Chapter 79: Whispers of Power (2/2)
Fang He, in her bold attempt to intimidate others, had left traces she hadn’t fully erased.
Kangxi, knowing the matter couldn’t be hidden, preemptively outlined her punishment to spare her his grandmother’s wrath.
Xiaozhuang gave him a knowing, half-smirking glance.
“You’re quick to find a place for her.”
Pregnancy or not, her audacity was reckless.
Xiaozhuang didn’t mind Fang He’s tactics but couldn’t tolerate her flouting imperial authority.
If it were up to her, after the child’s birth, Fang He should be sent to the family temple to learn humility.
She’d been outside the palace before; it wouldn’t hurt to go again.
But with Kangxi’s punishment and mention of the Empress Dowager, Xiaozhuang relented, waving a hand.
“Fine, no need for evasions. Let her focus on the pregnancy. Where she lives later can be decided then. Her rank stays as is. A mere consort, and she’s nearly turned the palace upside down. What would happen if she rose higher?”
She didn’t mind her grandson having a trusted companion, but not one he couldn’t bear to punish.
Kangxi rose respectfully and said “I agree, Grandmother. I’ll follow your guidance.”
He had no intention of granting Fang He further favor or rank.
With the Empress Dowager’s protection, a child, and her own fierce resolve, she needed no title to avoid being bullied.
That night in Yanxi Palace, every word Fang He spoke—her cold laughter, regret, and disgust—remained etched in his mind, turning his painstaking efforts into a mockery.
Kangxi might not grasp the depths of devotion, but for her… his feelings were a tangled mix of love and hate, with hate burning brighter.
He had no desire to see her again.
On the imperial palanquin returning to Qianqing Palace, his face stern, Kangxi gazed at the lingering snow, thinking faintly that he’d cleaned up her mess, giving her an explanation.
With the Empress Dowager’s care, she needed neither his concern nor wanted it.
Eight days later, on the eve of the Laba Festival, the rich aroma of Laba porridge wafted from the imperial kitchens.
Even in Hongde Hall, Kangxi caught its scent.
But as he studied the medical report before him, his brow furrowed.
After a long moment, he crumpled it and flung it at Li Dequan’s hat.
“Go tell Zhang Wenqin that if he can’t write a proper medical report, he can return to the Imperial Medical Bureau and send someone who can!”
Li Dequan didn’t dare utter a word, snatching the crumpled paper and slipping out of the hall with practiced haste, heading straight for the Imperial Pharmacy.
The moment Zhang, the imperial physician, spotted Li Dequan, a dull ache throbbed at his temples, urging him to flee on the spot.
“Hey, hey, hey! Don’t go, Physician Zhang!” Li Dequan called, hurrying to block his path, a strained smile on his face as he thrust the paper ball forward with both hands.
“His Majesty said… well, you know, the usual. You understand, don’t you?”
Zhang’s eyes brimmed with unshed tears.
Truth be told, his years in the Imperial Medical Bureau had been built on more than just medical skill—he had a knack for gauging the Emperor’s moods, securing his place in the pharmacy.
In all his years of service, he’d never misread His Majesty’s pulse.
Among the six imperial physicians, he alone had escaped punishment.
But ever since he began attending to that lady in Yanxi Palace, every attempt at drafting a medical report made him want to faint.
If he detailed the pulse, he was accused of forgetting a physician’s duty.
If he included the full scope of observation, inquiry, and diagnosis, he was scolded for verbosity, missing the point.
When he tried brevity, His Majesty berated him for laziness and evasion.
This time, he’d crafted a report both concise and eloquent, even consulting the scholars of the Southern Study for finesse, carefully veiling the critical details.
With a pained expression, Zhang pleaded, “Deputy Li, can’t you just tell me what His Majesty wants to see? What am I doing wrong?”
Li Dequan, rubbing his hat brim—still stinging from the memory of flying paper—had no desire for another projectile, painless though it was.
Leaning closer, he whispered, “Pregnant women, aren’t they all the same? Is she vomiting? Eating well? Sleeping soundly? How’s her mood? Any aches or itches?”
Zhang stared, dumbfounded.
This was a palace consort, not his wife at home—did he dare ask such intimate details?
Yet, in this palace, every soul was harder to please than any housewife.
Head pounding, Zhang resolved to try, unwilling to slink back to the Medical Bureau in disgrace.
On the day of the Laba Festival, Zhang’s submitted report finally included, at its close, what Kangxi wanted to see: “Consort Zhao’s pulse is stable… fetal movement observed, no vomiting, normal appetite, and sound in body and mind. Due to her condition, she experiences coccyx pain, disrupting sleep, though side-lying brings relief…”
Kangxi let out a cold laugh.
As expected, that reckless woman only vomited in his presence, not otherwise.
