Chapter 9
Princess Changling took a prince consort into her household.
The whole realm was astonished. “Good heavens! The prince consort is a monk!”
When I heard, I too marveled that fate lay beyond anyone’s control.
Only now did I understand: I had thought I was forcing my love upon an aloof disciple of Buddha, when in truth that lustful fiend had been seducing me.
The most formidable hunter was always the last to reveal himself!
As for his coy refusals, they were all because he had heard me say that I would tire of someone too easily won.
Tsk!
Once I learned that Yujingzi had controlled every one of those erotic dreams that nearly emptied me out, I loved and hated him in equal measure.
For the sake of my health, I went to sleep every night hugging a jar of realgar wine to ward him off.
I called it, grandly, “banishing evil.”
Our wedding night was no exception.
His brilliant red wedding robes made his features look even more delicate.
“Ah Yuan, you toyed with me so mercilessly, then cast me aside without a thought and turned to love someone else… I couldn’t accept it, so I haunted your dreams. I was wrong to harm the princess so deeply… I will punish myself.”
He took the realgar wine from me and poured himself a cup.
Then he tipped back his head and drank.
Terrified, I knocked it from his hand. “Are you mad? That’s realgar wine!”
“Mm.”
“Has Ah Yuan forgiven me?”
My eyes stung. When white scales appeared at his temple, I panicked. “If I still blamed you, I would never have taken you as my husband, you fool!”
His lips curved into a smile, and he fainted in bliss.
“The princess cares for me after all. I could die content.”
He collapsed to the floor, frightening me so badly that tears poured down my face.
I stumbled off to find an imperial physician.
After taking his pulse, the physician said, “Nothing is wrong. The prince consort is merely drunk.”
Who stopped breathing when they were drunk?
Quack!
I summoned a renowned physician from across the realm instead.
The old man’s face nearly split with delight, but he stroked his beard and put on an inscrutable air. “Ah, the princess might remove the prince consort’s clothes and soothe his… wounded heart. Give it a try. Perhaps he will recover.”
With no better cure, I tried his suggestion.
One hour later,
“That old bastard only said to give it a trial. He never warned me the trial might be fatal… He’s done me in!”
The ancients said that snakes were lustful by nature.
Little snakes and giant snakes were all the same.
In fact, the greater their magic, the more they…
He looked as proper as an immaculate immortal exiled to earth, yet behind closed doors his appetites ran deep and he wrapped himself around me every night, refusing to let go.
Three years later,
I stared blankly at a nest of snake eggs before me. “Are these the children I gave birth to?”
“…”
Yujingzi was speechless. “Can a human give birth without ever being pregnant?”
“So they aren’t mine.”
I immediately breathed a sigh of relief.
Turning away, I muttered, “I thought I’d gone to sleep and somehow produced a whole clutch of snakes… You might as well kill me.”
Yujingzi said quietly, “Ah Yuan, my hearing is exceptionally sharp.”
My body stiffened.
I spun around with a bright smile, wrapped my arms around him, and nuzzled his cheek and the long black hair he had grown out.
“Oh, snakes… I adore snakes! Baby snakes are so cute, just as cute as my dear Yu!”
The man’s face remained expressionless, though the tips of his ears quietly reddened.
“In that case, Ah Yuan, let us raise them together.”
“What?”
“They are young members of my clan. Their mother abandoned them, and no one else will raise them.”
I trembled. “Will they… take human form too?”
“They will need to cultivate for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years.”
Relieved, I just managed to accept them. “Thank goodness… By then, the grass over my grave will be several yards high.”
Yujingzi fell silent, holding a basket of snake eggs.
He was obviously unhappy.
The sight of him looking so thoroughly like a devoted husband made me want to tease him again.
“What’s wrong, my great Snake God? Sulking again?”
He did not answer. His thick black lashes merely lowered in dejection.
Then I understood.
Yujingzi was grieving over how brief my mortal life would be.
So I comforted him with a smile. “That is the way of humanity. We are born and we die. As long as I have those I cherish beside me during the years I live, that will be enough.”
Later,
Princess Changling ascended the throne.
Whenever the court officials presented their memorials, they would see one or two snakes poke their heads out from the new empress’s hair or sleeves.
They assumed age had finally begun playing tricks on their eyes.
I helpfully explained to them, “My dear ministers, they really are quite adorable.”
The more timid officials would topple to the floor in a dead faint.
After court,
I brought the little snakes to the bedchamber of Yujingzi, now granted the title of Royal Consort, and complained to him.
“They’re so cute! Those ministers are far too timid!”
Yujingzi lowered his eyes with a quiet laugh.
“Wasn’t Your Majesty once afraid of snakes as well?”
I clicked my tongue, stole a quick kiss, and happily stroked a little snake’s head.
“Mm, was I? I seem to have forgotten.”
“I’m terribly fond of my dear Yu now!”
(The End)