Chapter 18#

After Fengbing returned this time, he no longer visited the plum grove behind the back gate either, confining himself for many days to within three zhang of his sleeping quarters.#

In the first ten days of the twelfth lunar month, the Imperial Medical Director Sun Bin came by imperial decree to check Fengbing’s pulse.

Fengbing changed into formal robes, tidied the room, and received him in the front hall. Accompanying him was the Deputy Messenger of the Xuanhui Office, Yuan Jiulin, who read aloud the imperial edict. Fengbing gave thanks for the imperial favor, then sat on a small brazier-cage that Yuan Jiulin had brought over, and allowed Sun to examine him.

Sun Bin had been transferred to the post of Imperial Medical Director in the twenty-fifth year of Yongzhi, when Fengbing was newly married, and over the eight years since, he had earned the high regard of emperors across two reigns. He had known Fengbing already, so there was little in the way of pleasantries. Not long after taking the pulse, his brow furrowed.

He then looked over Fengbing’s frame. The heavy fur-lined robe concealed his waist entirely, but the wrists extending from beneath the sleeves were fragile—so thin they seemed as though one squeeze would snap them. His entire person was as light and thin as a wisp of smoke, making even his features seem almost illusory.

“Over these five years,” Sun Bin murmured thoughtfully, “has Master Li been taking his medicine as prescribed?”

Chunshi hurriedly brought out the prescription that the doctor in Laozhou had written. Sun Bin merely glanced at it before looking up in shock. “Where is the prescription I wrote for you?”

Fengbing smiled faintly. “The land and water in Laozhou differ greatly from Chang’an’s, so the prescription was modified considerably over time.”

“No—I mean…” Sun Bin faltered, at a loss for words.

Chancellor Pei had been smuggling tens of catties of medicine from the Imperial Pharmacy to Laozhou every year, and this was hardly a matter that could be openly discussed. Sun Bin suddenly hesitated, wondering—could it be that Chancellor Pei’s wholehearted devotion was, from Master Li’s perspective, nothing but something to be resented and avoided? If he laid everything out honestly, would Master Li turn around and report him for impeachment?

The human heart is inscrutable, let alone between a divorced couple separated by years of bitterness.

All Sun Bin felt was the regret of a physician. After taking office as Imperial Medical Director, he had labored painstakingly over the Fourth Prince Li Fengbing’s condition. Moreover, in those days when Pei Dan had been at leisure, he frequently visited the Imperial Medical Bureau—whenever Li Fengbing so much as caught a chill, Pei Dan would come and press the physicians to find solutions. Thus the prescriptions issued at the time had always been tailored to the circumstances and proved the most effective. Not to mention, Pei Dan had originally attended to Li Fengbing with meticulous, all-encompassing care. During those three years, Sun Bin had carefully administered his treatment, at times even believing that Li Fengbing’s chronic ailment was on the verge of recovery—when suddenly the Great Treason Case erupted.

The Imperial Medical Director’s rank was merely that of a lower seventh-grade official—humble in position and quiet in influence. But treating the imperial family daily carried immense risks, and this had long since ingrained in Sun Bin a tacit and steady temperament. He glanced at the people in the hall, and finally said only, in a low voice: “The medicines from the Imperial Pharmacy are effective even in Laozhou.”

Fengbing fell silent.

Knowing these words were unpalatable, Sun Bin said no more and went to compose the prescription. Yuan Jiulin followed closely behind, watching him write. Thinking about how he still had to report to the Imperial Preceptor after finishing his account to the Emperor, and then report to Chancellor Pei as well, Sun Bin felt a few more hairs on his head turn white.

Finally, after seeing off both Yuan Jiulin and Sun Bin, Fengbing looked at the prescription—and sure enough, he saw two liang of licorice root.

“Chunshi.” Fengbing sighed softly. “You heard it all too. What do you think Doctor Sun meant?”

Chunshi said nothing, only pressed a hand-warmer into his arms before going to add more charcoal to the brazier.

His fingers had been hurriedly warmed, but for a moment the warmth wouldn’t register—only a numbness in both hands. Fengbing slowly let his posture go slack, leaning against the armrest, his eyes cast low. “He asked whether I had been taking medicine as prescribed—but he didn’t first ask whose prescription I was using.”

Chunshi pressed his lips together, knelt down before Fengbing, gently took his hand, and said softly, “Doctor Sun is a good man. From now on, he will surely treat you with full dedication.”

Fengbing guessed that Chunshi had understood as well, but was simply being considerate enough not to say it outright. A breath was caught in his chest, and Fengbing couldn’t fathom why.

