Something flew open with a sharp clatter, and a warm, fragrant gust rushed into the room. Liuzhu woke with a start.
Her own home lay before her. It stood in the countryside outside Jinling, a clean, orderly dwelling, not poor like Green Willow Lane, and their life was still reasonably secure. The window, flung open by the gust, kept banging against its frame. On the table, the pale blue-green robe she had enshrined remained safely in place, unchanged.
She gradually calmed down. Her face was wet with tears. She wiped them away carelessly and sat blankly on the couch, not knowing what to do.
“My lord…” After a long while she still called for him. She had seen with her own eyes how much he had suffered during those final days, always struggling, always enduring.
He had smiled as though all were light wind and pale clouds. When the flowering peach petals began to fall, his consciousness was already slipping into confusion. No one could tell whether he was truly sleeping or merely sunk in an unconscious stupor from which he could not wake, yet whenever he murmured of Qixi, he would abruptly become lucid again.
He simply refused to leave even one minute, one moment early. He wanted to prove that Li Congjia had never broken his word. It was only that the world could not be predicted.
The candle went out. In the darkness she felt around again and again until at last she found the two characters he had written in blood. If not for those words, perhaps she would never have found the courage to return alive.
The blood had long since dried. Live.
You must live.
She sat there until dawn. Then, as though someone had finally shown her the way, she made up her mind.
“Mother, I am going into the city.” She finally packed her things and left, carrying the soft bundle she would allow no one else to examine.
Beside the shallow stream outside the village, she remembered that before the city fell, Li Congjia had told her to take Nüying away. At the time she had refused no matter what he said, until one gesture of his settled her heart.
He could no longer see, yet he placed his hand over her eyes. Beneath that cool, thin hand, she too could see nothing. In the darkness, everything returned to dead silence, and at such a moment the voice at the bottom of one’s heart could easily become infinitely loud.
That was when she thought of home, of the stream before the gate and its clear, cold water.
Now it was still the same. Liuzhu followed the tributary all the way until the Qinhuai led her back into Jinling.
It was almost exactly as she had dreamed: streets restored, Shengding House rebuilt, people coming and going, the common people slowly recovering from grief. Fortunately, the new ruler still governed Jiangnan with benevolence and seemed to have no intention of treating it harshly.
Was Zhao Guangyi still trying to repay what he owed?
At the inner Qinhuai, she stood alone looking at the old scenery that had thrown itself once more into luxury and could not stop herself from crying aloud. Scholars on both banks drank wine in the wind. Seeing a young woman clutching something and grieving alone, they merely shook their heads and sighed. How could they possibly understand what she felt?
The Qinhuai had not changed. All the joy, sorrow, chill, and silence that had unfolded here would never be spoken of again. The youth whose wrist had been white as snow, whose blue-green robes could overturn a kingdom, survived only in fragments of old people’s stories. Beyond a few embellished legends, no one would ever understand his suffering, and no one would ever understand his stubborn devotion.
Born on Qixi, dead on Qixi. A thousand years from now, would anyone still burn incense in remembrance?
Those lines of verse that cut straight into the heart, how could every word have drawn blood from those who heard them if he himself had not borne so much sorrow?
People understood only the beauty of legends. How could they know the grief through which a legend had passed?
Li Congjia’s life had been too splendid and too painful. Glory had burdened him; high position had humiliated him. In the end, he wanted nothing more than the simplest wish any ordinary person could have, and even that he could not fulfill. He could never do it now.
He had only wanted to return to Jiangnan with him.
Golden foil spread beneath his feet on childhood birthdays, the former emperor’s favor as he personally held him on his knee, fine days and beautiful scenes beside a lovely companion, all of it passed through Liuzhu’s mind as she stepped lightly into a small boat.
All that remained was the Mountains-and-Rivers Brocade in her arms.
The only thing he had ever truly been able to control was himself. And so neither his life nor his death would submit to a deadline ordained by fate.
A light breeze came over the Qinhuai, lovely and languid. Since ancient times, how many romances and remnants of vanished dynasties had gathered upon this one stretch of water? Liuzhu looked as far as she could. In the mist, mountains and water merged in an ancient, indifferent expanse. The world had lost some of its clear, airy grace, as though human life itself had been stripped of its spirit.
“My lord, Liuzhu has no way to repay you. But I will remember. I will do my best to live.”
A procession of carriages and horses suddenly halted on the bank. From far away, someone ordered them to stop.
A man in official robes inside one carriage seemed to see something and suddenly stepped down. Someone urged him, “My lord, should we not hurry to the ferry?”
“Wait a moment.”
He strained to make out the woman in the little boat, then abruptly walked to the riverbank and stopped there, staring.
