“Oh? Lady Lu? Do you know? Please step forward and tell all of us,” sixth sister-in-law pointed her gaze at a woman standing at the entrance of the ladies’ quarter.
My heart skipped a beat as her heel gave a tapping loud sound, I wondered if she was the same woman who I met earlier. I could not comprehend her speech earlier but it was scaring me a little, I have always kept a distance from women unlike other men I know and it was my first interaction and I was about to be exposed for flirting while I did not intend to do so.
As she walked with the same grace as a lady should, my anger was rising with her every step taken.
I did not know she would be such a shameless, opportunistic mad woman and I was here intrigued by her boldness and the way she spoke to me. It was so surreal that I even thought I might have hallucinated.
“Ahhh….”
“Waiiiii…”
“Heavens!!!!!”
A chaotic commotion overtook the enthralling atmosphere, several ladies seem to have fallen, only God knew how. They must have stumbled and bumped into each other, eunuchs immediately ran and surrounded my sixth sister-in-law to avoid getting hurt in case, they stood like shields, defending her.
The crown prince stood up from his place, panicked from the sudden havoc and he hurried to the adjacent side.
“What’s wrong?” He asked curiously, holding his wife’s back.
The lady who was standing on the left side moved away from her place, bowed, holding her fan below her chin, and replied, “Someone among them slipped and accidentally bumped the other two.”
Before my brother could react, she turned to palace maids and commanded, “Hurry! Help them up and escort them out to the guest room.” The tone of her voice was shouting with every word she spoke, she was the lady I met in the garden before.
The translucent curtain made the vision blurry, if I were to taken a glance at her I would have immediately known, that she was the woman; the cause of this whole disturbance. If not for her, I would not search desperately and my brother would never get a chance to pick on me with this matter.
She then bent on her knees and spoke in a polite manner, “The world prospers when the food is enough to share, I have prepared an exotic cuisine, allow me to serve.”
“Oh? Interesting! I allow you.” The Crown Prince said as he glanced a loving look at the crown princess.
The woman clapped her hands and several maidservants and eunuchs entered with plates of dishes in their hands.
I stared at the dish before me and saw others settling down to have a taste, I assume they had never seen such a cuisine before.
But I cannot blame them, even though I, as the eighth prince of the first rank, had never seen it myself.
But the cook was more interesting to me, I sat down and held my chopsticks again trying to peek at the lady who was now surrounded by her maidservants.
The dish was made from lamb meat, the exterior was crunchy but the meat was soft and the aroma was too strong as it filled the atmosphere.
“Umm…. it’s delicious.” The crown prince complimented and it was then I noticed him sitting on the throne of crown princess consort and she had taken the seventh Consort’s seat who was sitting at the lady’s seat.
“Where is she?” I mumbled to myself, unable to find her, again.
“I heard father will be back from his trip in a few days, Shiyi, what will you give him in the welcome ceremony?” My seventh brother had become an eyesore to me, if I was not the prince, I would have killed him long ago.
“A pair of golden geese!” I answered with a smirk, knowing he would try all his means to copy my gift and embarrass me.
“You have no wife or concubine, only you can afford such an expensive gift,” he commented with an envied look.
“Seventh consort, brother is saying you are high maintenance,” I said out loud for her to hear, she was taking a bite of some snack but put it back as soon as she heard me and glared at seventh brother, “What about his concubines? Huh? Shiyi ask him who spends more his fourteen concubines or me, the poor soul who has to keep toiling over his household affairs,” seventh consort was furious and asked me, however, I did not think it was necessary for me to repeat her words.
“Oh! Look what have you done!” My seventh brother was enraged and scolded me. He got up from his place and moved to the ladies’ quarter to coax his wife.
“What’s the use of this damn curtain! Both of my brothers are allowed to go there because of their wives, I don’t have one, as an unmarried man, I was forbidden to even lift it slightly.
However, I did not care about it, because the lady was gone. From the conversation, I guessed she was a close person to the Crown Princess Consort. I will ask about her later when the banquet is over.
I had nothing to do except focus on eating.
“Your highness, about the lady who was captured…” Lady Lu tried to bring the topic up again but some maidservants took her away forcefully.
“Lady Lu, some ladies are outside waiting for you to tell them this, let’s go.” A maidservant said and dragged her away.
….
“His Majesty has informed me that he will be delaying his return. It will be Empress Dowager’s birthday by then, so we should celebrate both the ceremonies at the same time, what do you say, Shiyi?” My seventh brother asked me and I replied with a yawn, or else what did he think? He woke me up early in the morning after our banquet last night. Everyone had retired, but those old ministers kept discussing official matters, after listening to their blabbering all night, I could guess they were discussing some tax affairs.
