The Apothecary Diaries - Volume 15 - Chapter 16

Chapter 16: Confession-The Secret

She'd screwed it all up, thought Ah-Duo.

She looked at the faces of the other three-she was sure they'd noticed, but they were pretending they hadn't; that was helpful of them. She wished it hadn't happened. She would will it away.

She considered why Yoh had summoned Yue like this immediately before his surgery, and why he had called Ah-Duo, who to all appearances had nothing to do with the matter.

Yoh, in her opinion, had no intention of letting Yue go. Was that because of that silly promise he'd made to Ah-Duo so long ago, or because, in order for him to be "Heaven," he wanted Yue to succeed to the same? Whichever, it had caused him to bring Ah-Duo to this making of his "will."

Normally a woman like her, not even a consort, would have no place at a gathering like this. He ought to have brought his Empress, Gyokuyou.

There was a simple way for him to ensnare Yue: All the Emperor had to do was publicly name him as his successor. Yue might have many enemies, but he also had many allies. It would confound people that His Majesty had named his younger brother and not his own son to follow him, but that could be dealt with; he only needed to tell Yue here and now that he was in fact Yoh's own child.

Even Yue would not be able to refuse a direct order from Yoh.

The other princes were still so young, and Yue was a superb administrator. Those two facts would far outweigh the lowly status of his birth mother, Ah-Duo. Plenty of families would be eager to back him.

It would, however, be a bolt from the blue for the Empress and her clan.

Yoh's Imperial affection fell fully upon Gyokuyou. It wasn't just her position; he genuinely liked her as a person. Ah-Duo herself had shared tea with Gyokuyou several times, and thought she was a fine consort. At least, she wasn't the kind who would deliberately seek to bring the country down from the inside.

It wasn't that Ah-Duo wanted to see Gyokuyou put in a difficult position. There was no need at this late date to reveal that her supposedly dead son yet lived.

Even if those involved understood, though, they must have questions. Yoh was not a person; he was Heaven itself. All others were merely people. Yoh could be permitted anything he might do so long as he was Emperor-so long as the mandate of heaven was not taken from him.

Heaven could treat people as it wished. It need not worry itself with what it meant to choose someone as a partner for the night on a whim. Heaven possessed the right and power to look after a person for her entire life.

Hence it need spare no concern for the matter.

Yoh was Heaven-but what about Yue? Was he the same? Ah-Duo had summoned Maomao here in order to find out. She wanted to know what choice Yue would make, if Maomao would be hemmed in, entrapped as Ah-Duo had been.

That had been the question on Ah-Duo's mind-but Yue was not Heaven, but a person.

Yoh was still looking at Ah-Duo. She looked back, hiding the place where the teardrop had fallen with her hand.

"Yoh," she said. "You heard what Yue said. What will you do?" She was fairly sure she had managed to sound like her usual self.

Yoh was quiet, agonizing-even though it was not for Heaven to show hesitation. This was why Ah-Duo never seemed to know what to do with him: these flashes of human frailty.

"Can they be sent home for the time being?" he said at last.

"Yes," she said.

Yoh must have decided to cool off and collect his thoughts, for he suggested breaking up the meeting.

Yue and Maomao were both agog at Yoh's behavior. Yue probably still didn't know why Ah-Duo was here, nor why she had summoned Maomao. He was such a perceptive boy, but still he didn't realize: There had been a time when he had called Yoh "Father."

People must have told him many times that he reminded them of Ah-Duo. And in fact, Ah-Duo had served as Yue's body double before.

If he actually did understand what the relationship was between himself and Yoh, and was simply acting as though he didn't, that was fine too. Or perhaps Suiren had hidden the truth just that skillfully.

It didn't matter either way.

To Ah-Duo, Yue was human. She had been able to determine as much tonight.

To Ah-Duo, Yue was a son. But she was not able to say so. For him to remain human, he could not be her son.

"Are you quite sure about this?" Yue asked Yoh.

"Yes."

"What will you do about the surgery?"

"Don't fret. I will accept it, as I must."

Maomao looked even more relieved than Yue at that.

"And what about your will?" It was Ah-Duo, not Yue, who asked this hardest of questions.

"I'll write it later. For the time being, I want you to go."

Yue's face was filled with anxiety. Maomao looked uncertain as well, but not too distressed; it seemed that knowing Yoh would accept the  surgery was what mattered to her.

"I suppose I should excuse myself, then." Ah-Duo got up to follow Yue and Maomao.

"Wait," said Yoh.

"For what?"

"I want something with you." He took her hand and would not let go.

