Elio’s Notes: The chapter title comes from the opening line of Li Yu’s elegy mourning a lost beloved: “The pearl shatters, precious before my eyes; the flower withers, spring beyond this world.” The poem appears in full later in this chapter, where its imagery becomes inseparable from Hongxiu’s death.
Li Congjia had something on his mind. Hongxiu could see it clearly. Although his eyes were directed toward the platform, he plainly was not truly paying attention.
After three turns, her feet staggered and she nearly fell. Liuzhu hurried over to support Hongxiu. “Miss, what is wrong? Come down and rest.”
Ehuang too looked worriedly at her complexion. “Hongxiu, are you feeling unwell?”
Hongxiu only stared at him.
Li Congjia lowered his head slightly, one hand resting upon a folding fan. He had been thinking about something, and only when the music suddenly stopped did he raise his head. “Hongxiu?”
The woman stubbornly lifted her chin and looked only at him. Never before had her gaze been so unwavering. Hongxiu seemed to want to see straight into his heart. After a long while, she managed to pull her lips into a faint smile.
Li Congjia did not understand why she was behaving this way and could only instruct Liuzhu to help her up. Unexpectedly, Hongxiu pushed Liuzhu’s hand aside. “Hongxiu must finish this dance today.”
Liuzhu understood even less. Her good intentions had been rejected, so she could only retreat to one side, privately wondering what had gotten into Miss Hongxiu today. She was behaving with so little regard for propriety, and this was someone else’s residence, after all.
But Hongxiu no longer cared. She stubbornly forced herself upright, the long dancing robes trailing across the golden platform. Her swaying figure resembled a wild rose. Even blooming amid heaps of gold and silver could never strip it of its defiance. She simply, stubbornly, wanted to dance one piece for him.
One final dance.
The tassels at her waist whirled into red clouds, and as her figure turned, long tongues of scarlet flame seemed to spread across the sky. The woman smiled like a flower, her beautiful eyes filled with joy. Suddenly, she felt happier than she ever had before. The stabbing pain in her chest grew so severe that she nearly vomited, yet in her heart it was as though every burden had been flung beyond the Nine Heavens. When all the clouds and smoke had finally dispersed, if at the very end she could still see him sitting there peacefully, smiling as he watched the clouds gather and scatter, then she would have no regrets.
Hongxiu struggled to raise her pale hands. Her shoulder felt as though it were being torn apart, the pain almost impossible to suppress, yet she gritted her teeth and forced herself to do it. Her breathing grew increasingly harsh. Dizziness from suffocation began to overtake her. Through the haze, she saw the blue-green figure rise and walk toward her, seeming to say something.
But she could not hear clearly.
Her entire body ached with the dull pain of being hacked apart. After noon, before the Wei hour, if Li Congjia did not die, then she would.
Those sinister eyes had watched the inch-long golden needle pierce straight into her skin. Even with the candle of her life already flickering, she had still willingly bowed before him. Hongxiu had tears in her eyes, but they were not for Li Hongji.
Why suffer so?
Before leaving that morning, she had carefully dressed before the bronze mirror, forever afraid that she was not beautiful enough. She had never deluded herself into thinking she could compare with Ehuang. It was the difference between a phoenix and a peacock. Both possessed pride, yet theirs was ultimately not the same kind of splendor.
That woman could truly soar through the heavens. Hongxiu had never possessed such a fate from the beginning.
After hesitating again and again, she had finally sighed and removed every piece of precious jade and jeweled ornament, leaving only the hairpin Brother Shui had given her. She used that simple hairpin to arrange her hair, then sighed at herself in the mirror.
It was not that something bought in the marketplace was unworthy beside all those jewels of gold, silver, and jade. Rather, their oppressive magnificence made them unsuitable. None of them suited today as well as that one hairpin. Before someone like Li Congjia, she did not even dare use the things she had obtained by singing, dancing, and serving at banquets to profane him.
He deserved to be matched only with the purest feeling.
Nothing suited this occasion better than that one hairpin.
Hongxiu had held the Qingu poison Li Hongji had prepared for her to pour into the wine and stared at it for a very long time. Even as people repeatedly came to hurry her from outside the door, in the end she had not put it into the wine.
