Part V

Considering how many things happened on their way, Yong Qi should not be surprised that three months later, and they reached Nanyang and he had found no time to make any mention of his mother to Xiao Yan Zi. The truth was, there was hardly time free and truly alone with himself to think, to worry about anything else than the dangers they were facing, though the guilt for that, and for the fact that he left her in the first place, would assault him in odd moments. This life on the run, however, never allowed those moments to be much longer than fleeting. There was always something else to worry about, whether it was assassins or injuries or hurts or Xiao Yan Zi's latest scheme, or…well, Xiao Jian.

Yet in the end, Yong Qi could not help but feel slightly (or very) foolish when Xiao Jian ended up being Xiao Yan Zi's brother. He looked back now and could see that, yes, Xiao Jian's attention had always been about Xiao Yan Zi's protection, about her well-being, about her past and how she lived and survived. It was all the concerns of a brother who didn't get to see his little sister grow up. Yong Qi tried to tell himself that he was hardly the only person who misread all that attention to mean that Xiao Jian was interested in Xiao Yan Zi romantically, that practically everyone thought so too. The only person who did not think so, who saw the attention for what it was, ironically, was Xiao Yan Zi, who they all dismissed as being too clueless to see what they arrogantly presumed.

He could not help but feel, part of Xiao Jian's attitude towards him all this time, keeping on with the act, not once attempting to contradict their assumptions, were all parts of a test. Now, Yong Qi understood more than ever that Xiao Jian had a right to find out, through whatever mean he deemed appropriate, whether Yong Qi could truly be good for Xiao Yan Zi. Now that the misunderstanding had been cleared up, he was acting cordial enough towards Yong Qi, so he could only hope that Xiao Jian was not entirely against the idea of him and Xiao Yan Zi.

Which was more than he could say about what he knew of his mother's views on his engagement.

He knew, by now, Fu Lun or Ling Fei would have told his mother everything that had been happening in his life in the last two years that he thought he could not burden with before. He spent all that time, trying to pin-point an ideal time to tell his mother about Xiao Yan Zi, and in the end, the way she ultimately found out might very well be the worst way possible. How could E'niang possibly understand, when Yong Qi was not there to explain, how and why Xiao Yan Zi meant so much to him that he could be here now, instead of there with her? How could he expect her to have a favourable impression of Xiao Yan Zi now, when they have never met, and all E'niang would really know was that Xiao Yan Zi was the person who pulled Yong Qi miles away from her? Any reassurance Ling Fei or Fu Lun could give, could not endear a faceless name to E'niang, not when Yong Qi knew that this life was precisely what his mother never wanted for him, what she gave up her every luxury to ensure he could avoid.

He was sure Xiao Jian was slightly unsure about the entire situation between him and Xiao Yan Zi, and his own mother's opinion was most likely not that favourable either. Thus far, it didn't seem like a great way to spend their lives together, for all that their engagement started off with such promise and hope.

It was this, and something else heard in passing when they were discussing Xiao Jian and Xiao Yan Zi's situations, that told Yong Qi that he had been running away from the issue long enough. Xiao Yan Zi deserved to know, and if "the right moment" and "later" would not show itself, he would have to make the moment right.

"The convent where you grew up, what was it called?" Xiao Jian asked Xiao Yan Zi.

"I can't remember…was it…Bai Yun Si?"

It sufficed to say that Yong Qi nearly choked on the tea he was drinking at the name, and Er Kang gave him a sharp look.

Of course, if Xiao Yan Zi had run away the year she was seven, that means she probably just missed Yong Qi's mother's arrival there, and they most likely would never have met at all. Still, Yong Qi wasn't sure, by now, that he could believe in coincidences anymore.

So, a couple of days later, when Xiao Jian and Xiao Yan Zi had both gotten more used to the idea of each other, Yong Qi pulled Xiao Yan Zi away for a long ride after breakfast. He had asked Er Kang early in the morning to also tell everyone else while they were gone. He had no idea how Xiao Yan Zi would react to this news, but knowing Xiao Yan Zi, dropping such great news on her so soon after the first news of her brother probably meant that her reaction won't be quiet and she would need Zi Wei's support, at least.

The reveal was, for lack of a better word, a disaster.

"Your mother is alive?"

"Yes."

"So all those days when I couldn't find you in the palace, you were off visiting her? Why didn't you tell me?"

"There was never the right time." It was a feeble explanation to say the least, though technically, it was true.

"We've known each other for all that time, and you couldn't find the right time?"

Yong Qi tried, incoherently, to explain, but it did not do much to mollify Xiao Yan Zi. The conversation ended when Xiao Yan Zi, looking hurt and angry, jumped on her horse and raced back to the house.

