"It feels so much better to be back in the capital," Shujin quipped, cheerily bustling around the room getting her young mistress's clothes and accessories ready for the queen's gathering.
Hana immediately shot her stern glare and the girl zipped up her mouth sheepishly. There were new attendants serving in the young mistress's quarters now and it would not do to set a bad example for them.
Zi-ning's living quarters was exactly the same as before, having been kept in pristine condition under the old madam's orders. Now that she had returned, the old madam had instructed Lady Min to deploy additional serving staff over. Besides Hana and Shujin, there were now two new servant girls, Chuntao and Chunxi, who had been assigned to handle her everyday needs. While Zi-ning treated the two new maidservants magnanimously, they were still different from Hana and Shujin who had been with her through thick and thin, so there was no question about who she trusted more.
"It must have been hard on you, those years at Taishan," Zi-ning said with a small smile, patting Shujin on the back of her hand. Shujin had always been a boisterous and outgoing girl, so to have spent two and a half years in isolation in the company of monotonous meditation must have been difficult to bear. Still, Shujin had never made so much as a single complaint, obediently serving by Zi-ning's side throughout.
Shujin shook her head. "Not at all! As long as I can stay by your side, it doesn't matter where I am."
"Enough, Shujin," Hana interrupted. "We need to hurry. Lady Min has already sent word that the carriages will be leaving in an hour. It wouldn't do if the young miss is late."
"There's no hurry," Zi-ning said. After all, she was not the one who was determined to shine.
Today was the day that the queen had arranged for all the mistresses and young ladies of the noble families to admire the flowers in the imperial garden.
Unlike Zi-ning, who was nonchalant about the occasion, Meiyan had awoken at the break of dawn to prepare herself for it. It was not often that the young ladies of the noble families were allowed into the royal palace—such occasions were excellent opportunities for them to rub shoulders with the ladies of the palace, and perhaps even have a chance meeting with one of the princes, or even the king himself. At a time when the crown prince and several of the other princes still had consort spaces that required filling, all the young ladies in the capital were hankering after an opportunity like this.
When she was ready to leave, Zi-ning headed out to the main entrance to find Lady Min and Meiyan already being helped up the horse carriage.
Meiyan had selected an elegant pearl-coloured dress with sky blue embroidery, paired with a set of white jade bangles and matching earrings. Her hair had been intricately done up, secured with a silver hairpin fashioned after a peony flower. Even though she always chose to dress in muted tones such as white and cream, all eyes in the room would still be drawn towards her the moment she entered. She was probably expecting no less from today's gathering.
"Mother, Meiyan, am I late? I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting," Zi-ning called out.
Lady Min and her daughter turned their heads to see Zi-ning walking out towards the front door, her head held high with a slight smile on her face.
She had chosen a deep blue dress with silver embroidery, which once again brought out the colour of her skin. Ever since returning from Taishan, Zi-ning seemed to have developed a liking for dark fabric colours—a complete transformation from the bright colours she used to favour. Typically, young ladies her age would shy away from such dark fabrics because it made them seem overly mature and dull, but when Zi-ning put them on they just made her appear all the more elegant.
At a brief glance, she looked almost on par with Meiyan, if not better.
"Zi-ning," Lady Min smiled, even though it came across a little stiff, "what took you so long? We can't be late for the queen's gathering, else it would be extremely disrespectful."
"I took a little too long deciding what to wear. It's the first time I'm entering the palace, so I can't help but feel a little nervous. Do I look okay?"
"Why didn't you choose a more vibrant colour? Young girls like yourself should wear bright shades to make yourself look more lively," Lady Min chided.
The brighter the better, so that I can stand by Meiyan's side and highlight her gracefulness? No one ever heard Lady Min telling Meiyan to put on brighter-coloured clothes.
"Perhaps it's because I've spent such a long time meditating at Taishan, so I've lost interest in all those flamboyant clothes and accessories."
Lady Min nodded, looking thoughtful, though she said nothing more. The maidservants quickly helped their respective mistresses up the carriages and the entire entourage headed towards the royal palace. As the only two daughters of the minister's official wives, Zi-ning and Meiyan shared the same carriage as Lady Min, whereas Meisi could only sit alone in the carriage trailing behind. Naturally, the minister's concubines weren't even included in the invitation.
By the time they reached the palace gates, there was already a long line of other carriages waiting to enter. The queen had gone to great extent to invite almost all of upper society to her party, which only went to show how much importance she had accorded to this occasion. Zi-ning and Meiyan alighted the carriage behind Lady Min, following behind her as they walked towards the imperial gardens.
"Why if it isn't Minister Han's wife!" a high-pitched voice exclaimed. A rotund figure soon appeared before Lady Min, the jewels on her neck and arms enough to blind anyone. The matron smiled broadly, though there was nothing friendly whatsoever about the look in her eyes. The royal palace was a place filled with hidden daggers and no one here was truly a friend. "I was beginning to wonder when you were going to get here." From the volume of her voice, it was as if she wanted the entire world to know that Lady Min had arrived slightly late.
Lady Min pursed her lips together in a thin line. "Lady Ouyang," she greeted.
Lady Ouyang was the wife of the Minister for Protocol, who held the same rank in the court as Minister Han. Whenever they met at such gatherings, Lady Ouyang would not miss the opportunity to throw stones at Lady Min, because she deemed her as unworthy of being here. Everyone knew that Lady Min was only a concubine, raised to the status of official wife because of Lady Yang's early demise. There was no place for concubines at such gatherings.