That day’s display wasn’t due to her pregnancy.
His expression grew frostier, the air around him so heavy that Li Dequan braced for another paper ball to the head.
But Kangxi merely tossed the report aside, silent.
After lunch, sipping Laba porridge, Kangxi tossed restlessly during his nap, unable to sleep.
He rose to tackle memorials instead.
The year-end pile was endless, but even emperors run out of tasks.
With no mood for the Southern Study or the training grounds, he finished the day’s work barely half an hour after dinner.
Feeling a chill in the hall, he approached the window, noticing fresh snow falling—large flakes, reminiscent of the night he sent Fang He to Yanxi Palace.
He wondered if the rear hall there was cold, if the meals arrived hot…
Irritating thoughts flickered through his mind, and after a moment, he laughed bitterly.
To think an emperor, spurned by her disgust, should find a corner of his own palace off-limits!
As she’d said, why should it be so?
His face hardened, and he strode out.
Liang Jiugong hurried after him, while Li Dequan, nearly jogging, ordered the sedan chair prepared.
At the palanquin, Liang Jiugong ventured cautiously, “Your Majesty, where are we headed?”
Kangxi shot him a withering glance and said, “If you don’t need that tongue, I’ll have it removed.”
Liang Jiugong chuckled nervously, whispering to the bearers, “Yanxi Palace, quick now—don’t let His Majesty… ahem, catch a chill!”
Kangxi glared, silently vowing to deal with that meddlesome servant someday.
As Kangxi passed through Rijing Gate, Fang He noticed the snow.
Fresh from a steaming hotpot, warmed by braziers and almost too hot, she longed to step outside.
Pregnancy felt like a marvel to her—a lazy, gluttonous soul like hers, now restless with child.
Lying down hurt her hips, sitting made her fidgety.
She loved wandering, shunning the smells of smoke, incense, or even fruit, craving instead the crisp, cold air outside.
Her maids, Cui Wei and Wei Zhu, were at their wits’ end, coaxing her to stay indoors to avoid catching cold, their hair practically falling out from worry.
Now, seeing Fang He slip toward the couch’s edge, Cui Wei’s left eyelid twitched violently.
She rushed over, pleading, “How about I open a window a crack?”
Fang He, clutching her belly, slipped on her non-slip shoes.
“Peeking through a window slit to admire snow? That’s unfair to the treasure in my tummy. Baby says it wants to watch snowflakes fall from the sky.”
Cui Wei’s face went blank.
“Did your little master not mention the cold outside, or the medicine you’d need if you fell ill?”
Fang He waved dismissively.
“What? My treasure trusts Aunt Fule. Maybe it’s worried its mama’s overheating and needs a walk.”
Clinging to Cui Wei’s arm, her voice dripped with honey.
“Good Cui Wei, I’ll just stand under the corridor, never straying from the brazier! Last time, I missed the snow. Let me have a peek—by the time baby can see snow itself, it’ll be next year.”
Resigned, Cui Wei ordered Liu An and Chenshun to move the brazier to the corridor, along with a fur-lined rocking chair and a thick blanket.
With Chunlai, she carefully escorted Fang He outside.
Finally outdoors after a day confined, Fang He breathed the fresh, icy air, watching snowflakes dance mischievously in the twilight.
Poetic inspiration struck.
“Ah!” she exclaimed, arms outstretched, sauntering toward the chair.
“Auspicious snow heralds a prosperous year—here comes more wealth!”
Since her pregnancy was announced, though confined to Yanxi Palace, gifts poured in from Cining and Shoukang Palaces, alongside congratulatory presents from other consorts.
Oddly, while Xiaozhuang and the Empress Dowager sent nourishing herbs and tonics, the other consorts gifted gold, silver, and jewels—items easy to inspect and hard to tamper with.
Consort Yi was the most generous, sending a chest of small goldfish ornaments, explaining they were for Fang He to reward her staff.
Fang He declared she welcomed such “insults” in abundance.
“Ah!” Thinking of her storeroom’s riches, her smile widened, but before she could wax poetic, Cuifuquan, the gatekeeper, scurried over, panting as he saluted.
“My lady, His Majesty is coming this way.”
Fang He’s grin vanished.
“Wealth or no wealth, I still answer to authority!”
She turned briskly toward the hall.
“I should’ve listened to Aunt Cui and stayed inside. My baby’s afraid of the cold.”
Cui Wei, exasperated, muttered, “Your treasure’s quite the fickle one, taking after its mama.”
As front-hall maids, Cui Wei and Wei Zhu had no time to glare at the giggling junior maids.
Hearing the report, they rushed to prepare.
Chunlai helped Fang He settle onto the couch, hesitating before asking softly, “My lady, if His Majesty comes, will you see him?”
