Chapter 82

After dark, a few black shapes flickered across the roofs of the Great Liang palace. They moved fast, quick as swallow-shadows skimming water, and left not the least footprint in the thin snow on the glazed tiles. The palace guards on watch never marked them.

The shapes came down together at last in a small courtyard. Landing, they sealed the sleep-point of the night-duty eunuch, then knelt in the snow and waited, quiet.

At the turn of the hour of hai, She Qingling had not yet slept. He was still copying out a sutra in earnest, and when he'd copied it, stroke by careful stroke, to the very end, he burned the whole of it.

The Buddhists say a man is reborn forty-nine days after death, so it makes no odds whether you burn it or not. Even She Qingling thought it made no odds. But he burned it all the same.

As a spy hidden years in the old dynasty's inner palace, how could he ever leave one stroke of his own hand out in the open? Burning was only habit. Copying too was only habit.

All of it a hollow show.

Just as the whole of Great Liang thought he grieved for his family, and thought his every hope was ash and he longed to leave the world. Only She Qingling himself knew that in truth he feared most of all to be without support, and had a vast ambition, and hungered for power.

People will forever lay on others the sense they hold themselves.

Had his heart truly broken to death over it? However bitter, it was so many years now...

Watching the flame turn to black butterflies, She Qingling thought of his wet-nurse. Today was her birthday. Today's sutra was written for her.

In those days the house held him strict. Speaking, sleeping, walking, everything had its rule. The greatest house-rule the She never wrote into the ancestral precepts was this. Keep your face.

Even at the point of ten thousand deaths, look to your face first.

Meet your parents by rule, speak by rule, eat by rule, dress by rule. To be a child of the She house was never easy. He'd been young once, and had even envied a page-boy who'd taken his reward-money and hurried home to be dutiful to his mother. He himself never dared be so unseemly. With his parents all was false and formal, done for outsiders to see. Even the mother's tenderness he sought, he found only in his wet-nurse. He loved sweet things and dared not say it, and the wet-nurse would put a little sugar-syrup in his egg to sweeten his mouth.

That sweetness he'd hankered after for years, and only tasted again when the patent came to his adoptive mother's house. Having tasted it, he clung to it and would not let go.

The whole world thought he should hate the old dynasty most, and next the Zheng.

Wrong. The one he hated most was his own grandfather. Yes! He hated him above all. There are those in this world who love money, and those who love power, and those who love a good name, and he held it firm that of them all the worst was the man who loved a good name.

To this day he could not forget the last eve. The men of the whole clan knelt in the ancestral hall, and his grandfather, flushed red with excitement, raved to his father like a man possessed that tomorrow they'd go and set right the She family's clean name for ten thousand generations.

And after that they all died, not one left, himself among them.

His grandfather had thought himself the cleverest man under heaven, and never reckoned the Benighted Emperor could carry a thing so utterly through. The Benighted Emperor had seen his grandfather's face clear, and hated above all the men who wanted to set him right. He left the She house not one road to live by, and left it only a eunuch.

Heh. How laughable.

Do you know why the Benighted Emperor favored him? Because he and the Benighted Emperor both hated the most hollow lovers of a good name. You'd never have thought it. In their idle hours the two of them would drink together and curse these base, shameless hypocrites, and those were the sweetest moments, and he pined for that pleasure yet.

As at the execution-ground, waiting for the blade, the little brother he'd carried in his own arms said: brother, can you cover Little Pig's eyes? Little Pig's afraid, he doesn't want to watch... He could not. He was bound too. So he turned his head, and strained hard, and pressed close to the old man's ear and said: "The most sickening thing in this world is to have been born your descendant..."

And when his grandfather's head flew, the eyes would not close.

He and the Benighted Emperor had cursed his own ancestors, and stripped the face off those so-called sages, and the Benighted Emperor cursed the ministers forever wanting to tread on his head to set him right. The Benighted Emperor took him for a plaything, and never reckoned that this plaything would play his realm to death.

Mm. That was a satisfying thing. A man needn't do much while he lives. He need only do one satisfying thing. Such as playing a whole country to death.

