Apo

by hea25

123

31. Chapter 31

Chapter 12: The Ritual

As instructed, Maomao shut herself up in the archives the very next afternoon. The building contained reams of public records and had a distinctly musty smell. A pale-faced official brought Maomao armloads of scrolls. He was the only other person she saw there; the posting seemed to be something of a sinecure.

It wouldn't hurt him to get out in the sun every once in a while, though, she thought.

She unrolled one scroll after another, each made of excellent paper. They listed in brief both accidents and crimes that had occurred in the palace complex over the past several years. This wasn't confidential information; the scrolls were quite public, and could be viewed by anyone who requested them.

She looked through them with interest. Most of the cases were mundane accidents, but a few piqued her curiosity. Cases of food poisoning, say...

She'd expected such cases to spike during the summer, but there were a surprising number in winter as well. Autumn could bring its own troubles, with people eating unidentified or inappropriate mushrooms.

Maomao asked the official for another bundle of scrolls. She'd expected him to treat her as a nuisance, but he seemed quite pleased to finally have an opportunity to do some work. It looked like he wasn't here just because he liked to kill time. He was clearly curious about what Maomao was researching, occasionally stealing little glances as she worked.

Maomao ignored him, flipping through the sheets until she found what she wanted: a description of the recent foodpoisoning incident. Maomao stopped when she saw the government organ with which the victim had been associated.

The Board of Rites?

That, at least, was what his official title suggested to her.

Maomao's recollection, such as it was, was that the Board of Rites was responsible for education and diplomacy. Maybe, she thought, she would be more sure if she had studied harder for the court ladies' exam.

"Having trouble with anything?" the pallid official asked her.

Anything to pass the time, perhaps.

Maomao decided that now was not the time to be embarrassed by her ignorance. "Yes," she said. "I'm not quite sure what this title signifies." She suspected the admission made her sound absolutely brainless.

"Ah. This person oversees the observance of ritual," the man said, sounding rather pleased to be providing this knowledge.

"Did you say ritual?"

Right, the food-poisoning victim had been in charge of ritual implements, hadn't he?

"Indeed. I'd be happy to fetch a more detailed book on the subject for you, if you'd like," the official said, not unkindly. Maomao, though, hardly heard him; the gears were spinning in her brain. Suddenly, she smacked the long table in front of her.

The man just about jumped out of his skin.

"Do you have anything to write on?" Maomao demanded.

"Er, y-yes..."

Maomao went rapidly through the register of incidents she'd been examining. She took down exact positions and terms of office.

When coincidence piled upon coincidence, it suggested something deliberate. And if she laid out all these seeming coincidences, the place where they overlapped would tell her where to look.

"Observance of ritual... Ritual implements..."

Rituals as such weren't uncommon; all manner of rites were observed throughout the year. The keeping of minor observances could be done by a village chief, but the most important ceremonies were performed by the Imperial family. The implements that had been stolen would have been for at least a mid-level ceremony, if not something even more important.

A mid-level ceremony, Maomao thought to herself. She remembered Jinshi performing a purification rite. If she had a question about something related to rituals, it might be quickest to ask the eunuch.

"Are you interested in ritual matters?" The official, who was turning out to be not only bored but in fact quite friendly, came over with some kind of large drawing.

"Huh..." Maomao said. It was a fairly detailed illustration of the ritual grounds. An altar stood in the center, with a banner fluttering above it. A large pot was placed at the foot of the altar, perhaps to hold a fire.

"Rather unusual place, isn't it?" the official said.

"So it is..."

It certainly looked elegant and imposing. The banner appeared to have some kind of writing on it—did they change it each time there was an observance?

Seems like a lot of trouble to take it up and down every time, thought Maomao, ever practical. The banner was up high enough that even getting a ladder up to it would be a headache.

"They've got a special contraption there," the official said. "A large beam hung from the ceiling. It can be raised and lowered so they can write the appropriate ritual inscription on the banner."

"You seem to know quite a bit about this," Maomao said, studying the pale man.

"I daresay I do. I used to do more dignified work than marking time in the archives. But, I'm ashamed to admit, I must have slipped up at the wrong moment or offended the wrong person, because I earned myself exile to the stacks."

He had, he added, formerly been assigned to the Board of Rites himself, which, Maomao realized, explained why he'd been so interested in what she was doing. And then the official said something that really got her attention: "I was concerned whether it would be strong enough at first. I'm so glad there haven't been any problems."

"You were concerned whether what would be strong enough?"

"The beam. The system that holds it up. That's a huge thing. I hardly dare imagine the tragedy that would result if it fell. But no sooner had I raised the issue than I found myself banished to these archives."

Maomao stared at the picture in silence. If the beam did come loose from the ceiling, the one in greatest danger would be the person directly below it: the officiant of the ceremony. Potentially a very important person indeed.

And he's worried about how strong the system is, Maomao thought. In order to raise and lower the beam, it would have to be attached to something. And if the fasteners were to break...

How strong it is...

There was a fire pot in the immediate vicinity. Maomao was suddenly seized by the question of what ritual implements had been stolen. She slapped the table again, producing another startled reaction from the official. She turned to him where he stood stiff as a board and said, "I'm sorry, but when is the next ritual observance?! And where's the place shown in this picture?!"

"It's a structure called the Altar of the Sapphire Sky, on the western edge of the outer court. And as for when it will be used..." The official flipped through a calendar, scratching his ear.

"Why, there's an observance today."

Before the man had finished speaking, Maomao was dashing out of the building, without even straightening up the scrolls.

The Altar of the Sapphire Sky, to the west, she thought, trying to organize her thoughts as she ran. This plan, she suspected, had been brewing for a long time. Prepared with the understanding that some individual parts of it might be foiled, but if just a few could be made to overlap, it would provide the opening the plotter wanted. I'm still just guessing. Nothing more than that. But it was dizzying to imagine the consequences if her guess was right.

Soon, she spied a round pagoda. Similar buildings flanked it to either side, and there was a row of officials in front of it. From their clothing, she guessed a ritual was going on even now.

"Hey, you!" one of them called. "What do you think you're doing?"

That was only to be expected when a filthy maid tried to race past them. Maomao gave a cluck of her tongue. She didn't have time for this. If she could have gone for Jinshi or Gaoshun, they might have solved the problem for her, but they were going to be out all day.

"Let me through, please," she said.

"Absolutely not. A ritual is being celebrated," said a warrior holding a nasty-looking war club. He glowered at Maomao, but she could hardly blame him for simply wanting to do his job.

Instead, she cursed herself for not being a smooth talker.

"It's an emergency. You have to let me inside."

"A maid like you would dare impose herself on the holy rites?"

He had her there. Maomao was nothing but a maid. She had no authority. If this man let a girl like her into the ceremonial venue just because she asked him to, he might as well kiss his head goodbye.

Unfortunately, Maomao couldn't back down either.

Maybe nothing will happen, she thought. But if it did, it would be too late for I-told-you-sos. By the time we realize something irrevocable has happened, it's always already too late.

The soldier stood head and shoulders taller than her, but she looked him full in the face. The officials nearby were starting to murmur and look at them.

"I'm not here simply to besmirch the ritual," Maomao said.

"Someone's life is in danger. You have to stop the ceremony!"

One of the nearby officials spoke up. "That's not for you to decide. If you have an opinion you'd like to share, we have a suggestion box." He was openly mocking Maomao, lowly servant that she was.

"You would never see it in time. Let me through!"

"No!"

They were never going to get anywhere arguing like children. Perhaps it would have been the mature thing for Maomao to acknowledge that she was never going to get through and simply back down. But she didn't have it in her. Instead, a sarcastic smile worked its way over her face. "There's a fatal flaw in the construction of that altar. And I believe someone may have taken advantage of it. If you don't let me through this minute, believe me, you'll regret it. Dear me, but I tremble to think what will happen to you when they find out I warned you and you didn't listen!" She put her hand to her cheek in an exaggerated expression of surprise. Then she said: "Wait... I see. Is that what's going on here?" She smacked her fist into her open palm as if it all made sense now. Her smile turned mean. "You want whatever it is to happen. You're delaying me here because you're in league with whoever booby-trapped the—"

She was interrupted by a dull thud from her own head. Almost before she knew what had happened, she was lying on the ground, her vision blurring.

Got to stay conscious, she thought, but wishing wasn't going to make it so. She heard the voice of the soldier who had struck her, but he sounded as if he were a great distance away, and she couldn't make out what he was saying. Well, at least she knew she had their attention. Any soldier would be angry about abuse like that from a little girl like her. Angry enough to raise a hand without thinking, perhaps.

She couldn't complain; she'd brought it on herself. But if she passed out now, it would all be over.

Slowly, Maomao pulled herself to a sitting position. Her ear burned, and her vision was still blurry. As color filtered back into her world, she perceived the soldier, his arm still raised, his companions restraining him.

Thought starting a fight might help, but...no good...

There hadn't been enough of a commotion to interrupt the ceremony; she could still hear music from the direction of the altar. The show was going on.

At last she dragged her body onto its feet. A few red specks stippled the ground in front of her. Nosebleed, she thought. Not something to worry about. The blow seemed to have caught her on the ear, but it only burned; there was no pain. Maomao pressed a thumb to one side of her nose and blew the blood out. A murmur ran through the assembled officials. Maomao realized maybe it was inappropriate to shed blood at the site of a ritual, but she hardly had time to apologize.

"Are you quite satisfied?" she said. With her still-fuzzy vision, she couldn't see exactly what response she got; she only heard the general buzz of voices around her. There was no time for these games. There was something Maomao had to do.

Her voice went up an octave: "Let me through!" I have to get in there!

It would be too late, once everything was over. Too late. If she didn't get in there right now...

I'll never get my ox bezoar!

Her head was spinning and her vision was still hazy, but that thought gave her the motivation to stay standing.

Maomao looked hard at those around her. "I'm not asking you to stop the ceremony. Only to let me by. Say a rat snuck in when you weren't looking." The current Emperor was a compassionate man; she didn't think anyone's head would roll for this. Except possibly hers. She could only beg Jinshi to intercede on her behalf. Or at the very least, to let her die by poison. "What will you do if something does happen, and you detained me here? I know that has to be someone important inside celebrating the ritual. Then you will pay with your lives!"

She didn't know who was officiating, only that everything about the situation implied it was someone highly ranked indeed.

A few of the guards looked at each other as if shaken by her words, but it was clear they weren't all about to step aside.

"Why should we listen to a nobody little girl like you?" the soldier asked.

That was the real question, wasn't it? Maomao had no answer, but only stood staring daggers at the man.

It was then that they heard a swift clack-clack of shoes. "Perhaps you would listen to me, then?" someone said, almost jokingly. Maomao could practically hear the smile in the voice. And she knew who it belonged to.

The soldier blocking Maomao's way took a half step back. The assembled officials had gone pale, as if confronted with something they'd hoped never to see.

Maomao didn't look behind her. It was all she could do to keep her scowl from getting any deeper. Her temples were already starting to twitch.

"Anyhow, nobody little girl or no, I'm not sure I can condone hitting a young woman. Look—she's injured. Who did it? Fess up!" A cold edge entered the voice. Everyone looked unconsciously at the man with the war club. His face had gone tight.

"For a start," the voice resumed, "why don't you do as the girl says? I'll take full responsibility for whatever happens."

Whoever was behind her, he couldn't have had better timing if he'd tried. Maomao gritted her teeth. Can't think about that now, she thought. She still didn't look back. Instead, she cast one final glance at the people around her, and then she ran for the altar. She decided she didn't care who the voice belonged to.

The aromas of smoke and incense drifted through the arena. The plinking of musical instruments was accompanied by the flapping of the banner that hung from the beam on the ceiling. The prayer of the celebrants was written on it in flowing, beautiful letters, displayed aloft in the hopes that it might reach heaven.

The appearance of a grimy young girl in this sacred space set the crowd mumbling. I must look awful, Maomao thought. She'd dirtied her uniform running, and now her face was streaked with dried blood from her nose. She was determined to have a nice, long bath when this was all over. She wouldn't be caught dead using the bath in Jinshi's residence, though. Maybe she could wheedle Gaoshun into letting her use his.

That was, of course, provided her head was still attached to her body by the time she got to that point.

At the far end of a scarlet carpet stood a man in black. On his head was a distinctive cap of office hung with pendants of beads.

He was intoning something in a loud, clear voice.

The huge fire pot stood in front of him, burning brightly. And there, over his head, was the beam with the flapping banner. And securing the beam to the ceiling was...

Maomao thought she heard a distinct creaking sound. It had to be her imagination; there was no way she could have heard it at this distance. Nonetheless, she kept moving. She could feel the soft material of the carpet under her feet as she drove toward him as fast as she could.

The officiant noticed Maomao and turned. She paid that no mind, but flung herself against him, wrapping her arms around his stomach and pulling him to the ground.

At almost the same instant, there was an earsplitting crash. A hot, sharp sensation shot up her leg. She looked back to discover a large metal beam pinning her leg. It had managed to cut the skin.

That'll need stitches, she thought. She reached for the folds of her robe, where she always carried some medicine and simple medical supplies—but a large hand caught hers and held it. She looked up and her vision was filled with the beads dangling from the hat. Somewhere beyond them floated a pair of eyes as dark as obsidian.

"And how do we find ourselves like this?" The voice sounded almost celestial.

The beam that had fallen from the ceiling lay on the ground. Had the owner of the voice been standing directly under it when it came down, he would certainly have been killed instantly.

"Master Jinshi... Can I... Can I have my bezoar now?" Maomao asked of the gorgeous eunuch who, she now discovered, was also the officiant at this ceremony. But why, she wondered, was he here at all?

"A fine thing to think of at a moment like this," Jinshi said, his face puckering as if he'd bitten into something sour. His large hand brushed Maomao's face. The pad of his thumb traced its way along her cheek. "Look at your face." He winced. Why would he do that?

Maomao was more interested in fixing the problem at hand. Or foot. "Would you let me stitch my leg up?" It didn't hurt so much as it burned. She twisted to try to get a look at the wound, but instead her body shuddered.

"H-Hey, now—!"

Jinshi's voice sounded far away. Uh-oh, she thought. It was that whack on the head.

Her strength abruptly left her. Her vision grayed out again, and then Jinshi was shaking her, shouting something, and she couldn't tell what, but oh, how she wished he would be quiet.

Chapter 13: Thornapple

It felt pleasant, as if her body was rocking gently. A faint smell of fine incense tickled her nose. The swaying made her feel like a child in a cradle, but after a moment it ceased, and she felt she was being laid down on something soft.

Then time passed, but she didn't know how much.

Where am I? Maomao thought upon waking. As her eyes fluttered open, she found a glorious canopy above her head. She recognized it—because she'd had to dust it every day.

She smelled the incense again, the finest sandalwood. This was Jinshi's bedroom, and that would make what Maomao was sleeping in his bed.

"Ah, you're awake," said a calm, gentle voice. It came from an attendant in the first flush of old age, reclining on a couch nearby. She stood and took a carafe of water from a round table, pouring liberally into a cup. "Master Jinshi brought you here, did you know? He couldn't stand to leave you to rest in the medical office." Suiren chuckled and passed the cup to Maomao.

Maomao brought it to her lips. She was in sleeping clothes. (When had that happened?) A sharp pain shot through her head, and meanwhile her leg felt like it might cramp.

"Now, don't strain yourself. You needed fifteen stitches."

Maomao rolled back the covers to find a bandage wrapped around her left leg. The dull quality of the pain suggested she'd been given some kind of analgesic. She touched her head: more bandages.

"I'm sorry to ask this when you've just woken up, but may I bring the others to see you now? We can give you a few minutes if you'd like to change clothes."

Maomao saw that her regular outfit was folded neatly beside the bed. She nodded her understanding.

Suiren led in Jinshi and Gaoshun, accompanied by Basen. Maomao had successfully changed into her day clothes; she welcomed them, but remained seated. A breach of etiquette, she knew, but Suiren had given her approval and Maomao decided, in this case, to take it.

Basen was the first to open his mouth: "What in the world is going on here?" He was staring straight at Maomao, looking unusually angry.

"Basen," Gaoshun said sternly. The soldier only clucked his tongue and took a seat. Jinshi positioned himself on the couch, his expression carefully neutral.

His master was in considerable danger, after all, Maomao thought. But she had done nothing to warrant being yelled at, so she simply sipped her tepid water, her expression as cool as her drink.

Jinshi looked at Maomao, his hands stashed in his sleeves. "I'd like you to explain a few things for me. What brought you to that place at that time? How did you know that beam was going to fall? Tell me."

"Very well, sir." Maomao set down the water and took a breath. "First of all, these events lie at the confluence of a series of coincidences. When enough such coincidences occur at once, one might suspect that they aren't happenstance at all. Thus perhaps this was not accident, but incident."

Maomao already knew of a number of related cases. There was Kounen's death the year before. Then that fire had broken out in the storehouse, while at the same time, ritual implements had been stolen. Finally, the very official who oversaw those implements swiftly came down with food poisoning.

"So you believe somebody caused all of these things deliberately?"

"Yes sir, I do. And I believe there's one further connection, which I had previously overlooked."

Maomao didn't know exactly what had been stolen, but it would have been something appropriate to the celebration of an important ritual. Something no doubt produced by a master craftsman. And she happened to have heard of one of those recently...

"You're not saying...the metalworker's family?" Jinshi said, startled. Maomao knew he was quick.

"That's right," she said.

She had a fairly good idea of what had killed the old craftsman. Lead poisoning, she suspected. It would be easy enough to dismiss it as an occupational hazard, but there was always the possibility that it was something more. It was conceivable that this, too, was deliberate. Give him some wine and a lead drinking cup as a gift, then wait for him to waste away. That would be one way to do it, anyway; there were others.

"The old man didn't personally teach his apprentices—his sons —about his most secret discovery. It's possible the art would have gone with him to his grave, a riddle no one else ever solved.

Someone might have found that very convenient."

This would imply that whoever it was already understood the technique in question. They wouldn't have to know exactly how it worked, just what it did.

"So you believe the stolen implements were produced by the dead craftsman?" Jinshi asked, but Maomao shook her head.

"No, sir. In fact, I believe the opposite: that the stolen implements were replaced with something produced by that craftsman."

Maomao got paper and a brush, and quickly sketched out a picture. In the center was a large altar accompanied by an iron fire pot, while a beam dangled from the ceiling above. Ropes were looped around either end of the beam. They passed through pulleys on the ceiling, and were secured to the floor with metal fasteners.

"If several ritual implements disappeared, perhaps we can presume that various other parts went with them. Elaborate pieces, I would suspect."

"That seems like a likely possibility," Gaoshun said, but he didn't sound completely sure. He probably didn't have all the information on the subject—this was outside of Jinshi's jurisdiction, after all.

"As I recall, the wires that held the beam up ran directly past the fire pot. Suppose the fasteners that held them in place were made to give way when heated..."

"Ridiculous," Basen snorted. "We would have known about that long ago. They would never use anything that might catch fire near the altar."

"And yet the beam did fall," Maomao replied. "Precisely because the fasteners broke."

Jinshi agreed with Basen: "They shouldn't break, no matter how hot they get. They're made to stand up to a little heat!"

"They broke," Maomao reiterated. "Or more specifically, they melted."

Everyone looked at her.

Maomao decided to divulge what she had discovered about the deceased craftsman's most secret art. "Many metals by themselves melt only at high temperature. But by mixing them together, believe it or not, it's possible to create a substance that melts at a lower heat."

The technique had been around for a very long time, but such substances still demanded substantial heat to melt. That was the crux of the old craftsman's discovery: the ratio he had perfected melted the metal at a considerably lower temperature than usual. It would be enough, for example, if the metal were to be near a burning fire pot...

Silence descended on the room. The only sound was Suiren, blithely preparing tea.

The builders of the altar must have sworn up and down that the beam on the ceiling would never, ever fall. Otherwise such a construct would never have been approved. Important people stood under that beam to perform ceremonies, after all. If Maomao hadn't connected the dots, there was a very real chance that Jinshi would be dead right now. Not that she had ever expected it to be him she found standing there.

Just who is this guy? she asked herself. But she felt her station was nowhere near high enough to actually ask the question aloud, so she stayed quiet. Besides, she suspected that knowing the answer would only lead to more trouble.

She thought it seemed most reasonable to assume there was some connection, however remote, among all these things. Whether directly or indirectly, somebody was pulling the strings.

"I've said all I can say," she told them. Now that they had the information, she presumed Jinshi and the others would flush out whoever was involved. There was a chance Lihaku was already working on it.

The image of the tall lady flitted through Maomao's mind.

Nothing to do with me, she thought, slowly shaking her head and casting her eyes at the ground. Still, she couldn't shake the memory of the woman's detached expression: it was as if she no longer cared what happened, as long as something did. Maomao was still bothered, too, by what the woman had said to her when they were at that small patch of a garden. A medicine to revive the dead...