Fang He sipped honeysuckle dew, sighing contentedly before smiling.
“No.” It wasn’t refusal—it was a choice, one born of the tangled emotions that still lingered from their last encounter.
“The Emperor won’t come back here,” Fang He declared, her tone firm.
Chunlai, however, was skeptical.
If His Majesty had no intention of visiting, why come to Yanxi Palace at all?
She slipped out to check, only to see the main hall’s lanterns flicker to life.
The front and rear halls were separated by a mere corridor, so sounds from the front carried faintly to the back.
With her keen ears, Chunlai heard more clearly than most: not a single footstep approached the rear hall.
Her eyes clouded with confusion.
What was His Majesty doing here?
Kangxi, his face a mask of indifference, lingered in the main hall, gazing at the falling snow before settling in under Liang Jiugong’s attentive care.
As the candles in the hall were snuffed out, leaving only a dim glow, Cui Wei and Wei Zhu exchanged bewildered glances.
Liang Jiugong, more attuned to his master’s moods than most, understood.
After instructing Li Dequan to stand watch, he tiptoed out, passing the two maids and muttering as if to himself, “Strange, isn’t it? The master arrives in the main hall, yet no one from the rear comes to pay respects.”
Cui Wei and Wei Zhu froze, catching his meaning.
The Emperor had brought his imperial pride from Qianqing Palace to Yanxi Palace’s main hall, laying out a path for their lady to climb.
Cui Wei wavered, tempted to act, but Wei Zhu’s expression remained steady.
As she moved to head to the rear, he stopped her.
“It’s snowing, and our lady is heavy with child. A fall would be no small matter.”
Though he was a eunuch, Wei Zhu grasped a simple truth: if someone truly cared, they wouldn’t let the object of their concern face even the slightest risk.
If their lady didn’t wish to see the Emperor, no one—not even His Majesty—would force her hand.
Cui Wei hesitated, glancing at the main hall, and nodded.
The little master was paramount.
Without that child, they might all be languishing in the Punishment Bureau.
So, the next morning, as Liang Jiugong attended Kangxi to court, the rear hall remained silent.
Though Kangxi’s face betrayed nothing, Liang Jiugong’s heart thudded with unease.
He shot Cui Wei and Wei Zhu several reproachful glares, frustrated by their inaction.
They only bowed their heads, ignoring his ire, while Liang Jiugong fumed, tempted to curse aloud.
Refusing a ladder to the heavens?
They’d regret it when their lady was trampled into the mud.
To Liang Jiugongs’s surprise, however, his master’s patience proved greater than before.
Kangxi began visiting Yanxi Palace nearly every other day, staying only in the main hall.
With no outsiders allowed and news sealed within, no one could tell if he was there to accompany Consort Zhao or merely to handle memorials as usual.
Liang Jiugong began to suspect: was His Majesty appearing so frequently to counter rumors of her disfavor, protecting the unborn heir?
He tested the waters once, saying, “Your Majesty, Physician Zhang just attended the consort. Shall I check on her?”
Kangxi glanced out the window, his voice calm but distant.
“No need.”
If that reckless woman wanted to see him, her fiery spirit would have found a way, even past his guards.
Her silence spoke clearly—she had no desire to meet him.
Why force it?
Liang Jiugong, seeing his master’s composed yet faintly wounded demeanor, felt a pang of sympathy.
When had the Emperor ever humbled himself so?
But an emperor’s dignity could not—must not—be cast aside.
Cui Wei posed a similar question to Fang He.
“My lady, whatever His Majesty’s reasons for coming, it’s eased our days. The Imperial Household is warmer to us now, no longer skimping with year-end excuses. You’ve heard of recent palace events… for the little master’s sake, shouldn’t you at least pay respects?”
Fang He rose, drifting to a window overlooking the main hall, staring silently at the snow-draped scene.
She knew her earlier actions had been rash, yet given the chance, she’d choose the same again.
She and Kangxi were cut from the same cloth—orphaned in spirit if not in fact, clawing through bittersweet struggles to survive, prickly as hedgehogs.
Neither trusted easily, both fiercely self-reliant, their empathy reserved for themselves.
His heart, vast with compassion, held too many; hers, shallow, had room only for herself and her child.
Even if a spark of affection flickered between them, closeness only sharpened the barbs that wounded.
Better to keep their distance, preserving what little good remained.
Her thoughts veered toward melancholy—hardly ideal for a pregnant woman.
Sweetness was the cure.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands and spinning around, startling the maids who thought her lost in sentiment.
“I just remembered—hedgehog candy! It’s delicious and easy to make with a clay stove. Since His Majesty’s here, we could ask the kitchen for sticky rice and brown sugar. No need to spend a coin, right?”
The room fell silent, the maids staring.
After all that gazing, she was thinking of food?