. You remain frozen, hands in your lap. “Why?” You thought you could do this. That you could speak to him again without wanting to flee. It should be easier without all those eyes on you, but it isn’t.
“Is it wrong of me to wish to speak to an old friend?” He arches a brow and smiles at you. It isn’t pleasant. He looks every bit like the shark his mother was when she last spoke to you. He looks like he’s just waiting for you to spill blood so he can strike. “We are still friends, are we not?”
You don’t respond. The question hangs awkwardly in the air as you turn instead to eat. Perhaps it’s petty of you, but you’ve learned to pick and choose your battles. Professing any affection for him would do you no good, especially when taking into consideration the people who could hear you but who you couldn’t see. “And I suppose you thought you were doing me favors by coming to my quarters?” He blinks in surprise as you speak after sipping some broth. It’s remarkably easier to speak to Yanjun when you think of his mother at the same time, of how he’s no longer the lovesick boy that you knew –– of how he might not have your best interests at heart anymore. “There are eyes and ears around the palace and you thought that coming to my bedchambers alone was the best course of action. I see.”
Yanjun laughs then, releasing a rather cavalier scoff. “My apologies, I didn’t think ––”
“Clearly.”
His chuckle cuts off abruptly. “I was hoping we could be civil.” Clearing his throat, Yanjun returns to his meal. Each movement –– even to raise his chopsticks to his mouth –– is practiced and sharp. Though it is only dinner, and a private one at that, Yanjun still can’t relax. You feel a little bad for snapping at him. The last seven years probably haven’t been very good to him. He had to have been forced to grow a thicker skin. Scales, if you will. The bags under his eyes say as much, anyway.
The two of you eat in silence, as you don’t dare to speak lest he turn your cold attitude against you. You had often imagined what it would be like to share meals as husband and wife. What it might be like to sit beside him in the grand hall, reaching over to add some vegetables to his rice and as he ladles you soup. How domestic it might have been. How useless these fantasies were. The Dowager Empress was right. At the time, you were a frivolous, naïve girl in love with the idea of love. Now, you are not. You’ve grown, and you’ve grown beyond him. The two of you were better off without each other. This isn’t you finding your way back to each other, or whatever drivel your eighteen year-old self would’ve come up with.
This is not the universe correcting its course.
But still, you have to wonder.
“Why me?”
The two words startle Yanjun out of his apparently length and intense internal monologue. From the harsh way he was staring at the plates in front of him, you thought he was trying to consume them with sheer willpower and ocular strength alone. He looks up at you and raises a brow. “I beg your pardon?”
“Out of all the doctors in the Middle Empire, out of every physician, every healer, every master of the art of medicine, why did you choose to extend this position to me?” There are plenty of people more famous than you, renowned across the nation for their prowess and advancement in the field. While you had garnered a bit of popularity (and something of an ego) for your improvements of herbal medicine, you still had doubts that these accomplishments alone warranted your sudden and enormous rise in status. “I highly doubt it’s because we are friends. If you’ll forgive me for the rudeness of the accusation, I believe you may have some ulterior motives.”
It isn’t something you would have suggested of him before. At least, not out loud. Yanjun was shrewd and playful, but such an important position, one that held the entire palace’s health in its hands, was not one to be taken so lightly. Nepotism had no place when life and death were involved, and you always thought that he knew better than to place personal preference over effectiveness. But you hardly know him anymore. So much of him is physically familiar. The details, however, are too dissimilar not to notice.
His relative reticence, the almost sleepy way he blinks, head occasionally dropping and his chin staying tucked against his clavicle as if he doesn’t want to lift it back up. The calluses on his fingers from hours of holding a brush. The wry curl of his lips resembling something like guilt. Like you’ve sniffed him out. The light dusting of pink across his cheeks, either from the wine he’s been indulging in intermittently throughout the night or embarrassment. Surprise, given that you never thought to challenge him like this before.
So, you were right. He was hiding something. Maybe you know him better than you think.
“That is a rather abrasive way to phrase your concerns,” Yanjun says mildly, “but I will forgive you for your tone.” He folds his hands in his lap. “The simple truth is that I needed someone I could trust implicitly. Although I had my doubts that you would be able to hold up under the pressure, there are very few people I trust to make sure that my family and friends and allies are healthy.”
You swallow roughly. The pressure. Right. When you told him you no longer wished to marry him, you cited pressure as the deciding factor in your departure. Of course, he’d remember.
