Xie Jing had a dream.
In the dream, it was the seventh year of Zhenyou. The emperor had never bestowed an imperial marriage between him and Lu Lingcong; instead, they had become distant acquaintances who exchanged only polite nods, each marrying an indistinct stranger whose face he could no longer clearly recall. Xie Jing’s official career still began as a Hanlin compiler and advanced through daytime lectures at Linhai Hall, as a matter of course becoming trusted by Lu Lingzhang and drawn into the Empress Wang’s faction.
Under the emperor’s secret authorization, the Wang and Xie clans continued the alliance they had held since the Jin Dynasty, fighting tooth and nail against Lu Lingcong, who was supported by unknown clans and officials. The outcome was not much different—the Prime Minister’s Mansion altered the testamentary edict and forced Prince Zhao away. A few years later, Lu Lingcong fought his way back to the capital to seize power and usurp the throne. The Xie family was held collectively responsible, facing the same fate of total execution.
As for Xie Jing himself, unfortunately, he was personally slain by Lu Lingcong’s sword.
However, the most distorted and terrifying part was that within the body of that Xie Jing, whose fate was so utterly different, dwelled the living soul of the real Xie Jing, a thirty-year-old spouse and mother.
From beginning to end, he was like someone drowning in a pitch-black lake. He wanted to struggle and break free, but his neck was throttled and his limbs were locked by a pair of immensely powerful hands. He could only watch helplessly as everything galloped toward an irrecoverable tragedy. In his heart, Xie Jing questioned, “Do you no longer recognize me?” But to Lu Lingcong, he was merely a troublesome political rival he had fought for years.
In the final moment, Xie Jing could even feel Lu Lingcong pulling his hair and raising his sword high. He only had time to cry out “Zifeng!” before snapping his eyes open, drenched in cold sweat and shaking to the core.
“…Caught in a nightmare?”
Xie Jing froze, then abruptly straightened up and wiped his sleep-clouded face to confirm that he was truly awake.
He saw Lu Lingcong’s hand hovering in mid-air, evidently having just lifted it from his hair; the sensation at the back of his head during the dream had indeed come from the other party’s touch.
Xie Jing knelt by Lu Lingcong’s bedside, ignoring the soreness brought on by his sleeping posture, and simply stared at him with wide, dazed eyes.
Lu Lingcong’s voice was hoarse, “I remember walking along the north bank of the Wuding River, searching and searching, when suddenly I saw you coming toward me while wearing that large red cloak… Has the snow stopped?”
Xie Jing instinctively turned to look out the window; the snow in Jinling had stopped long ago. But at the northernmost edge of the frontier, that heavy snow, which had buried the last remaining traces of Lu Lingzhen’s existence, would perhaps continue to fall endlessly in their hearts for the rest of their lives.
There was a rustle within the bed curtains. Xie Jing snapped back to his senses and saw Lu Lingcong propping himself up by his arms to sit up. He hurriedly reached out to assist him.
Lu Lingcong lightly grasped his elbow, pulling him closer with quiet authority, “Do not kneel there. Come up here; let me hold you.”
Xie Jing lowered his gaze to avoid direct eye contact but ultimately sat by the edge of the bed and leaned into Lu Lingcong’s embrace face to face.
“Why are you silent?” Lu Lingcong whispered, his exhaustion seemingly not yet dispelled. “Zhang Yan said back then that you would be harmed by me until not even the shards of your bones remained. I have brooded over those words, fearing both that you would avoid me time and again and that by forcing you to stay by my side, I truly would bring you bitter suffering. But now, upon opening my eyes and seeing you still here, I know that you have, in the end, accepted the hot potato that is the position of Empress.”
Xie Jing could only say in a trembling voice, “Why leave that blood-written decree behind? If you truly wished to make me your empress so badly, why not wait until you safely returned to Jinling and wrote another imperial edict on yellow silk to grant it to me? Was it worth those ten days or half a month? Ten-odd years ago I could not defy an imperial command, do you think I can now? Why did you have to write it in blood in that frozen wilderness!”