They heard from Lihaku not long after. As Maomao had expected, his message concerned the lady, Suirei.

Suirei, it turned out, had taken poison and died.

Maomao was brought up short by this abrupt end to the woman's life; somehow, it didn't compute for her. When the Board of Justice—the officials responsible for keeping the law—had gathered their evidence and come bursting into Suirei's bedroom, they had discovered her collapsed on her bed. An overturned wine cup had been confirmed to contain poison. The doctor had been requested to perform the inquest and had duly certified the death.

As a criminal, Suirei was to be punished in her coffin as she could not be in life. After one day and one night, she was to be burned—that is to say, cremated. At the moment, she was awaiting her punishment in the same place as those who had died in jail.

Maomao didn't know if the Board of Justice had been able to move so quickly because Lihaku had done such a thorough job of gathering evidence, or if they had been pursuing this case for some time already. But ultimately, Suirei was the only conspirator named. Maomao wondered at this: Did she really implement such

an elaborate plot all by herself? The idea lacked a certain

persuasiveness.

Perhaps she was a scapegoat, then? Perhaps. But something more basic bothered Maomao. Would Suirei really accept that? They hadn't known each other very well. Maomao was not such a good reader of people that she could understand who a person really was in the span of such a short acquaintance. It was always possible that Suirei's apathetic manner sprang from a lack of will to live.

But still, something nagged at Maomao. It was the tone Suirei had taken when she spoke, as if she was testing Maomao. No, I can't just go on intuition. I have to be sure. But Maomao had no way to be sure; all she could do was go silently back to her daily chores. Such was a maid's lot in life. Supposedly, anyway...

But her curiosity got the better of her.

"Master Jinshi, I have a favor to ask of you." This was her opening gambit. "I'd like to speak with the doctor who performed the inquest." At the mortuary, ideally.

Much to Jinshi's mystification, Maomao's face as she said this threatened to break into a grin.

The mortuary was dim, pervaded by the stench of death. According to the law of the land, no one who died in jail was permitted to be buried, but had to be cremated. Several coffins sat in a stack in one corner, housing criminals waiting to meet their fate. Suirei's coffin was slightly apart from the others, and a black and white tag hung on it.

Jinshi and Gaoshun were both present. Gaoshun didn't seem to like Jinshi being at the morgue, but if he wished to be there, Gaoshun couldn't stop him.

The doctor when summoned wore an expression as grim as the morgue itself. Maomao didn't blame him: a lady with whom he had been on good terms was dead, to be treated as a criminal, no less. But is that all there is to it? she wondered. If he was the one who had done the inquest, then he might know something no one else did. And Maomao had an inkling what it might be.

She got straight to the point: "The poison that woman drank. Did the ingredients by any chance include thornapple?" She studied the doctor from the chair where she sat; Gaoshun had made it ready for her on account of her injured leg. A hoe leaned against the wall beside the physician. This, too, Gaoshun had prepared at Maomao's request. Jinshi kept peeking at it as if he wondered what it was for, but it would have been time-consuming to explain, so she ignored him.

The doctor went pale almost before he could say anything. Still, he refused to be explicit, shaking his head instead. "The poison contained a number of ingredients, and it's hard to determine what any given one was. From the condition of the body, I would say the possibility is distinct, but I can't be certain." The answer was surprisingly confident and collected considering the way he had blanched at the suggestion. And he was telling the truth as far as it went, Maomao thought. She hadn't known what ingredients had been involved in the concoction either when she had evaluated it.

"There's a field on a small hill behind the stables, as I think you may know. Isn't there thornapple planted there? It may not be in season right now, but I can't imagine your pharmacy doesn't stock some of it."

Thornapple was highly poisonous, but in a measured dose it could act as an anesthetic. Suppose Suirei had taken some from the doctor's office.

The medical officer himself remained silent. This man was an excellent physician, Maomao had concluded. But not a gifted liar.

Thornapple had another name: the Uncanny Morning Glory. Maomao thought of Suirei's flat affect as she told Maomao she planted morning glories in that field.

"Let us find out for certain whether that particular toxin was involved, then," Maomao said. Then she picked up the hoe and advanced on the coffin with the black and white tag.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"This!"

She shoved the hoe under the coffin lid and pushed down on the shaft. One of the nails securing the lid popped up. The others watched in astonishment as Maomao worked. When all of the nails had been freed, they lifted the lid to discover a woman's corpse. It appeared to be some unfortunate night-walker who had died under a bridge.

"It's...not Suirei?" the doctor said, peering into the coffin. He was clearly shaken; his hand trembled as he touched the box.

If he's pretending to be surprised, then he's a damn fine actor, Maomao thought.

"This woman, Suirei—you're quite certain she was dead?"

"Yes. The most untutored amateur could have seen it. She was still as lovely as she was when she was alive. But the heart behind that beauty was no longer beating." The doctor's face was still white. He had treated Suirei's corpse with care, Maomao suspected. She also suspected Suirei had counted on it. She'd known he wouldn't feel the need to chop her up to figure out exactly which poison she had taken.

"In other words, sir, she used you."

The medical officer went from pale to visibly seething. Just as it seemed he might lose control of himself and lunge at Maomao, Gaoshun grabbed him from behind.

Suirei had used thornapple in her poison. And she'd had access to a wide range of other medicaments as well, had she wished for them. If they checked the medical office's stores, it was likely they would find discrepancies with the listed inventory. The worst thing the doctor could be accused of was a failure to keep close track of his supplies, Maomao supposed.

"Explain this," Jinshi said, narrowing his eyes. "Why isn't it the body of the condemned in there?"

"Because people would be suspicious if there wasn't something in the coffin, even if it is to be burned," Maomao said.

There were a number of coffins in the mortuary. Some of them were no doubt bodies destined to be burned, just like Suirei was supposed to have been. New coffins would presumably come with them, as well. Enough activity that a substitute corpse might be prepared and the two switched.

"Then what happened to Suirei's body? It can't have been carried away; somebody would have noticed."

"It didn't have to be. She walked out on her own two feet." Shock silenced Maomao's audience.

"Would you be so kind as to help me check those coffins over there?" she said to Gaoshun. She wanted to do it herself, but her leg was throbbing. Gaoshun didn't so much as flinch as he regarded the empty boxes. Alert as he was, he could tell something was off about one of the coffins; he pulled off the one above it to free the suspicious casket. The thing would normally have taken at least two men to move, but Gaoshun was strong enough to slide it aside by himself.

Maomao went to the coffin Gaoshun had freed, dragging her foot as she moved. "You can see a nail mark here," she observed. "I suspect this is the coffin Suirei was in. She lay here, awaiting rescue."

By the time her help arrived, Suirei was breathing again. After she was free, they would have switched the coffins, and then Suirei would have escaped the mortuary dressed like one of those who delivered the dead. People went out of their way to avoid paying attention to those who did such unclean work, and the uncommonly tall Suirei could easily have passed for a man.

Now Maomao asked the doctor, "Did you know there are medicines that can cause a person to appear dead?"

He opened his mouth, briefly stupefied, but finally he said,

"I've heard tell. But I have no idea how to make them."

It would have been easy to dismiss the idea of a "resurrection medicine" as pure fantasy, but that wasn't wholly true. Certain substances existed that could produce an effect very much like coming back from the dead.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Maomao said, "for I don't know the details myself. However, I have heard that the ingredients include thornapple and blowfish poison."

Once—just once—her old man had told her a story. In a far country, he said, there was a medicine that could kill a person and then bring them back to life. It required several other toxins in addition to the thornapple and blowfish poison. These substances, each normally immensely poisonous, somehow neutralized each other, so that after a brief period the subject began to breathe again.

Naturally, Maomao's father had never made this drug, and he wasn't about to tell Maomao how to do it. Even the fact that she knew about the thornapple and the blowfish was only because she had secretly read her father's book. He'd evidently never imagined she could read the writing of that far, strange country. It was his own fault for underestimating her, or at least her obsession with poisons. She'd wheedled the occasional customer from those lands to teach her, and gradually assembled a working knowledge of the language. Unfortunately, her father discovered the subterfuge before she had read the entire thing, and he had simply burned the book.

"Do you really think Suirei would have used such an uncertain method?" the doctor asked.

"What did she have to lose? She was facing the death penalty.

If I were in her shoes, it's a bet I would gladly take."

"I don't think it would take impending doom to make you do it." Why did Jinshi seem so eager to butt in? Maomao ignored him lest he derail the conversation.

"The fact that there's no body here suggests she won her bet. If no one had thought to look until after the cremation, her victory would have been complete."

I just didn't let her get away with it, Maomao thought. She smiled as she stared at the coffin. Inside was an anonymous woman, dead of who knew what. It didn't seem like much to smile about. She was sloppy. Maomao wasn't so soft as to bewail the death of a complete stranger. There were more important things to worry about.

The laughter bubbled up from deep in her belly, heh heh heh. Something was rising from within her, something that threatened to take over her entire body. "If she is alive, then I'd love to meet her," Maomao said to no one in particular. No, not so she could arrest the woman. Another reason entirely.

It was the wit Suirei must have had to make so many cases look like accidents, and the nerve to pull it off. And above all, she'd had the guts to wager her own life in hopes of fooling them all. What a waste it would be, Maomao thought, for such a person to simply kick the bucket. Yes, there had been casualties because of her, but Maomao couldn't deny what she was feeling.

The resurrection drug. I must know how to make it!

The thought almost overwhelmed her. Maybe that was why she was suddenly cackling. The three men in the room looked at her doubtfully.

At length Maomao cleared her throat and looked at the doctor. "Pardon me, but might I trouble you to sew up my leg? I seem to have reopened the wound." Maomao brushed her leg as if she hadn't been dragging it around all this time. The bandages were soaked with blood.

"Tell us that before you disappear into hilarity! Before!" Jinshi exclaimed, his agitated voice filling the mortuary.

Chapter 14: Gaoshun

Jinshi had finished his bath and was savoring a cup of wine. It seemed as if everything that came up these days was a fresh headache. He was at something of a loss. As if everything else vying for his attention hadn't been enough, just the other day, he had nearly been killed.

After what they had learned in the mortuary, the matter of Suirei had been taken care of with the utmost circumspection. That was the most convenient for everyone. He queried the mortuary workers who had supposedly brought in coffins while Suirei's body had been there, but strangely, they claimed not to have received any such requests.

About the court lady Suirei herself, much remained uncertain. The reason she had been so close with the doctor was because her guardian had been the physician's own teacher. Apparently, this teacher had seen Suirei's talent for medicine and had adopted her as his daughter some years ago, but little more was known than that.

Jinshi saw that this situation wasn't likely to go away anytime soon, but that was nothing new. There were many problems that went unresolved, simply piling up. The most he could do with such issues was to bear them in mind for the future. He had to focus on what he could do at this moment.

Jinshi was surprised by the crackling of charcoal, but when he looked outside he saw the world had gone white with snow. It was getting chilly. He picked his robe up from off the couch where it lay and slipped it on.

A metallic tinkling came from the entrance; the building was designed so that it could be heard from almost anywhere. Jinshi knew who it was likely to be.

As he'd expected, his aide, with his perpetually furrowed brow, entered the room.

"She's safely back," Gaoshun said.

"Sorry to put you to such trouble all the time."

Jinshi had instructed Gaoshun to see Maomao back whenever the hour got late. It had been in saving Jinshi, after all, that she had hurt her leg. He worried that if he left her to her own devices, the wound would open again.

That wasn't the only thing that concerned him, though. There was also the eccentric, Lakan. As far as Jinshi could tell, the man was telling the truth about being Maomao's biological father, but Maomao's attitude on the subject made it more than clear that their relationship was not the usual one. The general consensus in the palace was that you could never be sure what Lakan might do, and Jinshi preferred to take no chances.

Lakan had had something to do with Maomao's reaching the altar during the ritual, as well. No doubt the soldier who'd struck her was by now deeply regretting his actions.

One of Jinshi's saving graces was that unlike some other people of the court, Gaoshun could read him well enough to know when to leave him alone to do his work. This was, after all, the man who had been assigned to Jinshi as a tutor practically from the moment he was weaned. Notwithstanding a brief separation when Gaoshun had been sent to do other work, he was certainly among those who knew Jinshi best. When he considered that Gaoshun's own wife had been his wetnurse, Jinshi saw that he might never outlive his debt to this man.

"We'll be at the rear palace tomorrow."

"Yes, sir." Gaoshun brought out two bowls and a pot. It was full of a sickly sweet liquid; they had to drink it every day in order for it to have its full effect.

Gaoshun poured the contents of the pot into the two silver bowls, and then he took the first sip. It was a role Maomao might have eagerly assumed, but there would have been no point in having her taste it. It had no effect on women. Gaoshun frowned even deeper as he drank the stuff down, and then he waited a few moments.

"I think it's all right. Nothing unusual."

Nothing unusual—except the flavor was always unusual. The mixture contained a powdered variety of potato imported from another land, one with a very particular side effect.

The potato flour was just one of several ingredients Jinshi and Gaoshun had to take on a daily basis.

"Very well." Jinshi picked up his bowl, pinched his nose, and drained it in a single long gulp. He wiped flecks of the liquid from his mouth with the back of his hand, then accepted a cup of cold water from Suiren. Five years drinking this stuff, and he'd never gotten used to it.

"You shouldn't hold your nose like that when people are watching," Suiren said.

"I know that."

"It makes you look like such a little boy when you do."

"I know that." Jinshi sat down on the couch, pouting. His tone of voice, the way he spoke, the way he walked and moved: he had to constantly pay attention to all of it.

The eunuch Jinshi was twenty-four years of age. He straightened up, striving to put on his best official face, but the taste of the medicine still lingered in his mouth, making his lip curl.

Gaoshun frowned. "You needn't drink it, sir, if you detest it so."

"This is what makes me who I am. As a eunuch."

It had been five years since the current Emperor had taken over the rear palace. Five years—now nearly six—that Jinshi had continued to wear this twisted mask. Year after year taking the medicine that made him not a man. He did it even though the Emperor had told him he could do as he wished around the lowerranked consorts, and any ladies less prestigious than they.

Gaoshun touched a hand to the furrows in his brow. "If you do this long enough, you'll never regain the function."

Jinshi spat out his water at that. He put his hand to his mouth with a reproachful look at Gaoshun. Gaoshun looked back at him, as if to communicate that every now and again he would have his say.

"Well, the same is true of you!" Jinshi said.

"Not so. Why, just last month, a grandchild was born to me." Gaoshun's point seemed to be that his children were already grown; he had no need to produce more offspring.

"How old are you again?"

"Thirty-seven."

If Jinshi had his facts straight, Gaoshun had married at sixteen, and the couple had had one child each year for the next three years. Jinshi's milk brothers. He was particularly close with Gaoshun's youngest son. In fact, the lad had made himself helpful just the other day, during the food-poisoning case involving the seaweed. The young man who had accompanied Maomao to the official's house—that had been him.

"Which of the two elder brothers is it?"

"My eldest son. And I think my youngest could stand to find himself a wife sometime soon."

"He's only nineteen."

"Yes. Just the same as you, milord."

Gaoshun specifically refrained from using the name Jinshi. Jinshi was a twenty-four-year-old man who had become a eunuch five years earlier. He couldn't possibly be nineteen.

Gaoshun clearly thought he was making some sort of point, Jinshi observed. Maybe he felt Jinshi should hurry up and get himself some female companions, as the Emperor had done. Jinshi crossed his legs and looked at Gaoshun as innocently as he could.

"I want to hold my grandchild. Soon." So let's finish this assignment quickly, he seemed to be saying.

"I'll see what I can do."

Gaoshun accepted some hot tea from Suiren and took a sip.

Jinshi, ignoring his aide's baleful look, drank the rest of his water.

Another routine round of visits to the Emperor's ladies had gone without a hitch. Consort Loulan seemed to be integrating into the rear palace without any trouble. The move to bring her in had been somewhat forceful, so it wouldn't have been surprising if her presence had caused discord, but neither Consort Gyokuyou or Consort Lihua were short-tempered enough to let the new girl get to them. Yes, there had been the contretemps between the two of them after the births of their respective children, but that had been exceptional; since then they had maintained a distant but cordial relationship.

As for Consort Lishu, she was much too retiring to be the one to start any fights. It was always possible her ladies-in-waiting could goad her into it, though; he would have to keep an eye on the situation.

The residence of the former consort Ah-Duo had become a sorry sight to him under its new occupant. Under the old mistress, there had been not a frivolous furnishing to be seen, but now that the new one had moved in, the pavilion had become an eyewatering riot of ostentatious displays.

Consort Loulan's father was a man of whom the former emperor—or rather, more precisely, the former empress dowager —had been quite fond; it was under him that the number of palace women had ballooned to fully three thousand.

At present, Consort Gyokuyou was foremost in His Majesty's affections, and Consort Lihua next, but as ruler he could not limit his nocturnal visits only to those concubines he most favored. If the rear palace helped maintain the balance of power within the imperial court, it could likewise upset that balance. The Emperor couldn't afford to mishandle Loulan, and was (Jinshi was given to understand) taking care to visit her at least once every ten days.

This could not but dismay the other consorts. Yes, His Majesty was visiting them more often than Loulan, yet who knew who would conceive a child and when, and who wouldn't?

Even so, compatibility did mean something, and it was clear that Loulan didn't excite the Emperor's interest in the same way as some of his other ladies. Looking at her, Jinshi thought perhaps he could understand why. Back when the apothecary's daughter had given her "class," Loulan had been bedecked with a most unexpected accessory, an outlandish ornament featuring the plumes of a bird from the southern lands. But although sometimes Loulan dressed herself in the style of the southern lands, other times she was clad in an outfit from the northern tribes. No sooner had she put on the garments of the east than she traded them for a dress from the west. And each time, her hair and makeup changed to complement her outfit. It was enough to make the Emperor feel like he was seeing a different person every time he visited. Under those circumstances, he claimed, it was hard for him to get in the mood.

Consort Lishu was another who posed a challenge to "mood," but for different reasons. The Emperor viscerally rejected his father's preferences, and refused to touch, let alone bed, a girl who could still have passed for a child.

The Empress Dowager's belly bore a great scar, for she had given birth to His Present Majesty very young, her body too small for the task. The birth canal had been too narrow, the child delivered by slitting her open. It had been questionable whether the mother would survive the delivery, but she and her child had both emerged safely. The surgery, it seemed, had been performed by a doctor recently returned from foreign lands. His skill had been so superlative, in fact, that although she was scarred, the Empress Dowager's ability to bear children was left intact, and more than ten years later she conceived and bore again. To the end of his life, these were the only offspring the former emperor ever had.

There was, however, a complication. The physician who had attended the first delivery for the Empress Dowager (then a consort) found himself attending almost exclusively on Her Majesty, precisely because of his actions during that first, difficult delivery. A child born to the consort of the crown prince at the same time was neglected, with tragic consequences.

How could Jinshi not wonder what things might be like now if the current Emperor's first child had lived?

He shook his head: there was nothing to gain from meaningless fantasies. And he further thought that His Majesty ought to hurry up and get about the business of producing a new crown prince. On this point, he and Gaoshun were of the same mind. After the "lecture," the Emperor's visits had increased substantially. The fruits of Maomao's labors might come sooner than expected.

During Jinshi's visit, Consort Gyokuyou's chief lady-in-waiting, Hongniang, had confessed something to him with concern. The Emperor had called at the Jade Pavilion yet again the day before, and her mistress was looking quite fatigued. Hongniang worried for her. The disheveled appearance of her jet-black hair bespoke the great effort to which the lady-in-waiting was putting herself. Gaoshun seemed to relate to her. Hongniang, for her part, didn't seem averse to Gaoshun at all, but as he already had a wife to look after and hen-peck him (each as necessary), they would have to disabuse her of any interest sooner or later.

All this led Jinshi to believe he had the perfect solution.

Gyokuyou agreed without a second thought. Hongniang made a point to look put-upon, but quietly seemed to welcome the idea. She said as much to the three ladies-in-waiting who had been eavesdropping at the door.

It seemed Jinshi had made the right choice.

"The rear palace, sir?"

"That's right. Back to your favorite job."

Maomao was polishing a silver eating vessel to a mirror-like shine. When she was certain it didn't have so much as a smudge on it, she put it back on the shelf. Her leg still wasn't quite better, so she did a lot of her work sitting in a chair, but Suiren made sure that she did have work to do. A real stickler, that woman was.

Jinshi was eating a tangerine. Very literally: he wasn't even peeling it himself. Suiren did that, carefully removing the thin rind and setting each piece on a plate in front of him. What a spoiled brat.