The distant sound of strings rose again, clear and faint, yet enough to stir the heart.
Liuzhu listened. So people here still most loved playing the songs the ruler had left behind in those days. That was good.
She shook out the pale blue-green wrapping and revealed the peerless brocade within, lavish beyond measure: the Mountains-and-Rivers Brocade. Her boat had already reached the middle of the river, yet everyone on the bank fell silent and watched.
A treasure beyond price. Distant mountains, nearby waters, the splendor and soul of three thousand li of Jiangnan all lived upon that single garment. What kind of person could ever have been worthy of wearing it?
“My lord, we came home.” Kneeling in the boat amid the garment’s heavy, layered folds, Liuzhu whispered, “My lord… everything is all right now. Spring in Jiangnan is as warm and gentle as before. Your illness is gone too…”
Then, before the astonished people on the bank, she suddenly released her hands and watched that incomparable sweep of sky-and-water blue-green slowly sink into the Qinhuai River.
The water churned without rest, then returned to calm.
My lord… this Qixi, you finally made it back to Jiangnan after all.
This time… am I truly the only one left?
Liuzhu drifted on the river for a long time without direction. When she finally stepped ashore again, she found someone had been watching her the entire time.
The man wore crimson official robes. Everything here now followed the court dress of the north, so that alone was nothing remarkable. Liuzhu walked closer and saw his face. Only then did she truly not know what she felt.
“You…” She had barely spoken when attendants at his side blocked her. “Insolent! Why have you not paid respects to the Transport Commissioner?”
Liuzhu laughed softly. She neither moved nor bowed, carrying herself with the same effortless discourtesy Li Congjia once had. “Fan Ruoshui, you got everything you wanted.”
Fan Ruoshui only stared at her blankly. He waved the others away. “Go on to the ferry first. The salt transport cannot be delayed.” Then he turned back to Liuzhu. “…You came back…”
“Yes. I came back.”
Her eyes were still swollen, yet she answered with a calm smile. Looking at her, Fan Ruoshui once again seemed at a loss. “I heard. He already…”
“I am afraid you will not be able to take your revenge anymore.”
Fan Ruoshui had no answer. He could only watch her walk calmly past him. Then he suddenly called after her, “You do not hate me?”
“Why should I hate you? If it were my lord, he would only pity you…”
Yes. From beginning to end, he had been someone who needed pity. Whether it was Li Congjia or the people at his side, they had all been the same. All they could give Fan Ruoshui was compassion.
Liuzhu walked slowly through the streets of Jinling by herself. Without realizing it, she circled back to the imperial palace, now sealed under heavy guard. She stepped back and looked from a distance. Traces of the fire still remained inside. Yuxiao Pavilion rose high above everything, and all of it still looked much as it had that day.
Too many stories had unfolded inside this palace. Now she stood before it alone, as though an entire lifetime separated her from those days.
She even began to wonder whether she had truly lived there day and night, whether she had truly walked every road and entered every hall. The feeling was too oppressive to ease, and Liuzhu could never walk back inside.
To say nothing had changed was not true. Everything was different after all.
That world-destroying fire had killed Piaopeng and far too many others. A sudden chill went through her whole body. Had she perhaps died in that fire too?
A sound came from behind her. He had not left after all.
“Fan Ruoshui, did you come to watch me make a fool of myself?” There was no anger or mockery in her voice. If anything, she sounded unusually casual.
“I only… I only have not seen an old acquaintance in a very long time…” Fan Ruoshui stammered. He had never managed to rid himself of that cowardly nature.
“Neither have I.” Liuzhu smiled. She truly had never imagined she would meet him here. So he had become the Transport Commissioner for Jiangnan. It was a very respectable office.
“Where will you… where will you live from now on? By yourself?”
“I went home. My parents are still alive and well.”
She still had a home she could return to. But what about him? An inexplicable sorrow suddenly seized Fan Ruoshui. He had passed Green Willow Lane several times, but no matter what he did, he could not go home.
His mother refused to see him. Whenever the people in the lane saw him, they pointed and spat curses.
“I… I… I did wonder…”
“What are you trying to say? You wondered about Miss Hongxiu’s death?”
“Yes. He never seemed like someone who would lie to me.”
“Miss Hongxiu was not killed by my lord. From the beginning, you saw the matter too narrowly.” Hearing Liuzhu speak of the past only made Fan Ruoshui more miserable.
Had everything been wrong?
The two walked one behind the other. Sometimes they exchanged a few words, but most of the time they simply watched Jinling’s streets as they went. Liuzhu slowly left the city and turned back to smile at him. “My lord, let us part here. Liuzhu must go home as well. From now on, right and wrong are all matters of the past. Since you have achieved rank and office, you should treasure what you have.”