As if to soothe him, Lu Lingcong patted his back in a steady rhythm and sighed, “I had already drafted this investiture edict in my mind countless times in silence, weighing every word and every phrase a thousand times over. It had long been so deeply etched into me that when I finally sat down to write it, it simply flowed out at once.”
“Furthermore… I did not know whether I would return. Only at the very last moment did I decide that I must leave behind this testamentary edict. This time, every word within it records the true imprint of my heart; no one, it would be impossible for anyone to forge it.”
Xie Jing’s body shook, and he hardened his heart to say coldly, “If you yourself were gone, then even if the edict deified me as a goddess or the Queen Mother, what use would it be?”
Lu Lingcong, however, shook his head, “When I read history in my youth, I came across Emperor Jing of Jin’s first wife, Xiahou Hui, who died young. Years later, there was an intention to grant her a posthumous honor, but because Emperor Jing had still been a subject of Wei during her lifetime, it was argued that she lacked the virtue of helping establish the dynasty and the merit of instructing the consorts. People claimed her ‘posthumous ennoblement had no canonical basis,’ that her status was improper, and so the matter was delayed again and again.”
“I thought that if I truly lost my life this time, even if Qing’er ascended the throne and granted you titles in the future, without the Emperor’s own voice and hand in the investiture, you would, throughout my entire reign, never have been my legitimate Empress, never my only spouse, and could not be openly recorded with me in the history books or buried with me in the imperial mausoleum.”
Lu Lingcong created a bit of distance between them to take hold of Xie Jing’s shoulders, and said with the utmost gravity:
“I am selfish. I thought that even if our marital bond in life was exhausted, then using this edict to lock you to my side would suffice. From then on, with Heaven and Earth as witnesses, you would have no way to deny it.”
“If fate is unkind and I truly cannot share a quilt with you in life, then I will stake my life to earn the right to share a grave with you in death.”
Xie Jing gazed into Lu Lingcong’s eyes. He could not remember when it had started, but Lu Lingcong had grown accustomed to watching him like this; wholeheartedly, as if his eyes could only hold one person.
He murmured, “Did you never consider that if you ended up like Zhenzhen… then this decree would never see the light of day? Neither the world nor I would ever have known.”
“I thought about it—and I thought that would be fine, too. That way, you would never have to know of my selfishness,” Lu Lingcong said softly. “They say people only remember the good in the dead. If you could remember only the good of me granting you freedom and following your heart’s desires, I would be content.”
He brushed aside Xie Jing’s messy hair and pressed his thumb against the other party’s cheek, where the marks from sleeping haphazardly against the bedside still remained.
Lu Lingcong smiled. “Sweetheart, there was something else inside those clothes. Did you see it?”
Xie Jing was speechless. “No… I only dared to look at it once.”
Lu Lingcong gave him a nudge. “Go on, don’t be afraid. Go look for it.”
Xie Jing had no choice but to stand up and walk to the gold tray. He lifted the blood-stained edict, examining it front and back, then gave it a shake. Only then did he discover a tiny pocket sewn into the inner lining.
Inside the pocket was a lock of black hair.
Xie Jing lowered his head and instinctively looked toward his own chest; the clasp of his silver incense box was perfectly intact with no sign of anything missing.
Lu Lingcong’s voice rang out from behind him, “On the night before I left the capital for Huaibei all those years ago, you were unconscious with a high fever. It was then that I took a lock of hair from each of us, and I have kept them close to me ever since. You are no longer the only person who has gone behind someone’s back to perform a secret hair-binding ceremony.”
Xie Jing turned to meet his gaze. Lu Lingcong sat leaning there, looking just as he would on any ordinary winter morning, casually complaining that Xie Jing had risen too early and asking him to return to the couch so they could sleep in each other’s embrace for a little longer.