The old attendant seemed to have a habit of indulging Jinshi. She would bundle him in a cotton jacket when it was cold, or cool down his tea because it was hot. An adult man should've been embarrassed to be treated that way.

"It would appear Consort Gyokuyou has ceased to walk the path of the moon."

The "path of the moon" was a polite term for menstruation. So she might be pregnant, Maomao thought. Two separate attempts had been made to poison the consort while she was pregnant with Princess Lingli. The culprit had never been found. Maomao could understand why Jinshi might be uneasy.

"And when am I to begin my new assignment?"

"Would today be possible?"

"Possible? I would positively prefer it."

As men were not allowed in the rear palace, she would be free of any possibility of bumping into the one person she didn't want to meet—whose name she didn't even want to hear. Perhaps Jinshi had arranged this change of workplace out of consideration for her, or perhaps it was simply an opportune coincidence for him. Maomao decided she didn't care which.

She thought she was exercising admirable self-restraint, but then Suiren said, "Ah, good news, my dear?" Apparently Maomao wasn't hiding it as well as she thought.

"Not to speak of," she said.

"Too bad for me. I thought I'd finally found a protégé worthy of my training."

Maomao, a touch terrified by the grinning Suiren, determined to finish her work as quickly as she could.

Chapter 15: Rear Palace Redux

I used to think I didn't like this place, but I guess I was wrong, Maomao thought with surprise. She was finding life in the rear palace, now that she was finally back, quite congenial. She'd grown up in another place full of women, so maybe the rear palace simply clicked with her.

Her days once again consisted of tasting food, mixing medicines, and taking little walks. Her leg still wasn't healed, and she'd been given explicit instructions not to go out too much, but in her opinion she was fine so long as she avoided anything strenuous that might open the wound again. Frankly, her left arm proved she was nowhere near so delicate.

The question of Gyokuyou's pregnancy still wasn't definitively settled. When she had been pregnant with Princess Lingli, she hadn't suffered from any severe morning sickness, and her food preferences had hardly changed. Other than the delay in her menstruation, there was no evidence one way or the other.

Nonetheless, a gag order was imposed on the Jade Pavilion, so as not to take any chances. If there were any who didn't wish to see Consort Gyokuyou with child, they would certainly want to strike during the early stages, when the pregnancy would be most vulnerable. Poison was just one of many concerns.

For good measure, the sex-crazed old man (i.e., the Emperor) was discouraged from nocturnal activities at the Jade Pavilion for the time being. Normally this wouldn't have been a problem, but ever since Consort Gyokuyou had begun to put the things she learned at the consorts' seminar into practice, "normal" no longer seemed to apply. There was no telling what might happen.

Maybe I should have taken it a little easier on the lessons,

Maomao thought. But, no. Then Gyokuyou and even the Emperor would have wound up dissatisfied. Even if the end result of her approach had been to terrify Consort Lishu and cause Consort Lihua's women to view Maomao as even more of a monster.

Maomao naturally hesitated to raise the subject with the Emperor herself—it was hardly something for a maid to bring up with His Majesty—so she communicated through Jinshi instead. Though she couldn't quite make the suggestion explicitly, her hope was that the ruler would continue to visit Gyokuyou exactly as often as he had before, no more and no less. After all, while Gyokuyou wasn't His Majesty's only consort, if he were to suddenly visit her less often, some observant soul might sniff out the truth.

To her surprise, the Emperor continued to visit as faithfully as he ever had, playing with his adorable daughter and passing the time in idle conversation with Gyokuyou. Maomao was reminded, as she had been by Ah-Duo's story, that perhaps she shouldn't dismiss the Emperor as simply sex-crazed. Or again, perhaps His Majesty grasped the implications of his actions better than she gave him credit for. Some people regarded the current ruler as a sort of sage-king, and while some of this was because almost anyone would have looked competent after the buffoon that the previous emperor had been, Maomao did believe that the current ruler had his wits about him.

Not that it really matters to me, she thought. As long as he let life go on and didn't exact outrageous taxes, she was happy. Some said the real difference between a foolish ruler and a brilliant one was that a foolish ruler thought the people were inexhaustible, while a brilliant one realized that they had their limits. If that was so, well, the present Emperor was certainly the latter. Still, she saw the lonesome faces he occasionally pulled, so she decided to pass along the rest of her teaching materials. They would help him pass the time, if nothing else. (It needn't be said exactly what kind of teaching materials they were.) She'd made sure to have a number of different books on hand, just in case, but unfortunately none of the ladies-in-waiting had been interested in them.

He'll just have to make do with two dimensions... Maomao placed the materials where they would be unobtrusive but noticeable, and luckily it seemed he spotted them.

When, a few days later, she was ordered to prepare more such

"materials," she decided that maybe "sex-crazed" was the right way to describe him after all.

There was a penchant for rumormongering in the rear palace, most likely attributable to the boredom generated by the endless routine and the perennial shortage of the opposite sex. Thus when the ladies-in-waiting didn't have much to do, they found themselves chatting in the kitchen. For snacks they had the castoffs from the latest tea party—today it was longxutang, dragon's beard candy, a treat made of delicate fibers that melted in the mouth. This one had tea leaves mixed in, giving it a faint aroma.

"I couldn't believe that outfit, could you?" Yinghua, one of the Jade Pavilion's ladies-in-waiting, said around a mouthful of candy. She was a self-possessed woman, more than willing to say what she thought.

"It's true. But that thing she wore a little while ago, I thought that was nice. Western clothing is so cool, isn't it?" said Guiyuan in a mild tone. She was smiling, happy just to be enjoying a sweet treat.

"Clothes like that choose their own wearers," Ailan observed. "But hers have never looked bad on her." The lanky lady-inwaiting wasn't big on sweets and was simply sipping some tea at the moment.

Yinghua, looking wounded by her friends' faithlessness, turned to her last refuge, Maomao. "Yeah, sure," Maomao said, nodding and privately thinking how she hated to get dragged into these spats. That was as far as her engagement in the conversation went.

Yinghua, her hopes of reinforcement disappointed, puffed out her cheeks. "Well, I thought Consort Ah-Duo was much cooler." She took an angry sip of tea without ever pulling her cheeks back in. Guiyuan and Ailan grinned at each other.

"Well! It turns out you were on Team Ah-Duo all this time,

Yinghua!"

"I—I was not!" Yinghua exclaimed.

Ailan just smirked. "You don't have to hide it. I know we serve Lady Gyokuyou, but no one would blame you for feeling the way you do."

"I don't feel that way!"

Maomao listened to the girls chatter as she drank the rest of her tea. She much preferred savory treats; the cottony candy was too sweet for her. She would have loved to have some salty rice crackers to refresh her palate.

As for who exactly Yinghua and the other girls were talking about, it was the newly arrived consort, Loulan. She had one unusual quality, which was more than enough to inspire conversation. Which quality? Her clothes. Virtually every time she appeared, she wore an outfit with a different personality. One day she might be in a western dress; the next, she would be outfitted like a rider from one of the tribes.

I wonder what the story is, Maomao thought. Maybe she just had too much money. If she kept changing outfits at that pace, pretty soon her pavilion would be crammed with clothing. The formerly austere Garnet Pavilion had already changed beyond recognition, as if the new resident were intent on banishing the spirit of Ah-Duo.

It was both the right and the wrong thing to do. On the one hand, the rear palace was a world in which one got ahead by standing out; but on the other, the nail that stuck up, as they said, would be pounded down. Loulan might have found herself to be such a nail under normal circumstances, but her father was an important advisor from the days of the former emperor, so there was, as it were, no hammer big enough for the job.

That explains a lot, Maomao thought. That would be more than enough reason to drive Ah-Duo out. Considering Loulan's age, it might even have seemed a bit belated.

Then Maomao had a thought. Might it not have been more convenient in some ways for the Emperor had Ah-Duo remained in the rear palace? Because she could never be a mother of the country, her eyes were fixed straight ahead; she was so perceptive and intelligent one might wish she had been born a man. And now, at a stroke, the Emperor had lost an excellent advisor and gained a young woman who might influence not only the rear palace but the greater court itself. Perhaps it hadn't seemed to him the most advantageous trade.

He couldn't simply ignore her, but it wouldn't necessarily be to

his benefit to get too friendly with Loulan and have her conceive a child. A consort's backer was really only powerful during a child's minority. Once the boy became emperor—even had a child of his own—such a person could find himself altogether extraneous.

So what did that mean? Maomao entertained the possibilities as she helped herself to another cupful from the little teapot.

Chapter 16: Paper

When Maomao made her first visit in quite some time to the rear palace's medical office, she found its resident eunuch as mellow as ever.

"Ah, haven't seen you in a while, young lady," the quack doctor said, happily pouring tea. "It's gotten much warmer these days, hasn't it?" He politely brought her a drink, using a medical treatise in lieu of a tray. Maomao snatched the tea and the treatise both at once, wishing she could give him a piece of her mind for so blatantly abusing such a priceless object.

As ever, the quack was the only one in the office. She couldn't believe how little work he actually seemed to do in here. He was lucky he still had a job.

"Oh, it's still plenty chilly," Maomao said, placing a laundry basket on top of his desk.

Yes, there was still a chill in the air. It was cold enough that the butterbur hesitated to show their faces. Maybe the doctor only felt it had gotten warmer because he was so plump.

Maomao would have to pick plenty of herbs as the new season took hold, but there was something she wanted to do before that happened, and that was what had brought her here today. This wouldn't normally have been an urgent task, but she was who she was—and the quack was who he was.

"Gracious, young lady, you only just got here. What are you doing?" the doctor asked as Maomao pulled something out of the laundry basket.

"What a question." From the basket Maomao produced a set of cleaning supplies and as much bamboo charcoal as she had been able to stuff in there. "We're going to clean. This room." Her eyes flashed. Apparently two months of Suiren's discipline had rubbed off on her. With nothing to do in the Jade Pavilion, Maomao had come to the one place where she had almost free rein. She'd always thought the medical office was a bit of a pigsty; now the fire was lit and there was no putting it out.

"How's that?" the doctor asked, but his sudden frown couldn't save him.

The quack wasn't a bad person; indeed, he was quite kindhearted. But that, Maomao knew, was an entirely separate thing from being good at his job.

The next room over from the main office contained cabinets full of medicines. Three walls towered high with drawers, a veritable paradise on Earth for Maomao, but it wasn't all joy and sunshine. Yes, there might be a great many medicines there, but it was the quack who got to use them. Those he didn't use regularly would get dusty or might be eaten by bugs. And then there was a dried herb's greatest enemy: humidity. Let down your guard for a second and the materials would rot. The warmer it got, the more humid it would become. They had to clean things up now, before that happened, or it would be too late.

It wasn't that Maomao particularly liked cleaning. Neither did she have any special reason to help out here, as all too often when she visited the medical office, it was just to kill time. But still, she felt she must. The sense of duty thrummed in her. (As did the nagging feeling that she'd been thoroughly corrupted by

Suiren.)

"You don't have to do all this, young lady. Surely someone else can take care of the cleaning," the doctor said, sounding deeply unmotivated. The tone of his voice caused Maomao to involuntarily look at him in a way she normally reserved for Jinshi. Put simply, it was as if she were looking into a puddle full of mosquito larvae.

"Heek!" The doctor quivered right down to his loach mustache.

Any gravitas he might have had vanished.

Darn it, stop that, Maomao chided herself. He might be a quack, but he was still her superior. She had to at least act respectful toward him. Otherwise he might not put out rice crackers the next time she showed up. There were too many sweet snacks around the rear palace, not enough salt.

"Yes, we could ask someone else," Maomao said, "but what if they accidentally switched some medicines around while they were working? What would we do then?"

The doctor was quiet. It wasn't exactly proper for Maomao to show up at her leisure and decide to clean, but he was quiet about that too. He could hardly chase her out. The doctor who had been close with Suirei had indeed, they'd heard, been punished for the missing thornapple. According to Gaoshun, though, the man was too talented to let go; instead, he merely suffered a reduction in salary.

Maomao started in on the dusty shelves, opening the drawers one by one and running a cloth through them. She threw out anything that had obviously gone bad, and wrote the name of each item on a wooden tag. Whatever medicine remained she put in new paper pouches, then returned them each to their proper places.

Whenever there was something that required particularly strenuous activity, she got the quack to do it. Her leg still wasn't completely healed. And the doctor was a bit overweight, anyway; the exercise would be good for him.

He certainly uses fine paper here, she observed. Most paper used among the populace was of a low-quality, disposable type. Paper that would last was too expensive for ordinary people.

Instead, commoners did most of their writing on wooden strips. There was plenty of firewood floating around, much of it already cut thin enough to start a blaze with. That was what the people used. And when they were done, it doubled as a convenient source of firewood.

The nation had actually exported paper once upon a time, but the former emperor—or rather, his mother, the former empress dowager—had forbidden the felling of the trees used to make the finest paper. The restriction had been eased somewhat since then, but not enough to meet demand. Why had the empress dowager forbidden the trees to be cut down? There had been no one heedless enough of their life to ask at the time, but considering that the harvesting of those trees was still limited, Maomao figured there must be some sort of reason.

The upshot was that these days, with the exception of the very finest stuff, paper was made of other trees, or grasses, or old cloth. Such resources were less readily available than trees and took time to process, making them more expensive—and all the time and trouble caused producers to try to find shortcuts, leading to a low-quality product. Thus paper had acquired a reputation among the populace for being exorbitantly expensive but not actually worthwhile, and had failed to gain traction despite being more convenient than wood.

Maomao exhaled: "Phew..."

"All finished, young lady?" the doctor asked hopefully.

"No, only about half done."

A disappointed silence followed. Maomao, though, saw that half the work was about as much as she could hope to do in a day considering the sheer scale of the task, and decided to deal with the rest the next day. She left the charcoal sitting in the room to help absorb the humidity. She still didn't have enough of it, though, and requested the doctor to requisition more.

The doctor massaged his shoulders as he went about fixing a snack. He brought over fruit juice poured from a ceramic bottle. "A sweet treat, that's the thing when you're feeling tired," he said, using a bamboo spoon to scoop mashed chestnut and sweet potato onto some paper. He handed one of the portions to Maomao.

Old guy has rich tastes! Sweet potato was hard to get a hold of at this time of year, making such a snack a particular indulgence; and on top of that, he served it on high-quality paper as if doing so were completely unremarkable.

Maomao cleared the sweet potato in a single bite, then looked at the paper, now stained with round fingerprints. The material had a noticeable sheen.

"This is excellent paper you're using," she remarked.

"Oh, you can tell?" It had been an offhand comment, but it seemed to have gotten the doctor's attention. "My family produces this. We even supply it here to the court. Impressive, no?"

"It is indeed."

That would explain how he happened to have some lying around. It wasn't just flattery, either; Maomao could see that this really was material of high quality. Her old man had always picked the best of the worst when choosing from among the selection of disposable paper for his medicine packets. Quality material was desirable to prevent the infiltration of humidity or the spillage of powder, but costs had to be kept down somewhere—and for the sake of the patients, it couldn't be in the medicines themselves. But savings had to be made, lest supplies consume all of the profit and then some.

Maybe I could get him to sell me some, Maomao mused. You know, at a friendly discount. Ah, the unfair advantage. She sipped

her juice as she thought and it coursed, sweet and lukewarm, down her throat. Not for me, she thought, and decided to heat some water for tea. A fire was always kept burning in the medical office, very convenient at times like this.

"The whole village pitches in to make it. There was a time when we actually thought about throwing in the towel, but thankfully, we managed to scrape by somehow."

Maomao hadn't asked for the doctor's life story, but he seemed in a talkative mood today. In the past, making paper had been enough to earn a profit, so his family had concentrated on cutting down the local trees and shaving them as finely as possible to supply product. It was more lucrative to sell abroad than domestically, so their paper became an increasingly important trade good. In his childhood, the village had been so wealthy that the quack doctor could ask for sweets anytime he wanted and eat as many as he liked.

For one reason or another, though—perhaps they simply got

too big—the village incurred the wrath of the former empress dowager, who forbade them to cut down the trees they used to make their paper. They were forced to find other materials to produce with, but that inevitably meant a decline in the quality of their product. Now the trading houses were mad at them and had ceased to do business with them.

The village's salad days were over. The headman—who, in fact, was the quack doctor's father—was beset by villagers demanding he do something. He saw the writing on the proverbial wall, that they could no longer go on making paper as they had. However, not everyone in the village was able or willing to see this reality, and a great deal of anger focused on the headman and his family.

Maomao listened patiently, pouring boiled water from a teapot into a cup.

"It broke my heart when my older sister came here to the rear palace."

The village had been established in an ideal place for making paper, but not for much else. They decided to relocate the village, but lacked the resources. Around that time, the rear palace was looking for more palace women, and so the doctor's older sister answered the call.

"She laughed and said the next time I saw her she would be a mother to the country, but in the end, I never saw her again."

What exactly to do with themselves remained an issue on the new land. More resources were needed, and now the quack's younger sister volunteered to follow the older into the rear palace.

"And finally I decided to go. There was really no other choice," the quack said. As the rear palace expanded, there was inevitably a need for more eunuchs. They were in shorter supply than women, though, and thus commanded a higher price.

He's had it tougher than I realized, Maomao thought as she drank her tea.

The more one cleaned, the more one saw things that needed cleaning. Maomao successfully finished with the medicine cabinets on the second day, but now the next room over bothered her. The quack did some basic cleaning, it appeared, but he didn't seem to have an eye for detail. Maomao spent the third day brushing cobwebs off the ceiling and carefully wiping down the walls, and after that she wanted to organize the equipment. The quack had quite a bit of it, she'd discovered, and anything he didn't much use he stuffed into one of the other rooms.

What a waste, she thought as she surveyed that next room.

She'd been given to understand that it wasn't being used, but for Maomao, it was a treasure trove. She and the quack tackled the scads of medical treatises, Maomao with a glowing smile on her face and the doctor looking rather glum. In this way, over the quack's pouting, they spent seven full days cleaning. Maomao had also been doing food tasting for Consort Gyokuyou during that time, but nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.

It was around then, as the doctor was grudgingly polishing a mortar and pestle, that another eunuch showed up at the medical office. The quack had received a letter.

"Well, now, what have we here?" the doctor said. He took the letter eagerly, spying a chance to do some slacking off.

"Who's it from?" Maomao asked. In her mind, she was purely being polite, but the doctor replied, "It's from my younger sister." He showed her the letter, which was written on crackly, uneven paper that made Maomao wonder if it was produced from seaweed. It was very much the sort of low-quality product the average person might use.

I thought he said his family made paper, she mused. Maybe the sister figured a botched batch was good enough for writing to a family member.

As he perused the letter, though, the doctor's face took on a look of shock, his eyes boring into the page. Maomao sidled up beside him, curious what was going on, but at just that moment the quack's shoulders slumped. He slid weakly into a chair, hung his head, and let the letter drop onto the table. A few words jumped out at Maomao:

"Our Imperial commission may be withdrawn."

But the doctor had been bragging to Maomao just the other day about how his family supplied the court with paper!

"I wonder what could be the matter," the doctor said, almost to himself. "And we were just now able to start producing more supply..."

An Imperial commission—or lack thereof—could have major consequences for the family's income. The hoity-toity types who bought high-quality paper could never resist the idea that they were using the same stuff as the emperor.

"Producing more?" Maomao asked. "They haven't started cutting corners, have they?" She fingered the rough paper of the letter.

"They would never. They've been more excited to work than ever since they got that ox. Nowadays it does all the things we always used to need people to do. Why should that change anything?"

Making paper involved a great deal of physical labor. The work ought to be easier with an ox to do all the heavy lifting.

"And yet if this sample is anything to judge by, I can see why the court wouldn't be interested." Maomao picked up the letter and fluttered it at the quack. Low-quality paper would disintegrate if it got the slightest bit wet. Moreover, the uneven surface resulted in hideous written characters.

The doctor was silent, as if in tacit admission that he knew the workmanship was poor. Finally he leaned so far forward his head was on the table. "I just don't know what's wrong."

Maomao, recognizing that now was not the time for cleaning, studied the paper intently. Much of the paper circulating among the commoners was of questionable purity, made of strands of fiber from many different plants. Because the fibers weren't cut carefully, the glue hardened inconsistently, causing the paper to fall to tatters. Her inspection, though, showed that the fibers of this sample were of uniform size and diligently measured thickness. Yet the surface was uneven, and a gentle tug was enough to tear off a corner of the letter.

Maomao tilted her head in curiosity, reading the letter over once more. It said that the family was still employing the age-old methods of making the paper, and using just the same materials they always had. The younger sister implored her brother to advise them what to do, but sadly, the half-man who was her brother seemed at his wits' end.