Yong Qi did not hurry to race after her. With his grasp on his emotions tenuous to say the least, he would not have much success in calming Xiao Yan Zi down, when he hardly knew how to calm himself down at the moment.

The information that Er Kang just told them was too massive, too much, that Zi Wei found it hard to understand why it had been hidden for so long. She was also surprised that all this time, even if Yong Qi somehow had a reason to stay silent – something on which Er Kang was vague about – that Er Kang himself never let anything slip to her, either, even though he had shared with her practically everything else. Perhaps it wasn't this secret to tell, but the silence from the two most important men in her life on a subject so life-changing such as this sat uneasy with her.

She could not dwell on her own discomfort now, though, not when Xiao Yan Zi more or less stormed into the room they shared and it did not appear as if Yong Qi had hurried after her. So when Xiao Yan Zi was in this temper, she would need someone by her to vent, before she released that frustration and temper in other actions at lot more catastrophic.

To be fair, Zi Wei could not exactly blame Xiao Yan Zi for being angry and hurt this time.

"I don't like that he didn't tell you until now, either, Xiao Yan Zi, but don't you think not talking to him about it, is not going to make this entire situation easier?"

However justified Xiao Yan Zi's anger with Yong Qi was – and for once on this trip, it was – Zi Wei knew one thing: allowing this anger to brew did nothing good. It would only eventually build up steam that could not be contained later. As much as Xiao Yan Zi and Yong Qi were in danger of having another huge row now, perhaps they should just get the hurt and anger over with, while it was still fresh and they actually knew the sources for the anger and would be more likely to resolve the problems rather than add to them.

"Talk? What is there to talk about, Zi Wei? If he could lie to me about something like this, what else is he also lying about?"

Zi Wei winced at the harshness in Xiao Yan Zi's voice, and could not help but try to placate her. "You may be a little too harsh with your choice of words, but he only didn't tell you – "

"No, it is a lie. He told me once that his mother was dead. When I was first in the palace, I asked if Huang Hou was his mother and he said no, his mother was dead."

Zi Wei tried to understand, that to Yong Qi, it could not have been a picnic either, the lie he was forced to live regarding his mother. He probably had no choice but to say it like that, she knew. When it was written so in the records, when it was decreed that way, it was the only truth he could tell.

Zi Wei forced herself to accept now, more than ever, that Huang Ah…Huang Shang…his treatment of her and Xiao Yan Zi were always singular and a marvel. His other children and his other concubines were never that lucky, they never were allowed to freely adore him with a full heart, but always to look up at him as emperor and a source of fearful-worship, rather than pure, undisputed love. Yong Qi had grown up with such an emperor, such a father, one that, Zi Wei was sure, was very different from the one she knew. Even when Yong Qi defied his father in order to help Xiao Yan Zi, Zi Wei and then Han Xiang, he never assumed that he could be immune to the emperor's rage and punishments. He always acted like – and perhaps knew that – his father would not hesitate in casting him off. (The sentimental part of her reminded her that, because he knew this, and did it all anyway, should be enough for her and Xiao Yan Zi to be kinder to him now, to cut him more slack for this omission of information.)

She wondered if the only reason Huang Shang treated her with such gentleness before was merely due to guilt regarding her mother…Certainly the way he reacted at the mere idea that she might not be his blood, was enough proof that it was not her who he truly he cared for…He cared for the child of Xia Yu He, the proof of a woman who flattered his vanity by staying practically a widow for him her entire life.

Did he truly ever love her mother, or just the idea of her? They could not have known each other for long, and love, as Zi Wei knew it, took work, trust and compromise. What about her mother and...father (it hurt now to think of this word) was ever love? It was never anything more than blind infatuation on both sides: on his side he could forget; on hers, she had to hold on to the infatuation all her life, otherwise she had little else to live for.

"Zi Wei!"

She shook her head and looked to Xiao Yan Zi, who, other from the anger, looked a little concerned at how she had drifted off. She smiled weakly at her friend. "I'm fine. I was just thinking…if Huang – if my mother was never forgotten, but brought back to the palace, and then lost favour in such a way, whether I could do what Yong Qi does. What if I was made to act like she did not exist, would I be able to say it?"

"Of course you would not," Xiao Yan Zi said dismissively, but Zi Wei interrupted her.

"I didn't say that to criticise Yong Qi," she said gently, "as little as I like that he never told you this, Xiao Yan Zi. I'm just saying that he has his own difficulties, his own pains as well. Maybe…maybe we're just being too harsh on him. I mean, if it had been the official truth since he was eight years old that his mother is dead, perhaps over the years, he just trained himself to give that instinctual answer. He might not wish to lie, not to you or anyone, but how could he do anything different when the whole world would contradict his word?"

