Li paused, obviously trying to find a delicate way to phrase her next question. “How many children does he have?”
“Fewer than one would suppose, given the number of concubines,” Jia replied. “Also, all the children he has are daughters. Sooner or later he is going to need a son.”
“All of his children are daughters?” Li thought about it for a moment. “You must be correct; we would have heard had anyone borne him a son. But surely the odds...” her voice trailed off as she looked suspiciously at the qin. “What did you do?”
“Almost nothing,” Jia shrugged. “I invite them to my little gatherings, and I play the qin. Concubines are chosen for their youth and their yin essence. All I have done,” she played a series of notes, plucking delicately at the strings, “is to enhance their yin. Perhaps that results in their having so much female energy that they give birth only to daughters. Who can say?”
“Who indeed?” Li agreed, smiling. “Certainly not I.” She contemplated the qin. “Are certain strings more yin than others?”
“Not really. The qin originally had only five strings: one for each of the five elements—which have both yin and yang aspects. The sixth string was added by the first Zhou Emperor to mourn the death of his son, so it is sorrowful. The second Zhou Emperor added the last string to inspire his soldiers, so the seventh string is strong.”
Li chuckled. “That would be your string, then. You are definitely the strongest person I’ve ever met.”
Jia smiled wistfully. “Would that make the sixth string—the childless Emperor—my husband? At least the first Zhou Emperor had a son to lose.”
“Who can say?” Li said, echoing Jia’s earlier remark. She rose to her feet and bowed. “By your leave. May the Emperor soon tire of his concubines and return to you, and may Heaven grant you a son.”
After Li was gone, Jia bent her head over the qin, trying different fingerings on the sixth string. “Help yourself, and Heaven will help you,” she murmured.
She rose and moved to her writing desk, where she took out her ink-stone, brushes, ink, and paper. Using her best calligraphy, she composed an invitation to the Emperor to join her for an evening of poetry and music, carefully scheduled for three days hence: the night she was most likely to conceive.
~o0o~
The next day the nü-shih returned to court, bringing another group of concubines with her.
“How many does she have this time?” Jia asked Li, who had brought her the news.
“Only five.” Li was obviously trying to be optimistic about the matter.
“That brings the total to three-thousand-nineteen,” Jia remarked, “although I suppose that at this point, five more doesn’t make much difference.”
“It is her job to arrange the Emperor’s sex life,” Li pointed out.
“True. And she is so good at it—such enthusiasm...such dedication...”
“Such desperation?” Li asked archly. “I hear their ages range from nine to twelve.”
“That young? Really?”
Li nodded.
“Has she already collected every maiden in the Empire old enough to have sex? I know that in theory the younger a virgin is, the better her yin will nourish the Emperor, but these won’t be old enough to do him any good for years.” Jia frowned. “Considering the incredible number of concubines gathered for the previous Emperor—I don’t think that man ever did anything but search for immortality in the bedroom—not that it did him any good....”
“And all of them were sent to monasteries after his death,” Li pointed out. “Concubines are not allowed to go from the harem of one Emperor to the next.”
“She needed to start all over for the new Emperor.” Jia had not taken that into account in her calculations. “Maybe she actually has collected every suitable maiden and is now reduced to gathering children for the future.”
Li didn’t even try to answer that. She picked up a brush and ran it through Jia’s hair, and Jia sat silently, beginning to relax under the rhythmic strokes—at least until the nü-shih was announced.
The nü-shih bowed upon entering, for technically the Empress did outrank her. But rank did not overawe the woman in charge of the Emperor’s—and by default the Empress’s—sex life.
“I hear that you have plans for the Emperor tomorrow night,” she began.
“The Emperor and I have plans for an evening of poetry and music,” Jia said. “I do not believe that simple poetry and music fall within the scope of your duties.”
“As long as he confines himself to poetry,” the nü-shih said. She scowled at the scroll hanging in the place of honor on the wall. It was the first poem the Emperor had written for Jia, and she kept it displayed to remind everyone, including herself, that of all the women in the harem she was the only one the Emperor had chosen himself.
