The Child Emperor

There were three candles in the room: one in the middle of the room beside Han Ruzi, and one each at the door of the eastern and western side-rooms. One of those was near Prince Donghai, while Meng E’s position by the main door was more dimly lit.

The three remained motionless. There was no wind yet the candles were extinguished at the same time.

Prince Donghai cried, “What’s going on?”

The candle by Prince Donghai’s side suddenly came alit, but only for a very short moment, like a flash of lightning which had lost its charge. He let out a second scream, but nothing happened.

A moment later, the candle near the eastern side-room flashed on and then quickly snuffed off. Prince Donghai could not control the terror in his heart, and screamed even louder. But he immediately placed his hand over his mouth. Something strange was happening in the room, and neither screaming nor noble birth would protect him in a time like this.

In the dark, someone scoffed lightly.

Prince Donghai did not scream again, but he let out a sound that was something like a whine. A while later, he said, trembling, “Is there a ghost?”

Han Ruzi was unsure as well. Since he was little, he had heard many ghost stories, and they seemed similar to the current situation. “Meng E, are you still there?”

“You know that servant-girl’s name?!” Prince Donghai was rather astonished, and immediately thought that he had uncovered the “truth”. He shouted, “She is the ghost! That servant-girl is the ghost! Did you notice, the eunuchs and servant-girls attending to you could not see her! Only the two of us could… This… this is the Empress Dowager’s voodoo!”

The eunuchs and servant-girls always ignored one another when in front of the Emperor, so Han Ruzi did not find it strange at all. Moreover, he had seen Yang Feng speaking to Meng E, so all the more he did not believe that she was a ghost. “Keep quiet, there is someone else in the room.”

“Someone… or something?” Prince Donghai was even more frightened, his teeth chattering.

The candles further away from them came alit, and this time it was not snuffed out. Meng E stood by the side with a contemplative expression.

Han Ruzi heaved a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness you are alright. What was that just now?”

Meng E still refused to speak. Prince Donghai observed her for a while before saying, “Whether you are a person or a ghost, please… Please recognize who your target is. I am the Prince of Donghai, Han Shu. The one sitting over there is the Emperor.”

Meng E swirled around and took a short dagger from her left sleeve. The blade was three to four inches long, its hilt about two inches. It could not be held, only clasped between the index and middle finger.

Prince Donghai took in a deep breath. He pressed himself against the wall and kept still. He wanted to run into the side-room but it was too dark inside and he did not dare. As for his threat to hold his own life hostage — it was long forgotten.

Meng E quickly walked around the chambers. When she walked by the side-room, Prince Donghai had such a huge fright that he collapsed to the ground.

Meng E’s target was neither him nor the Emperor. After she returned to the doorway, she leapt up and grabbed the beam of the ceiling. She swung two times before jumping back to the ground. She tip-toed forward and then leapt up again. This was repeated three times before she kept still and placed the dagger back in her sleeve.

Han Ruzi and Prince Donghai were stunned. Meng E was not only adept at martial arts, but had displayed an expertise that they had never seen before. The beam of the ceiling was more than three meters high, and yet she leapt on and off with great ease. Prince Donghai no longer believed that he could team up with Han Ruzi and fight this servant-girl.

“Rest.” Meng E finally spoke a word.

Prince Donghai slowly got to his feet. He asked cautiously, “So, no assassination tonight?”

Meng E opened the door and left. Han Ruzi discovered that something was off, and he went to the doorway and swiped his hand along the door. As he expected, the part of the door which Meng E had come into contact with was smeared with blood. She was injured.

Prince Donghai slowly came around to take a look. His voice trembling, he said, “There… there really was an assassin.”

“Don’t make speculations.” Han Ruzi found a piece of paper to clean the blood from his hands. But he actually did believe that there was an assassin just now.

Before long, four servant-girls walked in, and they went to the eastern and western side-rooms to set the beds.

Han Ruzi slept in the eastern side-room, and he had a bellyful of questions which he had hoped to ask Meng E. But it was another servant-girl who stayed around this night, and she only answered “Yes” or “No” to every one of the Emperor’s questions. It was as though she did not even know who Meng E was.

Someone knocked on the door, and the person entered without waiting for leave. It was Prince Donghai, who also had not fallen asleep. He said to the servant-girl who sat up, “Lie down. This is none of your business.” He then crept to Han Ruzi’s bedside and asked softly, “Are you awake?”

“Mm.”

“I guessed that you would also not be able to sleep. It was truly too…” Prince Donghai turned around in the dark and said in the direction of the couch. “You, leave. Your services are not required tonight.”

“Ah??” The servant-girl asked in confusion.

“What are you ah-ing about? I am the Emperor’s attendant, of course I can take care of His Majesty. Moreover… We are to discuss important matters of state. How can a lowly servant-girl eavesdrop on our conversation?”

This was just an ordinary servant-girl, and she was scared by Prince Donghai’s words. All she could do was to make her way out of the room in the dark, and guard the door, not daring to go too far.

Prince Donghai was satisfied. He sat by the bedside and said seriously, “I have thought things through and I finally understand a little.”

“You don’t think Meng E is a ghost anymore?” Han Ruzi said with amusement.

“A ghost would not jump around like her. They would just float around, like the wind. Woo~~” Prince Donghai made the eerie sound of wind, but he realized that the Emperor was not scared. “That servant-girl is a person, and she is also a martial arts expert. But that is strange, how can there be such a person in the Imperial Palace?”

“Can the palace not have martial experts?”

“Of course it can! But they are mostly men, and they would definitely not pose as servant-girls. At the Ancestral Temple, the servant-girl accompanying the Grand Consort was very strange, she appeared to be a man in disguise. Plus these two people are prone to acting out of line; they don’t seem like they belong in the palace.”