"Maybe, maybe he had to say that then," Xiao Yan Zi said stubbornly, "but what about after? We were getting married, for Heaven's sake! Was he not going to tell me even then? And it's not as if it's a deep dark secret, exactly! Apparently the entire Fu family knows! And Ling Fei! So why did he hide it from me? He had plenty of chances to tell me! He never did, until now! Why would he do that?"

"Were getting married, Xiao Yan Zi? You cannot mean – " Zi Wei started, her voice laced with alarm. It was one thing for Xiao Yan Zi to be angry at Yong Qi, but for her to talk as if this was an irreconcilable thing, then it scared Zi Wei. Of course, Xiao Yan Zi talked like this on a regular basis, so perhaps she should not panic so much, but deep down, Zi Wei knew that this issue was more serious than any of their petty arguments before, even ones that had serious roots as Lao Fo Ye's disapproval.

"I don't know, I don't know! I don't know what to think anymore! I just don't understand why he needs to lie to me about this. And if he could not tell me this, what can I trust him to tell me?"

"Xiao Yan Zi, I'm not trying to excuse Yong Qi, I don't understand it as you do. But maybe instead of thinking how he kept this information from you, you could think about the fact that he is here now? It's one thing to leave the palace and luxuries and even…Huang Ah Ma, who will have other sons to fill his role, but Xiao Yan Zi, it can't have been easy for him to leave his mother."

Zi Wei tried not to imagine herself in Yong Qi's position. Would she be able to choose Er Kang over her mother, if she was in such position? Er Kang chose her over his parents, it was true, but his parents had each other, had Er Tai, and they supported Er Kang. She knew from the few details Er Kang told them, that Yong Qi's mother would have none of this.

"He can't have been thinking straight when he chose me over his own mother."

"Perhaps. Perhaps he was under pressure then, as our lives were in danger. But he never once tried to turn back, Xiao Yan Zi, don't you see that? He loves you enough to still be here now, even if knowing Yong Qi, the choice can't have been easy and would have been a weight on him all this time. Should that not count for something?"

Xiao Yan Zi didn't answer immediately, and grew ominously silent for a long time. Then, when she did speak again, her voice was low and fearful.

"It scares me, Zi Wei. Isn't he just being foolish? Isn't he just deceiving both of us? Because I can't be enough reason for him to leave his mother, not like that, not when he told me, he is practically all she has. I can't imagine doing that, Zi Wei, so how could he? I just – I just feel like I finally realised that maybe I don't know him at all."

Zi Wei could not blame Xiao Yan Zi for feeling this way. The feelings, for once, were perfectly reasonable and understandable. That only made the entire situation even more confusing. Zi Wei didn't know how to react to this, either, because like Xiao Yan Zi, she couldn't grasp Yong Qi's reasons for staying so silent on this subject for so long at all. "Maybe you should be saying all this to him, and not to me," she finally said, because she had no other wisdom to offer.

Before Xiao Yan Zi could answer, there was a light knock on the door. Xiao Yan Zi looked over at Zi Wei and shook her head, her eyes wide. "I can't!" she mouthed.

Zi Wei sighed and went to the door, opening it just a crack, to reveal, not Yong Qi as she expected, but Er Kang. She opened the door a little wider.

"Can I speak to Xiao Yan Zi a bit?" he asked.

Xiao Yan Zi turned around, apparently surprised that it was Er Kang too. As if knowing who they were expecting instead, Er Kang said, "Yong Qi would have come, but I thought…maybe you might want to hear some less…involved point of view, first."

Looking at Xiao Yan Zi, and when she gave a tiny, grudging nod, Zi Wei stood aside to let Er Kang into the room.

"Xiao Yan Zi," Er Kang said, "I'm not going to tell you that you should not be angry at Yong Qi, all right? I've been telling him he should tell you for a long time. But as much as you have a right to be angry at him now, please try to understand that he does have his reasons for keeping this from you, and honestly I understand his reasons, even if they are not healthy reasons."

"Like what?" Xiao Yan Zi demanded defiantly.

"I'm just going to tell you what I see and what I know. Yong Qi's vision of Huang Shang isn't your vision of Huang Shang, you know. Your first impression of him was as a kind man who loved you and cared for you, and that first impression you will carry with you always, even now. You know it's true," he stressed when it looked like Xiao Yan Zi would protest that she no longer thought that.

