Chapter 5

The Emperor had expected the Prince of An.

When his study door opened, the smile had not yet left his face.

“P-Pei, my minister… why have you returned?”

Pei Zhao placed An’s head beside the imperial desk.

The Emperor collapsed, his voice changing.

“An… Prince An…”

“He led troops against my pregnant wife. I have dealt with him for Your Majesty.”

Pei Zhao unfolded the secret letter so its writer could recognize his own hand.

The Emperor still tried to deny it.

“I… I never…”

“The messenger confessed. An’s deputy is still alive too.”

He set a prepared document before him.

The abdication decree lay on the desk beside the bloody head.

Reading it, the Emperor finally burst into curses.

“Pei Zhao… you mean to rebel?”

“You sent twenty thousand men to kill my wife and child and still expect me to keep this chair secure for you?”

Pei Zhao pressed a hand onto the decree.

“Affix the seal. Retire to the imperial tombs.

“Refuse, and you won’t leave alive.”

With a blade at his throat, the Emperor’s resolve dissolved.

“I’ll sign… I’ll sign…”

The jade seal came down.

That same night, the former Emperor was taken to the tombs.

The palace guards saw the letter themselves. They saw the wounds on An’s corpse after his siege against a pregnant woman. None wanted another battle on the Emperor’s behalf.

The next day, the officials learned of the abdication.

Whatever they thought, for the time being they could only acknowledge the sealed decree and the troops throughout the capital who had submitted.

Pei Zhao invented no fine account of receiving Heaven’s mandate. He wanted the result, not the former Emperor’s heartfelt acceptance.

Before leaving, the deposed ruler called bitterly through the hall’s doorway.

“You’ve won… but what do you want?”

Pei Zhao said he had promised to make me the mother of a child who stood above ten thousand others. He could not break his word.

As he finished, one of his guards rode through the palace gate.

“My lady is giving birth!”

Without even putting away the decree, Pei Zhao turned, mounted, and rushed home.

At the residence, labor had begun suddenly. The siege’s fright and too much exertion had brought the child half a month early.

By the time he kicked open the outer door to the birthing room, I was almost too exhausted to curse.

The midwife kept urging me to push. The baby’s head was showing; delay might suffocate it.

Gripping a cloth tied beside the bed, my fingers numb, I said, “I… I really have nothing left…”

“Then find it! One more push!”

Someone tried to stop him outside, saying he could not enter.

He kicked the door open and came straight to my bed.

Blood still stained his armor. Reaching for my hand, he hesitated, afraid of dirtying me.

Pain whitened my vision, yet I couldn’t help laughing.

“What are you doing here… Don’t you want your realm?”

“The realm won’t run away. You’re in pain.”

Removing his bloodstained arm guard, he took my hand and told me to bite him if it hurt.

When the midwife counted again, I really did bite his wrist, spending the last of my strength in that final pain.

A newborn’s cry rang out.

Everyone breathed in relief.

I could not relax yet. The placenta had not come, and contractions still gripped my belly.

Seeing the midwife continue working, Pei Zhao held the baby, unable either to stand still or sit. Finally, he gave it to the wet nurse and returned for me to grip his hand.

Beyond the curtain, the physician asked how much blood I had lost. The midwife answered clearly.

Only once they confirmed there was no sign of hemorrhage did the tense room truly breathe.

The midwife cut the cord and cleaned the child before handing him to Pei Zhao.

He had just forced an Emperor to abdicate at swordpoint. Now, holding a wrinkled infant, he scarcely dared move his arms.

“He’s so small…”

“Newborns all are. Don’t hold him so tightly. You’ll hurt him.”

He loosened his hold immediately, unable to hide his reddened eyes.

Bringing the baby beside me, he asked if I still hurt, then pressed the physician about any danger.

Only after hearing that mother and son were safe did he kiss my sweat-soaked forehead.

“Zhao Yan, thank you.”

“If you really want to thank me, first do what you promised.”

He knew what I meant. That night, he ordered the Ministry of Rites to prepare the accession and investiture ceremonies.

Bells rang throughout the capital next day.

Accepting the abdication decree, he became Emperor.

Some officials urged him to stabilize matters first. Appointing an Empress and Crown Prince could wait.

He rejected that suggestion in open court.

The edict named me Empress and our son Crown Prince.

He did not use the opportunity to purge every former official. He punished only those involved in the siege. Vacant offices went to commanders who had actually defended the capital.

I asked why he hadn’t replaced everyone who opposed him.