The sixth brother went to sleep with his wife, I was coming back to my mansion, sleeping my way there but the seventh brother pulled me out and took me to his mansion for discussing the ceremony.
I could not disregard it, no matter what but only pray that the seventh consort wakes up and take him back to sleep.
“Brother, father made sixth brother the crown prince so he looks after state affairs, he made you in charge of the officials and palaces so you should be the one arranging the ceremony and..”
“You are in charge of wearing that poker face and scaring away all the beauties,” he interrupted and spread a giant scroll on his huge table, which seemed to be the map of the Imperial Palace.
“Shiyi, you are not young and Her Majesty is always worried about your marriage. Father promised us that he won’t force us to sacrifice our matrimonial life for the Empire’s sake doesn’t mean you will play the same card even when your nephew ascends to the throne,” he said while placing a stone-carved statue in the middle.
“Brother, where did you get this?” I tried to distract him from the topic.
“Sixth consort gifted my wife, I literally stole it from her study,” he answered chuckling.
“How shameless!” I sneered at him.
“Ayee…but I will return her later, I brought it here because I want to build a similar statue of this pair of phoenixes for Empress Dowager’s birthday banquet.” He hurried to explain himself.
“You know nothing, this statue is carved by the sixth consort’s sister who recently returned to the capital. The sixth consort and my wife are so petty that they didn’t even introduce her to the crown prince and me.
I thought they would do so at the banquet yesterday but they didn’t.”
No sooner did the seventh brother mention the banquet I blurted a question at him, “Do you know the lady who had cooked the exotic dish?”
“Her? Who doesn’t know? She is young madam Sui, wife of minister Sui. And I guess you heard her wrong, she did prepare the dish but it was cooked by the sixth consort’s sister. You don’t know, this Madam Sui is a domineering person, so arrogant! But Imperial Consort Gao appointed her as the lady in excellence so that she can take care of the unborn child in the sixth consort’s womb.” He gossiped and his words made me feel disappointed for no reason. The world had turned upside down for me, however, an idea crossed my mind, and the curtains made the vision blurry, what if I was mistaken? So I picked the shattered pieces of my hope and said, “I heard this Madam Sui is well-versed in literature and poetry.”
The seventh brother looked at me with a straight face at first and then burst into laughter, “She? Literature? Shiyi, if she knows poetry then the parrot can write an epic. She is an illiterate person, how can she make a poem? I will shave off my head if she can read more than two words or recite more than one line of a poem.”
I had made a joke out of myself but it was worth it, I felt relieved when he said that.
“Now, back to business, this area must be renovated in three days, and the Palace of Equity must be cleaned up thoroughly for the guests. Ministers from other provinces shall be attending the big banquet, we cannot let them find mistakes. Only the best palace maids and eunuchs should serve them.”
He listed and encircled the map and scribbled it with short notes.
“Yes!” I nodded at each sentence he spoke, my eyes were trying to stay open but my brain was already asleep.
An hour later, I could no longer stand and asked, “Brother, what do you want me to do?”
“You are just a poker face military man! How can you know things related to celebration and decoration.” He poked me again with his brush so hard that I could not help but groan in pain, “Then, why did you ask me to be here?” I asked, annoyed.
“You…obviously for your opinion! Just now I asked you if we should invite some performers from Xinhua and you nodded.”
“Okay! Then let me go and rest, it’s only two hours left before the sun rises, I should rather stay in your mansion,” I turned to leave and my brother hopped to grab my heart but somehow he committed a sin.
‘Clink!!!!’
‘Drrr…..’
“What did you do?” I turned, afraid that my guess might be correct, and it was. The seventh brother accidentally broke the stone-carved phoenix pair statue.
“I am so done,” he gripped his head tightly and then hurried to pick up the shattered pieces, he did not think even for a second and hurt his finger, it started bleeding.
“It is because of you!” He scolded me sucking his finger and holding a huge piece of stone.
Seeing how frustrated he looked, I was forced to take the blame and admitted, “Okay! I will go and surrender myself to the seventh consort.” I took the base piece of black stone and headed to her courtyard but my brother stopped me from behind, “Good brother! Listen, it’s not about who admits the mistake, the thing is my consort cherished this treasure, I don’t want her heart to shatter like the statue.”
“Then what do you want me to do? Ask the sixth consort to give me another one.” I asked, wondering if it would be easier if she can help.
“No! No! This treasure was her sister’s creation, she can’t bear to give her statue, besides her statue is different, entirely different.”
“Then? I should gather all those pieces and find a master to resort to the statue.”
“No, she would know the statue was smashed.”
“Then I will admit, isn’t it a win-win situation for you.” I was vexed with his disagreement with every solution of mine.