Fan Ruoshui stared after her blankly as she left, then suddenly bent over the city wall, overwhelmed by pain.
The residence of the Jiangnan Transport Commissioner.
There was nothing luxurious in the room. It stood empty except for one dead red plum tree.
On another morning, a matchmaker came to the house again. Liuzhu closed the door. “Mother, send them away. Your daughter has already reached this age, and I was a woman from the palace. Even if I married, people would still be suspicious of me. I will not entertain such thoughts in this life.” No one could guarantee that a palace woman had not belonged to someone. Such suspicions were common enough, especially toward a woman who had served the previous dynasty, and every family would naturally wish to avoid the risk.
Still beside the Qinhuai River.
An elderly woman with a head full of silver hair rested quietly while humming to herself beside a basin of freshly washed clothes. The calmness of her younger features could still faintly be seen. A few mischievous children from neighboring homes came splashing through the water again, and she merely smiled and let them play.
“Granny! Granny, you sing so beautifully. What tune is that?”
“It is called the Rainbow Skirt and Feathered Robe Dance.”
“What dance? Ah… what a long name…” Everyone in the village said the old woman in the eastern house had lived alone for most of her life. Even at her age she still went out by herself and lived by herself. The children loved coming to play with her. When she was in a good mood, she would hum beautiful melodies and bring out sweets to coax them.
Her long hair was still kept impeccably neat, though frost had long since covered it. Her life was quiet and comfortable enough, yet younger villagers would sometimes see her airing old embroidered skirts so precious they seemed to belong to another age.
They were unmistakably palace garments of a kind later generations no longer understood. Whenever the weather turned fine, she would bring them outside to air. Decades passed like this, and she became a mysterious but deeply respected elder in the village.
“I want to learn! I want to learn too!”
“This piece is very difficult… When you are a little older, Granny will see whether she can still remember it. Then I will teach you, all right?”
In truth, Liuzhu remembered every rise, turn, and cadence with perfect clarity, just as she remembered Empress Zhaohui’s performance atop Yuxiao Pavilion that had once astonished the world.
Cooking smoke rose into the air.
At dusk, Liuzhu sat in the courtyard, slowly rubbing her shoulder. Her parents had passed away long ago. Now she too had reached this age. She had learned to take everything lightly after so many years alone.
Whether or not she had ever grown used to it, she had done her best to fulfill his final instruction: live.
Suddenly someone pushed open the courtyard gate. She hurried to her feet and saw a pair of trembling hands. An old man leaned against the wall, muttering something over and over while staring fixedly at her.
She walked closer and studied him for a long moment before finally recognizing him.
“Fan Ruoshui, what happened to you?” Only after the words left her mouth did she notice there were others behind him. Liuzhu stepped back two paces. “This is…” The man, trembling with fear and deference, heard her question and quickly turned to guide forward the person behind him, a man about their own age whose face nevertheless carried unmistakable authority and whose entire bearing spoke of rank and wealth.
Only when they walked directly into the courtyard without hesitation did Liuzhu suddenly recognize the visitor.
All three had white at their temples.
The man in the foremost position said nothing. He only looked at her.
“Liuzhu pays respects to Your Majesty.” After a long impasse, she finally made to bow.
“No need.”
Supported by Fan Ruoshui, he looked around while keeping one hand pressed to his stomach. Something was plainly wrong with his health. He too was probably ill.
“For Your Majesty to come in person… Liuzhu’s country home is crude. I fear I cannot receive you properly.” Her tone was neither warm nor cold. After so many years, even if the heavens collapsed before her, she probably would not have found it surprising.
“We… I… I only wanted to come back and look around. He said you were still somewhere near Jinling, so I came.” Zhao Guangyi looked at her. The clever, quick-witted girl in his memories had grown just as old as they had. “You have been alone all these years?”
“Yes.”
No one spoke again.
The three sat quietly in the middle of the courtyard. “A few years ago, I had Wang Jien executed…” Zhao Guangyi seemed hesitant. When Fan Ruoshui heard him bring this up, he edged slightly away.
“I learned some things… Chancellor Zhao Pu finally spoke. The old doubts surrounding Yunjie came to light… I made Wang Jien die miserably… so…” Did people begin wanting to undo things only when they grew old? Liuzhu smiled. “Is Your Majesty not the same as the late emperor today? Now that trouble over the succession is approaching, perhaps Your Majesty fears he might turn to someone else at such a time… If the work is the same, what difference does it make whom he helps do it?”
Liuzhu did not know the details of Yunjie’s affair. She only knew that Zhao Guangyi had spent a lifetime plotting and calculating. Whatever regret had awakened in him now could not erase what he had done back then.