He said if the court held only men who nodded, when famine came next year, no one would dare tell the Emperor the granaries were empty.

That I understood, so I left it alone.

He had given me a tally commanding his guards and the title of Empress—not a seat in the Golden Throne Hall to review memorials for him. Each of us doing what we did well meant fewer quarrels.

The official who came to proclaim the edicts told me all this in my chamber.

Unable to leave bed, I reclined on the phoenix couch, eating grapes peeled by the new Emperor himself.

“If those officials saw you doing this, would they faint with anger?”

“An’s twenty thousand men didn’t worry me. What are a few fainting officials?”

He offered a seedless grape to my lips.

“Recover properly. We’ll govern this realm together.”

Deliberately finding fault, I said he hadn’t peeled it cleanly.

He lowered his head and patiently removed the last thin skin, showing not a trace of impatience.

Three months later, for my grand investiture, the Ministry of Rites had the long steps washed free of every speck of dust.

Pei Zhao appointed no other consorts.

Twice, officials suggested expanding the harem. Both times, his questions silenced them.

Holding my hand, he climbed the jade steps. Behind us, the wet nurse carried the Crown Prince.

The ceremonial official had prepared a lengthy address. By its third section, my attention wandered.

Noticing, Pei Zhao ordered it shortened, retaining only the formal investiture text and presentation of the seal.

When the officials knelt, I was not thinking of the realm’s people.

I remembered the rush cushion in the Song main hall, where they had tried to make me kneel and serve Su Wantang tea.

Both occasions made someone bow.

The Songs had relied on controlling a woman with nowhere to go.

Pei Zhao gave me a publicly acknowledged place, unique and beyond anyone’s taking.

“Nervous?”

“No. Just remembering that a year ago, my husband drugged me and gave me away.”

“Then you should thank Song Jing’an.”

I turned to glare.

“And thank you too, I suppose?”

Suppressing laughter, he held my hand tighter.

After the ceremony, the phoenix carriage traveled through the city’s long streets.

Beside a gutter, I saw several people in rags.

With no one to care for her after her stroke, my mother-in-law had survived by begging.

Recognizing me, she struggled toward us, but fell before two steps.

Later, a guard reported she died that night in a ruined temple. No one collected her body.

She had helped her son force medicine on me and take me to be drowned.

After confiscation, she lost even the standing to claim a little grain on account of her age.

Yet to the end, she believed I was at fault for not obediently dying. She never wondered why she herself had ended in an abandoned temple.

The man sprawled beside the gutter was Song Jing’an.

His leg had been injured in prison. Afterward, he was turned out to beg.

Seeing me and the Crown Prince in the carriage, he smashed his chipped bowl and hoarsely called my name.

I did not stop.

Next day, someone found he had dashed himself to death against the wall behind the prison.

He still clutched half an old wooden tablet recording his scholarly distinction.

Su Wantang fled with all the money and a thug. He cheated her of everything. After contracting various illnesses, she died in the paupers’ burial ground outside the city.

I had it investigated. Taking the money, following the thug, seeking her own escape—all were her choices. Mother and son were still waiting in the ruined temple for her return.

She had mocked me for being passed between men. In the end, she delivered herself to a man who cared only for silver, gold, and hairpins.

Each had used what they most coveted to harm others.

In the end, greed, office, and shortcuts destroyed them.

I simply let the carriage continue.

That night, Pei Zhao dismissed the attendants and carried me from the dressing table to the imperial bed.

“Empress, you had every official bowing to you today. Shouldn’t you reward me a little tonight?”

“I’m tired. I only want to sleep.”

“The Crown Prince is with his wet nurse. No one will disturb you.”

“What if he cries?”

“Let him cry a little. One night should be all right, shouldn’t it?”

I pinched his ear.

“And you call yourself a father?”

“Being your husband comes before being his father.”

He reached for my sash.

I caught his hand and suddenly asked when he had fallen for me.

He answered without thinking.

“When you said you’d enjoyed yourself.”

“Just that?”

“Everyone in the capital pretends to be proper around me. You’d barely left my bed and already made no attempt at politeness. I thought then…”

He bent to kiss me, amusement lingering on his lips.

“We’re the same kind of people.”

Lamplight filtered through the bed curtains and cast his shadow across my shoulder.

Outside, moonlight lay on the stone steps. The night attendants kept their distance. No one approached.

A full moon hung high beyond the window, spreading silver over the ground.

That night, Emperor and Empress shared their affection in harmony.

And our story had only just begun.