“Your caution is well taken,” Miss Zhao says.
The next morning, we wake to the quiet of snowflakes falling from the sky. Poppy helps us bathe and dress in our finest, most elegant clothes. Then Miss Zhao and I drape ermine-lined cloaks over our gowns and leave the room. Considering how many women must serve the thousands of ladies in the Forbidden City, the halls in the Lodge of Ritual and Ceremony are surprisingly silent. I peer at Miss Zhao out of the corner of my eye. She looks unsettled, telling me this is not what she expected either.
We step into the courtyard. I hate the cold, but I can appreciate the brutal purity of it. Snowflakes dance in the air, carried by the wind. Icicles hang like ivory chopsticks from the eaves.
“It’s rare for snow to come so early here in the north,” Lin Ta says in greeting. Crystalline flakes catch on his eyelashes as he looks upward. Then he returns his gaze to me. “I’ve had coal-heated foot and hand warmers placed in the carriage to make your ride more comfortable.”
I appreciate the gesture, but the warmers do little to keep us from shivering. The windows in the carriage are covered by curtains, so we see nothing. We stop a couple of times. “Women for the Great Within,” the driver says to those I presume to be guards. “Let us pass.” We arrive at our destination, and a eunuch opens the door to the carriage. We’re already inside the Forbidden City, surrounded by protective walls four stories high and painted the color of dried blood. Miss Zhao and I are escorted through gate after gate—each one guarded by a pair of elephants. Live elephants. We reach the Eastern Palace, where the women of the imperial household live. I see the usual marble terraces, except they are many times the size of those in the Garden of Fragrant Delights. Every beam and rafter is carved and painted. The courtyards don’t have the lushness with which I’m familiar. Instead, they’re paved and stretch wide and empty under clean white blankets of snow. Eunuchs are everywhere, many of them little boys. What surprises me most is that we see no women. Where are the ten thousand beauties we’ve heard rumored live here?
“Wait,” the eunuch orders. He steps through a door. Miss Zhao and I seek each other’s eyes. I reach out and touch her sleeve, trying to send the message that I’m glad she’s with me.
The door swings open, and the eunuch motions for us to enter. We glide into a grand hall that could look austere in the severity of its architecture but for the embroidered hangings on the walls and the colorful silk carpets that unfurl underfoot. Perhaps twenty women sit in repose. Each is beautifully dressed in a long, flowing gown, with her hair piled high on her head and decorated with many ornaments and pins. They sit like open petals around a woman who presses a compress to her eyes. She must be my patient, who I see is also pregnant and farther along than I am. I suspect she might be an adored concubine. My vision next falls on Lady Liu and Widow Bao, each of whom nods in acknowledgment of my arrival.
A woman rises and begins to approach. She wears a gown of red damask and a black silk sleeveless jacket with scalloped borders. Her hair rises in an elaborate constellation of buns from which artificial flowers and kingfisher feathers sprout. Her steps are so light and ethereal it’s as if she’s floating across clouds. She looks radiant, as though she’s swallowed a cupful of stars. Perhaps only a doctor such as myself would discern the signs that she’s also full with child: the unique glow to her cheeks, the slight sway to her hips, the way she unconsciously keeps one hand on her belly as she walks. When she nears, I recognize who she is. Meiling.
A Snake always sheds its skin.
Meiling sees my confusion and smiles in greeting. “It’s the custom for midwives and wet nurses to dress and be coiffed in the fine fashions of the court. Did you expect me to be in sackcloth? I would not be allowed to come inside the Forbidden City, let alone to attend to the empress.”
The empress?
With that, Meiling opens her palm and glides her arm in the direction of the woman at the center of the blossom of the ladies of the court. “Empress Zhang, the Compassionate One.”
Miss Zhao instantly drops to the ground to perform obeisance. I hesitate for a moment and see the woman I thought was a concubine languidly remove the compress from her eyes. In a second, I’m on the floor next to Miss Zhao.
A voice as mellifluous as water streaming over pebbles says, “The two of you may rise.” Once we’re on our feet, the empress speaks again. “Welcome to the palace.”
The Great Within
I keep telling myself that the empress is no different from any other woman I might treat, but of course she is. She dresses in clothes embroidered with gold and silver thread. The decorations in her headdress are made of precious jewels. Her makeup is exquisitely applied each morning by a trio of young female artists. Everyone was wrong about how many women the emperor keeps in the palace. It is not thousands or even hundreds. The Hongzhi emperor has but one wife, and that is Empress Zhang. She spends most of her days in the special hall where I first saw her in the Great Within, but she prefers that I treat her eye infection in the privacy of her bedchamber, which is filled with furnishings made by the finest artisans in the land. I am to call her the Compassionate One, but I have not yet seen this aspect of her character.
“The Compassionate One’s infection is much better today,” I tell her this morning, my fifth in the capital. “It’s a shame that it was allowed to fester for so long—”
“Many months,” the empress says with a shake of her head. “But you’ve finally built the path to wellness.”
“As soon as you’re fully recovered, my party and I will return to Wuxi.” I bow my head. “I’m grateful to have served you.”
Empress Zhang smiles. “You will not be leaving so quickly.” She smooths her hands over her belly. “As you traveled here, Lady Liu, Widow Bao, and the midwife all spoke highly of your skills in helping to create a slippery birth. As the mother of the next emperor, I listened. I would like you to stay.”
“There are many fine doctors in the capital who I’m sure would be more capable—”
“Please don’t be modest.”
“I’m full with child—”
“And so is the midwife. The three of us can be pregnant together.”
I remain silent.
“If you help to create a slippery birth, then I should have no difficulties during my labor and delivery.” She pauses to consider. “I will put this another way. I am the empress. I don’t expect to have any problems during labor, but I will be reassured to have a woman doctor, who has given birth herself, present as the next emperor enters the world.”
I drop to my knees and put my head on the floor. “It would be a great honor,” I say. Inside, however, I’m torn apart. I’ve done what I was summoned to do, and now I must stay longer? I fight myself to keep from crying.
After we’re done with today’s treatment, I follow the empress at a respectful distance as she walks to the main hall in the Great Within. When we enter, everyone—from the fine ladies down to the boy eunuchs—pays obeisance. After the empress waves them back to their feet, the women resume their activities, which are the same things we do at home—embroidering, playing chess, working with brush and ink. Widow Bao and Lady Liu smile in my direction. They look pleased with themselves, and I should be grateful for their recommendation. Meiling sits with them, staring at her hands. In addition to the dismay I feel about not being able to travel back to Wuxi, I’m hurt that she must have known this imperial order was coming and didn’t warn me. I’m desperate to talk to her, but we have not had a moment alone together. Perhaps she’s been avoiding me. Or not. Whatever the reason, for now I must keep my thoughts and emotions to myself.