It was true though, as painful as it was for both Xiao Yan Zi and Zi Wei to admit. They still wished to see him as the father who loved them, still were both reluctant to let go of that naïve, simple view of him, even when assaulted with all evidence that proved he was much more complex man than that.

"It's not a bad thing," Er Kang conceded. "The truth is, I think Huang Shang does need that – untainted affection. The thing you have to understand, though, that we – or Yong Qi, more importantly – didn't grow up with your vision of Huang Shang. To Yong Qi, he was always emperor first and father second. For most of his life, Huang Shang is a figure of awe, and not always the happy kind of awe. He watched for eight years the very difficult relationship between Huang Shang and Yu Fei, where Huang Shang was indifferent and neglectful of Yong Qi's mother and while he was affectionate to Yong Qi, it was not anything particularly note-worthy. Their relationship is better lately, partly because his…worth to Huang Shang grows as he grows – don't look like that, Xiao Yan Zi, royal children, princes especially, are first and foremost heirs and tools. Though, to be fair, both your presence in their lives changed Huang Shang for the better and probably did much to improve their relationship. But it wasn't always like that. Before, I think…to some extent, Huang Shang does not particularly get attached to his young children, because children die so often and to invest his feelings more than natural instincts dictated was painful for him."

Xiao Yan Zi was staring at Er Kang, like everything he was saying was incomprehensible to her. Perhaps it was. Zi Wei knew, Xiao Yan Zi always craved and wished for a family, and she counted – even now – Huang Shang as part of that, so the idea that Huang Shang in turn could have such a distanced attitude to his family was not something she could easily come to terms with.

"You have to understand that, for Yong Qi," Er Kang continued, "even before he truly understood why things were the way they were between his parents, before he understood why he was doing it, had always felt he needed to divide his relationship with and his loyalty to his parents into two separate things, barred from each other by, preferably, a mountain. When he is with his mother, he knows by instinct that he cannot speak of his father because it brings her pain, and vice-versa when he is with Huang Shang. Huang Shang, in turn, would talk to him about his studies and everything else in the world, except his mother. This was all even before she left the palace. After she left the palace, she was dead to everyone but to Yong Qi, and Huang Shang always acted since then like she never existed. And when the emperor acts like that, Yong Qi could not openly defy him."

"Why not?" Xiao Yan Zi demanded. "If Huang Ah Ma could treat his mother so badly, why could Yong Qi not confront him? Why would he go along with it?"

It was such a Xiao Yan Zi thing to ask and Xiao Yan Zi thing to do that Zi Wei almost smiled. Of course, Xiao Yan Zi's first instinct was to berate Huang Ah Ma for his bad treatment of his concubines.

"Because he is not you, Xiao Yan Zi! You don't know how much you get away with things sometimes! Do you think Yong Qi never blamed Huang Shang, never was angry at Huang Shang for how he treats Yu Fei? Do you think it doesn't hurt Yong Qi to grow up, knowing that his mother was alive and but he could never acknowledge her existence, or even see her until he got older, because his father wished it so? Believe it or not, Xiao Yan Zi, not all of us can scream in the emperor's face and get off with nothing more than a slap. And it would not just be Yong Qi who would reap the consequences of such insolence, Xiao Yan Zi, but Yu Fei too. Yong Qi could not confront Huang Shang at her expense."

Xiao Yan Zi looked unconvinced still, but did not voice any further contradiction. Er Kang shook his head and went on.

"The point I'm trying to make is that, for all his life, Yong Qi had known his mother to be a very undesirable subject and then almost a taboo around his father – and by extension, around everyone else around him. He had trained himself into not mentioning her more than necessary with anyone, and to keep her separate from everything and everyone else in his life. He loves her but right now he has no means to protect her, not when the person who does not wish to even think of her is his father. So when he does find the precious time to visit her, he would do everything he could for her, but around everyone else, he forces himself to follow Huang Shang's lead and pretends that she, at least, is no longer alive. It's a very fine balance that he'd managed to set-up for himself, and to unsettle it is to make a torrent of undesirable and painful emotions to tumble down on him. He wasn't exactly happy when he told you the truth, was he?"

"No," Xiao Yan Zi admitted. "But I still don't understand why it takes until now for him to tell me."

"The thing is, Yong Qi had kept his feelings regarding his mother under wraps for so long, that honestly even now as I say this, a lot of it is speculation based on observation of everything he'd gone through. But Xiao Yan Zi, to tell you means he has to think about what happened, why and the fact that after all these years, even as much as Huang Shang loves him now, things stays the same for his mother, and it hurts. And the only way to lessen the hurt is to pick a moment when he is mentally prepared to tell you calmly. You have to admit things haven't exactly been calm in our lives lately."