“I think so as well.”

“Well, I have already explained it so of course you think so as well. The crux is not about the two of them, nor about you. It is about me.”

“You?”

“Mm. Why am I kept in the palace? Of course it is not because of what you said. Why did the Empress Dowager make me your attendant? Why was I sent here tonight?”

“Why?” Han Ruzi was a fond listener of stories, so he did not mind pushing the story along with his queries.

“To protect you.”

“You can protect me?”

“I cannot protect you, but my existence can protect you.”

Han Ruzi was a clever youth, but he was still confused. “Hmm… I don’t understand.”

“Listen to me.” Prince Donghai got onto the bed and sat cross-legged, his mood quite excited. “The Empress Dowager must surely be thinking this: The Cui clan is not willing to give up the throne, so they would surely send someone to assassinate the Emperor, which is you. So to protect her puppet, she sent me here. After all, the Cui clan would surely not kill me.”

Han Ruzi thought for a moment before saying, “What you say seems to make a bit of sense?”

“A bit of sense? It makes a whole lot of sense! It explains everything!”

By now, Han Ruzi had gotten up as well. “So the candles just now — that was an assassin sent by your Cui clan?”

“Of course not.”

Prince Donghai got closer to Han Ruzi. “You are as stupid as the Empress Dowager. She is wrong — my Cui clan could not possibly send an assassin. That is what is so strange about the whole matter: that strange servant-girl…”

“She is called Meng E, and she isn’t strange at all.”

“Don’t argue with me, I’m trying to guide your thinking.” Prince Donghai thumped the mattress a few times, speaking agitatedly. “Why was the servant-girl so calm after she discovered the assassin? She should have shouted loudly, calling for the palace guards. That would have been a great opportunity to strike against the Cui clan! Regardless of who had actually sent the assassin, the Cui clan could be blamed for it!”

Prince Donghai’s eyes only had the Cui clan, so in his eyes, every conspiracy was targeted at the Cui clan, and by extension, him.

“Meng E did not shout loudly because she did not manage to catch the assassin…”

“Heh, the key is here. Why was the assassin not caught? Since the Empress Dowager anticipated that there would be an assassin, she should have made ample preparations.” Prince Donghai said frantically.

“Why?”

“Heh heh… Just wait and see. The Empress Dowager has a master plan. For all we know, it might be pandemonium outside. We are just here in ignorance of what is going on. The Empress Dowager wishes to use this move to get rid of dissidents, but the Cui clan is not so easy to be trifled with.”

Han Ruzi kept silent for quite a while. Prince Donghai asked sullenly, “And what are you thinking of?”

“I am thinking that… The assassin might have been sent by your Cui clan…”

“I said no, that means no!” Prince Donghai said furiously.

Han Ruzi remained unmoved and continued, “I am also thinking that… Other than the Cui clan, there must be other reasons for why the Empress Dowager guessed that there would be an assassin tonight.”

“What reasons?”

“Like, before now, there were other assassinations that happened within the palace.”

Prince Donghai was aghast. “You mean… Our father and older brother…”

“The Graceful Emperor was on the throne for only three years, while the previous Emperor was on the throne for only a few months. Surely that is not normal. How was their health?” Han Ruzi was not close to his father or older brother, and he could not bring himself to call them father or older brother.

“I’m not sure about Imperial Brother, but Lord Father was definitely in good health. Just a few months before he ascended to the throne, he had even taken me out hunting. But one cannot be too sure. Illness comes like a landslide,[1] one never knows… No, no, you are thinking too much. Assassinate the Emperor? Not just one? Impossible. If it were so easy to murder the Emperor, the Chu Empire would have long been overthrown.” Prince Donghai had to refute Han Ruzi, otherwise it would increasingly sound like the Cui clan’s conspiracy.

Han Ruzi thought that it did seem quite easy to murder him. He was not dead only because the time was not right and the Empress Dowager did not want him to die too soon.

The assassin seemed to be lurking somewhere in the darkness, and the two fell silent. The surroundings grew quieter, and the atmosphere grew more frightening. Han Ruzi said, “Has there ever been an unluckier Emperor than me? It seems like everyone wants to kill me.”

“If I were Emperor, such things would surely not happen. The Cui clan would protect me zealously, and would hide nothing from me.”

Han Ruzi suddenly thought of something that Yang Feng had said. “Our grandfather, the Martial Emperor… He too had run into danger in the palace.”

“Oh? How do you know? Why haven’t I heard of this?”

“I… I just happened to hear someone mentioning it.” Han Ruzi’s thoughts had already gone distant.

“You… You are overthinking it. Where would so many assassins come from? This is just an anomaly. And it very well might be an anomaly arranged by the Empress Doawger.” Prince Donghai refused to accept Han Ruzi’s line of thinking, and continuously shook his head.

Han Ruzi also did not wish to continue speculating. Instead of doing so, he might as well remain ignorant. Hence he lay down to go to sleep, but he remained restless and could not fall asleep.

Prince Donghai remained by the corner of the bed. Every so often, he would mutter, “What is the Empress Dowager’s plan?”

After some time, while the two of them were in a state of quasi-slumber, someone knocked the door sharply. Prince Donghai was terrified and he rushed to hide behind Han Ruzi. But he quickly realized that the Emperor’s side was the most dangerous place, so he quickly ran to a corner of the room.

“It is time, Your Majesty.” It was Yang Feng’s voice ringing from outside the door.

[1] The Chinese saying “illness comes like a landslide, but goes like reeling silk” describes how one falls sick quickly like a mountain suddenly collapsing, but one recovers slowly and delicately, like reeling raw silk from the cocoons of silkworms.