Why would Doctor Sun write a prescription for him, all the way out in Laozhou?

Was it because of Pei Dan?

Yes—Pei Dan had been well acquainted with the people at the Imperial Medical Bureau in the past.

But it might not be Pei Dan either. What if it was someone else’s order—say, the Emperor’s or the Prince of Zhao’s? Then what would it matter whether he used the Imperial Pharmacy’s medicines or not?

Chunshi’s thoughts didn’t run as deep as his master’s. The moment Chunshi heard the way Doctor Sun had spoken, he knew at once—it must be Master Pei directing Doctor Sun.

Master Pei understood his condition even better than his own master did. When the two had first married, whenever his master couldn’t outmatch Master Pei in reading other books, he would always bring medical texts and pharmacopoeias to test him. But after more than half a year, he could no longer stump him—indeed, Master Pei would sometimes turn the questions back on him. Everyone at the Imperial Medical Bureau knew Master Pei, and even teased him, telling him he might as well go study under a medical doctorate—Master Pei brought to everything a stubborn, almost pitiable tenacity.

But Chunshi didn’t know how to broach it. His master seemed to understand everything, yet seemed equally lost.

In the end, why had they divorced?

Was this question of “why” also like the medicine that never reached its destination—lost in the dust of ten thousand li of road?

For the more than ten days afterward, until Little New Year, life quieted down.

Fengbing had developed the habit of rising early to copy scriptures while in Laozhou, and now he took it up again. In the room filled with the fragrance of medicine, he set up a Bodhisattva image, lit a green lamp, and unfurled a scroll of the Lotus Sutra—though he was not yet thirty years old, he carried himself like an old monk. He would always drag Chunshi along, explaining Buddhist teachings to him. For instance: once there was an elder who owned a grand and magnificent mansion, and his children and servants all played happily inside it, when suddenly the mansion caught fire—

Chunshi exclaimed in alarm: “Then of course we must put out the fire!”

“The elder went inside to pull the children out, but the children didn’t want to come—the mansion was far too fun! The elder had to say, outside the house, I have all manner of precious treasures and wonderful jewels, fragrant carriages—will you come out? The children’s hearts were moved, and they followed him out, thus escaping calamity—” Fengbing smacked Chunshi on the head. “Early in the morning—what are you still sleeping for?”

Chunshi nearly dozed off, jolted awake by the smack. “Th-this story—is it to remind us to be careful with fire?”

Fengbing looked at him and sighed. “The Three Realms are all without peace, like a burning house. This story is to teach us to turn away from worldly desires and draw close to the Buddha.”

Chunshi gave an uninterested “oh.” His master, at least, didn’t mind his ignorance—rolling up his sleeves, he copied the scriptures, and the very passage he was copying was this parable: “All suffering has its root in the desire for gain, with craving as its basis…”…

Chunshi slipped away surreptitiously to tend the medicine behind the curtain. When his master finished copying a section, he presented the medicine bowl at just the right moment. Master and servant had shared five years of hardship together, and much of their unspoken understanding required no words.

Since the day Sun Bin had visited, they had not once mentioned Pei Dan’s name. ——In truth, even on that very day, he had not truly been brought up.

This day, late into the night, the water in the room had been used up, and Fengbing went out alone to fetch more. Since this labor would allow him to work up a slight sweat, Chunshi couldn’t stop him, and could only deliberately switch him to a smaller bucket. The well was near the back gate; a few petals of plum blossom floated on the silver bed of accumulated snow, pristine and clean. The windlass turned gently, and clear well water filled the wooden bucket. Just as he was about to lift it away, he noticed—in another corner of the back wall—a small door had been opened.

Calling it a door wasn’t quite accurate; it looked more like a hole left from long years of disrepair, one he had never noticed before. And now, from within it, wisps of white mist drifted out faintly, as though there were ghosts inside. Even though Fengbing didn’t believe in ghosts or spirits, his heart tensed involuntarily. He set down the bucket and crept quietly toward the small door, his footsteps startling and shattering the frost and dew on the grass stems.

The white mist was hazy and ethereal, obscuring the crumbling walls around him. Ahead, there seemed to be bamboo, clouds, plum blossoms, and snow—all conjuring a realm of illusion. In a storyteller’s tale, this would be the very moment when demons and specters made their appearance. Fengbing gripped his hands tightly; sweat had already seeped into his palms.

“Hiss—too tight!”

Suddenly, a young voice he knew intimately well pierced through the mist and struck him, shattering every fantasy Fengbing had woven.