Chapter 56
Chapter 56: Prince Yong’s Love
Nanny He smiled as she opened the embroidered pouch and took out what was inside, then froze.
Inside the embroidered pouch was a silver banknote worth five hundred taels.
She stared blankly at Nanny Yin.
Nanny Yin also started, then opened her own embroidered pouch.
The two of them looked at the silver banknotes and stayed silent for a long time. They had worked in the Imperial Palace for most of their lives, yet all their savings together did not add up to five hundred taels.
This was the first time they had ever received such a generous reward.
Both nursemaids felt their hearts tremble.
Just a moment ago, they had only thought the princess consort was steady and reliable. Now they saw that she was not only capable, but also generous and openhanded.
She could not be underestimated!
For a while, the two nursemaids put away their earlier disdain and felt real respect for her.
Nanny Yin said: “No wonder she was made Princess Consort Yong.”
Luo Ning entered the palace.
Inside Shoucheng Palace, the Empress Dowager took her hand and said: “You have to change how you address me.”
In ordinary noble households, once the eight-characters betrothal card was exchanged, the girl was considered the future daughter-in-law. The laws of the current dynasty required the yamen to approve if an engagement was to be broken.
Luo Ning had been granted in marriage to Prince Yong. Even though the wedding had not yet taken place, she was already an imperial daughter-in-law.
“…Imperial Mother.” Luo Ning found it hard to say at first and felt awkward for quite a while.
The Empress Dowager laughed and said: “Good child.”
She once again slipped the Buddhist prayer beads off her own wrist and personally put them on Luo Ning’s hand. “These Buddhist prayer beads were carved by Great Master Xuan Miao himself. He gave them to me when I was six years old. I have worn them for almost forty years. Now I pass them to you.”
Luo Ning knew that these Buddhist prayer beads were very important.
But the first time she returned to the capital to ask for them, the Empress Dowager had still given them to her without a trace of hesitation or reluctance. Later, when she returned them, the look of relief on the Empress Dowager’s face made Luo Ning realize how rash she had been.
Now, the Empress Dowager was solemnly giving her something this important.
From the day she was born, Luo Ning had never known a mother’s warmth.
At this moment, the Buddhist prayer beads still held a bit of the Empress Dowager’s warmth. As they rested against her wrist bone, Luo Ning’s eyes grew hot, and tears dampened her lashes.
She said: “Thank you, Imperial Mother.”
Her voice was choked.
Ignoring the palace ladies and Eunuch Wei and the other eunuch attendants nearby, the Empress Dowager pulled her into her arms, just as she usually hugged Princess Ping Yang, and gently patted her back. “If you are ever wronged in the future, come and tell Imperial Mother.”
Luo Ning murmured in agreement.
The greatest comfort in the Empress Dowager’s life was that all four daughters-in-law she had chosen suited her heart.
Each one was more outstanding than the last.
It was a pity that Prince Chen’s consort had died young.
When the Empress Dowager looked at Luo Ning, she always felt she was fragile, not only in build but also in family background.
It was as if she had nothing to lean on, like a thin kite that might fly very high, yet could easily be torn apart by the east wind and vanish without a trace.
Besides assigning a teaching nursemaid to help her quickly grow into an imperial noblewoman, the Empress Dowager also gave her the Buddhist prayer beads.
The Empress Dowager had always firmly believed that these Buddhist prayer beads had spiritual power.
The Empress Dowager no longer needed them. She was forty-six this year. She had been made crown princess at fourteen and entered the Eastern Palace, and in the more than thirty years of storms since then, she had experienced everything.
Time had shaped her. She herself was now unshakable and needed no divine protection.
The Empress Dowager talked with Luo Ning for a long time.
At noon, the Empress Dowager kept Luo Ning to eat at Shoucheng Palace. Before the meal was served, a eunuch attendant came to announce that the Emperor and Empress had arrived.
Luo Ning immediately stood up.
She had met the Empress, Madam Zheng, once before. The Empress was a peerless beauty, graceful in bearing, beautiful in every way. But Luo Ning had not yet seen the Emperor.
When she heard footsteps, Luo Ning quickly glanced up and saw only a slightly pale man whose features were very similar to Prince Chen’s.
Then she lowered her head again.
She rose to pay her respects and greeted him with wishes for ten thousand years of life, and the Emperor told her to rise.
He and the Empress bowed to the Empress Dowager, then took their seats. A eunuch attendant brought over a brocade stool for Luo Ning again, and she sat below the Empress.
The Emperor spoke to her: “You saved Imperial Mother. I should have rewarded you at the time, but your injuries were too serious and I did not get to see you. Now you seem fully recovered. You truly have good bearing and match well with my seventh younger brother.”