"And who is this young lady?" Lady Ouyang peered over Lady Min's shoulder at Zi-ning. "I don't think I've ever seen her before."
"This is Zi-ning, the second daughter of our household," Lady Min replied drily.
"The second daughter?" Lady Ouyang pushed past Lady Min and walked over to Zi-ning, studying her curiously from head to toe. "You have got to be joking! From the way the rumours used to spread, I was expecting the second young miss to be—" She covered her mouth with her silk handkerchief and burst out in peals of amused laughter.
Before she left for Taishan, Zi-ning's reputation had been bad enough that all the noble ladies shunned her like the plague. However, over the past two and a half years it had been out of sight, out of mind. Most people had even forgotten that Minister Han had such a daughter.
"I can't believe you've been hiding a jewel like this for such a long time. Were you afraid that people wouldn't notice Meiyan if you brought this one along with you?" Entertained by her own jibe, Lady Ouyang laughed again, her eagle eyes waiting to catch Lady Min's reaction.
Lady Ouyang's loud voice was enough to capture the attention of all the other ladies in the vicinity, and all at once everyone's eyes fell upon Zi-ning, curious to catch a glimpse of what this elusive second young mistress of the Han family looked like.
Zi-ning maintained a tiny smile on her face, bowing down her head slightly. She knew that everyone was looking at her, whispering about her, but she could tell from the looks in their eyes that they were mostly impressed by what they saw. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Meiyan's darkening expression. Her sister never liked being overshadowed, especially not at occasions like this.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Lady Min replied. "Zi-ning has only just returned from Taishan temple, that's why you haven't seen her around. Now that she's back, it's only right that she comes along for such gatherings." Turning to Meiyan, she tilted her head in the direction of the other young ladies, saying, "Meiyan, why don't you take your sister over there and introduce her to some of the other girls. Zi-ning has been away for so long, she won't know many people here."
Meiyan bobbed her head in acknowledgement and promptly led Zi-ning away, eager to escape from the loud-mouthed Lady Ouyang.
All the other young ladies had already been observing Zi-ning ever since she entered, their eyes unwittingly drawn towards this beautiful young woman who looked like she was draped in the midnight sky. Zi-ning knew what they were thinking. Could this really be the same, uncouth and ill-mannered cow that used to make a scene at every gathering because of her arrogance and rudeness? The Han Zi-ning that all of them remembered never failed to show up in either bright shades of red, orange or yellow, her arms and necks covered with shiny accessories as if afraid that no one would know how wealthy her family was.
As she approached them now, the disbelief in their faces only continued to grow. Even as she walked beside Meiyan, she didn't falter in the slightest, holding her own as though she had walked these grounds many times before.
"Meiyan, why are you so late? We've been waiting for you," a bubbly girl in a light pink dress immediately linked her arm with Meiyan's, completely ignoring Zi-ning. This was Huang Minjing, the eldest daughter of the Huang family, a family that had produced a long list of top scholars.
"It's Zi-ning's first time at such a big gathering, so we had to spend a little longer getting ready," Meiyan said softly. Just a simple sentence and all the fault belonged to Zi-ning.
"Oh," Minjing glanced sideways at Zi-ning, "then maybe she shouldn't have bothered coming at all. She'll only make a fool of herself anyway. A person's dressing can't disguise what's really underneath."
The other girls burst out in giggles, all of them throwing looks of disdain in Zi-ning's direction. It didn't matter that she looked like a completely different person now—to them, she would always be that coarse and unrefined pig that they remembered, no thanks to her dear sister and stepmother.
"Did you hear? The crown prince might be making an appearance today!" one of the other girls squealed, and all at once everyone's attention was taken away from Zi-ning.
"Really? Where did you hear that from?"
"My aunt told me about it when I visited her in the palace two days ago." The girl who was speaking had dainty features and should have been considered a considerable beauty, were it not for that excessively harsh expression she permanently wore in her eyes. As she spoke to the other girls, her nose was slightly upturned, as if it was beneath her to even be mingling with them. This was Song Lanfang, the third daughter of the current Minister of Defence and also niece of Concubine Song, one of the king's current favourites.
Zi-ning was not unfamiliar with her, for this girl was also the first cousin of Prince Ru-an and it was no secret that she was infatuated with him. In her previous life, Song Lanfang had eventually married the Marquis of Dou, very unwillingly, and it was rumoured that her father had to tie her to the sedan in order to send her off.
"I don't see what all the fuss is about though. The crown prince is hardly better than Cousin Ru-an," Lanfang continued. She loved emphasising the familial relationship between herself and the fifth prince, as if that gave her an edge over all the other girls. "Although my aunt said that she would try asking Cousin Ru-an to come as well. I'm not sure if he will though. You know how busy he is."
While the girls continued cooing over the possibility of seeing the princes, Zi-ning quietly retreated into the background. She didn't care for their idle chatter. Walking towards the lake, she looked out at the calm waters and admired the tranquility of the scenery. In the middle of the lake stood an intricate rock formation, on top of which was a single willow tree, its long branches swaying gently with the breeze.
She used to like coming to the imperial gardens, spending hours sitting and reading at the pavilion by the lake while she waited for the eighth prince to be done with his official business. "Zi-ning, let's go home," he would call out to her, and they would walk back to their carriage side by side, silently. But that was all in a previous lifetime now.
"Are you... Zi-ning?"