Once she had made her decision, she would not regret it.
She had sought nothing else from this life. She had originally refused to bow to fate. She wanted to fly onto a high branch; she wanted glory and wealth; she wanted others to look up to her. But stripped bare, the truth was simple: you are not a phoenix. If you draw fire onto yourself, you cannot be reborn from the flames.
Then burn. Hongxiu’s vision grew increasingly blurred, and suddenly she laughed. Then let me burn to death in this expanse of Tianshui Blue washed by night rain. At least until death, she could continue breathing in that red-sandalwood fragrance, a scent that seemed to gather into one clean and tranquil heart, far clearer than all the glory and splendor she had spent her life pursuing.
Even though his eyes had never once contained her. Scarlet flame burned within everyone’s gaze except his. He was not someone easily stirred.
Li Congjia had plainly noticed something was wrong. He rose and slowly approached, studying her expression. Hongxiu’s complexion was terrible, though he could not quite describe what seemed wrong. She looked as though something had brutally restrained her, yet she was forcing her body to perform movements it was already incapable of making. “Miss Hongxiu?” he called softly.
Hongxiu ignored him and stubbornly continued dancing. The strings and winds wavered uncertainly. The musicians could all see something was wrong upon the golden platform, but no order had been given to stop, and they did not know whether they ought to continue. Their rhythm plainly began to break apart. Hongxiu, however, seemed unable to hear them at all. She continued following the melody inside her own heart, dancing with abandon.
Piaopeng finally could not stand watching and came over to ask whether the music should be stopped. Li Congjia only watched Hongxiu. “Miss Hongxiu? What is wrong?” Yet he did not order them to stop. He knew this woman must have her own reason.
Hongxiu felt as though something were tearing her chest apart. The pain reached such an extreme that it gradually became numb. Her steps could barely still be called dance steps. They were nothing more than strained, stubborn movements.
The red tassels turned more and more slowly.
Suspended in midair, they fell apart, no longer forming a song.
Ehuang too called to her from the side, yet Hongxiu seemed unable to hear anything. She did not respond at all. Everyone in the hall stood frozen, watching the almost crazed woman. She plainly could no longer dance, yet she insisted on continuing. It had begun as song and dance, but now she opened her mouth and recited a lyric instead, her voice cold and clear as she stubbornly turned: “Golden kingfisher hairpin, rouge-powdered face,”
“Briefly meeting among the flowers.”
“You know my heart; I feel your tenderness,”
“This feeling must be asked of Heaven.”
“Incense coils into tassels; wax becomes tears,”
“Still resembling the feelings of two hearts.”
“The coral pillow is soft, the brocade quilt cold,”
“Awakening as the last night-watch drips away.”
Elio’s Notes: Hongxiu is reciting Li Yu’s Geng Lou Zi, the same lyric whose line “still resembling the feelings of two hearts” supplied Chapter 13’s title. Here the poem becomes Hongxiu’s final declaration of a feeling she knows will never be returned.
She had only reached halfway through the line this feeling must be asked of Heaven when she abruptly collapsed upon the small golden platform. She rolled from it, her red robes spreading like blood in full bloom.
Startled, Li Congjia hurried over and crouched beside her. “Hongxiu? Piaopeng, go summon a physician.”
Hongxiu could no longer feel pain at all. Every sensation throughout her body had vanished, and her breathing grew weaker by the moment. The outlines of everything within her vision had long since blurred. The only thing she could still distinguish was that figure dressed in blue-green brocade. She had thought she would no longer be able to smell the red-sandalwood fragrance, yet somehow even that remained completely unaffected.
Or perhaps she had simply yearned for the spirit of red sandalwood too deeply. Perhaps that was why she could still sense it.
Li Congjia realized the situation had gone far beyond what he had expected. A long gash had opened across Hongxiu’s forehead, probably from striking the edge of the platform. Thin traces of blood began to seep out, yet she was still smiling. Li Congjia reached out tentatively to see whether she still had any sensation. Before his hand could touch the wound, Hongxiu suddenly seized it.