“Always remember,” the nü-shih said firmly, “that young virgins give him their yin energy and make him stronger, while you take his yang energy and weaken him.”
“That is the only way he will ever get a son to succeed him,” Jia pointed out.
“You could adopt a son for him.” The nü-shih smiled sweetly. Jia knew that the woman would really prefer that the Emperor divorce her for childlessness—as if that were Jia’s fault! The nü-shih had firm control over the concubines; if one of them replaced Jia, the nü-shih would have much more influence.
“Adopt? From what pool of candidates?” Jia asked. “It’s not as if he has a son by another woman. Nor does he have siblings to give him nephews. In any case, now is not the time to speak of it—I hear that you have a group of children to settle in.” Jia gave a smile as sweet—and as false—as the other woman’s and dismissed her.
~o0o~
Jia spent most of the day resting. Her plan, born from Li’s remark about the strings, would take a great deal of energy. She couldn’t do anything during the daytime while there were people about and she would certainly be interrupted, but once she had supposedly retired for the night, she would be undisturbed.
Alone in her bedroom, she worked far into the night, composing a piece that brought out the energy of the sixth string, while using the audible music to hide the imbalance. When she found tears for the son she had never borne welling in her eyes, she knew that she had succeeded. “But it’s not enough for the Emperor to want a son,” she said softly to herself. “He has to want to have a son with me.”
She carefully removed the string from the qin. This particular string, she recalled, was approximately two years old and had broken only once so far, so there was plenty of length remaining. She took a ceramic teacup, filled it almost full with hot water, then took an embroidery needle, passed it through a candle-flame, and pricked the fourth finger of her left hand. She squeezed six drops of her blood into the water, and then dipped both ends of the string into the cup. As the ends of the silk soaked up the water and her blood, she prayed to Heaven. When she removed the string from the cup, the ends were a pale pink, but the color became indiscernible a thumb’s length from the ends. By the time she had replaced the string on the qin, there was no visible difference between it and the other strings, save for the usual variation in diameter.
~o0o~
Privacy was almost impossible to come by anywhere in the Imperial Palace, but the Emperor sent his guards to await him at the end of the hallway—after they had inspected Jia’s rooms, of course—and Jia dismissed Li after she had brought in the tea and spice cakes.
“I have a new poem, if you would like to hear it,” he said once they were alone.
“I would love to hear it,” Jia said promptly. His skill with poetry was one of the things that had won her heart when he was first courting her. She listened appreciatively to his newest poem, and countered with one of his old favorites, accompanied by the soft sound of the qin. He picked another of his poems and asked her to play accompaniment to it; while he could play the qin—a man with any pretense to education was expected to play it—her playing was superior to his.
Of course, she did get more time to practice.
They shared music and poetry for several hours before she said diffidently, “I have a new piece for the qin, if you would care to hear it.”
“By all means,” he said.
She bowed her head over the instrument and played, concentrating only on the music, not daring to look up until the very end. She blinked the tears out of her eyes and saw that his eyes held tears as well. He walked to her side, took her hand, and led her to her bed.
~o0o~
Nine months later Jia held the newborn Crown Prince in her arms. “Help yourself, and Heaven will help you,” she whispered to him.
Comfort and Despair
by Tanith Lee
Tanith Lee is the author of almost 100 books, over 270 short stories, 4 radio plays, 2 TV scripts, several (mostly closet) poems—but not a partridge in a pear tree. Her work includes fantasy, SF, horror, historical, YA, contemporary—and even the detective genre—plus endless combinations and crossovers of all of the above. She writes longhand, then types the results, in a blue and yellow room, through whose windows tall trees, squirrels, doves, pigeons and magpies stare, (naturally with appropriate disbelieving amusement).
“In childhood I wanted to be an actress,” Lee recalls, “but what I was, and am, is a writer. Acting on paper is my trade—the only thing I can really do well. The most important part of me.”
