The Apothecary Diaries - Volume 7 - Chapter 18

Chapter 18: A Man and a Woman Play the Game

“You’re not going home with Sir Luomen?” Jinshi asked Maomao. She’d stayed behind and was boiling some water.

“You seem awfully pale, Master Jinshi. How many days since you last got a proper sleep?”

A question for a question. She mixed some herbs that would help him get to sleep into the water and passed him a cup. Lahan had left with Luomen, while Basen had gone to see both of them off.

“I’ve been sleeping every night,” Jinshi retorted.

“Let’s try a different question. How many total hours have you slept in the last several days?”

Jinshi started counting on his fingers. He didn’t look likely to get through an entire hand. He scowled and drank the tea.

“Early morning tomorrow?” she asked.

“No, for once things are relatively quiet. In fact, today is the first day I’ve been able to come back to my palace in some time.” So he really was working hard.

“Lady Suiren must be worried about you.”

“And you’re not?” Jinshi said, the cup still at his lips. He loosened the chest of his robe, prompting Maomao to look around for some sleepwear. Suiren entered at exactly that moment—thankfully—but no sooner had she handed Maomao a set of nightwear than she showed herself out again. Wants me to help him change, huh?

She’d done it before, back when she’d been serving in Jinshi’s residence, but she had never liked it. Quite frankly, Maomao thought he could stand to dress himself, while Jinshi held the fundamental conviction that he should be assisted in all things. Never the twain would meet. When it came down to it, however, one of them was of far higher status than the other, and it was Maomao who had to bend.

She put the sleepwear on him at almost the same moment as he sent his cloak fluttering to the ground. She tossed the belt around his waist, tied it loosely, and then collected the garment off the floor. “You make En’en do this for you too?” she grumbled.

“No, it happens I don’t.”

“But you have her tie up your hair.” Maomao considered that part and parcel of helping him change.

“That I do, but always under Suiren’s supervision.”

“Always?”

“To forestall the possibility of a swift stab from behind.”

“She—” would never, Maomao began to say, but she stopped. In a state of extreme Yao deprivation, there was no telling what En’en might do.

“Suiren can be overprotective. She’s never even left us alone in a room together.”

Yet here were Jinshi and Maomao in exactly that situation. Maomao said nothing.

“Suiren thinks quite highly of you,” said Jinshi.

“That’s not my fault.” Being high in Suiren’s esteem carried no benefits for Maomao. Indeed, she was hard-pressed to think of a single good thing that might come of it. She took the empty teacup and was about to leave, but Jinshi caught her wrist.

“You’re always trying to put me off,” he said.

“I can’t imagine what you mean, sir.”

Staying in this room was dangerous. She wanted to get out while the getting was good, but he wouldn’t let go of her.

“Suiren feels quite urgently that I should take a consort of my own,” he said. “She claims it would mean less work for me.”

“I’m sure she’s right.” Maomao was intent on acting as if the matter didn’t concern her. That, however, could only aggravate Jinshi.

“You know what I’m trying to say. How can you act so indifferent? Are you that desperate to avoid me?”

“Y—”

She slapped a hand over her mouth, but it was too late.

“Were you about to blurt out yes?”

“Pay it no mind, sir.”

Jinshi glowered at her. He was getting dark bags under his eyes. He should stop wasting time with me and get some sleep. He was obviously exhausted, and she wished she could order him to go to bed. But Jinshi was still talking.

“I can see why Sir Luomen looks so harassed all the time. I can practically even understand how our honored strategist must feel!”

Maomao’s ears started ringing. Jinshi was tired; she knew that. He had nowhere to vent his frustrations, and he had a great many frustrations to vent, and on top of that he was suffering from lack of sleep. Any other time, he might have taken more care. Might have known not to say what he said. Yet said it he had.

Strangely, it wasn’t the mention of the strategist that upset Maomao the most. It was the name Luomen that kept reverberating in her mind. Today she’d had that rarest of things, a difference of opinion with her father. Jinshi had seized on it.

Maybe he wasn’t the only one who was tired. Maomao hadn’t been sleeping so well herself. And at last she exploded.

“You’re forever telling me I need to use my words, Master Jinshi, but are you in any position to criticize? Everything you say to me, everything you do, it’s like it’s calculated to save you from ever having to actually say what you mean! To make me figure it all out! You know, you remind me of someone. You act exactly like a man who used to come by our brothel all the time. He was in love with one of the girls, but he would never just come out and say it. He thought it should be obvious from the way he acted. He was so sure he had a good thing going with this woman that he never sent her so much as a letter. I remember how forlorn he looked when someone else swooped in and snatched her away! He kept coming to the brothel after that—to get drunk and whine to the ladies. Well, in my opinion, he could have avoided all that heartbreak if he’d told the woman how he felt. Clearly, unequivocally, so that she knew where they stood. It was the least he could have done!”

Everything came out in a torrent. She felt like she’d said it all in one breath. It was strange, she thought, to hear so many words come out of her own mouth. She was mystified. Jinshi was no less startled, but the shock soon left his face, replaced by something else. He got up off the bed and stared down at Maomao.

Shit. Now I’ve done it. She’d given him a piece of her mind, and he was about to give her one back.

“So I should be clear, should I? Unequivocal? I should say what I mean? If I did, would you actually listen to me? Is that what you’re telling me? I’m going to hold you to that! Right this minute. I’ll say it all. Don’t plug your ears—listen to me!” He grabbed her hands as she was in the process of trying to put her fingers in her ears.

He took a breath. He was looking at Maomao, but somehow he seemed almost embarrassed.

Finally he managed, “Now listen to me, y—I mean, Maomao! Listen close! I am going to make you my wife!”

He’d said it. He’d actually said it. To her, it sounded like a death sentence. All his vagueness, all his ambiguity had actually been a show of kindness to Maomao. For with her social status, the words once spoken were as good as a command. She couldn’t fight them, couldn’t contravene what he wished.

Jinshi was blushing, but Maomao was completely pale. “I wish there were an immortal here who could turn back time,” she mumbled.

“Your internal monologue is showing,” Jinshi snapped. He couldn’t quite bring himself to meet her eyes, yet he hadn’t let go of her wrists. A profoundly uncomfortable feeling hung between them. At length, he sighed. “Be that as it may, you’re right that with things as they stand, making you my wife could only harm you. Neither of us wants that.”

He took a sip from the pitcher by the bedside in an effort to bring down the flush.

“For you, I will remove every obstacle that keeps us apart. One day. Just know that.” With that, Jinshi buried himself under the covers. “I won’t let what you fear come to pass. I swear it.”

Soon she heard him breathing evenly in sleep. What I fear... Maomao pictured Empress Gyokuyou. I don’t think Master Jinshi knows, she thought. She didn’t think he was aware of the secret of his own birth. What about Empress Gyokuyou? Does she know?

And what did His Majesty want for Jinshi? What about Ah-Duo?

It’s never good to know too much.

When Jinshi discovered the truth, would he still try to find a way to make things palatable to Maomao? She wasn’t the only one concerned. Could he concoct circumstances that would stave off talk from everyone around them?

No... Even he couldn’t do that. It was difficult, if not impossible, to manufacture a situation that pleased everyone, and it only got harder the further you went up the social ladder.

Maomao shook her head and made to leave the room. At the doorway, she ran into Suiren, who was smiling and for some inexplicable reason giving her a thumbs-up. All Maomao could do was glare at the old lady as she went by.