"A letter from Consort Gyokuyou?"
"That"s right. She told me to personally deliver it."
"Ah Duo-sama is out for a tea party though."
The plump head maid, Fonmin looked at Maomao, troubled.
Maomao opened the letter box she presented. Inside, instead of a doc.u.ment, was a small bottle and one red trumpet-shaped flower. A sweet scent she was used to smelling came from the bottle.
As for what that was, it seemed Fonmin knew as well. Her shoulders gave a twitch.
"There is something I want to talk to Fonmin-sama about."
"I understand."
Fonmin, with a stiff expression, invited Maomao into the Pomegranate Palace.
The makeup of Fonmin"s room was roughly the same as Honnyan"s room, but for some reason the baggage was compacted to the corner of the room. It was like she was done with packing.
(I knew it.)
They faced each other in the room she was invited into with the round table between them. There was crude tea that warms the body, and hard bread accompanied it as teacakes. Fruits boiled in honey hung overhead.
"Just what"s happening? The spring cleaning was already good enough."
Though her tone was gentle, she said it searchingly.
"That"s right. When will you be made to move?"
Maomao glanced at the baggage left in the corner of the room.
"Your judgement is good."
The spring cleaning was the surface reason.
Together with the new year greeting, in order to receive the new Four Consort, Consort Ah Duo must leave this palace.
A consort who cannot give birth at the Inner Palace is unneeded.
Being milk siblings with the emperor, a relation deeper than actual blood ties, had probably maintained her position up until now.
At least, if the male infant who was born was still alive, Consort Ah Duo would have stuck out her chest largely. [T/N: to boast about it.]
(Probably, Consort Ah Duo is….)
The gallant figure that was like a young man. That wasn"t a feminine aura.
It was as if, the woman had become something close to a eunuch.
She hated to talk of speculation.
But, if she had conviction, she could only speak out.
"Consort Ah Duo can"t give birth anymore."
"…."
Her silence was an affirmation.
Fonmin"s expression quickly stiffened.
"Something happened during childbirth."
"That is unrelated to this."
The middle-aged head maid narrowed her eyes.
That wasn"t the helpful gentle woman. Hostility burned in her eyes.
"It is related to this. The one who was at the place of childbirth, was my foster fatherdad."
Fonmin stood up and expressionlessly looked at Maomao who had informed her the truth.
The Inner Palace was always shorthanded on medical officers. The quack doctor was doing as much as he could in his current position to continue to remain.
It was unnecessary to specially become a eunuch while holding the special position of a medical officer. This was what happened to her unskilled dad; he was probably gently pressured to become one.
"Wasn"t the unfortunate thing was that it overlapped with the birth of the emperor"s younger brother? Because of where the scales tipped, Consort Ah Duo"s child birthing was postponed."
At the end of a difficult birth, the child was born with no issues, but Consort Ah Duo"s womb was lost.
And then, the child too, pa.s.sed away young.
Though in the same way as the previous poisonous face powder incident, it was questioned whether Consort Ah Duo made her child pa.s.s away due to that.
"Does Fonmin-sama feel responsible for that? At that time, the one who a.s.sisted on behalf of the Consort Ah Duo who was disgraced after childbirth should be you."
"You know anything. You"re just the daughter of the quack who couldn"t even help Ah Duo-sama."
"I guess so."
The unavoidable words, wasn"t to clear up the medical treatment. It was her dad’s words.
Resigned to be slandered as a quack, he was that type of person.
"I was sure that quack prohibited the use of face powder that contained white lead. Because of that, the intelligent you did not let the babies die."
Maomao opened the small bottle that was in the letter box. The viscous honey sparkled. Maomao put the red flower that was in it in her mouth.
It tasted like sweet honey. She held the flower, twirled it around with her finger.
"A lot of flowers have poison. Like aconite and renge azalea. There is poison in their honey."
"I know."
"I thought so."
It wasn"t strange for her to have that knowledge if her family ran beekeeping.
She wouldn"t give poison that would cause poisoning symptoms to adults to a baby.
“But you didn’t know that just mixed in honey is still an effective poison for babies.”
It wasn"t speculation. It was conviction.
Though it was rare, there is that sort of poison. It was only effective to babies with weak const.i.tutions.
"It was fine even when you tasted for poison. You never thought that the medicine you gave to nourish the baby would completely backfire on you."
And so, Consort Ah Duo"s child ceased to breathe.
The cause of death was viewed as a mystery.
At the time, her father who used to be the medical officer, Ruomen, was banished from the Inner Palace due to his frequent mistakes, together with the treatment at the time of childbirth. As a physical punishment, the bone of one of his knees was extracted.
"You didn"t want her know. Consort Ah Duo."
That she herself was the cause who killed her master"s only child.