"She mentions a time-tested way of making paper. Exactly what methods do you use?" Maomao finished drying the mortar and pestle and returned them to the shelf. Then she put on a kettle to help them relax.

"The same ones everyone else does," the quack replied. "The difference is, our family is very particular about how we break down the materials and how we make the glue. I can't say more than that."

Not so talkative on this subject, huh? Maomao thought. She pulled a container of tea leaves off the shelf. She was rifling through it, trying to decide which would be good, when some arrowroot practically jumped out at her. She grabbed it and tossed it in a teacup. Then she put the kettle back on the fire to boil.

"Are you also particular about your water?" she asked.

"Mm. We use spring water heated to a very precise temperature to get the glue to set just right. I can't tell you more, though. That's a trade secret."

That was the quack doctor she knew, Maomao thought, as she set down another teacup. She filled it with hot water, then stirred it assiduously with a spoon before it could cool, producing a viscous gruel. Arrowroot tea.

"And the glue, do you boil it with water left over from washing rice?"

"No, we take the trouble to dissolve wheat flour into it, the way you're supposed to. Otherwise it doesn't stick well." The moment he'd spoken, the doctor slapped his hand over his mouth, but it made scant difference to Maomao whether they used rice water or wheat flour or whatever else. She placed the arrowroot tea in front of the doctor.

"In that case, where do you keep the ox?" she said.

"I'm afraid I don't know that." He looked at her as if to ask Why arrowroot? but nonetheless started lapping at the hot liquid. It stuck to the teacup, making it tricky to drink. "Young lady, I do believe you've mistaken the proportions here. It's impossible to drink this."

Maomao passed him a spoon. "My apologies. I'm happy to tell you how to make it drinkable. Want to give it a try?"

"What should I do?"

Maomao placed the spoon briefly in her mouth, then stuck it into the tea and stirred vigorously. Then she did it again, and then again.

"Somewhat uncouth," the quack remarked with a frown, but he did as she showed him. As he repeatedly put the spoon in his mouth and then stirred, a change began to take place. "It's getting less starchy," he observed.

"I should think so."

"In fact, it's practically watery now." The doctor looked quite impressed.

"Arrowroot and glue are rather similar," Maomao offered.

"I suppose you could say that... I wonder if saliva thins out glue the same way it does arrowroot."

"Indeed."

The doctor's mouth opened. "Indeed what?"

He wasn't as quick on the uptake as Maomao would have liked. I'm practically rubbing his nose in it, she thought, but she decided to give him one more hint.

"Oxen, I believe, produce a great deal of slobber."

"Yes, now that you mention it, I suppose that's true."

"What if you were to find out where the ox is drinking its water? Just to be sure."

Maomao, resolved not to say anything further, cleaned up the teacups, and promptly went back to the Jade Pavilion. The quack must have finally caught on, for he dashed off a letter and hurried out of the medical office to send it.

Maomao contemplated what she would do when she was done cleaning.

But it's when things seem most quiet that disaster often lurks.

Chapter 17: How to Buy Out a Contract

"So, how much does it cost to buy out a courtesan's contract?" Lihaku asked. He and Maomao were sitting in the room that connected the rear palace to the outside world. When Maomao heard Lihaku's question, her mouth dropped open. Since he'd summoned her personally rather than sending a letter, she'd assumed he had some new information to give her about the incident. But this was what he wanted to know?

I just knew he was a big, dumb mutt.

Lihaku clutched his head until finally, unable to take it anymore, he pounded the desk between them and exclaimed, "You've got to tell me, young lady!" The eunuchs guarding the entrances on either end of the room observed the commotion but clearly considered the entire thing a headache.

Evidently, on a recent visit to the Verdigris House, Lihaku had heard some talk of someone buying out one of the ladies' contracts. One of the three princesses, no less. Lihaku, who was very passionate indeed about Pairin, one of said princesses, couldn't let the subject go.

"There are any number of answers to that question," Maomao said.

"For one of the very best courtesans, then."

"I hear you," Maomao said, studying him from under lidded eyes. She requested a brush and an inkstone from one of the guards, and Lihaku provided some paper. "Market price can change in a heartbeat, of course, so consider this to be merely a guesstimate," she said. Then she wrote the number 200 on the paper. This was roughly the amount of silver your average farmer could expect to earn in a year. A nice, cheap courtesan could be had for about twice that amount. Lihaku nodded along.

"That excludes celebration money, though," Maomao informed him. A courtesan's actual buyout price could be influenced by factors like how long was left on her contract and how much money she might be expected to earn during that time, but one could also find oneself paying almost double that amount again on top of the buyout. For it was the custom of the pleasure district to see its ladies off with the grandest of celebrations.

"Give it to me straight. How much can I expect to pay in all?"

Maomao was somewhat stymied by Lihaku's soulful look. It's not an easy question to answer, she thought. Pairin had earned herself many customers, and a commensurate amount of money, since making her debut at the establishment. She didn't owe the brothel anything for clothes or hair ornaments, and in fact her term of service as such had been up long ago. She remained at the Verdigris House—and kept earning—because her sexual preferences happened to make her perfect for courtesans' work. If a woman's buyout price were purely about offsetting her debts, well, then Pairin's would have been virtually nil.

How old is she this year, again? Maomao wondered. Pairin was the oldest of the three princesses, to which she had belonged since before Maomao was born. Yet her skin was still lustrous and she had honed her specialty, dancing, over many years. Her youthful looks even sometimes prompted rumors that she stayed young by sucking the essence out of men. There were practices— the so-called fangzhongshu, or "arts of the bedchamber"—that supposedly allowed both men and women to maintain their vital essence by making love, and Maomao had occasionally wondered idly if Pairin had learned those abilities.

Judging strictly by age, Pairin's value should have been naught, but her beauty remained undiminished, as did her energies. At the same time, the old madam wouldn't want her three princesses to stagnate; she would be looking to move the oldest of them— Pairin—along one of these days. Maomao had heard her muttering about it on her last visit home.

Pairin had been a model courtesan, supporting the Verdigris House when it had teetered on the brink, but she couldn't rest on these laurels forever, nor could the Verdigris House rest on her. It would have to foster a new generation of famous faces while it was in the ascendant, lest its current crop suddenly turn out one day to be old and dusty.

Maomao scratched the back of her neck and grunted thoughtfully. "If anyone was going to buy Sis—I mean Pairin—out, it would be one of two people." She searched her memory. It was likely to be someone Pairin knew well; the Verdigris House didn't take that many new customers.

One of the candidates was the head of a prosperous merchant business, a lavish spender who had been so good as to continue patronizing the Verdigris House even when it had fallen on hard times. A decent old man. He'd often given Maomao candy when she was little. He frequently came not to stay the night as such, but to have a drink of wine and enjoy watching a dance or two. He'd spoken of buying Pairin out more than once. The greedy old woman had managed to put him off the subject each time, but if he were to raise the possibility again now, she might be more receptive.

The other possibility was a high-ranking official who was a regular client. Still young, only just past thirty, Maomao didn't know exactly what kind of official he was, but when she thought back to the jeweled ornament she'd seen on the hilt of his sword some years ago, she realized that at that time he had already ranked higher than Lihaku did now. Surely the man had been promoted since then, as well. He seemed to be quite a match for Pairin as far as nocturnal activities went: she was always in excellent spirits after a night with him.

Just one thing nagged Maomao about this second suitor. Compared to the indefatigable Pairin, he often seemed a bit...tired. She worried about how Pairin would get along after being bought out by either of these men.

Pairin was a beautiful woman and a superb dancer, but at the same time, she was renowned for never coming off second best in bed. It was even said that when she got too frustrated, her appetites could extend not just to the menservants of the brothel, but to the other courtesans and apprentices as well... In short, she was insatiable.

That was what caused the madam to consider not just the possibility of selling Pairin's contract, but alternatively of letting her take over the Verdigris House. It was also conceivable that Pairin might simply leave the brothel, but her personality made that seem unlikely.

Even though it would probably be the most peaceful solution for her, Maomao thought. Formally she would retire, but she

could be allowed to take customers in special cases, while on her own time she could love freely. She would have far more liberty than she'd ever had before, which would presumably please her no end.

Hmmm... Maomao eyeballed Lihaku again. She took him to be in his mid-twenties. He was toned and muscled, his brawny arms just the sort of thing Pairin liked. Not to mention that when he had come to the Verdigris House that first time, he and Pairin had gone into her room and not come out for the whole two days Maomao was home, yet Lihaku hadn't appeared spent afterward. "Master Lihaku, how much money do you make?"

"That question seems kind of forward," Lihaku said, a bit apprehensively.

"Around eight hundred silver a year?"

"Hey, don't go around trying to put numbers on people." Lihaku was frowning, but not very hard. A little low, she saw.

"Twelve hundred, then?"

This time he didn't say anything. That suggested a number in the middle—about a thousand silver per year, say. A fairly good income at his age. To buy out a high-ranking courtesan, though, one ideally wanted to have at least ten thousand silver on hand. After all, such women could command a hundred silver for a cup of tea, or three hundred for a night's company. Lihaku had returned to spend two or three more nights with Pairin since that first visit. He would have to stretch his salary to support that habit, but Maomao suspected the old madam herself was behind this. Most likely using Lihaku to help ensure Pairin didn't become too frustrated.

"Not enough?" Lihaku asked.

"I'm afraid not."

"What if I promised to pay the money back after I make it in the world?"

"They'd never allow it. They'll probably expect at least ten thousand in hard cash."

"T-Ten thousand?!"

Lihaku was rooted to his spot. Maomao wasn't sure what to do. If he could somehow raise the money, he wouldn't be such a bad suitor for Pairin. She would no doubt appreciate his tremendous endurance.

Yes, she would appreciate it—but did that constitute love? Maomao wasn't sure. Hmmm, she thought again. She looked at Lihaku, who was clearly depressed, and let out a breath.

He seemed to be thinking along the same lines she was. He looked at Maomao with uncertainty and said, "If, hypothetically, I was able to get together ten thousand silver, would I be able to buy out her contract?"

"Are you asking whether Sis would simply turn you down out of hand?" Maomao said coolly. The moment she spoke, Lihaku's eyes became a little more bloodshot and he ground his teeth. She'd only mentioned the possibility; she hadn't said it would happen.

Okay then, just one thing to do, she thought. Maomao rose and stood in front of Lihaku. "Please get up for a moment, sir."

"All right..." Lihaku said dejectedly. Maybe a disappointed dog is an obedient one, for he promptly did as Maomao said.

"Good. Now take off your shirt, raise your arms to shoulder height, and flex."

"All right." Lihaku began to do as he was told, but he seemed to be causing some alarm among the eunuchs on guard. They stopped him before he could remove his shirt.

"Don't worry, nothing untoward is going on," Maomao said. "I just want to have a look at him." Despite her assurances, the eunuchs didn't move.

Still openly disappointed, Lihaku sat formally on the chair.

"If I take it off, she won't reject me?"

"If I know nothing else, I know Pairin's tastes."

"I'll take it off," Lihaku said promptly, and then he did so. He quelled the objections of the eunuchs by displaying his accessory of office.

Maomao circled around the posing Lihaku, examining him from every angle. Occasionally she would form a square with her palms and pointer fingers and peer at him through it critically. He had the carefully crafted body of a military officer. Nothing slumped or sagged, and muscles covered virtually everything. His right arm was slightly larger than his left, suggesting he was right-handed. Pairin was ravenous and would devour almost anything if she had no other choice, but like anyone else, she had her preferences. If she'd been here at this moment, she would have been licking her lips.

"Very well. Now the bottom half."

"The bottom half?" Lihaku said plaintively.

"I insist." Maomao's expression was perfectly serious.

Lihaku shuffled out of his trousers, though he didn't look thrilled about it, until he was standing there in nothing but a loincloth. Maomao's face didn't change; she continued to study him with almost scientific rigor.

Lihaku's legs and hips were as sturdy as the rest of him, demonstrating that there were no imbalances in his training regimen. There was no fat on his thighs, and the muscles flowed smoothly toward the joints of his knees, then swelled out again to his calves.

These really are exceptional muscles, Maomao thought. He didn't have the wine-bolstered belly of so many who frequented the brothel; his skin was a healthy color. Just Sis's type.

Maomao had Lihaku strike pose after pose, starting to think he just might have what it took. As Lihaku started to warm to the exercise, he took the positions with ever more vigor.

Finally, Maomao was ready to inspect the most important part. "Now, if you'll remove your l—" she started, but she was interrupted by the door banging open. Lihaku, who had looked downright enthusiastic an instant ago, blanched. The eunuchs looked like they thought they might be given the death penalty.

As for Maomao, her mouth simply hung open.

"What are you all doing in here?" The overseer of the rear palace (a vein standing out prominently on his temple) was standing in the doorway, accompanied by his aide. A bevy of palace women who were hanging around hoping to get close to Jinshi scattered and even fainted as if they had seen something unbearable.

"Good day to you, Master Jinshi," Maomao said mildly.

Some things in the world were mysterious, Maomao thought.

For example, why was she sitting so formally just then? And why was Jinshi looking at her with such a chill in his eyes?

Lihaku had hurried home, still barely dressed. Maomao thought the whole scene was ridiculous. She also felt it was vaguely unfair, but having the soldier stay seemed like it would somehow have made things even more complicated than they already were, so perhaps it was just as well for him to go.

"What were you doing?" Jinshi reiterated. Maomao looked up at him, privately observing that the beautiful are truly fearsome when roused to anger. Jinshi had crossed his arms and was standing imposingly in front of her. Behind him, Gaoshun stood with his hands together and the impassive expression of a monk contemplating Emptiness. The eunuchs, looking weary, had resumed their positions by the doors, though they stole occasional glances at their glorious chieftain.

"He simply came to me for advice," Maomao said. She'd informed Hongniang at the Jade Pavilion, per protocol. She'd finished the laundry in the morning, and as there were no tea parties planned for today, a food taster would not be necessary.

Maomao had no work duties to attend to until evening.

"Advice, eh? Then what was he doing looking like that?"

Ah, Maomao thought, so that was the issue. Despite the fact that there had been guards present, it was admittedly beyond problematic for a man from outside the rear palace to be seen in such a state. She vowed to resolve what was obviously a misunderstanding.

"It was nothing inappropriate, sir. I never touched him; I was only taking a good look." She tried to emphasize that point: she hadn't laid a finger on him. That was what she wanted Jinshi to take away from this.

Jinshi, though, reacted poorly; his eyes went wide and he looked like he might fall over backwards. Gaoshun, meanwhile, seemed to be advancing from the contemplation of Emptiness to the realization of Liberation. Maomao wondered why he was looking at her with the unperturbed compassion of a bodhisattva.

"A good look, you say?"

"Yes, sir. I was only looking."

"To what end?"

"I should think that was obvious. I needed to make sure his body would be satisfying, and examining it in the flesh was the only way."

In a conversation about who would buy out Pairin's contract, Maomao wanted to be sure to take her sister's feelings into special consideration. Pairin was a woman who loved often and much, and it would be ideal, in Maomao's opinion, if she could go to a man she truly cared for. If Maomao had thought Lihaku was too far removed from being Pairin's type, she certainly wouldn't have offered him any further advice. She wasn't such a soft touch as that.

Maomao had grown up at the Verdigris House, at least until she had been torn away from her old man. In her youth, it had been the three princesses—Pairin, Meimei, and Joka—along with the old madam who had seen to her upbringing.

Pairin was unique in that although she had never borne a child, her breasts still produced milk, and it was this milk that had fed Maomao as an infant. When Maomao was born, Pairin had only just graduated from her apprenticeship, but she was already plenty voluptuous. Maomao always thought of Pairin as "Sis," but in reality it was something more like "Mom." Incidentally, she took this informal tone with Pairin lest Meimei and Joka get mad at her.

Maomao suspected that if Pairin went to one of the two longstanding prospects, she was unlikely to have the life she truly wanted. Even so, Maomao wasn't sure it would be best for her to simply go on and end up like the old madam.

Many former courtesans gave up on having children. The constant use of contraceptive drugs and abortifacients robbed their wombs of the strength to foster a child. Maomao didn't know if this was the case for Pairin or not. But when she remembered her youngest days, being rocked to sleep in Pairin's arms, she thought it would be a shame for Pairin never to have children of her own. She was a woman of immense sexual appetites, but her maternal instinct was just as strong.

Lihaku was thoroughly smitten with the courtesan Pairin. He was well aware that as a courtesan, he wasn't the only man to whom she offered her services. Yet as much as Lihaku could be a bit of a big puppy sometimes, at heart he was a serious and diligent man, and his determination to rise in the world for the sake of a woman was both silly and endearing.

Lihaku's single-mindedness meant his ardor was unlikely to cool suddenly, and even if he should fall out of love one day, Maomao suspected she could help handle arrangements surrounding any breakup. What was most important was that he had impeccable endurance.

And just as she was appraising this specimen, Jinshi had arrived. As the one responsible for overseeing affairs in the rear palace, he probably wasn't thrilled to have one of its women meeting with a random man from the outside. He chose, Maomao thought, the oddest times to be passionate about his work.

"His body—satisfying?!"

"Yes, sir. Appearance is just one part of a person, yet one may certainly hope it might be to one's liking."

As far as she had seen, Maomao could give passing marks to Lihaku's body. She was already trying to decide how she would explain to Pairin that she hadn't gotten a chance to evaluate the last and most important part of all.

Maomao had told Lihaku that it would take ten thousand in silver to buy Pairin out, but depending on how the matter was approached, he might get away paying as little as half that. It would depend in particular on how Pairin felt about him.

"Is outward appearance that important?" Jinshi finally stopped looming over her and took a seat instead. His foot tapped the floor restlessly; he was clearly still irritated.

"I should say so," Maomao replied, reflecting that she found it oddly vexing that Jinshi of all people should ask this question.

"I must admit I never expected to hear that from you. So?

What did you make of his looks?"

He's just full of questions, Maomao thought. But it was an underling's burden to answer every inquiry of those above her.

"His body shows excellent proportions. He's lean all around. It's clear he has a superb physical foundation, and I believe it's fair to assume he's quite dedicated. He must work at his training and physical conditioning each and every day. If I had to guess, I would suspect he's quite capable even by military standards."

Jinshi was agog at Maomao's proclamation. She almost thought

he found her response surprising. His expression swiftly soured until he looked downright irate.

"Can you really tell what kind of person someone is based solely on how their body looks?"

"More or less. The fruits of habit appear in the flesh, if you will."

When providing medicine to a customer who was reluctant to talk about themselves, it was important to be able to discern who you were dealing with. Any apothecary worth their salt would acquire the skill whether they consciously intended to or not.

"And would you be able to evaluate me by my body?"

"Huh?" Maomao said in spite of herself. She almost thought there was a trace of sullenness on Jinshi's face.

Wait...

Could it be he was jealous of Lihaku? That would explain why he had looked increasingly displeased over the course of their conversation. It was all because Maomao had been too lavish in her praise of the other man's physical qualities.

I can't believe this guy, she thought with a mental sigh. He just has to be reassured that he's the more attractive one.

Jinshi had a beautiful face. So beautiful, in fact, that had he been a woman, he could have had the country wrapped around his little finger; and one suspected that even as a male, it wouldn't have been impossible. And yet, despite having a countenance that was beyond compare, now he wanted to gloat about his body too?

I mean, I guess that's fine by me, Maomao thought. The glimpse she had gotten of Jinshi's body had shown someone surprisingly muscular and toned. She didn't have to study it closely to see that he was quite attractive. But so what? Was he trying to suggest she should recommend him to Pairin if she thought he outstripped Lihaku in physical beauty? Come to think of it, had she ever even mentioned Pairin to Jinshi?

While Maomao thought all this over, Jinshi leaned his elbows on the table and watched her intently, his lips pursed. The eunuchs standing guard looked absolutely cowed, yet nonetheless entranced by his stormy visage. As for Gaoshun, he looked at Maomao with all the tranquility of an image of nirvana.

Maomao felt a bit bad for Jinshi, but she would have to be clear about this here and now: Jinshi lacked the one thing Pairin considered more important than any other in a man. No matter how exquisite his other physical features might be, without that crucial thing, it would be no use even talking about it.

"I did see your body, Master Jinshi, but I'm afraid there's simply no point," Maomao said, albeit reluctantly. The atmosphere in the room iced over immediately. Gaoshun went from looking like a saint in nirvana to looking like the criminal Kandata as the spider's thread broke. "I'm quite sorry to have to tell you this, sir," Maomao went on, "but you simply aren't a match for my elder sister."

"Huh?" This time it was Jinshi's turn to sound completely flummoxed.

Gaoshun pressed his forehead against the wall.

Lihaku could only wonder what in the world was going on. The eunuch who had given him the glaring of a lifetime over his little blunder the day before was now here in front of him—and on his unimpeachably lovely face was a smile.