1. Grey
Everyone said she was the perfect wife.
Perfect, that was, in her demeanour and her constancy. For example, she was never seen to look at another man, even should he be glamorous, except in the most friendly, indeed almost maternal way. She never flirted with him either, was only courteous, sympathetic and, when occasion called for it, amusing. It would seem, they said, Monsieur Carmineau must have more to him than met the eye. He must be an ardent and accomplished lover, a vigorous and entertaining partner in all the dual occupations of a marriage. They would not normally have suspected this of him. He was in his later fifties, and though as a youth not unattractive, now he had grown grey, jowly and corpulent. His own wit was rather slow. Nor was he either a poet or a dazzling intellectual, the sort that might despite all else still sweep a young woman into adoration. He did, however, own the big house, the Little Chateau, and its park. He was rich. And she. Madame Carmineau—well, she came, one heard, from very humble beginnings, a dead scholar’s daughter, who had been teaching ungrateful brats in the town, and they more likely to put a rotten cabbage or a dead mouse in her lap than to learn a single lesson. Probably she was grateful to be rescued. Probably she knew when her luck changed, and wanted to risk no new loss of it. And yet, Madame never appeared caught in a union of that order. She seemed—if not in love with her husband—yet raptly fond of him, sensitive only to his welfare. While there was about her the blissful inner vivacity, the hint of melancholy and unease, the absorption, that only those in love ever demonstrate. More, she seemed happy. Fulfilled. And true happiness and fulfillment are so rare, one must always doubt them, in oneself and others. For surely there is always something behind the densest and most sparkling veil that may give the lie to both.
~o0o~
At seven o’clock, rather late in fact, certain business confrères of Monsieur were to dine at the Little Chateau. Jeanne had spent an afternoon supervising the bevy of cooks and kitchen staff; thereafter, another two hours in self-preparation.
While she did this, she mentally reviewed the dinner guests. There was faddy Monsieur Belart, and didactic Monsieur Devalle, each with his wife. Besides there was the old actor Ronesset, whom Jeanne had privately christened the Wasp, for his verbal sting. Monsieur Ronesset brought no wife. He preferred himself to eat for two. To make up the extra female at table, Jeanne’s husband, Monsieur Carmineau, had asked the insane widow of a dog-breeder, Madame Tupe. She would come with her current ‘husband’ naturally, a hound by the name of Petit, a creature almost as tall as a horse and covered in thick black fur.
Did Jeanne sigh over these guests? Not at all. She did not mind them. She always made sure Belart’s food was exact, listened respectfully to Devalle, subtly commiserated with both their spouses, laughed at Ronesset’s stings, and agreed with every word uttered by La Tupe. And when the English custom was observed, and the ladies withdrew to leave the men to their brandy, pipes and cigars, (Mme Tupe would always remain) fed the two wives and the big dog called Small, who usually left with the retiring ladies, treats and dessert wines in the hothouse.
It tickled Jeanne slightly, the way in which the other women always puzzled over her. Each time, even as they pecked the sweets and fruits, they would try to tease out of her some confession of regret. They failed. They, on the other hand, (around the second glass of Armagnac au Framboise) were soon openly regretful on their own accounts. “Oh, Devalle can be such a beast!” “Oh, Monsieur Bel drives me into madness with his carping—I have lost our third cook only this month, due to his foolishness!” “Woof,” said Petit softly, gnawing a honey-glazed meat-bone under the ferns. As if to add, “And none of you knows what I have to put up with from that Tupe woman.”
This evening, things went as always.
Jeanne, in her pale silk gown, oversaw the candles and flowers and the impeccable service of a tasty, greedy dinner. Now and then, between her attentiveness to his guests, she glanced at her old husband. Tonight he had a glow from the wine, and when their eyes met they smiled at each other, assured, content. If she had been twenty-five years older, even so some might have remarked on it, for contemporaneously aging couples do not always like each other, either.