“Hair is the slowest thing to decay. Perhaps a hundred years from now, when you and I have both turned to rotted flesh and white bone within the coffin, this bound lock of hair will remain. That way, even if our vows are not unshakable, they can endure just a little bit longer.”
At the start of the new year, the emperor led the Tiger Division in a triumphant return to the capital and changed the era name to Yanjia. The young Crown Prince had successfully fulfilled his mission of overseeing the state; his judgment was clear and his decisions appropriate, earning him a reputation for “virtue and wisdom” throughout the court and the common people.
Lu Lingcong had no severe external injuries to begin with, and after several days of recuperative medicine upon his return to the capital, he had basically recovered shortly after waking. Having laid down his heavy burden, Lu Shuqing breathed a long sigh of relief as a delayed winter drowsiness finally hit him. The couch in the Imperial Study was spacious and soft; during the day, when officials entered to report matters, Lu Lingcong would sit at the front to listen while the boy curled up in the back to sleep. Occasionally, while sleeping, he would roll over and inadvertently tumble off the other side onto the floor with a “thud,” startling both Lu Lingcong and the ministers.
The Imperial Study held no restrictions for Xie Jing. Lu Lingcong had repeatedly expressed his wish for Xie Jing to be present during private audiences with ministers, or perhaps to restore his official rank as Right Vice Minister of the Department of State Affairs, or even to set up a permanent desk for him in the Political Council. However, Xie Jing had sidestepped every suggestion.
It was only after several officials from the Ministry of War had withdrawn from the study that Xie Jing entered through a side door while carrying a food container that Lu Lingcong, who was buried deep in a mountain of paperwork, remained completely oblivious to his arrival.
Xie Jing tapped the corner of the desk. Hearing the sound, Lu Lingcong looked up in surprise. “Why have you come over? I was just about to head back to the rear hall to have lunch with you.”
Xie Jing did not commit to an answer. Instead, he took out a bowl of light vegetable noodle soup from the container and pushed it toward him.
Lu Lingcong was puzzled. He took a few bites, but noticing Xie Jing standing guard beside him, watching his expression with visible unease, he suddenly realized, “You didn’t make this yourself, did you?”
Xie Jing seemed somewhat tense. After a moment of hesitation, he nodded.
Lu Lingcong knew how to cook and how to eat; he had always been a connoisseur of fine cuisine. Naturally, Xie Jing did not expect his effort to be ranked alongside delicacies of land and sea. It was simply that after eating the food Lu Lingcong had prepared for over a decade, he wanted Lu Lingcong to taste his own “handiwork” as well.
It wasn’t exactly bad, but it wasn’t particularly good either. It was simply the most ordinary, mundane bowl of noodle soup imaginable, produced by a person with mature wit and functional limbs.
As his suspicion was confirmed, Lu Lingcong said nothing more. He simply picked up his chopsticks and continued to eat unhurriedly.
By the time the noodles were gone and only the broth remained, Xie Jing still hadn’t received a response. His heart sank halfway, yet he felt too embarrassed to bluntly demand, “Let me taste it and see what’s wrong. Is it too salty, too bland, too sour, or too sweet?” After a long silence, he suddenly turned on his heel, “Forget it, I don’t care about you anymore. If you don’t like it, then starve.”
Before he could take a single step, his waist was hooked from behind by Lu Lingcong, “What’s the rush?”
Exerting firm pressure and leaving Xie Jing no room to refuse, Lu Lingcong pulled him back to his side, “I haven’t said a word yet, so how do you know I don’t like it? Every time I cook a dish, I stay by your side and the little ancestors’ sides until you all have finished tasting, listening humbly to your critiques. Have you forgotten the example I’ve set for you all these years?”
Pinned in place, Xie Jing could only ask, “Then tell me, do you like it?”
Lu Lingcong: “I don’t.”