"Yes, yes, very well. Don't mind us, kids-you go home."

Yue and Maomao shared a look, but left the room.

Once it was quiet, Yoh finally released Ah-Duo's hand.

"Don't ask me to take dictation on your will. If you die, people will say I forged it."

"As if I would do such a thing." Yoh looked at the ceiling.

"You're not going to write that Yue should be the next emperor?" Yoh remained silent, so Ah-Duo went on. "If Yue were sitting in that seat, he would do the job perfectly well. And most likely abdicate of his own accord when the Crown Prince came of age." Still Yoh gazed up at the ceiling. "He might not be one of the greatest rulers known to history, but he certainly wouldn't be one of the worst."

Yoh's eyes were open wide.

Finally Ah-Duo said, "Can you live with yourself if you don't tell Yue that you're his father?"

"Can't I write it down?"

"No. I'm not suited to be the mother of the nation, right?" Ah-Duo replied with self-deprecation. "You know, I really thought you were going to tell him-tell him about the mistake I made."

"You thought I was going to do that, and yet you're the one who deliberately brought in an outsider. That girl has less and less hope of ever running free again."

"I don't think it would be a problem to tell her. Maomao is clever."

"She ought to be; she's Lakan's daughter. If she ran off, I'm not sure we could catch her."

"If she ever tries, I'll be sure to help her."

"Whose side are you on?"

She saw now why Yoh gazed continually at the ceiling all throughout their conversation. He was trying not to let the tears spill out of his eyes. All this blustering talk was probably just an act so that he looked strong.

"Ah-Duo," he said. "Do you resent me?"

"Yoh," she replied. "Do you think I couldn't?"

"Is there something that I failed to give you?"

"Ha ha ha. That's the thing."

Yoh had been good to Ah-Duo. Both as the crown prince and once he became emperor, he had ensured that nothing would hamper her. Even after she left the rear palace, he had looked out for her, making clear to all and sundry that she was special.

"Did you wish you could have made me mother of the nation?" she asked.

"You were the one who asked me to, weren't you?" There was a scratch in Yoh's voice. "You'll keep your promise with me, won't you, Ah-Duo? So long as it stands?"

"I will. And on your part, how many promises have you broken to me?"

Ah-Duo reached out to her little partner in crime. Not to do anything so kind as to wipe away his tears-instead, she tugged on his beard.

"I suppose you assumed that even if you had set up the Crown Prince instead of Yue, I would be there while he was young."

"I did. Because you are honest and faithful."

Ah-Duo felt a flash of anger; she squeezed the beard in her hand as if she might rip it straight out. "Setting up the crown prince would be an excellent way to control your other subjects. And were you of a mind to switch him with Yue when he grew up bold and strong? Or were you planning to break your promise to me? If you were, you should have just said so. How many years-how many decades-did you plan to keep me like a pet?"

It was vacillation, pure and simple. It shouldn't have happened, but to Yoh, it would be allowed.

"If it were a political matter, you would have been able to make up your damn mind. I was useless baggage, and you should have just cut me loose!"

"You're not baggage."

"I am! Do you know how many years I spent being mocked as a consort with no part to play? No, you don't. You look down from on high, content in the belief that the wars of women are not as brutal as those waged by men. It's true, I suppose we don't beat each other so often as you men do. Just the occasional stabbing, or poisoning, or setting on fire."

Ah-Duo gave Yoh's beard another good tug, forcing him to meet her eyes. The tears that had been gathering in his eyes spilled over with such force that they landed on Ah-Duo's cheeks.

"I'm no longer able to bear children. When the child died, why didn't you release me from my promise on the spot?"

"Ah-Duo. You won't abandon the promise on your own. If you ever know for a fact that you can no longer keep it, in whatsoever form, I'm sure you'll just go off somewhere without asking me."

And yet, Ah-Duo was still there with Yoh.

"Was that it? Is that what tipped you off that the babies had been switched?" Ah-Duo found she couldn't resist a smile. She'd always wondered how Yoh had found out, when she was certain that her conspirators Anshi and Suiren would never have betrayed her. "I must admit, you do know how I think."

"Yes."

"And since you know me so well, I'm sure you haven't forgotten what I wanted to do."

“No."

Back when Yoh had been crown prince, he'd often sneaked away when he was sick of studying, and the two of them would hide and eat snacks together, chatting idly as they ate.

"I'll never be an official. So maybe I should be a merchant or something."

Ah-Duo had been so bright and eager as she spoke those words- how many decades ago had that been now? But once she had spent the night with the Emperor as his "instructor," she lost any opportunity even to leave the rear palace, let alone to be a merchant.