Next in the hothouse among the orange trees, Jeanne commiserated as ever with the wives, yet contrived also to spare the erring husbands. “How aggravating for you, Sophie—” this to Mme Belart. “Your fourth cook to leave. Dreadful! He is so fortunate you are so kind. And I suppose poor Monsieur does suffer with his stomach. But you are so understanding and clever, why he’d be lost without you, wouldn’t he?” Or: “Poor Monsieur Devalle must be so tired after his work at the university. Yet how exhausting for you, Annette, with everything else you must deal with.” To the dog luckily she need only slip a candied alcoholic cherry to soothe his nerves.
Eventually in great gladness they were able to unite en masse in the wish that Monsieur Ronesset should be flogged and drowned. While they were, when with him, his merciless target, he became theirs once they were out of his hearing. Soon the hothouse rang with pitiless laughter as they pictured him hung up for crows to peck—let him try his stinging remarks on them.
Petit meanwhile slept. Jeanne stroked his huge sleeping forehead, which frowned somewhat in slumber. Had he been a cat, she thought, he would be purring. But he led the life of a slave with his mistress, this extraordinary animal. Walked once every day or so, by one of La Tupe’s reluctant and scared servants, but only around the paved paths of the town’s public gardens. Meagrely fed on ‘healthful’ foods that left him hungry. Expected to attend his owner in virtual silence and to behave like a well-trained lap-dog. When all the while he should be romping over fields and through woods, terrifying innocent rabbits and barking at sun, moon and stars. Jeanne felt she respected Petit. She sensed that he acted as well as he did less from coercion than out of his compassionate nature and good manners.
The party concluded around eleven. The church clock was striking from the village, clearly heard across the summer night.
The guests climbed, most of them heavily, (the dog included) into their carriages. Only Ronesset sprang like an elderly and over-athletic weasel into his equipage, and sat there picking his pointed fangs with a silver toothpick filched from the table. “Won’t miss this gew-gaw, will you, Carmineau? No, I shouldn’t think so. I’ve seen better on a stage. But the food was not so bad. Even if your cook can’t tell a flambé from a flambeau.”
Off they all presently rattled, into the darkness under the trees.
A huge golden moon stood high in the east, calling the earth to wake for d
ay-in-night. But yawning, Jeanne’s husband led her back towards the house. Below the servants were dousing the lights.
Husband and wife climbed the stair, he commenting on the dinner in a mild and satisfied manner. He thanked Jeanne, as he always did, for her stewardship of house and table, and complimented her on her charming looks, the way her fine brown hair shone in candlelight, the luminous whiteness of her skin. Despite that, she knew he would be too drained by the pleasures of the evening to ask, polite as he always was, and more so when asking this, if he might visit her in half an hour in her bedroom. She never of course refused such a visit. She had no reason to. She had guessed from the first, and been proved right, that Monsieur Carminaeu was a gentle and undemanding lover, dull but in no way unwholesome or offensive. The transaction was on every occasion swiftly accomplished. Nor did he expect lies and raptures from Jeanne, only that she did not mind, and she demonstrated freely that she did not. The other aspect of the arrangement which pleased her besides was that she suspected her husband was sterile, and this far had found him so. She had no wish to bear a child, having had more than enough of them when forced to teach.
At the top of the gracious stairway, they graciously kissed each other on the lips. He said to her the one sweet and romantic thing then of which he felt able to deliver himself. “Sleep well, my beauty. You are the jewel of my life.” He meant these words, and sometimes when he said them, (as he had, almost every week of their four-year life together) his eyes filled briefly with the tears of truth and joy. Because of this also, Jeanne loved him. For love him she did, as he loved her. The ideal couple, in their own fashion. They parted quietly, each going to their own chamber.
Now risen so high, the golden plate of the moon blazed on the roof of the Little Chateau, screaming and hammering to be felt and answered.
But every light had faded from the house.
Beneath heaven’s fire, even the black woods seemed sleeping.
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