The Apothecary Diaries Book 3

Third Time's the Charm (Part Two)

There was a general hubbub. People rushed to see what was going on. The elegant entrance hall was already packed with palace women, up to and including maids standing dumbstruck with dustcloths in their hands, completely forgetting that they had been wiping railings and window frames.

"And what, may I ask, brings you here now?" asked a lady with her eyebrows drawn together. She was looking directly at the one and only medical officer in the rear palace.

This was most unusual. The doctor hardly ever left the medical office; it had been nearly a year since he had last been seen in the Crystal Pavilion. How could he show his face around here after the death of the young prince? He was notorious now for being a doctor in name only, otherwise incompetent. He had remained in this garden of women, unpunished, chiefly because there would have been no one to replace him.

And now here he was. What could he possibly want?

The doctor carried an outsize bundle and a palace woman followed behind him. The woman was slim, nearly emaciated; her movements were efficient and precise. On her mouth (which she kept closed) was a touch of bright-red lip color, and there was a dusting of pink on her cheeks.

Had there been such a woman in the rear palace? they asked themselves. And wouldn't it be more typical for the eunuch doctor to be assisted by another eunuch? Maybe they were wrong about that. And anyway, there were two thousand palace women here. It wasn't that surprising if there were one or two they didn't recognize.

Since everyone else was busy whispering, she had taken it upon herself to step forward. "Can we help you?" When they heard her speak, the other ladies immediately stopped chatting. The maids promptly returned to their tasks, although their dallying didn't go unnoticed. She might not know every face in the rear palace, but she certainly knew every face here at the Crystal Pavilion. Her name was Shin, and that was her job.

She had come with Lihua when she had been chosen as consort, and had worked ever since to gain the Emperor's affections.

"We'd like to see the Wise Consort, if we might," the doctor said. Shin narrowed her eyes. "Wise Consort" was not an expression she wanted to hear from this man.

"My apologies, sir," she said. "I don't believe Lady Lihua wishes to see you."

The doctor's face with its sad excuse for a mustache drooped at the polite but unambiguous refusal. His facial hair was truly pathetic; as a eunuch, he was no longer able to grow a mustache worthy of a man. He was as far from the Emperor, with his glorious beard, as the clouds were from the dirt.

The eunuch looked back with an expression of distress. The palace woman behind him, with an eminent air of competence, whispered in his ear. The eunuch hesitantly reached into the folds of his robe and produced a piece of parchment paper. "We've got a letter, you see."

The parchment was covered in flowing script and bore instructions that the doctor was to be allowed into the residence. The name at the end read: Jinshi.

Jinshi, the first person anyone in the rear palace would think of if you said the words "gorgeous eunuch." He was so lovely that, had he been a woman, he could have brought the country to its knees—but he was not a woman. Nor was he a man.

He was beautiful enough to make even Shin sigh in spite of herself, but, unlike the other palace women, he evoked no more feelings than that for her. When she thought of why she had come to the rear palace, she knew she had no time to be distracted by eunuchs. It was vital that she gain the Emperor's affections, not just for herself, but for the sake of her clan. That thought had been drilled into both her and Lihua since they were girls.

Shin's mother was the older sister of Lihua's father. Shin and Lihua were the same age; thus they had entered the rear palace together, and thus Shin oversaw the Crystal Pavilion, where they now lived. All the ladies-in-waiting of the Crystal Pavilion were the daughters of prominent families, of blood suitable to serve His Majesty.