Watching the last of the black butterflies fly out of sight, She Qingling rose slowly and went out to the courtyard. And by this time the few black shapes outside had gone to snowmen.

These forces he'd reared back in the old dynasty, forces even Yang Zao knew nothing of, were for his Dasheng by and by.

Dasheng was a good name, a thousand times finer to the ear than Feilian.

Seeing She Qingling come out, the black shapes bowed low together, and the one at their head said: "Just as the master foretold, that Qin Zhuo showed himself base. He left Yanjing and went straight for Quanhou Street."

She Qingling worked a hand into his sleeve, glanced at them, and seeing their clothes whole gave a snort: "That fellow's always been small-minded. Your young master's unharmed?"

The leader went on: "Yes, the young master's unharmed. But the things the master made ready for us, we hadn't the least use for. We meant to head Qin Zhuo off, and had our traps and stupefying smoke and poison all laid. It was Qin Zhuo's own bad luck. He met the Elm-Tree Lady of Baiquan Mountain."

The Elm-Tree Lady?

She Qingling's brow lifted. Of this woman lately come near Baiquan Mountain, he had very little.

So he asked mildly: "And then?"

The man's face was all disbelief, and he drew from his robe a length of broken sword and a brocade pouch: "The two of them traded three hundred and twenty strokes. Qin Zhuo was soundly beaten and spat blood, and after wrote a keep-off ban with his own hand on Baiquan Mountain. Only, going down the mountain, that Elm-Tree Lady..."

The man told out the whole fight between the Elm-Tree Lady and Qin Zhuo. In it She Qingling put four questions, three touching the Elm-Tree Lady, and the heaviest was this: "With your lightness-skill you truly could not catch her?"

His man, whose lightness-skill walked alone under heaven, said: "Yes! Could not. Beside her, what skill we few have is as a little grass beside a high mountain. A few bounds and we'd lost her. And besides, even the master of Qin She was no match for her, so we dared not be rash, and hid ourselves far off..."

He told it on, and coming at the end to Qing Buyi being restored to her senses, he asked for orders: "...after, the Qin father and daughter parted at the seventeenth charity-pavilion on the Qingfeng road. Your servant set men to follow Qing Buyi, and she's gone to lodge at the Qingque Nunnery. What say you? Shall we steer her toward Tan Shiyuan once more? To this servant's eye, Tan Shiyuan's little minded to stay a monk, and will likely flee before many days..."

She Qingling walked into the snow, took the pouch and the broken sword, and looked at them a long while before he said: "Help him out. A good man like that should go back and stir the Tan house up. As for Qing Buyi, the aim's met, so cut your line with her. His Majesty's temper is very foul just now, and he's already sick to the teeth of the Tan house. Some things a single push will do. More is drawing legs on a snake... As for that Elm-Tree Lady, go more often to Qingfeng after this. I think old Xin the beggar should know a thread or two."

The black shapes took their orders and went. She Qingling stood in the snow, watching until the snow had buried the marks their knees had left. Then he took the broken sword and the pouch into the shrine, and before long came out empty-handed and went straight to his bedchamber.

That business of Qing Buyi's madness, he'd brought about with his own hand. His good boy had far-reaching aims, and though he came on fast, he'd forever been using the poorer means. She Qingling would not force the seedling. He could only tamp down the ground behind him.

As a great eunuch beside two dynasties' emperors, his highest understanding of the alienation-stratagem was this. Beside a sovereign there are only two kinds of minister. The ones he likes, and the ones he does not. Great power gives a sovereign a born advantage, that his nature may strip away all the gray and keep only love and loathing. Be a man a loyal minister and able general, if the sovereign loathes him in his heart his road ends just there, and, once out of favor, he can be thrown away any moment.

That night She Qingling slept most easy, and at daybreak was sickened by someone.

Forced up, he leaned against the bed, threw a robe on, and looked with plain disgust at Weng Jinzhong, the Empress Dowager's eunuch, and said: "I'm not going!"

Weng Jinzhong took the warm shoes a little eunuch handed him, all smiles, and set them out for She Qingling with his own hands, and only then said soft and coaxing: "Now you make it hard for me. The Dowager means it kindly. She feared you'd spend the festival alone, and so asks you to the back palace. If you won't go, at least give this old servant a reason to carry back. You fling out three little words and I've nothing to catch them with!"