With everyone above and below the hall watching, propriety and reason both dictated that she should never behave with such impropriety. Yet she gripped his hand tightly. Li Congjia was startled and instinctively tried to pull away, only to discover that at some point her spring-onion-like fingernails had dug so deeply into the flesh of her other wrist that several had broken off inside it. Blood soaked her sleeve, but because the dancing robe itself was red, no one had noticed.
Li Congjia was deeply shaken by the sight before him. He no longer cared about differences of rank. Taking her arm, he supported Hongxiu’s upper body. “Hongxiu? Can you hear me?” Everything before him could only make him believe that this woman had already lost every one of her senses.
Hongxiu could not see his expression and did not realize that she herself could no longer hear. She gripped his hand with excessive strength because she could feel nothing. “Duke of Anding…”
Ehuang hurried outside to see whether the physician had arrived. Li Congjia asked Liuzhu to bring a brocade handkerchief. He watched the blood from Hongxiu’s forehead slowly run downward as she was raised, afraid it would enter her eyes, not knowing that she could no longer see clearly. “Hongxiu, tell me. What happened?”
Only now, at close range, did he notice that although Hongxiu had come elaborately dressed today, there was only one ordinary, inconspicuous jade hairpin in her coiffure. It was strange, but he had no attention to spare for it. He saw Hongxiu’s lips move, yet after a long while she could only manage the three words, “Duke of Anding.”
“Hongxiu, tell me. What happened? Can you still hear me?”
Hongxiu raised a hand and groped inside her clothing. Seeing how difficult the movement was, Li Congjia wanted to help retrieve whatever she sought, but the separation between man and woman made doing so improper. While he hesitated, Hongxiu continued reaching and spoke again. “Duke of Anding… red sandalwood…” Suddenly she bent over, spitting a mouthful of fresh blood onto the floor.
Everyone in the hall cried out in alarm.
Li Congjia wanted someone to carry her into the rear rooms, but Hongxiu stubbornly refused. At last she removed something from inside her clothing and clutched it in her palm. Her breathing had already become extremely faint before she could finish speaking. “Red sandalwood… suits you very well…”
The physician was hurriedly brought inside. Seeing the scene, he immediately reached forward to take her pulse. Hongxiu instead flung out her hand and shoved him aside. Having completely lost control over her strength, she sent the unprepared physician staggering away.
Ehuang called her name, tears already in her eyes. In the confusion, when had she ever witnessed anything like this? “Hongxiu? Hongxiu, what is happening? This is the physician… let him examine you…”
Hongxiu only smiled and shook her head. “Duke of Anding… the Crown Prince destroyed Flowing Wind Pavilion… he truly did… care about you.” Then she opened her palm. Li Congjia saw, unmistakably, a porcelain bottle identical to the one he had seen that night, that eerie cold-jade bottle. Suddenly, he understood part of what had happened. Hongxiu, she…
“This poison… is extremely cold… Only the coldest ice is worthy of… Green Willow Lane.” Hongxiu drew a deep breath. “…Duke of Anding, could you promise… after I die… to return my body to Green Willow Lane…” Li Congjia felt the strength gripping his hand slowly weaken. His mind rapidly sorted through everything that had happened. Seeing her like this, he could only tell her not to speak nonsense. Hongxiu would not allow anyone else close, so he bent down, intending to lift her himself.
But in that single instant, the woman raised her head and drank the entire bottle of Qingu.
Li Congjia froze where he was, cold spreading through his entire body.
Suddenly, he understood. This woman would rather die than die under another person’s coercion. At the very end, he heard her chest heaving violently, almost like the sudden onset of heart disease. Her final words emerged as faint as a thread. “Trust Lord Han… and…” She smiled with relief. “In this world, how many people… are like you…”
Blood spread across the floor in a terrible mess. Her hand released his. Before his own eyes, Li Congjia witnessed the effect of Qingu. The physician stood to one side, shocked, shaking his head and sighing that perhaps the woman had gone mad.