“Nevertheless, you are correct. I owe you the truth. I am well aware of what was written on the summons. None of it is particularly untrue. I fully expect you to conduct research to combat the tianxing plague in Guilin. But that isn’t all I wanted to ask of you. I suppose that, upon reflection, my apprehensions no longer seem very reasonable. And, as such, I no longer see the point in hiding anything from you. Are you aware of what happened to your predecessor?”
“Only that he leapt into a river not long after your mother’s death.” You decide to keep your conspiracy theories to yourself.
“You were not informed of why?”
You shake your head. You wish he would just get to the point, though he’s had a history of being superfluous in his storytelling.
“The official narrative we passed along to the palace staff is that he feared punishment for failing me because he was unable to prevent my mother’s death. She had an ailment of the liver and suffered a painful death. It would not be surprising to hear that he feared retribution from the crown.” Would it? You didn’t think he was that kind of man. But people change. Yanjun leans in and your traitorous heartbeat quickens. If he notices the way your breath catches in your threat, he doesn’t say anything.
“Only three ministers, the Empress, myself, and now you know the truth. The Crown Prince’s health has been deteriorating for the past month. While it seemed the doctor had been making some headway, he took his life two weeks into my son’s illness. I can only presume this was because he reached an unfavorable prognosis. But rather than do anything he could to save a seven year-old boy’s life, he took the coward’s way out.” Yanjun clenches his fists. You fight the urge to reach over and take his hand.
What little surprise you felt at learning that he was a father quickly faded and was replaced by sympathy. You had no children to call your own, disgraced to spinsterhood after the dissolution of your engagement. You had no idea what he must feel to watch his son in pain, to watch the boy die. You could scarcely fathom it. It puts the exhaustion in his visage into perspective. Your heart aches for him.
But you still aren’t very happy with him. “Why… why didn’t you just tell me the truth?” For someone who claimed to trust you enough to put his family’s life in your hands, the fact that he decided to withhold this information from you didn’t support his assertion whatsoever.
“I couldn’t risk your summons being intercepted. If the news that the heir to the Empire was dying fell into the wrong hands, I feared the worst. Morale dropping in the midst of a war we are losing is the mildest of consequences.” He clenches his jaw and avoids your gaze. “Worse yet, the Jurchens may send someone to finish the job. We are aware that they have spies within the palace. We just don’t know who they are.”
“That sounds like a bunch of excuses. Valid ones, yes, but not the truth. Yanjun, if you want me to do the best that I can, you have to trust me.” Not all of him is entirely unfamiliar –– the way his voice wavers and the way he refuses to look you in the eye are little dishonest quirks you recall from his childhood. Your fingers twitch and his flex in return. You’re both too stubborn to reach over and complete the movement. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Licking his lips, Yanjun drops his head. He reaches up to rub his jaw. He used to do that when he got in trouble and his steward was about to wring a confession out of him. “I was afraid. And foolish. I thought that you still loved me. That you would refuse to treat a child that you thought could’ve and should’ve been yours. For that, I apologize. I should not have let my assessment of you be clouded by fanciful sentiment.”
Can you resent him for his line of reasoning? Part of you wished that he thought you still loved him, but that notion was supposed to work in conjunction with the idea that he still loved you too. That part of you, the smallest bit of romanticism remaining within you, was wrong. He thought you still loved him, and he used that to think the worst of you. You are not afraid to admit that it hurts –– both on your behalf and his. What happened to Yanjun to make him this cold? Was it… was it you who made him this way?
“Oh, Yanjun.” Your words are pitying. You can tell by the way his shoulders tense that it irritates him. “If you had just asked, I still would have come.”
A chill creeps down your spine as Yanjun stands and meets your eyes. You’ve never seen him like this before. Aloof, icy. His eyes are hard as stone. It’s difficult to categorize him, and he always seems to be shifting. For much of your dinner, Yanjun was nowhere near as cold. Just because he wasn’t talking didn’t mean that he was trying to freeze you out or scare you. But now, you can’t be sure. When you look up at him, you can’t help but remember the way he used to look at you. He gazed at you with such warmth, like you were the sun and stars and everything in the universe –– a sentiment that you shared toward him.
Now, none of that remains. Yanjun looks at you, and there is… nothing there. Negativity, resentment, and bitterness, perhaps. Though you don’t want it to be so, there is no longer anything warm and loving when he beholds you. There is only dislike. He speaks deliberately, mouth forming his words with self-assurance. You can’t construe his tone as anything but loathing. “I couldn’t have known that.”