The man's name was Jinshi, Lihaku recalled. Jinshi seemed a bit younger than Lihaku, but he was also in the Emperor's confidence. With that gorgeous face, rumors occasionally cropped up of a dalliance between Jinshi and the Emperor, but at the very least Jinshi seemed serious about his job; there was nothing to complain about in that respect. The way he could cause virtually anyone, man or woman, to fall head over heels for him could be a bit of an issue, but otherwise, in Lihaku's opinion, there was nothing objectionable about him. As for Lihaku, though, he wasn't the type to be interested in another man, no matter how lovely.

All the same, when that man showed up practically out of the blue and started staring intently at him, Lihaku was a little bit lost for what to do. He was just glad there was no one else around to see them. They were in the officers' building, which was rarely very populated. One particularly eccentric commander made his base of operations here, a person with whom everyone else preferred to have the minimum of contact.

Word was that the eccentric had been out and about quite a bit recently, and Lihaku thought maybe this eunuch had been press-ganged into helping with something around here. Lihaku had submitted his paperwork and tried to get out of the building as quickly as he could so as not to get dragged into anything himself, but just as he had been leaving Lakan's office, he had bumped into this eunuch. And now he was facing that mystifying smile.

Speaking of mystifying, the aide standing behind Jinshi was the man who had requested Lihaku to be his go-between at the brothel. Allegedly, he was an old acquaintance of one of Lihaku's superiors. He'd wondered how the man knew the freckled palace woman Maomao, but now it was starting to make sense.

"Might I have a moment of your time?" Jinshi asked. It was a polite request, but Lihaku was hardly in a position to refuse. Although the other man was younger than him, the jeweled ornament hanging at his hip showed a more esteemed color than Lihaku's. If he didn't do as he was asked, there was no telling if he would ever get the promotion he sought.

"As you wish," was all he said, and then he followed after the eunuchs.

They were in a courtyard of the palace, a place the officers often went to enjoy the refreshing breeze on summer nights. Admittedly, Lihaku wasn't a frequent visitor; he had never been terribly attuned to aesthetics. In this season the chill in the air went beyond refreshing; it was getting downright cold. Between the time of year and the time of day, they could count on not being disturbed.

In summer, flowers called bigleaf hydrangeas would have been putting out blooms as large as embroidered hand balls.

Apparently they were unusual flowers that had been brought from an island country to the east, and depending on the day the blossoms might be red or they might be blue. The commander had gone out of his way to have them planted here. The blooms bore some resemblance to lilacs, but at the moment they simply looked like stubby bushes. Lihaku sometimes wondered if they gave the man a bit too much discretion, but one heard tell that even the general had trouble asserting himself with the monocled man, so maybe there wasn't much to be done.

Jinshi took a seat in an open-air pavilion, then gestured for Lihaku to do the same. Left with no other choice, he sat down facing the eunuch.

Jinshi set his chin on his clasped hands and fixed Lihaku with a radiant smile. His aide, behind him, seemed entirely used to this, but Lihaku found himself somewhat unsettled. It was ridiculous, but the smile was so brilliant that he almost wanted to look away. He realized now that all the talk of how Jinshi could have brought the country to its knees if he were a woman was more than idle gossip. But he was a man. Even if he was missing something normally considered important to one.

One could be deceived by his nymph-like smile and silken hair, but his stature and the broadness of his shoulders gave him away. He didn't look too frail even compared to his own aide, who looked distinctly like a military man, and anyone who was misled by the delicate smile into thinking they might have their way with this person would seem likely to find out otherwise, and painfully. Every motion he made was entrancingly elegant, yet also utterly efficient and precise. Lihaku had thought so even when simply following along behind the eunuch. He'd also thought the man looked somehow familiar, but he couldn't place him. The thought nagged at him, even though he'd only ever caught glimpses of Jinshi; he'd never really seen him face-to-face. What did a person of such high station want with him?

"My attendant informs me that you, my boy, have your heart set on somebody."

Would it be overthinking it, Lihaku wondered, if he felt the crack about "my boy" was a somewhat unnecessary twist of the knife? It took him a second to understand who Jinshi meant by his attendant, but he realized that in this context it could only be the scraggly, freckled girl. Come to think of it, she had apparently done a stint in the outer palace—Lihaku realized she'd been working for this eunuch, of all people. He put his hand to his chin unconsciously.

He'd always thought it would take someone of very particular tastes to hire that woman as their personal servant. He never would have imagined this gorgeous eunuch would have those tastes.

Even recognizing that the situation in which Jinshi had found them would have required some explanation, though, Lihaku was a bit taken aback to realize she had told Jinshi of his desire to buy out Pairin's contract. Maybe that was what inspired the eunuch to smile so intently at him. At his young age, for him to aspire to buy out one of the most beautiful, most revered courtesans in all the land was humorous indeed.

And frankly, Lihaku didn't mind if Jinshi thought he was a buffoon. Let him laugh at Lihaku—but if he intended to make light of Lihaku's beloved Pairin, then things might be different.

Pairin was a good woman. Not just a good courtesan—a good woman. He pictured her, smiling at him in bed. Saw her dancing, holding up the hem of her robe with two fingers. Thought of the way she served tea with attention to every detail.

Some might say that was just what a courtesan was supposed to do, and with such people there would be no room for further discussion. But Lihaku didn't mind. He didn't care if it was real or not. As long as he believed in it, it didn't matter.

He'd seen more than one of his colleagues lose themselves in women and gambling, and to those around him, perhaps he just looked like another such lost cause. Those who would tell him that Pairin was no good for him no doubt had his best interests at heart. And for that he was grateful—but he wished they would butt out.

Lihaku went to the Verdigris House of his own volition. Frequently he didn't even see Pairin, but was simply served tea in the front room by an apprentice. And that was fine with him. It was part of Pairin's business to be as unreachable as a flower on a distant peak. If she charged a month's silver for a cup of tea, who was anyone to say that was greedy? Pairin poured all of herself into being a courtesan; she was living merchandise. Any who claimed she was too expensive simply didn't understand.

That was why if the eunuch across from Lihaku tried to belittle Pairin, Lihaku was prepared to get physical. He knew perfectly well that it might cost him his head, but he could live with that, so to speak. He had never compromised his principles, his beliefs; and this way of life, as straightforward and unrelenting as a charging animal, had always suited him. If those around him thought he had gone mad for some woman, let them.

For the moment, he controlled himself with an effort, pressing his trembling hands together and looking at Jinshi. "And what if I do, sir?"

He was careful not to add "It's none of your business," or anything else unnecessarily antagonistic. Jinshi appeared to pay no mind to Lihaku's dark look; the heavenly smile remained unmoved. What Jinshi said next shocked Lihaku. "What would you do if I said I would shoulder the cost of purchasing her contract for you?"

Lihaku caught his breath, jumped to his feet, and pounded the table. The granite surface sent some of the force back at him. Only when the shiver had passed through his entire body was he at last able to speak. "What do you mean by that?"

"Precisely what I said. How much would it take to buy her out?

Twenty thousand; do you think that would be enough?"

It was as if the number meant nothing to Jinshi, but it made Lihaku gulp. Twenty thousand was not an amount to simply give away. Certainly not to an officer one barely knew. Had Jinshi already spoken to Maomao about the probable cost? Or was the sum truly an afterthought to this man? Lihaku put his head in his hands.

The thought did go through his mind: if this man spoke of twenty thousand as if it were nothing, then half that would be less than nothing to him. But he resolved not to get lost in a naive fantasy.

"I'm overjoyed by your words, sir," he said, "but I must wonder what would prompt such generosity toward someone you hardly know."

Offers that were too good to be true always had a sting in the tail. Even a child knew that, and Lihaku wasn't foolish enough to forget this basic rule. He sat back in his chair and looked at the man across from him. The eunuch's expression showed no change despite having offered this staggering amount of money, although his aide, behind him, looked slightly exasperated.

"My cat is most wary, yet not only was she willing to speak to

you, she seems to be earnestly considering you as a possible match for a woman she thinks of as an older sister."

The "cat" must have been Maomao—it was the meaning of her name—and when Lihaku thought about it, he realized that she could indeed be catlike. She could be as suspicious of others as a stray cat, but when there was food to be had she would come just close enough to get it, take as much as she could, and then she would be gone again.

Lihaku had never wanted a cat. If he was going to have an animal, he would have liked a dog, something that could hunt with him.

Despite the eunuch's choice of metaphor, though, and despite Maomao's attitude, apparently she trusted Lihaku to at least some extent. True, the disinterest in her eyes had made it clear that she thought it was annoying to have to answer his questions, but answer them she did. Ultimately, it had led to this conversation.

"You're saying that when a mistrustful cat takes to somebody, that's reason enough to have faith in them," Lihaku said, earning a slight flinch from Jinshi. He wondered if he'd said something wrong, but the soft smile was back on Jinshi's face so quickly that Lihaku wondered if it had been his imagination.

"I did a bit of asking around about you," Jinshi said. "I learned that you're the son of a provincial official. To rise up the ranks in the capital must have taken quite a bit of work."

"A fair amount."

There were cliques and factions anywhere you went. His father had been an official, yes, but only a regional civil administrator. That had meant an uphill battle for Lihaku, and a good deal of time before anyone really took him seriously.

"They say you were discovered by a commander with an eye for talent and entrusted with a unit of your own."

"Yes, sir," Lihaku said hesitantly. He wondered just how much this man had learned about him. Outwardly, Lihaku was supposed to have been promoted after the commander of a small unit left the service.

"And who wouldn't want to be on good terms with a promising young soldier?" Jinshi continued.

Many might, but rarely to the tune of twenty thousand silver.

Lihaku only really needed half that amount—or actually, if one factored in his own contributions and all he could scare up, even just a quarter of it. One quarter, or five thousand in silver. Would this man really just give it to him? Lihaku was nearly sick with wishing for it—but he shook his head.

He looked at Jinshi seriously and said, "I truly do appreciate your vote of confidence, and I confess I'm almost beside myself wanting to accept your offer, but I can't take your silver. To you, she may be simply another courtesan, but to me she is a woman. A woman I wish to take to wife. And if I don't do that with my own money, then what kind of man am I?"

Lihaku managed to say all this to Jinshi, though it wearied him having to be constantly alert to the tenor of his language.

He'd thought Jinshi might be peeved by his refusal, but that nymph-like smile didn't change. He even thought it might have softened a little. Then the smile turned into laughter. "I see! I'm afraid I've been quite rude." The eunuch stood, utterly elegant as he ran his fingers through his hair. Looking like he had stepped out of a painting of a classical beauty, he stood there with a satisfied smile on his face. "I think there may be something I will wish to speak to you about later. You wouldn't mind?"

"Whatever you wish, sir." Lihaku stood up as well; he pressed a fist respectfully into his open palm and bowed. The gorgeous eunuch responded with a short nod, and then he and his aide went home. Lihaku watched Jinshi go, almost befuddled by his elegance, until they were out of sight.

Finally he murmured, "What was that all about?" and scratched his head, truly puzzled. His heart dropped a little when he felt the bald patch that still remained where his hair had been scorched off. Then he sat down again, mumbling, "What am I going to do...?"

He would have to try to show his best side for his superiors at their next training session. Or maybe he could take on more work. No, no, there was something more important. He would send a letter to the woman he hoped to be joined to someday. He wouldn't simply, unilaterally take her. He wanted to know how she felt as well. Whatever she said in reply might be only for politeness's sake, but he would place his faith in it; it would be what sustained him.

"A'right." Lihaku stuck his hands into his sleeves and set off from the courtyard at a brisk trot. He wondered what kind of branch would make the best accompaniment for his letter.

"Maomao, you've got a letter." Guiyuan held out a bundle of wood writing strips. Maomao took it and undid the tie, to find the strips were covered in a light, flowing hand. It was a reply to the message she'd sent to the Verdigris House several days earlier.

"The old lady can say what she wants, but I'm still earning plenty."

The letter was from Pairin. Maomao could practically see her sensuous older sister puffing out her ample chest.

"Besides, I'm still waiting for a prince on his white horse to come and get me."

In one far country, white horses were what princes were said to ride when they came to rescue trapped young maidens. Pairin was still a woman, and she had a woman's dreams. Maybe it was a bit late to call her a young maiden—she'd already been with more gentlemen than could be counted on both hands—but she didn't give up on the fantasy. Maybe that stubbornness was part of what had preserved her youth for so long.

I sort of suspected, Maomao thought. If the prospect was someone who pleased her, she didn't even need that ten thousand silver. He just had to play the part of her "prince." The role demanded absolute physical strength and endurance, along with something that most men had but eunuchs didn't. Add a dash of theatricality and a little bit of money with which to celebrate, and that would do the trick. No, it wouldn't be necessary to buy Pairin out as such, but the community wouldn't sit by and watch her go without marking the occasion.

The old madam herself had once said to Pairin, "If you want to retire, I won't stop you. But we're going to have the party to end all parties." It was quite a striking remark from a woman who was normally so tightfisted. When Pairin left the stage, it would be commemorated as befitted one of the pleasure quarter's most beautiful blossoms. A courtesan had her pride, after all. Thus, for a man who suitably impressed Pairin, even the old madam wouldn't try to wring out too much. But surely five thousand or so for the celebration. Anyone who couldn't come up with at least that much money wasn't fit for Pairin—and if they had the money but refused to spend it, that would show them even worse.

Yeah, even if ten thousand is out of reach, five thousand ought to do it. If Lihaku continued his steady rise up the ranks, he

should be able to save up that much within a matter of years. The rest would be up to luck. If Pairin were to be brainwashed by the old woman, that would spell the end. Lihaku just had to get her out of there before that happened.

There was no part for Maomao to play in any of this. There was just one thing that worried her. Surely he wouldn't go into

debt to get the money, would he? she thought. If he took a loan to get the cash, the madam would sniff it out, and that would be it. "How can I let Pairin go to a man mired in debt?" she would demand. Maomao was fairly confident Lihaku wouldn't do anything so silly, but she couldn't be sure.

With these thoughts running through her head, she found herself at the end of the letter—where she discovered something very troubling.

"A certain someone was coming around talking about buying out a contract. I think the apprentices got the wrong idea."

A certain someone. Right, Maomao thought. It was unusual for Pairin to be so indirect, but Maomao knew perfectly well who she was talking about.

Maomao tied the letter closed again and put it on a shelf in her room. When she emerged into the hallway, she discovered that Jinshi was visiting the Jade Pavilion for the first time in several days. He'd looked downright stormy the last time they'd parted, but today he seemed in high spirits. Maomao went to the kitchen to prepare tea, wondering what might have him so pleased.

Chapter 18: Blue Roses

The cold was gradually loosening its grip on the world, and the first hints of spring were in the air. As Maomao stood out drying some bedding, she felt like she might succumb to the temptation of the warm, pleasant sun, but she shook her head (Mustn't sleep

on the job!) and forced herself to focus on her work.

Time did pass quickly when one's days were full and satisfying. Even though somehow, the two months she had spent in Jinshi's employ had felt interminably long.

She still longed sometimes for the larded shelves of medicines in the outer-palace physician's office, but she could rectify that issue here; she could work through the quack doctor to get the rear palace medical office up to speed. Meanwhile, she could lean on Gaoshun to get her anything she needed from the archives. It would have been even better if she could have left the rear palace at will, but, well, one couldn't have everything. So long as she was serving there, she couldn't expect to come and go as she pleased.

Consort Gyokuyou's pregnancy was becoming more and more certain. Her menses still hadn't resumed, and now she was experiencing fatigue as well. Her temperature was slightly elevated, and it seemed she was evacuating more often than usual. Princess Lingli would occasionally put her cheek to Gyokuyou's belly and grin, as if to intimate that she knew there was something in there.

Can babies tell? Maomao wondered. Lingli was waving bye-bye to Gyokuyou's belly as Hongniang took her away for her afternoon nap.

Children were most mysterious creatures.

The princess had begun to toddle around on her own; the Emperor gave Lingli a pair of little red shoes, while she in turn gave the ladies-in-waiting their share of headaches. She had become more expressive as well; if you gave her a nice, soft bun, she would smile broadly in return. The ladies-in-waiting of the Jade Pavilion had no children of their own but apparently did have the maternal instinct, for they doted endlessly on the little princess.

Hongniang became given to saying "Perhaps I'll have one of my own sooner or later," but the other women, including Maomao, weren't sure how to respond. Hongniang looked concerned when she said this, yet no one expected the devoted head lady-inwaiting to retire from her post. Even had a suitable offer come along, the other women would most likely have done anything to stop Hongniang from leaving. It was she who allowed the Jade Pavilion to function with such a small staff.

Ah, being too talented could have challenges of its own.

Maomao took to entertaining Princess Lingli when she had no other work to do. The injury to her leg was another factor. Rather than having the busy and able-bodied other ladies-in-waiting watch the princess on top of all their other duties, wasn't it more efficient to have the woman with nothing to do but taste food look after her?

Thus, on this day, Maomao found herself once more playing with Princess Lingli, who was making piles of wooden blocks (purposely constructed with light materials) and then knocking them down. She also showed some interest in illustrated books, so Maomao would copy the pictures out of books she got Gaoshun to borrow for her, writing the words below each one. Lingli was still just two years old, but Maomao had heard it was never too early to get them started. Sadly, Hongniang put a premature end to her educational efforts when she confiscated the pictures.

"Draw flowers like a normal person," she instructed, pointing to the flowers in the courtyard. Apparently, no matter how excellent the renderings might have been, pictures of poisonous mushrooms were off-limits.

That was how Maomao passed the time until, one day, a gorgeous eunuch appeared for the first time in quite a while, bringing trouble with him.

"Blue roses, sir?" Maomao asked, looking at the eunuch with some fatigue.

"Oh, yes. Everyone's quite interested, you see."

Jinshi looked like he was in something of a bind. To the palace women, he looked beautiful even in his distress, and at this moment, three pairs of eyes were watching through the crack in the door. Maomao chose to ignore them. Shortly thereafter, Hongniang, looking rather exasperated herself, grabbed the owners of the eyes—quite nimbly, we might add; two with her right hand, one with her left—by the ears and dragged them away. Maomao chose to ignore that too.

"Such capable handling," Gaoshun commented, a remark Maomao would keep to herself. Back to the subject at hand.

"Everyone would like to admire some of these flowers," Jinshi said. And for some reason, he was the one who was supposed to come up with them.

I knew this was going to be trouble, Maomao thought.

"You want me to find some?" she asked.

"I thought you might know something about them."

"I'm an apothecary, not a botanist."

"It just seemed like something that might be in your wheelhouse..." Jinshi offered weakly.

"Oh, very convincing, sir," Consort Gyokuyou said gaily from where she was lounging on a couch. The princess was beside her, sipping on some juice.

Someone somewhere (Jinshi professed not to know who) had suggested that one of Gyokuyou's ladies might know something about the subject. That at least explained why he was here.

Was it the quack? Maomao wondered. It wasn't impossible. The good-natured old fart had a bad habit of overestimating the abilities of others. It was profoundly frustrating.

Maomao wasn't entirely bereft of knowledge about roses. She knew the petals yielded an oil that served as a skin beautifier—the courtesans had used it periodically. She had earned herself some pocket change by steaming the petals of wild roses, with their powerful aroma, to make the stuff.

"I'm given to understand such flowers once bloomed on the

palace grounds," Jinshi said, folding his arms. Hongniang, evidently done disciplining the three eavesdroppers, entered with fresh tea.

"Someone was seeing things, surely." Arrgh, my calf itches, Maomao thought. Her wound was driving her crazy as it healed. Small blessings: her feet were hidden under the table, so she could scratch it with the toes of her other foot. But somehow, that seemed to inspire itches elsewhere.

"I only heard one person say it, but upon investigation I discovered a number of people who testified to it." Jinshi's expression was hard to read.

"Was opium ever widely used here?"

"It would be the end of the damn country if the likes of opium got around!"

Consort Gyokuyou and Hongniang looked at Jinshi, wide-eyed at the sudden change of tone. Gaoshun furrowed his brow and coughed politely. The anger lingered on Jinshi's face for another beat, but the next second, the celestial smile had returned. Maomao looked at him almost pleadingly. She just didn't deal well with that smile. Gyokuyou was watching them with considerable amusement, though Maomao herself wasn't amused in the least.

"Can't you possibly?" Jinshi said.

Yeesh! Personal space! Maomao thought. He kept leaning in, but she didn't want him any closer than he already was. Finally, she heaved a sigh. "What is it you want me to do, sir?"

"I'd like them to be ready by the garden party next month."

It was time for the spring party. Had it really been that long since the last one? Maomao's emotions were just threatening to get the better of her when she had a thought. Huh? Next month? "Master Jinshi, were you aware?" "Of what?" He looked at her, curious.

