Tale of Zhen'er

Beloved Imperial Son

Murong Yuān began to grow into the very image of his Imperial Father. At times, caught unawares, his artless smiles almost tore her emotions asunder. Bringing forth all the memories that she had slaved over trying to forget.

But his companionship is nowadays the joy of her life. His furtive visits to the Cold Palace is something she look forward to with a quiet sort of happiness.

The little landscaping plans they made together as they reclaimed the surrounding greenery, bouts of light-hearted sparring as she helped him practice his martial forms, and all those sincere conversation where she let herself be a place for him to unburden a child's numerous woes, these were now her greatest wealth.

Simple meals made from the harvest of their labours surpassed any from the Imperial Banquet. The feeling of accomplishment as they managed to coax the nearly dying terraces to bloom once more. Humble awe as they witnessed rescued faunas surviving their own deadly trials of their short life with grim determination and unyielding spirit.

Little victories and mundane achievements, such were her existence now.

Never before had her life been so full.

And one day, he gave the most beloved of her recollections. A treasured balm that soothed her heart, a victim of the merciless Imperial Court.

*****

His visit that particular day began as usual. A warning jangle rang from the old horse saddle bells, hung on branches of the trees crowding his favourite covert entry to her residence.

Those bells were amongst the first findings of hers, during the early stages of her confinement here.

His clothing gave hints to the occasion. A perusal of his somber mien and a quick rifling through her mental calendar, gave her a shrewd inkling of his current emotions. But his half-hearted greetings, stumbling over the customary acknowledgement of her courtesy rank, gave her pause.

Deciding to allow him the space to gather his thoughts, she merely smiled and ushered him to their favourite nook in the restored garden.

Several times he started to speak, but the words tapers off.

Abruptly, he began to walk to and fro, lost in his thoughts. She busied herself with tea preparations.

"Today was the memorial for the late crown princess. My birth mother."

She nodded, wondering where this conversation were heading. And the strange emphasis upon the decedent.

He threw himself into the seat next to her and laid his head upon the table in a comical example of poor princely behaviour.

"They made much of me, you know, those fool consorts of the Imperial Harem. Empty flattering and appeasement, to improve their rankings in the Imperial Harem as they wormed their way through Imperial Father's good regards. Today, even more so. I shudder to think, how much of a spoiled creature I would be, had I believed even an hour's worth of their words."

She tried to hide her instinctive smile over his unabashed disdain. His answering smile illuminates her abject failure.

"I saw a new memorial, at the shrine today."

"Oh?"

"A discreet thing, tucked away from general view. Had I not slipped away the way I did, from the clutches of those overly gilded lilies, I would've never caught glimpse of it."

Giving her a guarded look, he sat up politely as befits a Prince of his station. And in the gentlest manner that he had, continues.

"It's a good name, fitting for my Imperial Brother."

"Oh!" A familiar pain, lanced her core. Unbidden, hot tears sprang forth.

Giving her time to compose herself, he played for a while with the teacups, drinking and stealing glances to gauge her emotions.

Pride over the sincere maturity of his actions warmed her heart. How much he had grown! Such a great difference from the cynical and combative tiny princeling that stumbled into her life three years ago, spoiling for a fight.

"Quite an apt companion for my own," he added, smiling sadly. "What a pair we would've made."

The thought of two boys, tumbling around her in the courtyard as they laughed and grew together, catches her heart and gave birth to such pitiful yearnings.

Oh, how she hated these useless tears! The past is gone, her babe long dead, his ashes beyond her reach. And still these contemptible weakness pours from her eyes! To stem from further shaming herself, she asked for the name.

"Yè(曄). A fitting match to my Yuān(淵), isn't it?"

"Murong Yè..."

Looking at her, he carefully caught her hands and spoke solemnly as he tangled their fingers. She unconsciously held her breath, startled by this new breach of courtesy between them. Despite their familiarity, Murong Yuān had always held himself at a certain emotional distance from her. A product of growing up in the treacherous waters of the Imperial Family.

"I've lost my mother, and you, your son. Both of them, much unfairly too soon. I think, now that they're together in the shrine, they might be together somewhere else too. Watching over us."

He paused, waiting for her reactions to his words. His thoughts on the departed beloved souls comforted her. The notion that another mother is now looking after her child, brings her a strange sense of relief.

She couldn't stop the tears, even as a wobbly smile dawns.

For years, she had went through life hopelessly resigned to the fact that her dead child will never be honoured with remembrance or any offerings. His life was much too brief. But now, knowing that he was named, and recognised by the Murong family, no matter how surreptitiously, brings her great consolations.

"Thank you. Oh, thank you!" Her words were nothing more than repetitions of the same phrase, over and over again, but his expression tells her that he understood the sentiments she tried to convey.

"He have my mother, looking after him. And my mother, him for company. Thus, I think, they won't mind if this son choose to look after the mother left behind with me."

Ceremoniously standing up before her, he carefully and soberly sank into a perfectly executed filial obeisance, from a royal son to his mother.

"This Imperial Son greets Royal Mother."

*****

He took his duties seriously, as much as he can, after that afternoon. An eight years old princeling can only do so much, for a disgraced and abandoned consort. No matter what rank she held before her banishment. A cast-off Empress is stil a cast-off.

But her outlook on life remarkably shifted. Similar to the landscape of the Cold Palace, bit by bit, Li Zhen also regained her second blooming.