There was no way Yoh could fail to understand that.

"Ordering me to spend the night together may have been a whim for you, but it has dogged me for my entire life," she said.

After a moment, Yoh said, "If you'd become a merchant, you might never have come back to the palace." His hair, which was starting to show streaks of white, seemed to droop. His cheeks, covered with whitening powder, were sunken. "You would have left me here and never come back."

"What does it matter if I'd stayed or if I'd gone? Without an order from you, I would never even see you, would I, Yoh?"

Ah-Duo certainly had no right to summon him. It was he who had the authority. Their positions in life had been fixed at birth. If Ah-Duo's mother Suiren hadn't happened to be Yoh's nursemaid, they would never have laid eyes on each other.

She understood what Yoh was trying to say: He could give her anything, but he could not go anywhere. He must have feared that Ah- Duo would go somewhere far away. At the tender age of twelve or thirteen, he couldn't have been able to give it much deep consideration.

"I didn't want to let you go anywhere," he said. "So I tried to keep my promise."

"A promise that benefits no one? Even though you knew I didn't really want to be mother of the nation?"

"That's right."

As Heaven, Yoh possessed, owned, the human called Ah-Duo.

What about Yoh's son, Yue? Would he walk the same path as his father? That was why Ah-Duo had summoned Maomao: to find out whether Yue intended to possess her or not.

Her fears had been groundless. Yue was not Heaven, but human.

"Ah-Duo ... If you had become a merchant, could you have been my friend?"

"If you had allowed me to supply the Imperial court, I would have been very friendly indeed."

"Ha ha ha." Yoh's eyes narrowed, his face crinkling as he laughed.

"Listen. I have a favor to ask." Ah-Duo let go of Yoh's beard and wrapped her arms around his neck instead. She leaned in close to him, her palms picking up some of the whitening powder on his skin. "I'll vacate our promise myself."

"You mean you'll leave me?"

Yoh was trying to raise his head; Ah-Duo did everything she could not to let him. "No, I'll be with you until the end. The baggage in my pavilion is too heavy for anyone else to carry."

There was Sui and the Shi clan children, and the shrine maiden of Shaoh.

"In exchange," she whispered softly in his ear, "just let Yue do as he wishes. I'll listen to you complain all you like. Until my very bones creak."

Ah-Duo knew what hubris her request represented. Yue was her only son, and Yoh had other children-yet she was asking him to treat Yue special.

This was the greatest favor she could demand.

"The boy is part of the Imperial family, but he's too nearly human. He's too kind," she said.

"Yes, I see."

"He has the potential to become a wise ruler, but at the same time, I don't think he would live for long."

"Perhaps not."

What an emperor needed was not kindness, but compassion, something that flowed from high to low. A ruler who saw himself as equal to his subjects would grow ill-and Yue had shown that he refused to involve the person who might cure that illness.

Ah-Duo knew she was doing wrong by Gyokuyou and Lihua and the other consorts. She was asking Yoh for something immensely selfish.

She was pushing a burden on to other children in order to protect her own.

"You failed. It was a mistake to let him take over the rear palace on a childish bet. Why did you make such a wager?"

"He's more clever than we give him credit for, Ah-Duo."

"Ha ha ha. Yes, he gave the consorts the runaround in the rear palace!"

"Yet never laid a finger on any of them."

"It might have saved you the trouble of producing offspring, Yoh, but Yue well understood how much trouble it would be."

Yoh's head shifted in Ah-Duo's arms. At least he had the mental space to laugh now.

"You should hurry and go to sleep," she said. "You have a very uncomfortable surgery tomorrow."

"Oh, don't do that. Yes, I know. I'll rest. We don't want any unexpected side effects on account of me feeling weak from lack of sleep."

"Not going to write your will after all?"

"I don't plan to die."

"Write it anyway. At least put down that it's no crime if the physicians fail."

Ah-Duo let Yoh go.

"Why, you're assuming they'll kill me!" He gave her a sulky look like someone much younger than he was.

'Maomao and her adoptive father are helping with the surgery. If it doesn't work out, you'll find yourself with the La clan for enemies."

"Stop, stop! Lakan gave me enough trouble for banishing his uncle."

"He won't give you any trouble when those doctors mess up, because he won't be in this world anymore."

"I told you, stop assuming I'm going to die," Yoh said, but he got out a writing set.

"I see your handwriting is still awful."

"Pipe down."

So Ah-Duo and Yoh began writing his will, bantering like children of ten.

Yoh was Heaven, and Ah-Duo was human. Yet they could, at least, act as if they were friends.