The Empress Dowager smiled and said: “A talented man and a beautiful woman, you truly are a good match.”
As they chatted, the Empress Dowager also kept the Emperor and Empress to eat with them.
When the eunuch attendants had set out the lunch, Prince Yong arrived.
After exchanging greetings, Luo Ning moved her seat, and Prince Yong sat beside her at the table.
The Emperor asked: “I heard that you have arrested the Duke of Shen?”
The Duke of Shen was the Empress, Madam Zheng’s, own uncle. The Zheng family had three men who held the title of duke of the realm. Two had been granted their titles by the late emperor, and this Duke of Shen had been granted his by the current Emperor himself.
Luo Ning listened quietly.
Prince Yong’s manner was cold, his voice calm and even: “To answer Imperial Elder Brother, the Duke of Shen secretly stored two hundred jin of iron. The contraband has already been found.”
Empress Zheng’s heart tightened.
In the current dynasty, salt and iron were run by the state. Any iron with no known source was a crime once discovered. By saying “secretly stored,” Prince Yong had already defined the nature of the matter.
The gap between an ordinary offense and a serious crime was exactly two hundred jin.
No more and no less, the Duke of Shen had hidden two hundred jin, just enough to be charged.
At best he would be scolded and stripped of office; at worst he would lose his head.
The Empress spoke: “Seventh Younger Brother, my uncle would never dare do this. He is being framed. Please investigate carefully and clear his name.”
The Emperor frowned.
The Empress Dowager also glanced at her.
The Empress should not have spoken.
But this matter was too serious, and she could not stand by and watch.
When Empress Zheng was a child, she had gone through a military revolt. During their flight, there were many people and great chaos, and she got separated on the road. It was her aunt who turned back to search for her.
That turmoil lasted three years, and during those three years Empress Zheng lived with her third uncle’s family. She grew from five to eight years old then, the age when a girl changes from ignorant to aware of the world.
This left a deep mark on her, and Empress Zheng had always been very close to that uncle and aunt.
“No wonder…” Luo Ning sat straight and quietly set down her chopsticks.
Prince Yong had urged the Emperor to grant him a marriage and used the imperial betrothal to draw attention away, while secretly moving against the current minister of war, the Duke of Shen.
Luo Ning’s father was a military general, and her childhood friend was as well, so she understood some military matters and was not completely ignorant.
In the current dynasty, to mobilize troops there were two tiger tallies, and in addition there was a black iron qilin command tally.
The tiger tally was split into two halves: the Emperor held one half, and General Wang, that is, Prince Yong himself, held the other.
To move the troops in the usual way, both halves of the command tally had to appear together. But to break the rules and use the army in an emergency, only the qilin command tally and one half of the tiger tally were needed.
The qilin command tally was kept in the Ministry of War and controlled by the ministers of war of each generation.
In other words, the minister of war had to be someone the Emperor trusted completely, or great trouble could easily arise. And Prince Yong surely wanted to replace him with his own man.
Luo Ning remembered that this Emperor was obsessed with immortal pills and would die at the end of next year. When the young emperor ascended the throne, he would be only one and a half years old.
The Emperor’s half of the tiger tally would be kept for the time being by the Grand Empress Dowager.
Later, when Prince Yong took the throne, the first person to support his ascent was the Duke of Shen.
The Duke of Shen was also Empress Zheng’s own uncle, and in terms of feeling he was like her father.
So Luo Ning figured it out. [The Duke of Shen is actually Prince Yong’s man. The Emperor just does not know it. Maybe there have been some rumors lately, and Prince Yong needs to ease the Emperor’s doubts, so he has to move against the Duke of Shen.]
[This is a struggle over military power.]
Thinking of this, Luo Ning glanced at Empress Zheng again.
[Right now, the two of them, she and Prince Yong, must actually be in love with each other, right?]
[Is she truly begging for mercy for her uncle, or is she helping Prince Yong put on a show?]
[If it is the latter, would this “future Princess Consort Yong,” Luo Ning, become someone Empress Zheng is jealous of? Even if Prince Yong explains things to her in private, would she believe him?]
[Jealousy is just a feeling. Even knowing that Luo Ning is only for show, she might still be angry with her.]
[Luo Ning did not have such a powerful uncle, nor such strong political methods.]
[She was not like Empress Zheng, a highborn lady carefully raised from childhood.]
[She only hoped Prince Yong could explain the inside story of this marriage to Empress Zheng in private and not drag Luo Ning into it. Luo Ning did not want to be hated by Empress Zheng and die without knowing why.]