He put out a hand for She Qingling to lean on, and waited on his washing himself, and when he'd sat down to table for his meal this patriarch at last relented and said: "Tell her I've gone back to the old mansion."

Weng Jinzhong took fright and hurried to talk him out of it: "Aiyo, patriarch! Why torment yourself so? That place is gone to ruin, no fit place to live. You'd only be wretched going back, and it slaps the Emperor's face and the old lady's. Come, take it that I never got here today, will that do?"

That said, he waited for no answer from She Qingling, but fled in a rout with his people.

She Qingling took up his bowl, face blank, and ate in earnest. There were twenty-four solar terms in the year, and a thing like this came round a few times a month.

That was the maternal kin. His and the Emperor's maternal kin. Sorely as the Zheng longed now to change their gate, to go back to being the clean and honored house the scholars of the whole realm had once looked up to, he would not have it, and the Emperor less still. So the Zheng could only live on as the throne's in-laws. A voice at court they might as well forget.

The sovereign did not like them.

Because he loitered at the Emperor's side, Zheng Xingyun could only be shunted to the Board of Rites. That was his revenge. And this revenge, out in the open, the Zheng knew, and the Emperor knew, and the Dowager knew. Only the world did not.

Everyone knew the Emperor was but Dowager Zheng's foster-son, no true blood of hers. Would the next reign's sovereign still own this kinship? Heaven knew.

She Qingling ate his fill by half, set down his bowl and chopsticks, threw on a great cloak and went to look at the sky, and cursed the wretched thing under his breath, and then went on about his own business.

He cursed the sky every day, and no worse luck ever came of it.

He'd gone a little while when Weng Jinzhong came hurrying up again. The Dowager had bidden him carry word for She Qingling to report himself sick, and he could only run back and forth in the great snow. Reaching the place and finding She Qingling gone, he let out a long breath, and said to his own foster-son, a little mournful: "Son, what fate is your father's? What our house dreads most now is a festival. Come a festival, and these legs of mine go two rounds thinner..."

Muttering it, Chief Weng climbed into his bamboo chair and rode back through the snow to the old Dowager in the back palace to make his report.

His say said, he put on a look of dread and begged pardon.

Hearing it, Dowager Zheng plucked the band off the crown of her head. The old lady was easy-tempered, and took no offense, but only smiled and sat herself briskly up and said to Attendant Weng: "There, there! You needn't act it out. This year and more he's grown used to minding no proprieties, and I can't provoke that stubborn old man, he's my father! And I can't provoke this stubborn little donkey, he's my sister's son! Push him too hard, and, ai! How am I to face my sister down below? There now, Aman's waited since dawn, poor child, saddled with elders like these. Go tell him, at least let the boy have an answer to take home."

Attendant Weng nodded, turned, and went.

Chen Dasheng did not know his foster-father had run into another vexation. He'd drunk a little too much with his three cousins the night before, and rose in the morning turned queasy with the wine, his head splitting fit to burst, and only after two bowls of sobering broth was he any better.

At that, Chen Dasheng looked puzzled. Qi Qian'er came, took the gold-clasped ornament-girdle from Chunfen's hands, and bound it on him herself, and Chen Dasheng said nothing, only held his arms out and let her do as she would.

The girdle bound, Qi Qian'er hung on him a few jade pendants worth five and eight strings, and jade rings on silk cords, saying as she went: "That house's sons who went off with their father are home, though how many I don't know, and some of their grandsons' generation besides. When you go you'll have to meet them all, so just take these off for greeting-gifts."

Here she grew rather cross: "That's a shameless house! Don't they know we're keeping the good-fortune cauldron? They must go asking you alone. It sickens me."

She hung the last little calf-hide satchel on Chen Dasheng and patted his waist: "Off you go! I'm afraid they'll be too shameless, so I've put a couple of dozen little gold peanuts in here for you. If there's a crowd, grab two or three at a time and give them out any old way. They've only just sent us a bit of gift to boost the cauldron, and now they'll be wanting it back. Isn't it sickening?"