So the end of Green Willow Lane was a figure clothed in misty blue-green. Hongxiu lost every sensation. She could no longer see his brows and eyes, could no longer see his spring-wind smile, could no longer see the startling brilliance of one lift of his wrist, could no longer see the unfathomable depth of that double-pupiled eye. Even in death, she could not hear him agree to the only request she had ever made of him in this life.
The only thing Li Congjia could promise her was to send her back to Green Willow Lane.
Her fingernails were still embedded in her own flesh. Li Congjia suddenly released her and stumbled several steps backward as though frightened. His smile was filled with grief. “Hongxiu… Hongxiu… why did you have to do this?”
His folding fan slipped from his raised wrist with a sharp pa, striking the floor and breaking one of its ribs.
They were all people who had lost their hearts. Three hundred thousand taels could be scattered with a wave of the hand, and tomorrow one would again wander to the ends of the earth. When disappointment came, write it into wine, drink from the cup and look upon the realm. One ought to ride the clouds, bathe in rosy light, and refuse to betray these fleeting years.
She had wished for nothing more than not to betray the years given to her. Better to flourish at the height of beauty and then fall than to wither, grow haggard, and let the spring winds pass with no one left to admire her.
She must have been poisoned somehow by the suspicious Li Hongji, so that once the appointed time arrived she would be tortured to death. Yet she had stubbornly refused to pour the Qingu into the wine. Even Ehuang, weeping beside them, could understand something of what lay behind that choice. She was far too intelligent. As another woman, there were many things she could no longer bring herself to say aloud.
Hongxiu should never have fallen to such an end. Her bearing had never resembled that of some vulgar beauty. Even at the point of death, she had not forgotten to repay kindness. She would not allow Li Congjia to misunderstand Han Xizai because of this affair, nor did she wish to see him hate Li Hongji.
She had spent her life greedily chasing glory and wealth, yet at the end she still remembered that she wanted to return to Green Willow Lane. Perhaps at last she too had seen clearly the so-called human hearts of the imperial family and the royal nobility.
No one could win this wager.
“The pearl shatters, precious before my eyes; the flower withers, spring beyond this world. The hatred in my heart has not yet faded, and now the body within my hands is lost.”
“The jade case still holds medicine; the fragrant dressing box is already covered in dust. Earlier grief joins later sorrow, yet no tears remain to wet the kerchief.”
“Her radiant beauty was like a fragrant tree; the peril of their floating lives was much the same. Just as one grieves for spring blossoms falling, the rain comes again to ravage the grove.”
“Where now is all that luxuriant beauty? Everything that drifted away has become empty. Deep and silent, there is nowhere left to ask; for a thousand years, farewell to the east wind.”
Elio’s Notes: Li Congjia recites the elegy that supplies this chapter’s title and also contains the line used for Chapter 8, “All That Drifted Away Is Gone,” and the line that will title Chapter 24, “Deep and Silent, There Is Nowhere Left to Ask.” The novel is deliberately threading multiple chapter titles through the same mourning poem.
Li Congjia half laughed, half recited. Grief clogged his nose and chest, yet there was nowhere for it to go. Brother Hongji… Brother Hongji… Do human lives truly mean nothing to you? Even if that qin string still existed, what would it change? She was only a singing girl, perhaps, but she was still someone who had shared your pillow. And you poisoned her to this point.
Splendor gradually turned cold.
Ehuang went over and supported him, not knowing how to comfort him. Li Congjia loudly ordered Piaopeng to bring Resounding Spring.
Piaopeng had never witnessed anything so grave as a life ending before his eyes. His hands and feet seemed to knot together from fright, and he hurried trembling toward the rear to fetch the qin.
The physician examined Hongxiu on his own, then stepped forward to report. “There was a traveling needle inside her body, poisoned to seal the acupoints. If it was not extracted within the appointed time, the needle would move with the blood. Wherever it traveled, the meridians would be severed. Eventually the blood of the heart would surge, and the needle would pierce the heart, causing death.” The physician stopped nervously for a moment before finally continuing, “But Miss Hongxiu appears to have… swallowed some other strange poison… That is what proved most immediately fatal. Without that poison, perhaps her death might have been delayed somewhat, though I fear it would only have prolonged her suffering…”
Li Congjia pressed a hand to his forehead and waved him away.