Xie Jing turned to leave immediately, but Lu Lingcong broke into a laugh. With one hand steadying the bowl and the other firmly restraining Xie Jing at the desk, he said:
“Fine, I’ll stop teasing. We wouldn’t want to knock over and spill the broth.”
Only then did Xie Jing stop struggling, casting a glare back at Lu Lingcong, “Do you think you entered the kitchen because the Prince’s Mansion or the palace lacks cooks? Or because we’re so desperate for that one mouthful of food you make? It’s because I know you enjoy it; that you find pleasure in turning the raw into the cooked and harmonizing the five flavors, that I tried to cater to your tastes. And yet, I end up being ridiculed by you. Where is the sense in that?”
Lu Lingcong’s expression turned solemn upon hearing this. “It is precisely because I enjoy it that your situation is different from mine. You forced yourself to learn this skill for the sake of survival, for Ningning’s sake. Tell me the truth, do you yourself actually like doing it?”
Xie Jing paused. “There is no ‘like’ or ‘dislike’ to speak of. It was never up to me anyway.”
“Come with me.” Lu Lingcong took Xie Jing by the hand and led him toward the empty front hall, speaking as they walked. “In the past, when you were displaced in a foreign land and forced by circumstance, it truly was not up to you. But today is different. The person I married all those years ago was a bright pearl; fifteen years passing will not turn that pearl into a common fisheye. If I must ask you to do something for me, it would never be to ‘wash your hands to make the soup.'”
On the steps between the imperial throne and the vast hall, Lu Lingcong and Xie Jing sat down side by side. It was a middle-ground position, much like their original identities—high enough to look up at the Son of Heaven, yet low enough to observe the assembled ministers.
“Zhiwu,” Lu Lingcong said, his gaze sweeping over the twelve gilded nanmu pillars that supported the hall’s ceiling with dragons coiling around them. “These past days, I have been thinking about one thing.”
Xie Jing asked, “What is that?”
Lu Lingcong extended his hand, closing it loosely around empty air. “These ministers speak of ‘ten thousand years, ten thousand years’ every day, but is it possible that this realm is not mine to possess, not the exclusive property of the Lu clan? That I, and even the Great Qi itself, are merely custodians, temporary caretakers, rather than true owners of this land?”
Xie Jing was slightly stunned as he heard him continue, “Looking back at the changing masters of the Dragon Throne; some were short-lived, like the Qin, which perished in its second generation; others were long-lived, like the Han, which endured for four hundred years. There were periods of seven kingdoms and the tripartite division of the Three Kingdoms. Who among them truly became the master of the Divine Land? Were they not all just caretakers for a time? Prosperity and decline, rise and fall; these are the eternal laws of the cycle of Heaven and Earth. On what grounds should I believe that I can break this ancient rule and ensure the dynasty lasts for a thousand generations?”
“I am not entirely sure how to be a wise ruler, nor will I sit upon this chair for very long. But I believe that if the emperors of past and present could grasp the proper boundaries of their actions by viewing themselves as guests rather than masters, then they would not be such bad caretakers.”
Xie Jing listened, and after savoring the words for a moment, he gave a faint smile. “A caretaker… My Majesty, so this is your Way of the Sovereign.”
“What of it?” Lu Lingcong glanced at him. “What kind of monarch does my Empress admire and feel willing to follow?”
Xie Jing shook his head. “To speak of ‘following’ feels a bit distant, and to speak of ‘admiring’ feels a bit too intimate. I can only say that, in my heart, I identify with your Way of the Sovereign.”
Lu Lingcong turned toward him, earnestly making his request for ‘harem interference’ once more, “Since that is the case, are you willing to strategize for my sake?”
Xie Jing stared at the square stone tiles of the great hall floor and fell silent. A few paces in front of his toes, there was a crack between two bricks. Xie Jing remembered that when he was sixteen and attended the court examinations, he had knelt right there with his head bowed, staring at that very crevice while answering the emperor’s questions. He did not know how many years it had existed; he only knew it would continue to exist, far outlasting the lifespans of mortals like them.