Chen Dasheng couldn't hold back a laugh at the last, but first took the mouth-rinse Chunfen brought, and rinsed three times over before he dared open his mouth to speak to Qi Qian'er.

His fine ways were more and more these days, and he never noticed it himself.

When the stale taste of last night was out of his mouth, Chen Dasheng drew Qi Qian'er to him and said: "Bear it. They're neighbors. Get through it on the surface and it's enough. We buried our dead not long ago, and the old lady's kept two months' fast, and old Madam Tao's kept the women of her whole house company at the Qingque Nunnery the while. She's followed our old lady six years and more now. A man can't live and dodge every sickening thing. Why does she fawn on our old lady all day? She's near out-earning Dame Li at it. It's only that she wants a way made easy for her."

Qi Qian'er was cross. She reached out and patted his shoulder and rolled her eyes: "Go, and promise nothing!"

Chen Dasheng nodded at once: "Of course!"

He'd not dare, either!

So Chen Dasheng went out in his great cloak, plain cloth without, sable within. His house was but a few dozen steps from old Madam Tao's, out of Guard Lane and across the way at an angle.

Out of Guard Lane, Chen Dasheng smiled. His own Chen house had laid on guests and opera, two full sets of it a day, all whole plays, so a good many onlookers had come in from the ten li and eight villages round.

His house had set its cauldron up at the Qingfeng city-gate. Old Madam Tao's house knew how to work a thing too, and had put a great pot up outside her own door as well, only hers boiled plain water, handy for the play-watchers to come and drink.

So it looked as if her house too were keeping a good-fortune cauldron.

No wonder his own wife had no love for her. It was reckoning too fine by half.

Chen Dasheng could keep his face even now, joy or anger showing nothing. Wearing his old honest look, he walked smiling to old Madam Tao's door.

Rounding the great press of people queuing for water, he came to the door, and saw old Madam Tao's grandson, the one with the milk-name Top-Scholar, spring up and run inside.

Before long a whole crowd came pouring out. At their head was one he'd met, that Zhou Jizong who'd carried off the bolt of brocade, and behind him another whose face was like his, though he didn't know the name. Only these two looked a little wilted, like frost-struck plants.

Old Madam Tao came out on her grandson's arm to greet him, so glad she could hardly bear it. All smiles, she came bracing her hands on her knees: "Aiya, my lord Recorder! We've waited for you the whole morning."

Chen Dasheng smiled and made a junior's bow: "Come now. Keep your good wine for next year. You know well enough about our house's loss. Could it not have waited?"

Old Madam Tao made a show of heartiness: "It could not! Yesterday the Kitchen God went up to heaven to feast and be merry, so it's surely our turn now! It's nothing. Whose house isn't so these days? None of us can afford to stand on ceremony. Come, come, let me tell you about these worthless boys of mine."

She drew the eldest of them forward: "This is my third boy, Jiye." Then she pointed at Zhou Jizong: "And this shameless, good-for-nothing one you've met, my fourth boy, Zhou Jizong."

Chen Dasheng made his courtesy to the two, and, seeing not a mark of office on either, knew these two were likely without a post.

The courtesies made and a few civil words said, they brought Chen Dasheng into old Madam Tao's courtyard. When he'd been shown into the main hall, he saw that Doctor Cheng and Meng Wanquan had come too, and sat to one side watching him and laughing.

The sight of them cheered Chen Dasheng, and his tone eased: "Oh, what a treat! What, is our house's food not good enough for you?"

Meng Wanquan laughed and nodded: "Just so. A cauldron's never as good as a sit-down feast."

Doctor Cheng stroked his beard and nodded too: "Just so, just so. We were hungry long since, only we'd to wait on you, you black-hearted thing, that wouldn't get up, and go hungry keeping the guest company till this hour."

That said, the two of them saw the string of trinkets jingling at Chen Dasheng's waist, and laughed together. Meng Wanquan even stood to have a look. He had them too, and Doctor Cheng had them too.

Old Madam Tao's laying on of guests just now was a graceless thing in truth. It was the last month of the year, and there was a good-fortune cauldron next door, and if you'd have guests you should at least have some name to give it. To call folk in of a sudden to drink with no name at all was, first of all, to leave the guest no room, and that was a breach of manners.