Xiao Yan Zi let out a huff but did not contradict Er Kang.

"I'm not saying that's an excuse," Er Kang said, more gently. "I'm not saying that it makes it right for him to have not told you everything before now. But please just know that he's been struggling with himself to try and tell you for a very long time. He could just never find the right time to do it. Granted, his opinion of what constitutes the right time is too fastidious, but the caution he'd exercised when it comes to talking about his mother has been a life-long habit, born out of a need to protect both himself and his mother from hurt. It's not something he can just abandon. He needs your understanding now, not your anger, Xiao Yan Zi."

Xiao Yan Zi began to look less confrontational at these words. Zi Wei allowed herself to feel a little less worried. She was thankful that Er Kang had come to say all this, because he was the only one who could truly give an insight to what was in Yong Qi's mind and heart right now. Er Kang would have seen all this unfold, she thought. He probably knew more of the depths of the pains Yong Qi had gone through than what he had already expressed.

Confronted by all the information, Zi Wei could not understand how Yong Qi could have endured it. Perhaps there was nothing to do but endure, and perhaps it was a miracle that he turned out so compassionate and kind. He would probably have more reasons than most of them to resent Huang Ah Ma now, but still he did not. Most likely, that inability to completely hate Huang Ah Ma was a habit and an emotional weight too.

Zi Wei felt guilty now, too, because she had always wondered why Yong Qi always treated her so well. He had no reason to, her very existence said nothing good of his father. Yong Qi had every right to not like her, let alone risk all that he did to help her. She was grateful for it all, of course. It was not until now that she understood, perhaps he also knew what it was like to live everyday with pain hanging in the background. He knew the helplessness she felt all her life of seeing her mother in pain and suffering, and never being able to provide relief. She had always imagined his growing up to be vastly different from hers, but now, she wondered if he knew better, and that he always saw that their childhoods were, at the heart of it, very similar.

When she was young, she could never understand why the whole world shunned her mother and herself. It hurt her to see it and it hurt her even more when her mother tried to put on a brave face, to show that the coldness from everyone else around them did not affect her. Her mother was never really good at this façade, however. It always became obvious to Zi Wei, even at a young age, that her mother suffered from the isolation, but was also too proud to admit it. Older, when she understood why the world shunned her, she tried with all her might to not listen – or believe – the malicious words, that her mother had brought this upon herself, that she had been loose, that she was to blame… She used to make up fantasies about how her parents were star-crossed lovers and her father only ever left them because he had great things to do, or he was cruelly and tragically pulled away… Even until very recently, she found it easy to believe that Huang Ah Ma did love her mother…

That fantasy no longer existed, of course. Confronted with Yu Fei's fate, remembering Ling Fei's woes and words a few months before, when Han Xiang first came into the palace, Zi Wei understood now more than ever what "a dragonfly's step on water" meant. An emperor's love, an emperor's favour, an emperor's pleasure were but fleeting moments that you could hardly have time to appreciate before it was gone again. Even ones that Huang Ah Ma arguably felt more affection for, like Ling Fei, could not escape such fate. Perhaps it was all for the better that her mother never entered the palace. There was never guarantee that she could have kept the emperor's love even then, not when beauty and talent was in abundant in the palace. Xia Yu He was a marvel in the small village by Da Ming Lake, but in the Forbidden City, what real chance did she have to truly stand out? He could not have loved her for who she was, for he could hardly have known her for who she was. He only saw the beauty, the calligraphy and heard the music, all of which were pleasing to his eyes and ears. It inflamed his heart, but the flame had been put out, not by the torrential rains of autumn, but by the light showers of the spring season that took him away.

…At least, as difficult as their lives was, her mother had always been left alone to hang onto the illusion, the hope, the desperate wish that Huang Shang cared for her, once. Yu Fei never had that. Perhaps Zi Wei should be glad, somewhat, that at least in her childhood she was allowed to dream of a perfect family. Yong Qi never could, not when he would have been confronted everyday by reality.

A/N: This chapter sort of took me by surprise. I intended to write the conversation with Er Kang from Xiao Yan Zi's point of view, but then that fell out. I did not intend to get into Zi Wei's head or write her confrontation with reality about her mother in this story...but here we are.

But I guess what it means is that I had to leave the way Yong Qi tells Xiao Yan Zi incredibly vague. I needed to have this conversation with Er Kang first, but I promise Xiao Yan Zi and Yong Qi will have a real conversation in the next chapter. They will need to, Yong Qi can't push it away as "not the right time" anymore.