He didn't understand. Of course not. There wouldn't be blue roses, and couldn't be blue roses, and it wasn't a problem of color.

"It's going to be at least two more months before any roses come into bloom."

His silence was her proof: he'd had no idea. Of course. She was starting to get one of her bad feelings. He was going to press the matter, and she wasn't going to like it.

"I'll turn them down...somehow." Jinshi's shoulders slumped.

"May I ask you one thing, sir?" Maomao said. Jinshi looked at her hopefully. "Would this request happen to have come from a certain military commander?" It was the only thing she could think of, considering the circumstances. That would explain the

itching, she thought. She'd had her suspicions; and her body had reacted in a show of absolute denial of this name she didn't wish to hear.

"Indeed. Laka—"

Jinshi slapped his hands over his mouth before he could get the name out. Gyokuyou and Hongniang looked at him, mystified.

He was speaking, of course, about him.

No way around it, then, Maomao thought. If he was involved, then she bore a certain responsibility.

"I don't know if I can help you," she said, "but I'll try."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. But there are a few things—and a place—that I'll need."

It would have been too infuriating simply to run away from the challenge. She would have liked nothing better than to snatch the monocle off that leering face and smash it.

The spring garden party would take place among the peonies. It would ordinarily have been held a little earlier, but people kept complaining about the cold, so it had been moved back. Maybe they should have done that sooner, but precedent was a hard thing to change.

A red carpet had been laid out and long tables surrounded by chairs set up in the garden. The musical performers restlessly tuned their instruments, ready to start anytime they were needed. Women rushed back and forth making sure everything was in order, while young military men stroked their as-yet underdeveloped beards and enjoyed the sight.

A curtain had been set up behind them all as a blind, and someone behind it was making a fuss. A slim girl—practically emaciated, in fact—was holding a giant vase of flowers. Cradled in it were colorful roses—even though it was still too early in the

year for them.

"You really did it," Jinshi said, gazing at the roses, whose buds had not yet opened. The flowers were red and yellow, and white, and pink, and yes, blue—as well as black, purple, and even green. When Maomao had promised to try to create blue roses, no one had imagined this panoply of colors. Jinshi was set back on his heels, wondering how she had done it.

"I can tell you, it wasn't easy. I didn't even get them to bloom," Maomao said with genuine regret. She wasn't sorry to have come up short for Jinshi so much as she was disappointed not to have been able to make things go exactly as she had envisioned them.

Jinshi already knew she was like that—but it still irked him.

It irked him so much.

"No, this will be just fine." He picked up a rose, water dribbling from its stem. "Hm?" Something seemed off. For the moment, though, he didn't care; he put the rose back in the vase.

He remained surprised that, though she had only agreed to blue roses, Maomao had produced a veritable rainbow. However she had done it, she looked like she might collapse from sheer fatigue. He entrusted her to the care of the ladies-in-waiting of the Jade Pavilion, while he took the vase and set it by the seat of honor. Even as buds, not blossoms, the roses were more than enough to steal the peonies' thunder; everyone seemed to notice them, and everyone was amazed.

Murmurs spread among the gathered officials, along with some derisive snorts: this wasn't possible.

Jinshi was a eunuch in His Majesty's good graces. What was more, though he understood that it sounded like hubris to say it, he knew that his looks were enough to take most anyone's breath away. But for all that, he still had his enemies. One would have to be all but bereft of ambition to enjoy the prospect of a young eunuch throwing his weight around with the Emperor—and most officials were anything but. Jinshi never let his nymph-like smile slide, making sure his posture was perfectly straight as he approached the dais. The Emperor with his prodigious beard sat there, surrounded by beautiful women.

The gazes that focused on Jinshi concealed many different thoughts and feelings. Lust was fine by him—there were endless ways to use it. Jealousy likewise. Very simple to exploit. Whatever someone might be feeling, so long as you knew what it was, there were ways to handle it.

Far more problematic when a person was hard to read. Jinshi looked at the official who sat to the Emperor's left. Full cheeks— and eyes that never gave away what he was thinking. If Jinshi was a little uncomfortable around him, who could blame him?

As far as this man was concerned, Jinshi was just a young upstart, and a eunuch at that. At one moment, he could seem to be studying Jinshi intently; the next, it was as if he were looking at empty air. The man's smile was ambiguous, defying exact interpretation.

He was Shishou, the father of one of the consorts currently at the rear palace—Loulan. He'd had the Imperial affection during the previous reign—not of the emperor, but of his mother, the empress dowager—and he continued to lord it over the current ruler.

It was not a good thing.

Even so, Jinshi never let his smile slip...

At least, not intentionally.

Then his gaze went from Shishou on the Emperor's left to the man sitting to the Emperor's right, and their eyes met. This man wore a monocle in one of his fox-like eyes, and he was eating a chicken wing with no concern for decorum. He seemed to think he was being subtle about it, but he would take a bite, stash the food in his sleeve, then take another little bite before concealing it again.

At the moment, this was the man Jinshi considered most dangerous—Lakan. He appeared to be studying the head of the high official standing beside him. Then, as if the chicken wing wasn't bad enough, he reached over and plucked away the official's cap. What could he be thinking?

For some reason, a wad of black fluff was attached to the cap's underside. Lakan feigned a look of astonishment. When they realized they could see the man's bare head, three officials across from him fell silent.

It was a cruel prank, exposing the man's (admittedly wellmade) wig. A few people chuckled at the childish mischief, some were openly exasperated, and a few had their hands full trying to control a rush of anger. Jinshi wasn't the only one who couldn't maintain an impassive expression.

It wouldn't do for him to burst into laughter, however, so he somehow mastered his face and instead knelt on the carpet. He offered the vase of roses to the Emperor, who stroked his beard and nodded with undisguised pleasure. Jinshi prevented himself from sighing as he respectfully withdrew.

Lakan inspected the roses theatrically, this time with a dried grape in his fingers. Jinshi couldn't help wondering why nothing ever came of his failures of civility.

"You mustn't go to the Crystal Pavilion anymore."

Maomao's head rested on Yinghua's knees. They were in an open-air pavilion some distance from the banquet. Yinghua had been quite worried about Maomao, and was keeping a close eye on her.

With her pregnancy beginning to show, Consort Gyokuyou had excused herself from this event on the pretext that she was giving her place to Loulan, the new Pure Consort for whom this was in effect a public debut.

Why had Maomao grown so gaunt as to alarm Yinghua? It seemed every time she went to the Crystal Pavilion, she ended up ravaged by fatigue.

That was where she had been for the past month or so; she'd had Jinshi make the arrangements. The ladies-in-waiting of the Crystal Pavilion continued to look at her as if they thought she was some sort of evil spirit, but she paid them no mind. There was something she needed there in order to make her blue roses.

The "place" she had requested of Jinshi was the Crystal

Pavilion's sauna, which she'd asked to have built when Consort Lihua had been convalescing. Maomao knew that despite the consort's high status, Lihua could be a very generous person, so she'd figured it couldn't hurt to ask if she might borrow the bath.

And indeed, Lihua had agreed without hesitation.

Maomao still felt bad using the place for free, though, so she'd brought along a book she'd recently obtained from the Verdigris House. "This is His Majesty's favorite reading material," she said as she gave it to Lihua. The Emperor had requested new and different "texts," so one of them might as well come from Lihua.

When the consort realized what kind of book it was, she calmly put it away in her private chambers, maintaining her elegant demeanor the entire time. Her ladies-in-waiting whispered among themselves as they watched their lady go to her room. Maomao regarded them with a detached gaze; no one would ever imagine that such an aristocratic woman would have a book like that tucked in her sleeve.

Having thus earned the goodwill of the mistress of the house, Maomao received permission to construct a small shed in the courtyard, into which the steam from the sauna would flow. The building looked rather strange: it had large windows, including one right on the roof. Like the sauna itself, it was expensive—well, expensive for Jinshi, who paid for it out of his own purse. No skin off Maomao's nose. Still, she couldn't help wondering just how much of a salary he must draw to afford things like this.

Into the building she brought roses. Not just one, or a few, but dozens, hundreds. She cultivated them amidst the warmth from the steam, making sure they got plenty of light and taking them outside when the weather was good. On any evening cold enough to threaten frost, she would stay up with the flowers all night, pouring water over hot stones to keep them warm.

More than once, all the to-ing and fro-ing caused the wound on her leg to open. When Gaoshun discovered this, he insisted on assigning another maid to be Maomao's minder. Xiaolan, of all people, was the one who arrived. (How had Gaoshun known about her?) It had proven simple enough to motivate Xiaolan: when she found out that not only would she get to skip her chores but be given snacks, too, she was thrilled to do it. She was probably the one thing that kept Maomao from collapsing from overwork.

Maomao's goal in all this elaborate maneuvering was to confuse the roses. Flowers bloom according to their season, but once in a while, for whatever reason, they can be seen to bloom at a different time of year. That was what Maomao was hoping for: to trick the roses into thinking it was time to bloom.

She'd brought in the massive number of plants on the understanding that not every one would put out buds. She'd picked a species that bloomed on the early side, and not every rose in her collection was of the same variety. With just a month to work, she couldn't guarantee success—so she was overjoyed when she saw the first buds. She'd known that would be the real challenge, far more difficult than achieving the right color. She'd gotten several eunuch helpers from Jinshi, but the subtleties of maintaining the correct temperature were something she alone could oversee. If there was the slightest mistake and the roses died, it would all be for naught.

From time to time, the women of the Crystal Pavilion would hover around, either out of open curiosity, or a desire to test their nerve against the sheer fright of seeing Maomao. They began to get on her nerves, so Maomao decided to arrange for something else to hold their attention. But what? The idea came to her when she was staring at her fingers, considering what to do.

She took some rouge and painted it on her fingernails, then buffed it carefully with a cloth. It was a simple manicure, the sort of thing they did all the time in the pleasure district, but it was uncommon in the rear palace. Such decoration would get in the way of work—but it immediately drew the interest of the ladies of the Crystal Pavilion, who didn't do much work to begin with. Maomao made sure the other women "happened" to catch sight of her nails, sending them scrambling to their own rooms to dig out their rouge.

That worked out very nicely, Maomao thought, and then she had a very slightly naughty idea. She decided to suggest a manicure to Consort Lihua as well.

The rear palace had its own trends, and the trendsetters were frequently the ladies who had the eye of the Emperor. And since even a maid, if she became His Majesty's bedmate, could be elevated to the status of consort, it was only natural that the women of the rear palace should all want to imitate anything that might please the Emperor.

At the moment, it was unquestionably Loulan who was at the cutting edge of fashion in the rear palace, but she changed her clothes so often that none of her looks could take hold as a genuine trend. When Maomao went back to the Jade Pavilion to do Gyokuyou's food tasting, she showed her manicure to the Precious Consort and the other ladies-in-waiting. Hongniang was vociferous about the inefficiency of it, but the others were all very impressed.

Wish I had some balsam plants or woodsorrel. Balsam, which was sometimes simply referred to as "nail reddener," could be ground up together with woodsorrel (sometimes called "cat's paw" in Maomao's language) and applied to the fingernails. The woodsorrel helped bring out the red color of the balsam.

About the same time a craze for manicures began to take hold in the rear palace, the buds of the roses started to swell and then put forth blossoms, a profusion of white petals. All the roses Maomao had chosen were white.

"What in the world did you do?" Jinshi asked as he came back after presenting the flowers. There was a deep furrow in his brow and Gaoshun, behind him, looked equally intrigued. Yinghua had gone, dismissed by Jinshi. Although Maomao was publicly Consort Gyokuyou's lady-in-waiting, Jinshi was still technically her direct employer.

"I dyed them."

"Dyed them? But there's nothing on them," Jinshi said, plucking at a petal.

"Not on the outside," Maomao said. "I dyed them from the inside." She picked up one of the blue roses and pointed to where the stem was cut. Droplets of blue liquid clung to it.

She had put the white roses in colored water. It was as simple as that. The flowers absorbed the water, color and all, through their stems, dying the petals a whole rainbow of hues. However, when they were arranged in a vase together, all the flowers except the white ones had to be specially treated, lest the colors mingle together and turn the blossoms an unpleasant black.

Thus, although the roses appeared to be arranged all in a single vase, the base of each stem had been padded with a bit of cotton impregnated with color and secured with oil paper. Maomao had left the paper there until the moment the flowers were to be presented.

That really was all there was to it.

The gimmick being so simple, it was conceivable that somebody might figure it out and say something, but Maomao had a way of dealing with that too. The night before the banquet, when His Majesty visited the Jade Pavilion, she had told him exactly what she had done. Everyone likes to be the first to learn a secret, and with the pleasure of having been let in on the game, His Majesty seemed apt to remain in good spirits no matter what anyone said to him.

Jinshi, it seemed, had withdrawn before the Emperor had a chance to tell him the story.

"In other words, the last time there were blue roses around here, it was because someone or other had enough time to kill that they could spend every day infusing the roses with blue water," Maomao said, looking toward the garden of roses.

"But why on earth would someone go to all that trouble?"

"Who knows? Wanted to impress a woman, maybe," Maomao said flatly. Then she produced a narrow, oblong, paulownia-wood box from the folds of her robe. It looked like the box in which she kept her caterpillar fungus, but it was something she'd had sent along when she requested the "special" books.

"Now, that's unusual," Jinshi said, peering at the box. "Do you color your nails?"

"I do, though I can't say it suits me." Being exposed to so many drugs and poisons and doing so much scrubbing and washing had left her hands in a sorry state. The pinky finger on her left hand was slightly deformed. Painting it red wouldn't change the unnatural shape, but it helped.

Jinshi was looking a little too interested, so she regarded him the way she so often did: like he was a fish gawping at the surface of the water.

Oops, can't be doing that, she reminded herself, shaking her head. If a little peek was enough to set her off, she'd never last with him. Anyway, she still had work to do.

"Master Gaoshun. Do you have what I asked for?"

"Yes. Exactly as you requested."

"Thank you very much."

The stage was set. She was going to give that bastard the scare of his life.

Chapter 19: Red Nails

The disgustingly multicolored roses stole the show at the garden party. Lakan looked at them vacantly. The musical performance had virtually lulled him to sleep; he was holding someone's cap with a ball of fuzz attached to it in his hand, and he didn't even know where he had gotten it.

Oh well, Lakan thought, and placed the cap next to him on the table. The official beside him greedily snatched it up and arranged it on his own head. He seemed to be looking reproachfully at Lakan, but the strategist didn't really know why. He decided to take out his monocle, polish it with a handkerchief, and then put it back on the other eye.

The roses were positioned in the very center of the banquet, as if to show off the poor taste of whoever had arranged them.

He was at a banquet; he remembered that much. Music furled around him and silk streamers waved. He was presented with a meal that was clearly the height of luxury, and he could smell wine everywhere.

It so happened that Lakan had never been very good at remembering things that didn't interest him. He recalled what had happened, but not the attendant emotions; he felt completely divorced from those.

Before he knew it, the proceedings were over, and two consorts, one dressed in black and the other in blue, were receiving roses from the Emperor matching the colors they wore. Lakan heard whispers around him indicating how beautiful the women were, but he wouldn't know. Whether people's faces were beautiful or ugly was something else he'd never had a connection to.

God, this was boring. Wasn't he here? Why go to all the trouble of provoking him if he wasn't even going to come?

He was left with no choice but to find someone else to tease.

He could at least let off a little steam. He looked around: there were plenty of people still here.

He hated crowds.

Most people's faces just looked like Go stones to him. He could differentiate between men and women, for men's faces looked like black stones, and women's like white ones, but they all had nondescript, expressionless caricatures of faces on them. Some of the people he knew particularly well in the military had graduated to looking like Shogi tiles, but that was all. The grunts all look like pawns, and as their ranks went up they started to look like lances or knights, the game's more powerful pieces.

The job of a military commander was simple: to arrange the pieces where each was most suited. A place for everything and everything in its place; that was what won most battles. It wasn't difficult! That was all Lakan had to do, and his job was finished. He might be a talentless hack himself, but if he could distribute his pieces correctly, those around him would take care of his work. That was how Lakan felt about the matter, anyway.

Even that man whom everyone said was as beautiful as a celestial nymph—Lakan had to take their word for it. He couldn't tell. All he knew was that he had to find a gold general with a promoted silver in tow.

And finding people was something he was used to.

Argh, but his eyes hurt worse than usual today. The red stuck in them. Everyone had red pigment on the tips of their fingers.

This so-called "red polish" was supposed to be all the rage among the palace women these days. The red polish that he recalled, floating back from his memories, had never been so garish. It had been thinner, lighter. The red of balsam.

The word tugged on his heartstrings, reminding him of the name of a courtesan. Even as the thought floated through his mind, a diminutive palace woman appeared directly in his line of sight. She looked small and frail, but determined, like woodsorrel.

She turned hollow eyes on him. When she saw he was looking at her, she turned as if to say, Come with me.

Out beyond the peony garden, a Shogi board had been set up in a small open-air pavilion. On top of the board was a paulowniawood box, inside which rested something that looked like the withered remains of a rose.

"Might I ask you for a game?" the girl said, but her voice was flat, affectless, as she picked up the pieces.

Nearby was the gold general, with his promoted silver close at hand.

What possible reason could he have to refuse? How could he turn down a request from this dear little girl—his dear little girl? Lakan grinned cunningly.

What in the world did she hope to achieve?

Maomao had asked Jinshi to go home if it was at all possible; he, in turn, had ignored her. She looked deeply displeased, but accepted it on the condition that he be quiet. Then she had issued her unspoken invitation to the commander, after which she began lining up the Shogi pieces.

Her face was utterly without emotion; even her usual cold reticence seemed warm and humane in comparison. She would scratch the back of her hand from time to time; maybe she had a bug bite.

"So, who'll go first?" Lakan asked. His eyes, one of them behind a monocle, gleamed with genuine joy. It only went to show how obsessed he was with this game.

"Before we decide that, let us lay out the rules—and the wager," Maomao said.

"That should be easy enough."

Jinshi stared over Maomao's shoulder at the board. Lakan fixed an unsettling grin on him, but this was one contest he wasn't going to lose. He poured ever more honey into his own smile.

It would be a standard contest of three games out of five. Jinshi simply didn't understand. The commander had never been beaten at Shogi. Maomao's very choice of game was madness. From the way Gaoshun's brow was furrowed, it seemed he shared Jinshi's opinion. What could be going through Maomao's head?

"What pieces do you want for your handicap? A rook, perhaps?

Or a bishop?" Lakan said.

"I don't need a handicap," Maomao replied. Jinshi, though, thought Lakan had been very sporting to offer one, and that Maomao should have politely accepted it.

"Very well. If I win, you'll become my child."

Jinshi nearly objected aloud to this, but Gaoshun stopped him.

They had promised not to speak.

"I'm currently employed, so you would have to wait until my term of service expires."

"Employed?" The fox-like eyes glanced in Jinshi's direction. He never let his smile slip, though he had to resist a twitching in his cheeks. "Are you really?"

"Yes, and the paperwork says so."

And so it did—at least, that was what the paper Maomao had seen said. But suppose it had been the old madam—her guardian, after a fashion—who had actually signed it? The man who was effectively Maomao's adoptive father had pinched the brush right out of Maomao's hand.

"Well, I hope it's all in order. But more importantly..." Lakan studied her. "...what will you ask for?"

"Yes, the wager I request." Maomao closed her eyes. "Perhaps

I could ask you to purchase one courtesan from the Verdigris

House?"

Lakan stroked his chin. "I must say, of everything I thought you might ask for, I didn't expect that."

Maomao remained completely impassive. "The madam is looking to clear out those who are getting on in years. I won't stipulate who you must buy out."

"So it's come to that." Lakan looked absolutely exasperated somehow. And then he grinned. "But if that's what you request, then that's what I must accept. Is that all you ask for?"

Maomao regarded Lakan coldly. "Perhaps I could also stipulate two additional rules."

"Name them."

"All right." Maomao produced a bottle of wine she'd asked Gaoshun to prepare. She poured equal amounts into five separate cups. The smell suggested it was distinctly potent stuff.

Then Maomao produced some medicine packets from her sleeve and sprinkled one into three of the cups. They each contained similar-looking powder. She gave each cup a gentle tilt, dissolving the powder, then quickly shuffled the five cups around until it was impossible to say which were which.

"After each game, the winner will pick one of these cups and the loser must drink from it. The loser doesn't have to drain the entire cup; a mouthful will do."

Jinshi was getting a very, very bad feeling about this. He moved from directly behind Maomao over to one side. He had the impression that her face had taken on a slight flush. Previously so emotionless, her lips now flirted with a smile.

He knew what caused Maomao to make that face. He wanted to know what the powder was but didn't dare ask. He was angry at himself for not being able to ask.