They were all put out at heart, but for the sake of four or five years' shared hardship they'd grant her this face. And Zhou Jizong looked rather shamed too, and knew his own house was graceless, and quickly asked them to the table. Chen Dasheng held the highest office now, so he took the seat of honor, and when he was seated the dishes began to come.

Old Madam Tao had spent a great price today. She'd hired the best cook-house kitchen in Qingfeng, and set out the finest broth-dishes of the place, chicken and duck and fish and meat and fruit and greens, every one stewed in broth, and all borne up in little clay pots neither too big nor too small. In the deep of winter you could see the vegetables in each soup, and that was fine and particular indeed. One such table cost ten strings at the least.

Chen Dasheng didn't drink out of doors, so he took tea for wine and drank three cups first.

When he'd drunk, and set down the cup, and before he'd put out his chopsticks, old Madam Tao came into the room on two women's arms.

Come in, she said to her grandson at the door: "Top-Scholar, I've a word to say to your uncles. Help your granny shut the door."

The boy called Top-Scholar came in at once and shut the wooden door, and in the last crack of it Chen Dasheng saw the child throw a look of pure hatred at his two uncles.

The wooden door closed, and the sing-song of the opera-stage went faint as if a village off. In the quiet of the room old Madam Tao was helped to the table by her two daughters-in-law and sat down.

She sat, and said nothing. A good while later the old woman lifted her face, her lips trembling: "You three, I know today I asked you here as guests for no proper reason at all, and truly earned your dislike, but, but there was no help for it!"

The old woman was sore wronged indeed. Her say said, the tears began to fall from her eyes, one drop and another, a whole river of grief.

Seeing her weep, Zhou Jiye and Zhou Jizong could not sit still, and rose and knelt on the floor and dared not make a sound.

Meng Wanquan and Doctor Cheng took fright, and both looked to Chen Dasheng.

Once, Chen Dasheng would long since have been flustered. So old a woman, one who'd been at the old lady's side six years, whatever her house's want of standing, she was an old neighbor and an old friend, and he'd surely have stood to comfort her.

But he was another man now. What sort of people did he keep company with? What manner of world did he look on? What did he do with his days? Never mind the private things. In the ordinary run he saw a minister go mad at court every few days, saw ministers dragged out and their backsides beaten, went now and then with the Emperor into the secret prison, stood bare before a mad nun, and more. He was long since seasoned.

Seeing the old lady weep so, Chen Dasheng's head ached a little. He put out a hand for the spoon, ladled himself half a small bowl of soup, and drank a good half of it hot, and when his belly was easy he said: "Old lady, if you've a thing on your mind, say it out plainly at home. What sort of days your house keeps, we old neighbors all know. It's all the aunties' and the girls' own two hands, worn to the bone, thread by thread. Why waste this money? Now you call us here so anxiously and put on this show. Isn't that making it hard for a body? I'll tell you the truth. I'm a stone-hearted man now. This kind of thing won't answer with me."

That said, he took up his chopsticks and began to eat. Come this far, not to eat was to eat for nothing.

Never mind old Madam Tao. This new face of Chen Dasheng's, come out plain, gave Meng Wanquan and Doctor Cheng a fright.

Old Madam Tao was struck dumb. Trembling, she lifted her head, and saw Meng Wanquan, all smiles, lay a piece of hot tofu in Chen Dasheng's bowl.

Did they truly none of them care for her house?

Sore at heart, the old woman began to sob. Seeing his mother so hard-pressed, Zhou Jizong, kneeling on the floor, said: "Three lords, this is all our two's fault, ai!"

At that he knelt no longer, but put out a hand and slapped himself hard, left and right, then stood and said to Chen Dasheng: "I'll not hide it from you lords. Our house has done a graceless thing, but my old mother was only driven to it. We two came back this time to see the family settled, and tomorrow we're for Zuoliang Pass to report for duty. My mother would not have us go to guard the frontier, and so was forced to do this."

That said, he put out his arms, gathered up old Madam Tao, and made for the door.

Old Madam Tao struggled: "Let go of me! Son, I'd rather die than let you go to your death!"