It was already too late. Nothing could be done.
The servants huddled to one side in terror, unsure what they should do. Hongxiu’s body remained where it was, and for a time there was only silence. Li Congjia ordered, “Without my permission, no one is to touch Miss Hongxiu.”
“Congjia…” Ehuang came forward and slipped her arm through his. She said nothing, offering only silent comfort. Everything before her had gone far beyond anything she had imagined, but she knew that now was not the time for questions.
“I… am fine.” Yet there was no longer the slightest trace of his usual tranquil smile upon his face.
Piaopeng returned with Resounding Spring. Li Congjia ordered him to place it at the center of the hall and commanded that every door and window on all four sides be thrown open. He sat before the qin and motioned for every performer to return to Pear Fragrance Courtyard.
Dressed in the Mountains-and-Rivers Brocade, Li Congjia faced the bright daylight and played the qin at the center of the hall as he sang. Every feeling of the newly composed melody poured through his fingertips. Behind him lay scarlet robes weeping blood. Wind entered through the open windows on every side. “Green gauze dances throughout the room. The pearl shatters, precious before my eyes; the flower withers, spring beyond this world. The hatred in my heart has not yet faded, and now the body within my hands is lost.” Every string entered the ear, and grief filled the eye.
He pitied Hongxiu. But the one he grieved for was himself.
“Where now is all that luxuriant beauty? Everything that drifted away has become empty. Deep and silent, there is nowhere left to ask; for a thousand years, farewell to the east wind.” His voice rang clear and bright as he sang an elegy she could never hear.
He knew that no matter what happened, Li Hongji could never hear this song. Yet he insisted on playing it anyway, simply letting it go with the wind. All the beauty of Jinling, all the languor of the Qinhuai River, could not overcome one song spoken from the heart. Li Congjia was simply tired.
Everything that drifted away has become empty. Losing means losing. You destroyed Flowing Wind Pavilion and still could not find that qin string. What use is there in my keeping Resounding Spring?
When the piece ended, no one spoke.
Wrapped in the Mountains-and-Rivers Brocade, Li Congjia seemed to have exhausted all his splendor and stood on the verge of being carried away by the wind. Ehuang watched him through tears. She knew how bitterly he suffered, yet she could not say it. Because of that, she suffered all the more. Whatever happened, she still had to try. She had to remain standing beside him.
No matter what happened, as long as he could still stand here safely, that alone was Heaven’s greatest blessing to her. So many people longed merely to glimpse the elegance of his silhouette. Hongxiu’s final heart’s blood remained vividly before her eyes, while Ehuang could still stand proudly at his side. She ought to know contentment.
Her tears fell quietly and disappeared into her clothing. The woman whose beauty flourished at its fullest still stood straight and composed. Wind and rain were nothing more than a backdrop.
Suddenly, Li Congjia rose with unhurried grace and lifted Resounding Spring violently into the air. Those wrists of incomparable beauty framed the qin’s final moment of austere elegance. Then he smashed it brutally against the floor.
The sound of it shattering seemed to tear the heart apart. Piaopeng cried out and rushed forward, but he was too late.
The qin split apart, yet the sound of its strings had not completely died.
Flowing Wind and Resounding Spring. The truest things in the human world. The purer they are, the less this world can tolerate them. Who told you to be born into an imperial family?
Ancient wood lay shattered across the floor. Suddenly Li Congjia threw back his head and laughed without restraint. That laughter split through the languid bustle of Jinling and climbed straight into the clouds, while ten thousand fallen blossoms left only longing behind.
Blue-green curtains rose and fell with the wind. The man in the Mountains-and-Rivers Brocade stood within the pavilion and laughed with fierce defiance. His double-pupiled eye was almost demonic in its power to seize the heart. As his sleeves flew in the wind, the desolation upon his face destroyed the spring light and drifting catkins alike, until heaven and earth seemed to lose their color.
Far away upon a rooftop, a man with sword-like brows saw only that blue-green figure moving in the wind. Sword in hand, he launched himself away and sped toward the Crown Prince’s residence.