Lakan voiced the question instead. "What was that powder you put in them?"

"A drug. Medicinal, in small quantities." But, Maomao added, all three cups together would be tremendously poisonous. She managed to say this with a smile on her face, strange girl that she was. "The other rule I request," she said, "is that if a person abandons a game for any reason, it will be considered a loss.

Those are my two rules."

She gently rocked the cups that might or might not have been poisoned. Her hand was stained red, and on that hand the pinky finger was deformed.

Lakan stared intently at that finger.

Maomao thought of the most terrible things, Jinshi reflected. Even knowing it would be all right as long as one didn't drink all three cups, she seemed cavalier about it. Was she trying to gain a psychological advantage? True, any ordinary opponent might have been shaken by the extra pressure. But this wasn't an ordinary opponent; it was the master strategist himself, widely regarded as a superlative player. It would take more than a little scare tactic to bend him out of shape.

As anyone might have predicted, Maomao lost the first two games in a row.

Jinshi had thought maybe she at least knew the ins and outs of the game, but it became clear that she knew the rules at best, and had no real experience of actual play. She had already drunk down two of the cups; quite eagerly, in fact.

For the umpteenth time, Jinshi asked himself what she could

be thinking.

The third game had only just begun, but the outcome already seemed apparent. When Maomao drank that third cup, she might poison herself. The chances of picking one of the drugged cups were three out of five the first time, and after the second game, two out of four. After this last game, the chance would be one out of three. In other words, there was a one-in-ten chance that she was about to poison herself horribly.

Jinshi wasn't sure which was more frightening: the thought that Maomao might poison herself, or the realization that he knew she might drink the poison and be just fine. He wasn't sure if Lakan knew how resilient Maomao was when it came to toxic substances.

He looked at Gaoshun, wondering what they would do when the winner was decided. At that moment, there came a voice: "Check." But the voice didn't belong to Lakan; it was Maomao's. Jinshi and Gaoshun both looked at the board to discover Maomao's gold general closing in on Lakan's king. The way she had used her pieces was pathetic, amateurish—but there was no denying that the king had been trapped with no escape.

"Well, heck. I yield." Lakan put his hands up.

"A win is a win, even if you gave it to me, yes?" Maomao said.

"So it is. God knows I can't poison my own daughter, even if I do it by mistake."

Maomao's expression hadn't changed as she drank the two cups; it was impossible to know whether there had been drugs in them or not. Lakan gazed at his expressionless daughter with a somewhat cowed smile. "That drug you used—does it have any taste?" he asked.

"It's quite salty. You'll know at the first sip."

"Fine, then. Which one will you pick for me?"

"Take whichever one you like."

So that was it: Lakan could afford to lose two games. If either of the drinks he took tasted salty, he would know Maomao was out of danger. The percentages were the same, but this was a much safer method. Nothing escaped this man.

Lakan took the cup in the center and brought it to his lips.

"Oof. Salty."

Jinshi hung his head. To his ears, the words signaled that it would all be over with the next game. He wondered what he would do now...

"And...warm." He looked up when he heard that. Lakan's face was bright red, and he was swaying unsteadily. Then the blood drained from his face, and suddenly he slumped over, pale as a sheet.

Gaoshun rushed over and propped Lakan up.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Jinshi demanded. "You said one dose of that drug was safe!" No matter how much she hated Lakan, he couldn't believe she would actually poison him.

"I did. And it is," Maomao replied, appearing thoroughly vexed.

She picked up a carafe of water nearby and brought it over to Gaoshun and Lakan. She pried Lakan's eyes open to make sure he wasn't comatose, then dumped water into his mouth, forcing him to drink. She wasn't exactly gentle.

"Master Jinshi," Gaoshun said, perplexed. "He appears to be...drunk."

"Alcohol is the king of all drugs," Maomao commented. She had, she said, simply added a bit of salt and sugar to help the body absorb it. She was attending to Lakan, albeit with a minimum of enthusiasm. Despite her distaste for him, she was evidently going to do justice to her vocation as an apothecary.

"And this man is not a drinker," she said.

With that, Jinshi finally understood what she had been plotting all along. He realized that he had only ever seen Lakan drink juice, never alcohol.

"All right," Maomao said, scratching the back of her head and looking at Jinshi. "Let's drag him off to the brothel so he can pick a flower."

She sounded practically disinterested. Jinshi could only offer a stunned "Right."

Chapter 20: Balsam and Woodsorrel

An old memory came back to him. So many scenes in black and white—this one alone boasted some faint red. It seemed he had trouble seeing things others saw easily, but this alone shone bright and clear.

Red. Red were the fingers that held the Go stones or Shogi tiles.

His toned, rippling muscles would have been the envy of anyone. Only one person seemed unimpressed by them: that great lady, the esteemed courtesan Fengxian.

He was sometimes obliged to visit brothels when out socially with others, but to be blunt, they were of little interest to him. He couldn't drink alcohol, and dancing or erhu performances didn't excite him. No matter how beautifully a woman dressed, she looked like nothing more than a plain white Go stone to him.

He had been this way for a long time: he couldn't tell one human face from another. But even this was an improvement. It was bad enough to confuse one's mother with his wet nurse, but he couldn't even tell men apart from women.

His father, feeling that there was nothing he could do for his child, had begun seeing a young lover. His mother promptly began plotting to get back her husband—though he had abandoned his child because the boy couldn't identify his own father's face!

Thus, despite being born the eldest son of a prominent family, Lakan had lived his life with an unusual amount of freedom—a blessing, as far as he was concerned. He lost himself in Go and Shogi, which he learned by playing game after game; he kept his ear to the ground for rumors, and once in a while he pulled a little prank.

That time he made blue roses bloom in the palace? That was something he'd tried after hearing his uncle talk about it. His uncle wasn't always the most pleasant person, but was, the young man felt, the only one who understood him. It was his uncle who told him to focus not on people's faces, but on their voices, their body language, their silhouettes. It made life a little easier when he started to assign Shogi pieces to those he was closest to; over time he reached a point where only those he had no interest in were Go stones, while those he was starting to become more intimate with appeared as Shogi tiles.

When his uncle began to appear as a dragon king—a promoted rook—the young man knew for certain that his uncle was a person of great accomplishment.

To him, Go and Shogi were simply games, extensions of his leisure. He never imagined that they would reveal his true aptitudes. His family background afforded him another stroke of luck: although he had no special martial talents, he was promptly made a captain. He knew he didn't have to be strong and powerful, though; if he used his subordinates wisely, the profit would come. Shogi with human pieces was the most interesting game of all.

He continued undefeated in both his games and his work until a spiteful colleague introduced him to the famed courtesan. Fengxian had never lost to anyone at her brothel, and he had never lost to anyone in the army. Whichever of them had their streak broken in this game, the spectators would enjoy themselves.

He discovered then that he had been like a frog living at the bottom of a well. Fengxian all but broke him over her knee. Even though she held the white stones, meaning she had the disadvantage of playing second, she amassed a crushing amount of territory. She took the stones in her delicately painted fingers and systematically cut him down to size.

He could hardly remember the last time he had lost a game. He didn't feel anger so much as a sort of awe at the remorseless wound she had inflicted on him. Fengxian resented that he had taken her lightly: he surmised as much from the way she never said a word, the way even her movements were dismissive, as if the game hardly warranted her attention.

Entirely without meaning to, he started laughing, so hard he clutched his sides. The onlookers murmured; they thought he had gone insane. He laughed so hard his eyes blurred with tears, but when he looked at the merciless courtesan, he saw not the usual white Go stone, but the face of a woman in an ill humor. The look in her eyes would let no one get close to her. Like her namesake, the balsam, Fengxian seemed as if she might burst at the slightest touch.

Was this what human faces looked like?

It was the first time he had experienced something other people took for granted.

Fengxian whispered something to an apprentice who was attending her. The little girl pattered away and returned with a Shogi board. The courtesan, so lofty that she wouldn't even allow a man to hear her voice at their first meeting, was challenging him to another game.

This time, he wouldn't lose.

He rolled up his sleeves and began setting out his pieces.

The woman named Fengxian had her pride as a courtesan if nothing else. Perhaps it was because she had been born in a brothel. She sometimes said that she had no mother, only a woman who bore her—for in the pleasure district, courtesans could not be mothers.

Their acquaintance continued for years and years, and during their meetings they would focus on one thing only: playing Go or Shogi. Gradually, though, they saw each other less frequently. As accomplished courtesans grew more popular, they also became more reluctant to take customers, and Fengxian was no exception.

Fengxian was intelligent, but flinty and hard; this might not have appealed to most people, but there was a small cadre of diehards who ate it up. Perhaps there's no accounting for taste.

Her price kept going up, until it was all he could do to see her once every few months.

Once when he went to the brothel to see her after a long absence, he found her painting her nails, looking as disinterested as ever. Red balsam flowers and some thin grass sat on a plate in front of her. When he asked what the latter was, she replied, "It's cat's paw." A plant with medicinal properties, evidently, useful to counteract bug bites and some poisons.

Interestingly, balsam and cat's paw shared an unusual characteristic: if you so much as touched the ripe seed pods, they would burst and send seeds everywhere. He picked up one of the yellow flowers, thinking that maybe he would try touching one the next time he had a chance, just to see what happened—when Fengxian said, "When will you come next?"

How strange—this from the woman who only ever sent the most impersonal notices to remind him her services were available.

"Another three months on."

"Very well."

Fengxian told an apprentice to clean up her manicure supplies, then began setting up a game of Shogi.

It was about that time that he first heard talk of Fengxian's contract being bought out. Sometimes the price had little to do with a courtesan's perceived value: some people would drive up the amount simply because they didn't like one of the other bidders.

He had managed to earn some promotions in the military, but meanwhile, his position as heir to his family's fortune had been usurped by a younger half-brother, and the bidding ultimately became impossible for him to keep up with.

So, what to do?

An awful idea entered his head, but he immediately snuffed it out.

It would have been unimaginable to actually do it.

Another three months, another trip to the brothel, and now Fengxian sat before him with two game boards ready to play, one of Go, one of Shogi.

The first words out of her mouth were: "Perhaps a wager today?"

If you win, I'll give you anything you like. And if I win, I'll take something I want.

"Choose your game."

It was Shogi at which he held the upper hand—yet when he sat, it was in front of the Go board.

Fengxian dismissed her apprentice, saying she wished to focus on the game.

He didn't know which of them had been victorious, but the next thing he knew their hands were intertwined. There were no sweet nothings from Fengxian. Nor did he feel compelled to offer any vapid words of sentiment. In that respect, perhaps, they were alike.

He heard Fengxian, cradled in his arms, whisper, "I want to play Go."

Personally, he had been thinking about some Shogi.

The misfortune began after that. The uncle with whom he had been so close was dismissed from his position. The man never had known how to play the game, and Lakan's father declared the uncle a disgrace to the family. The uncle's misadventure had not in fact done any harm to the family, but Lakan now found himself

persona non grata for having been too close to him; he was told

to go on a long trip and not come back for a while.

He could have ignored this, but it would only have been a headache later. His father was in the military, too, making him not just a parent but a superior officer. At last, he wrote to the brothel saying he would return in half a year's time. This was after he had received a letter saying the contract buy-out had fallen through.

Thus, for a time, he labored under the impression that all would be well.

Little did he imagine that it would be some three years before he came back.

When he finally returned home, he found a mountain of letters had been tossed carelessly into his dust-choked room. The branches tied to them were withered and dry, making the passage of time painfully evident.

His gaze fell on one letter that showed signs of having been opened. It was full of all the familiar banalities—but in the corner of the letter, there was a dark-red stain. He glanced into the halfopen pouch beside the letter. It, too, was stained.

He opened the pouch to discover what looked like two small twigs, or maybe lumps of clay. One of them was tiny; it looked delicate enough to crush in his hand.

He was too late realizing what they were: he had ten of them himself. This gave new meaning to the term "pinky swear."

He rewrapped the two twigs and shoved them back into the pouch, then raced for the pleasure district as fast as his horse would carry him.

When he reached the brothel, which he found looking substantially more dilapidated than when he had seen it last, there were only Go stones there. There was no one who resembled balsam, although a woman came at him with a broom.

It was the old madam; he could tell by her voice.

Fengxian was no longer there: that was the only thing the

madam said to him. A courtesan who'd been abandoned by two important prospects, had dragged the name of her establishment through the mud, and was no longer trusted by anyone had no choice but to turn tricks like a common harlot. Did he not grasp what happened to such women?

A little thought might have revealed the answer, but his head was full of Go and Shogi and nothing else, and he had been unable to arrive at the truth. Throwing himself on the ground and crying, heedless of onlookers, wouldn't turn back time. It was all his fault for being so impulsive. All of it.

Lakan sat up abruptly in bed, gripping his still-throbbing head. He recognized the room he was in. Somewhere with a fragrant but not overpowering incense.

"Are you awake now, sir?" someone said gently. A face like a white Go stone appeared before him. He recognized her from the voice.

"What am I doing here, Meimei?"

Yes, he knew this courtesan of the Verdigris House. She'd been Fengxian's apprentice long ago; the one Fengxian had ordered out of the room, in fact, if he recalled correctly. He'd seen her as an apprentice tentatively toying with Go stones from time to time, and so he had humored her with the occasional game. She always acted all embarrassed when he told her she was a pretty good player.

"A messenger from some noble brought you here and left you. My word, but you were a mess. I don't know whether your face was more red or blue!"

Meimei was more or less the only courtesan at the Verdigris House who would entertain him. It was always her room to which he was shown on his visits.

"I sure didn't think I'd end up this way." He'd assumed that if his daughter was drinking it, the alcohol couldn't be that strong. Then again, Lakan had never been very conversant with different types of alcoholic drink. Just a single swallow of this stuff had been enough to set his throat on fire. He grabbed a carafe of water from the bedside and drank lustily.

A bitter flavor spread through his mouth, and he spat the

water out before he knew what he was doing. "Wh—What is this swill?!"

"Maomao prepared it," Meimei said. He presumed she was smiling, for she covered her mouth with her sleeve. The drink was probably intended as a hangover cure, but the way it was delivered implied a touch of malice. Was it strange that, even so, he couldn't keep a grin from his face?

Beside the carafe was a paulownia-wood box.

"Well, would you look at that..."

He had sent it along with a letter a long time ago, jokingly, as if it were loot. He opened it to find a single dried rose. He hadn't realized it would retain its shape so well despite having dried out. He thought of his daughter, who reminded him of woodsorrel— cat's paw.

After those long-ago events, he had come knocking on the door of the Verdigris House again and again, each time to be met with the madam's recriminations. There's no baby here, go on home, she would shout as she thrashed him with the broom. She could be terrifying indeed.

Once, as he was sitting, exhausted, with blood dribbling down the side of his head, he noticed a child rooting around nearby. There had been grasses with some sort of yellow flowers growing by the building. When he asked the child what she was doing, she said she was going to turn the grass into medicine. Instead of the Go stone he expected to see, he perceived an emotionless face.

The girl set off running with two handfuls of grass. She was heading for someone who walked with a limp like an old man. And his face, which might have been expected to look like a Go stone, instead looked like a Shogi tile. And not simply a pawn or a knight, but a dragon king, a powerful and important piece.

He knew now who it was who had opened the one letter out of all those he had received, and the dirty pouch. For here was his uncle Luomen, who had disappeared after being banished from the rear palace. The girl with the cat's paw went trotting about after him; he called her Maomao.

Lakan pulled out the dirty pouch. It was even more worn than it used to be, since he carried it with him at all times. He knew the two twig-like objects would still be inside, wrapped in paper.

Maomao's hand had looked unsteady as she moved her tiles. Partly that could have been because she didn't play the game much. But partly it was because she was playing with her left hand. When he had looked at the red-colored fingertips, he had noted that her pinky finger on that hand was deformed.

He couldn't blame her for hating him. Not considering all he had done. But even so, he wanted to put himself near her. He was tired of a life of nothing but Go stones and Shogi tiles. That had given him the incentive he had needed to steal back his birthright, to expel his half-brother, and to adopt his nephew as his own. Then, in the course of much negotiating with the old madam and over some ten years, he had successfully paid off an amount of money equivalent to two times the damages.

It must have been around that time that he was finally allowed back into the rooms. Meimei naturally took on the role. Perhaps she was paying him back for teaching her Shogi all those years before.

Lakan continued to visit, time and time again, because the only thing he wanted was to be with his daughter. Unfortunately, one talent Lakan decidedly lacked was the ability to grasp how other people were feeling, and again and again the things he did seemed to backfire.

He tucked the pouch back among the folds of his robe. Maybe it was time to give up, at least this time. Somehow, though—call it stubbornness—he couldn't bring himself to let the matter drop completely.

And besides, he didn't like the man in her company. He stood much too close to her, and during their match, he had touched her shoulders no fewer than three times. Lakan had been peevishly pleased to see his daughter brush the hand away each time, though.

All right, how to make himself feel a little better? Lakan picked up the carafe and drank down the foul-tasting medicine. However disgusting it might have been, his daughter had made it herself.

Maybe he would spend some time deciding how to knock the bug off his flower. His thoughts were interrupted when the door flew open with a slam.

"Finally had enough sleep, have we?" a Go stone cried

hoarsely. He could tell from the voice that it was the old madam. "So you're looking to buy one of my girls, are you? You ought to know by now that a couple of thousand silver isn't going to cut it."

Still a skinflint, as ever. Lakan held his pounding head, but a wry smile appeared on his face. He put on the monocle (which he only wore for effect). "Try ten thousand. And if that's not enough, how about twenty or thirty? Admittedly, a hundred might be a bit of a stretch." Lakan winced inwardly as he spoke. They weren't small sums, even in his position. He would have to beg from his nephew for a while; the boy had some side businesses he ran.

"Well, all right. Come this way, and make it snappy. I'll even let you choose, whichever one you like." He let the madam lead him into the main room of the brothel, in which there stood a whole row of gaudily attired Go stones. Even Meimei was mixed in among them.

"Hoh, I could even pick one of the Three Princesses?"

"I said whichever one you liked, and I meant it," the madam veritably spat. "But you can expect to pay for it."

Even with this dispensation to choose freely, Lakan faced a unique problem. However fancy the girls' dresses, to him they all looked like nothing more than Go stones. He could practically hear the women smiling. He could smell their sweet fragrances. And the kaleidoscope of colors that was their outfits nearly blinded him. But that was all. He felt nothing more than that. None of them moved Lakan's heart.

He had been told to choose, though, so choose he must. Once he had purchased the girl, he could do as he pleased with her. He had enough money to keep a lady, and if she was unhappy with that, then he would give her some cash and set her free to do as she wished. Fine; surely that would be fine.

With that in mind, he turned toward Meimei. He supposed it was guilt that induced her to be so kind to him. If she hadn't left them that day, perhaps none of this would have happened. It would be well and good, he thought, to reward her decency.

At that moment, Meimei spoke. "Master Lakan." He could hear a small smile in her voice. "You must know I have my courtesan's pride. If I am your desire, then I will have no hesitation." So saying, she pattered over to the great window that looked onto the courtyard and opened it. The curtain fluttered, and a few stray flower petals drifted into the room. "But if you're going to choose, then choose with your eyes open."

"Meimei, I didn't give you permission to open that window!" the madam exclaimed, rushing to close it again.

But Lakan had already heard it, distantly. Laughter. Like a courtesan's chuckle, but somehow more innocent. He thought he caught the words of a child's song.

His eyes widened.

"What is it?" the madam asked suspiciously. Lakan gazed out the ornate window. The singing drifted to them in snatches. "What are you doing?!" Becoming increasingly agitated, she tried to grab his hand.

But she was too late. He jumped out the window and hit the ground running, dashing single-mindedly toward the source of the voice. He had never regretted his failure to exercise more bitterly than he did at this moment. Yet he ran on, even as his legs threatened to buckle underneath him.

For all the times he had been to the Verdigris House, he had never been to this particular part of it: a small building, almost a storage shed, at a distance from the main house. He could hear the song coming from within.

Trying to keep his heart from pounding clear out of his chest, Lakan opened the door. He caught a distinctive odor of medicine.

Inside was an emaciated woman. Her hair ringed her head but had no luster, and her arms lay atop her like withered branches. She reeked of illness. And there was something else: her left ring finger was deformed. Lakan could only stare in amazement. He realized then that he felt something on his cheeks.

The madam rushed up. "What are you doing? This is a sick room!" She grabbed his hand and tried to drag him away, but Lakan didn't move. He was staring, fixated on the emaciated woman. "Come on, get out of here. Come choose one of my girls."

"Yes. Right. Must make a choice." Lakan sat down slowly, making no effort to wipe away the overflowing droplets. The woman didn't seem to notice him; she only smiled and sang her little song. There was no longer any trace of the imperious bearing or the mocking look. Her heart had reverted to that of an innocent child. Yet despite her wasted state, to Lakan, she looked more beautiful than anyone in the world.