In the struggle the old woman's hand caught her son's face, and clawed three red weals straight down it.

Zhou Jizong said no word of the hurt, but coaxed her with a smile: "Listen to you. The realm grows more peaceful by the day. What's this of going to my death? Third brother and I are off to make our fortunes..."

Old Madam Tao cursed: "Rot! I've no wish to enjoy any fortune of yours. You dump this houseful of people on me to drag me down, when I can't keep them, and now you'll be off to your deaths, take yourselves off, off with you..."

The old woman was clean past herself today.

Zhou Jizong lost no temper, but held his mother and said: "Yes, yes, rot it is, off we go, off we go..."

When the sound of them had gone far enough off, Zhou Jiye, kneeling on the floor, gave a cough and slowly climbed up. Up, he hopped first to the door, put his head out, looked left and right, and seeing no one, shut the door and trotted back to the table, and with no by-your-leave, spoon in the left hand and chopsticks in the right, fell to eating hard.

When he'd got himself half-full, Zhou Jizong came running back in, and the two brothers fell to like hungry ghosts new-reborn. Eating, Zhou Jizong would now and then look up and say with a smile: "Don't take it amiss, lords. This year we've done so many shameless things we've no shame left!"

Zhou Jiye said without lifting his head: "Yes, yes. We only came in the day before yesterday, and to keep us from the frontier our mother's kept us starving."

The two of them were men of five-and-thirty, six-and-thirty, four-and-forty, and there was something comic in their carrying on so.

Chen Dasheng poured himself tea, stood, and said with a smile as he drank: "No blame in it. Eat slowly, uncles."

Zhou Jizong, a mouthful of soup down, looked up: "Ha? Uncles? Come off it. That's because you've heard we're for Zuoliang Pass. You needn't do us the honor. We're not worth it!"

Zhou Jiye nodded: "Right, right, not worth it."

That said, he took up half a chicken, minded not that it scalded his mouth, and set to it with his hands, gnawing a good while before he was wholly at ease and could talk properly.

He said with a sheepish laugh: "Me, I came out of the army camp's own gaol to throw myself on my old mother. I'll not hide it, I took a bit of silver I shouldn't have, didn't share it with my commander, and came to grief. If it weren't for that bolt of brocade of your house's, I'd be off to exile now at the least."

Zhou Jizong went on with a smile: "The dirty doings of my house, the old neighbors likely all know now. I'll not hide it. From my father I learned a little sharp practice, and from my mother a little scheming, and children can't say their elders taught them wrong. But we two talked it over. Putting down the rebels won't fall to the likes of us, so if we'd win our mother some face we must go the high road, and so we've worked our way to Zuoliang Pass. There's a bit of shrewd calculation in it, that we'll set our teeth and eat a dozen years' hard bitterness, wanting to win our mother a patent of rank."

He gave Chen Dasheng a sheepish smile: "Our old lady, she envies your old lady to death."

Zhou Jizong, two days starved by his mother, ate now in a low and greedy way. Taking the pot with grateful hands, he stuffed down a few more mouthfuls before he said with a smile: "What else was there for it? Whom does she know?"

His eyes reddened a little. He tipped his head back, held it in, and smiled again: "Lords, for old neighbors' sake, we'll ask no great favor of you. We two brothers would beg one small favor, if we may?"

Chen Dasheng thought a moment, then nodded: "No need to trouble the others. If it's not hard, I'll help you."

"That'll do, that's best!" Zhou Jiye set down the empty pot and said with a smile: "Two things. The first is this. Our rolls at the Board of War have us down as Zhou, and we'd have them changed to Tao. This touches soldiers going to the frontier, and we two, weak and few, can't well change it."

Chen Dasheng smiled and nodded: "A small matter."

Zhou Jizong, seeing him agree, grew glad: "Wonderful. Then even dead we'll not fear a wrong name cut on the stone. And the second. We're a bit short in hand, and don't like to ask our mother, so we'd ask you, heh heh..." He rubbed his fingers together at Chen Dasheng: "We'd borrow two proper sets of the Board of War's own forged armor, and weapons, and warhorses. Would that be hard for you?"