She did not hate anyone. She was merely stating the truth calmly. Zhao Guangyi had nothing more to say. Yes, now he had too many things to weigh. Even killing the man who had helped him seize the throne naturally involved calculations of its own. Nothing he did could now be governed solely by human feeling. He could no longer be Jiang Zheng. He had to be Zhao Guangyi.
He possessed the realm beneath Heaven.
At daybreak, Zhao Guangyi left with one hand over his stomach. He seemed to have suffered from illness for years as well. Accompanied by Fan Ruoshui, he secretly went to Andong Temple.
Liuzhu saw that he did not look well and still walked out to see him off, calling from a distance, “It is all past… Once they were gone, there was no need to keep brooding over it. Treat it as though Your Majesty had a dream. You have both obtained everything you once wanted. Let the past go…” He and Fan Ruoshui had perhaps gotten more of what they wanted than anyone, yet they were the two least able to release the past.
By now, incense at Andong Temple had dwindled, and the trees outside the neglected monastery had grown even more tangled.
Once, someone had secretly entered this place at night and sworn he would take him away. Holding that red-sandalwood bracelet, his eyes had carried endless regret. After hesitating for a long time, all his words had finally become one sentence: “It was Big Brother’s fault.” Then came that familiar pat on his shoulder.
Zhao Guangyi’s palace boots, lined in imperial yellow, stepped onto the final stone stair before the temple gate. In the end, he never knocked.
The following year, Song Taizong, Zhao Guangyi, died when an old blade wound in his abdomen failed to heal.
From the river terrace I gaze as far as sight can reach; fallen lotus scatters on the river, and still I cannot return. Ill and without strength, while silk fans are put away and gauze robes first sought, time slips through a crack. I sigh beneath the carved rafters, where paired swallows are guests. Where is that person now? A curtain of pale moonlight seems almost to illuminate that face.
Elio’s Notes: These lines are from Southern Song poet Jiang Kui’s Ni Shang Zhong Xu Di Yi (《霓裳中序第一·亭皋正望极》). Its preface says the piece was built from surviving notation associated with the Rainbow Skirt and Feathered Robe music.
She hummed it, just as she always had.
“Granny! I heard the ruler who used to live here was very good at writing lyrics… Do you still remember him from back then?” The child from next door came pestering her again.
“I remember.”
“I have been going into the city these past few days to study with my teacher. Behind the teahouse, there is an old storyteller who secretly sets up a stall at the end of the street. Every day lots of people go listen. He says the ruler back then was ‘without equal in all the world’… What does ‘without equal in all the world’ mean?” The child lifted a soft, pink little face in curiosity.
“It means… it means you will never see anyone like him again.”
“Then… they also say there used to be a very beautiful color that was lost… Did Granny ever see it?”
“I did. It was very, very beautiful. No one can dye it anymore.” Walking had already become difficult for her. She leaned against the wall as she dusted the cloth, while the child squatted at her feet.
“Ah… I wish I could see it. That storyteller is really good. Lots of the children I play with sneak away to listen. And they say there used to be some… some score with a really long name, and if anyone could bring it out now, it would be worth ten thousand in gold…”
Liuzhu smiled. The child was still absorbed in that story, which sounded like legend. “I want to find that score. If I find it, will I become rich? Will I have more gold and silver than I could ever spend?”
Liuzhu began humming casually again. “Mm. You would.”
Her shadow stretched endlessly in the sunset. In the child’s eyes, her hair was entirely silver, yet she still seemed to carry some different kind of radiance. “Granny will teach you to read, all right? Before the jade trees in the rear courtyard, before the mirror where precious grasses adorn. Last year’s flowers have not grown old; this year the moon is round again. Let nothing tilt apart. With moon and flowers together, may Heaven keep us forever young.”
“Granny, say it slower. I cannot remember… Jade trees…”
The storyteller in Jinling still set up his stall. He too was an old man now. It seemed he had once held office, but in recent years he had lost power after offending someone influential. He had developed a half-mad habit of throwing himself around any red plum tree he saw and weeping, and of staring toward Green Willow Lane without ever daring to go inside.
The next day, all the children in the village were sad. The old woman who owned so many hairpins, bracelets, and embroidered skirts worth fortunes had died. She had gone very peacefully.
That night, Liuzhu had felt as though she had caught a chill and was somewhat uncomfortable. She lightly gripped that strip of cloth and slowly fell asleep.
The bloodstain on the cloth had turned a dark brown. Live.
Someone in blue-green lifted his wrist. One eye held double pupils, stirring the nine heavens. He smiled with peerless grace until the spring flowers lost their color, and murmured, “With moon and flowers together, may Heaven keep us forever young.”
The dream was too beautiful. She never wanted to wake again.
End.