"That"s why you thought to make Consort Riishu disappear."
Consort Riishu became emotionally attached to Consort Ah Duo, who was the older daughter in law, during the era of the previous emperor.
A young girl who was far from home, and a woman who couldn"t have children. A type of co-dependency was born.
However, suddenly, one day Consort Riishu was rejected by Consort Ah Duo. No matter how many time she came to see her, she was chased out by Fonmin.
And so, just like this, the previous emperor died, and Consort Riishu retired into religion.
"Consort Riishuu told you that there was poison in the honey, right."
If Consort Riishu continued to come, she might talk about that.
Fonmin just wanted to avoid that.
The girl who retired to religion, and never thought she would meet a second time, appeared back in the Inner Palace again.
This time as the same high rank consort.
This time with the position to drive off Consort Ah Duo.
And yet, that shameless young girl came to meet Consort Ah Duo as if to seek a mother.
A young girl who couldn"t read the atmosphere, who was ignorant of the ways of the world.
That"s why she thought to make her disappear.
The gentle, helpful head maid wasn"t there. Instead, a woman faced her with a cold stare.
"What do you want?"
"I don"t need that kind of thing."
Maomao felt a tingling sensation on the back of her head.
Fonmin only needed to stretch her arms out to reach for it.
"Anything is fine."
"Doesn"t Fonmin-sama yourself know that type of thing is pointless?"
A few days ago, she reported what she investigated from the book to Jis.h.i.+n.
She must not deceive him.
Jis.h.i.+n will catch Fonmin if he heard Maomao"s talk.
The truth from sixteen years ago will come to light.
That"s why, even if Maomao disappeared here, it will be the same.
Sooner or later, it would be exposed.
The smart head maid should understand that.
What Maomao can do, is only one thing.
Not to hope for a reduction in penalty, nor to speak of dealing with Consort Ah Duo.
Only to decide which one out of the two possible motives.
To just continue hiding that motive from Consort Ah Duo.
"The result will not change. So if that"s alright with you."
Please accept my proposal, she said.
(So tired.)
Maomao returned to her room in the Jade Palace, and collapsed into her hard bed.
Her clothes were sticky with sweat. The clinging scent from the perspiration from the tension was strong, quite stinky. She wanted to take a bath.
At least she could change. She took off her outer garment. The area around her chest to her belly was wrapped in cloth. It was fixed with oiled paper that was layered repeatedly over it.
Property of © Fantasy-Books.live; outside of it, it is stolen."It"s good that this wasn"t necessary."
(It would have hurt if I got stabbed.)
Maomao peeled off the oiled paper, and put on a fresh change of clothes.
"And so, Fonmin surrendered."
"That"s good."
The blunt maid spoke, especially nonchalantly.
Jis.h.i.+n had his elbows on the table. He ignored Gaoshun who only faced him when there was something he wanted to say. He wanted to say that his manners were bad.
"Do you know anything?"
"What kind of thing?"
"It seemed like you randomly got Gaoshun to gather up books though."
"Indeed. It became useless in the end."
As if she was treating him like a fool, she indifferently brushed it off.*
As usual, she faced him as though she was looking at filthy mud. It was much more refres.h.i.+ng once you look past the rudeness.
"The motive is as you said. It was to maintain the Four Consort seat."
"Is that so."
She looked at him with absolutely no interest at all.
"It"s unfortunate, but it was determined that Consort Ah Duo will step down from being a high rank consort. She will leave the Inner Palace and will now live in the Southern Villa."
"Is that because of this incident?"
Maomao asked in return.
It seemed the cat finally expressed interest in the gold. [T/N: Maomao = catcat ∴ cat :D]
"Nah, it was decided from the start. The emperor"s decision."
Was she being enclosed in the villa without returning home because she was the love of many years?
It was unusual for Maomao to ask something out of interest. He got unintentionally elated.
When he initiated a step closer toward her, for some reason, she put herself on guard and retreated half a step.
I told you so, Gaoshun gave him an amazed look.
Was she still holding a grudge on the trivial prank from the other day?
Jis.h.i.+n was quite bothered that he was being guarded against. He sat back down on the chair again.
The short court lady lowered her head. Though she was going to leave, her footsteps suddenly halted.
The room* was decorated with a branch of a red trumpet shaped flower. [T/N: doesn’t say what was decorated, so I a.s.sumed room.]
"Honnyan decorated just then."
"I see. It"s blooming off season."
Maomao, taking the flower, held onto the stem and put it in her mouth.
Jis.h.i.+n tilted his head. He slowly inched close and copied Maomao.
"It"s sweet."
"It"s poisonous though."
He spat it out and held his mouth. Gaoshun came forward with a pitcher of water.
"You won"t die so it"s fine."
The odd girl who was licking her lips, gave a faint sweet smile.