"This woman, madam. I want this woman."

"Don't be stupid. Get back in there and pick."

Lakan, though, reached into the folds of his robe, feeling around until he found a heavy pouch. He pulled it out and placed it in the woman's hand. It appeared to catch her interest; she opened it and looked inside with stiff, stilted motions. With trembling fingers, she pulled out a Go stone.

Perhaps it was only his imagination that made him think he saw a momentary flush in her face. Lakan grinned. "This is the woman I'm going to buy out, and I don't care how much it costs.

Ten thousand, twenty, it doesn't matter."

There was nothing the old madam could say to that. Meimei came up behind her, her dress dragging on the floor as she entered the room to sit across from the sick woman. She took the woman's bony hand. "If only you had said what you wanted to begin with, Elder Sister. Why didn't you speak up sooner?" Meimei seemed to be crying; he could tell when he heard the sob. "Why not let it be over before I started to hope?"

Lakan didn't understand why Meimei was crying. He was busy studying the woman, who looked affably at the Go stone. She was as beautiful as balsam.

I am so tired...

Maomao was reminded how exhausting it was to deal with people she wasn't used to. She'd helped get the soused fox-eyed man to a sleeping chamber, and now was all but stumbling home. She'd already parted ways with Jinshi and Gaoshun, who had business of their own to attend to. They'd left her with another official—the one who had accompanied her during the food poisoning investigation.

Basen, that was his name. She'd only had to meet him several times to start remembering it. He was easy to work with: he wasn't effusive, but he did his job attentively and thoroughly. It was a good combination for Maomao, who rarely felt compelled to start a conversation if someone else didn't do it first.

Seeing him again, though, had reminded Maomao that sometimes there were people you simply didn't get along with. Things you simply couldn't accept. Even if the other person had never had any malice.

As she trudged along, Maomao spied a glittering entourage. At the center of it, attended by a palace woman holding a parasol for her, was a woman in a lavish dress—Consort Loulan.

Maomao heard someone cluck their tongue. She realized Basen was beside her, watching the group through lidded eyes. He didn't seem to like it very much. Maomao briefly wondered why, but then she saw a portly court official standing and waiting for Loulan. He was flanked by men who looked like aides, and there was a train of people behind him.

When Loulan saw the portly man, she hid her mouth with a folding fan and began speaking to him in an obviously friendly manner. Notwithstanding all the ladies-in-waiting who were present, Maomao wondered if it was really all right for any consort to be speaking so intimately with a man who wasn't His Majesty.

A venomous whisper from Basen, however, answered her question. "Damned schemers, father and daughter both."

So that must be Loulan's father, the one who had pushed to have her admitted to the rear palace. Maomao had heard rumors that the man had been an influential advisor of the former emperor, but that the current ruler, who preferred to promote people on demonstrated merit, regarded him about as favorably as a black eye.

Nonetheless, Maomao shot Basen a look. She wished he wouldn't badmouth a high official out loud, even if she was the only one around. If anyone chanced to hear them, they might think she was a willing party to the conversation.

He's still young, I guess. Looking at him, it occurred to her that he wasn't much older than she was.

It had been decided that Maomao wouldn't go back to the rear palace that night, but would stay at Jinshi's residence instead.

"And here I was under the impression you despised him," Jinshi said slowly, his arms crossed. He'd gotten there before she had and had been waiting for her.

Maomao was sipping some congee Suiren had prepared. It was bad manners to talk while one ate, but she was more interested in catching up on the nutrition she'd missed during her time at the Crystal Pavilion. Suiren, shocked to see Maomao so thin when she reappeared after her stint away from Jinshi's residence, hadn't stopped at congee but was producing one dish after another. In this, too, she was like the women of the Jade Pavilion, not begrudging any task because she was a lady-in-waiting.

"I don't despise him. It's precisely because he did what he did

—and who he did—that I'm here at all."

"Who he—?" Jinshi seemed to be wondering if there wasn't a more delicate way to put that.

Not sure what he wants me to say, Maomao thought. She was only telling the truth.

"I don't know how you imagine the pleasure district works, but no courtesan has a child unless she wants to."

All courtesans routinely took contraceptive medicines or abortifacients. Even if a child was conceived, there were any number of ways to end the pregnancy early on. If they gave birth, it meant they wanted to.

"In fact, one might almost think it had been planned."

By paying attention to when a woman had her flow of blood, it was simple enough to take an educated guess when she was likely to conceive. A courtesan need only send a letter changing her partner's visit to a convenient day.

"By the commander?" Jinshi asked as he took a bite of a snack Suiren brought him.

"Women are cunning creatures," Maomao replied. Thus, when her aim had gone awry, she'd lost control of herself. She had been so far gone that she had even been willing to injure herself, and worse...

That dream the other day.

It really had happened. Not satisfied with just severing her own finger, the courtesan who had given birth to Maomao had taken her child's to add to her letter as well.

No one at the brothel ever spoke to Maomao about the courtesan who had borne her. She was well aware that the old madam had ordered everyone to stay silent on the subject. But just the atmosphere of the place, along with a modicum of curiosity, was enough to make the truth clear.

Maomao was the reason the Verdigris House had nearly gone under.

She also learned that her father was an eccentric man who loved Go and Shogi—and that all that had happened could be laid at the feet of one headstrong and selfish courtesan.

She learned one other thing, as well: the identity of this woman, whom Maomao had always been told was no longer there. The identity of the woman who, until the humiliation of her missing nose drove her insane, had always refused to go anywhere near Maomao.

That fool of a man. There were better courtesans! Why didn't he just buy one of them out? That's what he should have done...

"Master Jinshi, does that man ever speak to you anywhere but your office?"

Jinshi thought for a second. "Now that you mention it, no, he doesn't." The most he ever did, Jinshi said, was give him a quick nod of the head when they passed each other in the hallway. The only time the man ever cornered him with chatter was when he showed up at Jinshi's office.

"Once in a while," Maomao said, "you'll meet someone who can't discern people's faces. That man is one of them."

This was something Maomao's old man had told her. She'd only half believed it herself, but when he'd told her that he was like that, it had somehow seemed to make sense.

"Can't discern?" Jinshi said. "What do you mean?"

"Simply what I said. They can't seem to put faces together. They know what an eye is, or a mouth, and can perceive these different bits, but they don't register them in aggregate as distinct faces."

Her old man had been solemn as he told her this. He was communicating that even he deserved sympathy, for he had suffered much in his life because of this thing he couldn't control. Nonetheless, while her old man was compassionate, he did grasp the broader situation, and he never tried to stop the old madam from chasing the other man out of the brothel with her broom. He knew that wrong was wrong.

"For some reason, he does seem to recognize me and my adoptive father. I think that's where that stubborn obsession of his comes from."

One day, out of the blue, a strange man had appeared and tried to lead her away. The madam had shown up shortly after and beaten him with a broom, and the sight of the bruised and bloodied man had inspired fear in her young heart. Anyone would be scared by a man who reached out to them grinning even as blood poured from his face.

He showed up periodically after that, always doing something unexpected before being sent home a bloody mess. It had taught her not to be surprised by anything, or at any rate by very few things. The man kept calling himself her father, but as far as Maomao was concerned her father was her "old man," not that raving eccentric. He was, at best, the stud who had sired her.

He was trying to displace Maomao's old man, Luomen, and be her father instead, but Maomao was having none of it. This was one point on which she wouldn't bend. Everyone at the brothel told her that the woman who had given birth to her was gone—it was less trouble that way. And even if she was alive, what did Maomao care? Maomao had her old man; she was Luomen's daughter. And she was perfectly happy that way.

That man wasn't the only one responsible for her. In fact, she was grateful to him on that count. She had no memories of her

mother—only of a terrifying demon.

As for how Maomao felt toward Lakan—she might hate him, but she didn't resent him. He was clumsy about some things, but not malicious; even if he was sometimes a bit overdramatic in his reactions. If there was a question of forgiveness to be answered, well, there was at least one person who had more reason to resent him than Maomao did.

Maybe the madam's forgiven him by now, she thought.

She wondered if the man had noticed the letter in the box with the rose in it. It was the biggest concession Maomao was capable of making to her sire. Well, if he never noticed, that was fine. Let him buy out her pleasant courtesan-sister. That might be happiest all around.

"I can't help thinking it certainly looked like you hated him."

"That's simply because you don't know him very well yet,

Master Jinshi."

When Maomao had been trying to get into the ceremony, it was Lakan who had helped her. She suspected he'd had an intuition that something was going to happen. He'd never needed to look at scenes and gather evidence the way Maomao did in order to predict impending events. He seemed to simply have a nose for them. And his guesses were rarely wrong.

"Has he never wheedled you into looking into a matter you otherwise wouldn't?" Maomao asked.

Jinshi fell quiet at that, but from the way he then whispered, "So that's what that was," she presumed she had guessed correctly. Perhaps he was also the reason Lihaku had been so quick to investigate Suirei, and that the Board of Justice had responded so efficiently to her.

The one hitch with that man was that as much trouble as he put everyone else to, he never seemed to want to lift a finger himself. Just imagine what might happen if he were willing to take a public stand every once in a while.

Maybe that resurrection drug would already be within reach.

The thought pained her immensely.

He didn't understand what genius he was blessed with. This whole country held few people whom her old man would praise so openly and with such fervor. Maomao recognized this feeling: it was jealousy.

"It might be impossible to make a friend of him, but I'd suggest you not make him an enemy either." She almost spat the words—then held up her left hand and looked at the pinky finger.

"Master Jinshi, do you know something?"

"What is it?"

"If you cut off a fingertip, it will grow back."

"Must you say that while I'm eating?" He gave her an uncharacteristic glare, their usual positions reversed.

"One more thing, then."

"Yes, what?"

"If that man with his monocle ever told you to 'Call me Papa,' how would you feel?"

Jinshi paused for a moment and looked deeply disturbed:

another unusual expression for him.

"My goodness," Suiren said, putting her hand to her mouth.

"I suppose I would want to tear that stupid monocle off his face and shatter it."

"I expect so."

Jinshi seemed to understand what Maomao was getting at. He whispered a question, something about whether it was rough to be a father. Standing beside him, a twinge of grief passed over Gaoshun's face. Perhaps something about the conversation struck a nerve.

"Is something the matter?" Maomao asked, and Gaoshun gazed up at the ceiling.

"No. Only bear in mind that no father in the world wishes to be reviled," he said softly.

Well now, Maomao thought, but she only brought her spoon to her mouth, determined to finish the last of her congee.

Epilogue

Several days after Maomao returned to the rear palace, a letter from Meimei arrived, along with a package. The letter spelled out exactly whose contract had been bought out, and by whom. It must have been raining or something when she wrote, for the page was streaked with droplets.

In the small case that accompanied the letter was a lovely scarf of the kind courtesans used on celebratory occasions. Maomao was about to close the case again but thought better of it. Instead she went over to a chest of clothing, one of the furnishings in her small room, and started digging for something at the very bottom.

The lights of the pleasure quarter glittered in the distance. Maomao thought they looked even brighter and more numerous than usual. From her place atop the outer wall of the rear palace, she could hear jangling bells—courtesans dancing with their scarves, she imagined. They would wear their most beautiful outfits, wave long, flowing cloth, and scatter flower petals.

Being bought out of a contract was a cause for celebration. When all the city bloomed for one woman alone, the other flowers would dance to see her off. There would be wine and feasting, singing and dancing. The pleasure district never slept, so the carousing would go on all night.

As for Maomao, she had the gossamer scarf Meimei had sent her wrapped around her shoulders. She grasped it with her fingers. Her left leg still wasn't at its best, but she thought she could manage this. She removed her overrobe and dabbed a touch of rouge on her lips. That, too, she had received from Meimei.

It feels like some kind of joke. Maomao thought of Princess Fuyou, who had been given to a military officer in marriage the year before, an old friend of hers. Had she forgotten all about her days in the rear palace by now? Or did she sometimes remember how she once danced on these walls, night after night?

Now Maomao would do the same thing as the princess. Clad in the lovely dress her sisters had foisted on her, she called to mind the first steps of the dance she'd been taught so long ago. The rouge she'd received from her sister Meimei was on her lips. Small bells were attached to her sleeves, so she jingled with each movement. Small stones were sewn into the long skirt so that it would billow out each time Maomao spun.

Her skirt circled around her, her scarf traced an arc, and her sleeves slipped through the air. She'd let her hair down tonight, decorating it with a single rose, a small flower dyed blue.

The scarf danced; the skirt rose in time; sleeves and hair fluttered together.

Didn't think it would come back to me so easily, she mused, surprised to find the dance the old woman had taught her still within.

Her scarf billowed again—and then Maomao found herself looking directly at a very unwelcome companion. That was when she tripped on her skirt.

She fell face-first, and as she tried to protect herself from striking the ground with her nose, she tumbled—straight toward the edge of the wall. She just managed to stop herself, and someone pulled her up.

"Wh-What are you doing here?" the unexpected visitor asked, breathing hard. His hair, which had been carefully bound, was a mess now.

"I should ask you the same question, Master Jinshi," Maomao said, brushing off her dress. "Why are you here?"

He fixed her with an exasperated look. She was safely away from the edge of the wall now, but for some reason he was still holding on to her hand. "Where else was I supposed to be? When I got word a strange woman was dancing on the wall again, I had to come deal with the matter."

Huh, and I thought I'd kept a low profile. Now Maomao thought about it, though, maybe it shouldn't have been so surprising that she was noticed. Still, did this mean the guards still believed in ghosts?

"I'll thank you not to add to my workload," Jinshi said, placing his hand on Maomao's head.

"Surely you didn't have to come yourself, Master Jinshi. Couldn't you have sent someone else?" She slid her head aside, out from under his hand.

"A very kind guard recognized your face and contacted me directly," Jinshi said. Maomao touched her face. "You may think what you're doing is innocuous, but remember that it won't look that way to those who see you."

"As you say," Maomao replied. Somewhat embarrassed, she scratched her cheek. This whole endeavor was harder than she'd thought.

"That's my story," Jinshi said. "Now it's your turn. What are you doing here?"

After a moment, Maomao replied, "In the pleasure quarter, we dance to send off a courtesan who's been bought out of her contract. My celebratory outfit arrived this very day."

In truth, she'd wished to send off the courtesan who'd given her the clothes. Meimei had stuck with Maomao faithfully as she struggled to learn to dance. "I want you to be able to dance properly when I leave," her sister had always said.

Jinshi was looking at her intently. "What is it, sir?" she asked.

"I just didn't know you could dance."

"It's a basic subject of education where I grew up. I couldn't not learn it. Although admittedly, I never got good enough to perform for a paying customer."

Still, she told him, sometimes when celebrating a woman's departure, what mattered was the number of dancers more than their quality. When she said that, Jinshi looked out toward the distant lights of the pleasure district. "The rumors are already starting beyond these walls. The stories of how that eccentric bought out a courtesan."

"I imagine so."

"What's more, he's put in for leave. He plans to take off for ten straight days."

"He does know how to cause trouble."

Maomao suspected that tomorrow, another new rumor would begin as well. She didn't know how much the old kook had spent on this banquet, but judging by the number of lanterns she could see from her perch on the wall, it far outstripped what anyone would spend on the average courtesan. Meimei's letter made it sound like there would be feasting and celebrating enough for a solid week. So the tongues would wag: who had known that it wasn't only the Three Princesses at the Verdigris House? That there had been another such courtesan there?

I still think he should have taken Meimei, Maomao thought.

The sick woman, ravaged by her illness, surely didn't have long. She certainly lacked her memories of those long-ago days; all she knew was how to sing children's songs and set Go stones beside each other.

But that man had found her, after the old lady had hidden her for all those years.

I wish he hadn't, Maomao thought. Then he could have picked her wonderful sister. Meimei was overflowing with talent and still beautiful; she would have made an excellent wife. But she's

strange in her own ways.

It was Meimei who had first let the man the madam so reviled into her room. Maybe she thought it was the only thing to do with the strange person who continually came pursuing Maomao. Once he was with Meimei, he hadn't done anything, but only talked endlessly of Maomao and the woman who had borne her. Sometimes he would seat himself in front of a Go board, but they never played a game together. Instead the man would play out one old game after another from memory.

That, at least, was what Meimei told her. Maomao couldn't know for sure. Maybe Meimei was just being considerate of her. But it really didn't matter to Maomao. She would have been happy enough to see Meimei go to that man. His personality aside, at least he had plenty of money; her sister wouldn't have wanted for anything in her life. Maomao wanted to know what there was not to like about her sister.

"I can't help wondering who in the world he bought out," Jinshi said. He'd known of the wager, but evidently hadn't imagined the celebrations would be so momentous. He was surprised to discover the man was even more eccentric than he had realized. "Yes, I wonder who it could be."

"Do you know?"

In response, Maomao only closed her eyes.

"You do know, don't you?"

"No woman he chose could be more gorgeous than you are,

Master Jinshi."

"That's not what I asked."

He doesn't deny it, though, she thought. She suspected Jinshi wasn't the only one wondering. The whole palace—probably the whole capital—would be asking the same question. The courtesan for whom all this fuss was being made must be resplendently dressed, but she would never appear in public. There would be only rumors, and they would only grow. People would ask themselves what woman could have so caught the eye of a man like him, how beautiful she must be.

And won't the old hag be pleased, Maomao thought. People would be talking about the Verdigris House for quite a while to come. More than a few officials would come knocking on the door —purely out of curiosity, of course.

Maomao's whole body felt hot. Maybe it was because she hadn't danced in so long. Her feet in particular tingled, and when she looked down, she saw her skirt was tinged with red.

"Oh, shit," she said and grabbed up her skirt.

"Wh-What are you doing?!" Jinshi cried, his voice scratching.

Maomao looked at her leg and made a face. The heat had become pain. Her experiments with medicines had dulled her perception of such sensations. She'd been convinced the wound in her leg had healed pretty thoroughly, but her dancing had torn it right open again.

"Huh, guess it opened up again..."

"You act like it did that on its own!"

"Don't worry, I'll sew it right back up." Maomao rooted among her discarded overgarments and came up with some disinfectant alcohol and a needle and thread.

"Why are you so prepared for this exact situation?!"

"You never know." Maomao was just about to make the first stitch when Jinshi grabbed the needle. "You can't sew, sir," she said.

"Don't do it here!" No sooner had he spoken than he hefted Maomao into his arms and made his way deftly down the wall without so much as a ladder. Maomao was so stunned she didn't even think to struggle. When they reached the ground, she assumed he would put her down, but instead he continued to carry her, though he shifted her somewhat in his arms.

"What are you doing that for?" she asked.

"It was getting hard to hold you."

"Then put me down."

"And let you make it worse?" Jinshi pursed his lips. He had his arms around Maomao, and she found it most uncomfortable how close her face was to his.

How do I end up in these situations? she thought, but she said, "What if someone sees us, sir?"

"No one will see us. It's too dark. Besides—" He lifted her slightly and adjusted his grip so she wouldn't fall. "—this is the

second time I've held you like this."

The second time? she thought. Oh!

It must have been the day she'd injured her leg. She'd been unconscious; someone had carried her away from the scene. It would make a lot of sense if it had been Jinshi. Which would mean he had picked her up in front of an entire ceremony's worth of people...

There was something more important, though, something she'd been forgetting. She'd meant to say it for so long, and she deeply regretted not having said it before. She pressed a handkerchief to the blood that dribbled down her calf.

"Master Jinshi," she began. "I know this is hardly an ideal moment, but if I may, there's something I've been meaning to say to you for quite a long time."

"Why so formal all of a sudden?" Jinshi asked, somewhat perplexed.

"Sir, I simply must say it."

"Well, then, out with it!" Jinshi responded.

"Very well," Maomao said, looking Jinshi full in the face. "Sir...

Please give me my ox bezoar."

Jinshi's head connected with Maomao's with a thwack, and she saw stars.

A headbutt! Right out of the blue! It crossed her mind that

perhaps he'd only been leading her on the entire time.

"Sir, don't tell me... You don't have it?"

"Please. Surely you have a little more respect for me than that." As Maomao looked at him questioningly, the slightest of smiles crossed Jinshi's face.

The rapid change in the eunuch's expression from annoyance to amusement reminded her how immature he could seem. But then again, she found him easier to talk to that way, she thought, as she rocked in his arms.

No one knew quite where the rumor had started—but word was that some profligate noble from the great country that occupied the middle of the continent was buying up every kind of rare and unusual medicament he could find. It was during an afternoon tea party that Maomao first heard that Jinshi's office was so full of get-well flowers he could hardly get inside. She only took a bite of her peach bun and commented, "Huh."