After a long while, Xie Jing said softly, “If you are saying you wish to share with me the power to govern this land, then I am sorry; I do not like it, I do not want it, and I also have never harbored any grand ambition to change the world.”
He paused while returning Lu Lingcong’s gaze. “But if you say that you feel tired, that you are exhausted and troubled by the labors of state affairs, then I am willing to take those tedious tasks from your hands and devise strategies for you.”
“If it is to share your burdens—I have no further objections.”
In early spring, the ice and snow melted, and Yanji turned green once more. The Emperor and Empress personally selected a geomantically auspicious site by the river to serve as a cenotaph for the late Eldest Princess.
On the day of the burial, the coffin was to be sealed within Hanzhang Hall, where the remains had been kept. Xie Jing remembered that when the soldiers and civilians of Yongzhou had gathered her belongings, they had placed Lu Lingzhen’s blood-stained military uniform into the coffin. Fearing the sight would stir unbearable grief, he initially stood silently to the side, not daring to approach.
However, Lady Wu seemed to see through his thoughts, “Go and see her one last time. The clothes I prepared for her are new.”
Xie Jing started and stepped forward despite himself. Holding his breath, he looked inside—resting in the coffin was a set of robes as red as fire, clean and brand new, with a hand-crafted jade belt from Lady Wu laid across the waist, its surface shimmering with a soft, radiant luster.
The skirt and belt lay flat and empty at the bottom of the casket, yet as Xie Jing closed his eyes, he could almost immediately imagine how they would have looked on Lu Lingzhen.
This was the gift he had hurriedly sent to her before leaving for Yongzhou, accompanied by a few lines of poetry through a closed door.
Lady Wu sighed softly. “Even after the mourning period for her father passed, she was still reluctant to touch them. She said she would wait for her brother and sister-in-law to return, and only then would she put them on to show you two.”
The long, narrow wooden box was cramped and crowded. Even if Lu Lingzhen’s remains were there, and even if it could confine her physical form, it could not suppress the vivid traces of her life that leaped before one’s eyes at all. This did not seem like a coffin; it was more like a young girl’s most cherished treasure chest, filled with her various curios: the longevity lock she had lost years ago, her broken hair ties and bracelets, her exquisite Hu-style blade and its gem-encrusted sheath…
Lu Lingcong traced these old objects with his gaze one by one. Suddenly, he spoke, “Zhenzhen loved Yi Yun since she was a child. When the carriage transports the coffin to Yanzi Cliff later, let Yi Yun led the way to see her off on her final journey.”
He turned his face, looking around at everyone, and asked, “Where is Yi Yun?”
The hall fell instantly silent.
No one answered him. Lady Wu and the two siblings stood in stunned silence; the ministers were too hesitant to speak, and the palace attendants were at a loss; only Xie Jing felt his heart tightened.
The brocade box containing Yi Yun’s mane was, in fact, kept in Lu Lingcong’s sleeping quarters. He had asked about Yi Yun the very day he woke up. Seeing that he had not yet fully recovered and fearing that grief would harm his health, Xie Jing had fabricated a story that “Yi Yun is recovering well at the Prince’s Mansion.” Since Lu Lingcong could not easily leave the palace, the excuse had served for the time being.
Afterward, Lu Lingcong asked several more times. Each time Xie Jing wanted to tell him the truth, yet he found himself at a loss for words.
From the very, very beginning, when everything was still in its perfect, original state, Yi Yun had been with them. Accepting her departure was no different from uprooting those cherished memories they used for self-consolation; it was too difficult for both him and Lu Lingcong.
No one dared to answer the question, so in the end, it fell to Xie Jing to speak, “Zifeng…”
Yet, it was already unnecessary.
Lu Lingcong had already read the abnormality within that long, deathly silence.
