Chapter 3
Affection between people ought to be built with honest hearts. A deception like mine could never be allowed, so the Old Man Under the Moon severed their red thread of fate, and our young miss never married Young General Shen.
The year after their betrothal was dissolved, the young miss entered the imperial selection. Mingyue and I followed her into the palace.
She came from a great family, possessed a lovely face, and had a charmingly innocent nature. The following year, she was made a consort.
As the sisters who served her most closely, Mingyue and I naturally rose with her tide.
Mingyue had been pure and kind since childhood. She could be clumsy, but I knew her devotion to our young miss was sincere.
She remembered every kindness the young miss had shown her. No matter how great a temptation others offered, she rejected it firmly.
I knew I could not compare with her in that regard. I had private ambitions of my own. I used our young miss’s influence to gain access to the Astronomical Bureau.
It held the most complete astronomical calculations compiled to date. If I wanted to prove my conjecture, I needed more data.
It was already taboo for an ordinary person to meddle in such matters, much less a woman.
I knew I was taking a desperate risk, so I had to proceed with care. I could not reveal a word even to the young miss and my sister, the two people I trusted most.
That way, at least, if the matter ever came to light, I could protect them.
Yet even the most meticulous plan leaves a crack. The Grand Astrologer who supervised the Bureau discovered what I had done. After reading my calculations, he let me go.
That day, he spoke the same words as Master Cen. “What a pity. What a terrible pity.”
I was no longer an ignorant girl. I understood what those words meant.
But I thought that if this mortal body could pursue the learning of the highest heavens to its utmost limits, that would be enough.
In the end, the Grand Astrologer allowed me to continue my research—as someone whose work could never see the light.
The emperor took notice of Mingyue and raised her to the rank of jieyu.
By all reason, having such a distinguished woman in our family should have been cause for joy. The rest of us could even be released from bondage along with her.
But Mingyue knelt sobbing on the floor and bowed her head again and again before our young miss. “This servant never seduced His Majesty. This servant never betrayed Your Highness…”
The young miss hurried to pull her up. “I know. I do not blame you. I do not believe those rumors.”
I stood beside them in silence. I had always known this day would come, just as the mistress had vehemently opposed bringing Mingyue into the palace.
What mother of an imperial consort would dare leave a palace maid of such beauty beside her daughter?
Before we entered the palace, the mistress had once said to me, “The tree peony may be the true queen of flowers, but an herbaceous peony in full bloom has charms of her own.”
I lowered my head and pretended not to understand. The mistress had no wish to state her warning plainly, either, and dismissed me.
Now her fears had become reality after all.
Our young miss sighed and said only, “Possessing beauty can itself be a crime.”
Even someone as slow as I was in matters of the heart could see the emperor’s interest. Whenever he visited our young miss, his gaze would linger, deliberately or otherwise, on the radiant, youthful Mingyue.
At first, Mingyue’s fresh, innocent beauty was easily overshadowed by our young miss’s dazzling looks, and the emperor naturally paid her little notice.
But as time passed and novelty faded, Mingyue slowly came into his sight.
Once I realized it, I found excuses to keep Mingyue out of view. Yet the emperor often ordered our young miss to summon her, claiming that the tea Mingyue brewed had a richer flavor.
Our young miss saw through that lie at once. We had served beside her for so many years; she knew Mingyue’s skill all too well.
One could not call it an utter catastrophe, perhaps, but it was certainly a waste of perfectly good tea leaves.