The Concubine. Jade Lee
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face as he fell. And when she rolled over to peer after him, she heard the porters laugh. The Insolent One, as she now dubbed him, had landed in some rotting leaves. His fine dark clothing was smeared with grime. She couldn’t see his face, though, as the porters carried her on by.
Then, with a sigh, she deftly removed two strings of ivory beads from her headdress. She would have to bribe the porters into silence. That was a good deal of money to lose before she even reached the gates, but there was no hope for it. She couldn’t risk them speaking, even about an insolent eunuch. In the end, her father’s grand gesture—like all his great gifts—had cost too much money to be worthwhile.
Thankfully, she was about to change that. When she became an imperial bride, money would flow like water through her family’s door. And on that happy thought, she reclined alone on the silk cushions and waited for the first test.
2
THE MASTER OF THE FESTIVAL was late. Ji Yue rolled her eyes. Of course, Sun Bo Tao, playboy of the Forbidden City, would ignore his imperial duties. He was probably in an opium daze in some woman’s bedroom. But why hadn’t there been provisions for that man’s irresponsibility? Why couldn’t they continue the inspection without him? Ji Yue tried to find out, but no one had accurate information, and she dared not risk appearing unseemly by demanding answers. Virgins were supposed to be docile and graciously accepting. So she tried to be patient as she reclined in her palanquin to wait. Dozens of girls stood around in the heat, their legs aching and their makeup running into their silks. At least she got to sit, though even she felt like she waited in an oven.
Really, the nerve of the man, making the future empress of China stay out in the heat like a drying fish! She glanced outside to see if there was any movement at all. Palanquins clogged the streets while porters squatted on their heels and threw dice. The girls were visibly wilting. One in particular drew Ji Yue’s eye.
She stood nearby, her dowry in trunks around her feet. If a carriage of some sort had brought her, there was no sign of it now, and so the girl stood outside on tiny raised shoes. She looked so sad just standing there. And perhaps since Ji Yue also felt a creeping loneliness, she called out to her.
“Come, come! Sit here with me.”
The girl—for she was quite young—didn’t at first understand. Ji Yue had to stand up and gesture her over.
“Me, mistress?” the girl said, her eyes widening until they seemed to cover her entire face.
“Yes, yes. Why do you stand there in the heat? Where is your carriage?”
“Gone,” she confessed as she waved vaguely to the west. “They said they could not wait around all day on an emperor’s whim.”
“Treasonous dogs!” JiYue spat, earning a smile from the girl. “Come, sit with me. I will say that we were carried here together.”
The girl shook her head and refused to move from her trunks. “I couldn’t! Not in an imperial palanquin!”
“Of course you can!” But no matter how much Ji Yue waved, the girl did not move. Finally Ji Yue went to her. “What is your name?”
“Li Fei,” she answered. Then she leaned forward and confided her difficulty. “Mama says I must not sit or I will crinkle the silk.”
Ji Yue smiled. “I understand. But there will be a great deal of standing to come. Wouldn’t it be better to risk a few creases rather than faint when the emperor at last sees you? And besides,” she added in an undertone, “your mother could not have guessed that the master of the festival would be this tardy!”
That brought a giggling nod from Li Fei. “Then I shall gratefully join you.”
So began JiYue’s first friendship within the competition. Ji Yue learned that Li Fei was from an outlying province, that she had many brothers and sisters, but that she was the only daughter of an age to apply as consort. And that she was terribly, terribly nervous about life in the Forbidden City. The next hour flew by as Ji Yue relaxed for the first time since the call went out for eligible daughters. Then a gong sounded. Loud and clear, it silenced everyone who loitered outside the gate.
“Do you think it is time?” Li Fei asked.
Ji Yue nodded, her own heart beating painfully in her throat. They both stood, but it was difficult to see, harder still to hear as a eunuch cried out orders. Fortunately, the news was whispered from servant to mistress to porter and beyond. In time, all understood that the girls were to present themselves one by one to the head eunuch, the imperial dowager consort, Kang Ci, and that playboy courtier Sun Bo Tao, master of the festival. The three would decide who was allowed to enter and who would be sent home.
“But that will take hours,” Li Fei murmured. Ji Yue agreed. So they returned to the palanquin to sit longer, waiting for their inspection. Both tried to talk, but their hearts were not in it, their attention turned to the sounds that came from the front gate.
At first they heard nothing but the paid criers’ announcements. “Fan Mei Lin is accepted! Fan Mei Lin enters the Forbidden City. Fan Mei Lin!”
Next came the refused, the sobbing, the wretched, even a few who had fainted dead away. No crier announced them, but whispers traveled quickly. One had been rejected for a limp, another for hair on her neck. Some had breasts too shallow to nurse a babe or ill-fated ears or feet too large. The last charge struck terror in Ji Yue’s heart. Manchurian women were forbidden to bind their feet; that was a characteristic of the defeated Han people. And yet, after one hundred and fifty years of dynastic rule, the Manchu men liked tiny feet. Always the men looked to see the women’s shoes.
Ji Yue looked down at her shoes. Like the curtain of ivory beads that obscured her face, her feet were adorned with jade and pearl drops. They were, in fact, her most expensive attire. She and her mother had planned this, since her large feet were her most troublesome attribute. But with feet surrounded by jewels, any man would see wealth, not size. Just as any man looking at her face would see ivory beads and think beauty without judging the face beneath. Or so they hoped.
“We are next,” Li Fei whispered.
Ji Yue nodded, then gripped her new friend’s hand. After a quick word to the porters to mind the luggage, the two women walked hand in hand to the front gate.
There was a row of imperial eunuchs, dressed in finery meant to impress. Each was designated inspector of a certain aspect: walk, skin, teeth, ears and yes, feet. A tally eunuch walked with each girl, adding results on an abacus. One count for acceptable aspects. Two counts for excellence. Unfortunate aspect—one count removed. Or, worst of all, an assessment of most unfortunate. Those girls were sent back to their conveyances and told never to return.
Gold and gems disappeared quickly as bribes were slipped from girl to eunuch. One girl just ahead of Ji Yue began with a heavy necklace of gold links that draped almost to her knees. By the end of the line, she wore a tiny choker of links at the top of her gown.
But Ji Yue did not have that much bribe money. She could not pay every eunuch for a favorable report. But she had known that would happen; it was part of her plan. She guessed that her father’s status would gain her entry into the Forbidden City. Except for her feet, she had no obviously ugly feature. So the man judging feet received a pearl drop, and the tally eunuch was given a whole string of ivory from her headdress. Beyond that, she simply had to pray that her looks were acceptable.
She maintained hope until she entered the tent where the final tally was evaluated. Inside sat her three judges. She stepped in, making an effort to keep her steps small, her attitude reverent. But when she looked up, she saw the head eunuch, the dowager consort and the insolent eunuch from her palanquin. She stared at him, her mind working feverishly. It couldn’t be possible. This couldn’t be Sun Bo Tao, playboy courtier to the emperor and now master of the festival. It couldn’t! And yet, as she stared at him, she knew it was.
He had changed his clothing into stunning blue silk and combed his black queue. She hadn’t realized when he’d been stretched out in her palanquin how very