Cry of the Midnight Jackdaw

Chapter Thirty-eight,
Opportunity

Just as Xiao Zuo returned to the residence, he could not wait to worm inside his own bedchambers. After he tightly shut the doors and windows, he then sat on the edge of the bed, and very carefully took out that paper ball that person at the Qing Yin Hall gave him.

The surface had a strange symbol on it, looking like a snake with the head and tail held together.

This pattern…… Xiao Zuo slightly knitted his eyebrows, he once saw it in the palace, in Father’s bedchambers.

Xiao Zuo suddenly greatly shook inside, his eyes tightly contracted like they had been pierced by needles, and carefully flipped that bundle of paper again and again with hurried breaths, that’s right, it was this pattern. At that time, this snake biting its own tail appeared in…… a secret letter sent from Nan Liang to Jin.

From what he heard from He Xuan later on, this person who gave him this paper, was the second young lord of the Etiquette Drafter of the Ministry of Rites Fu Huai Qian, Fu Zhan Chuan[1]. Xiao Zuo put that paper ball away, he was worried he did not remember right, so after the lanterns went up in the night, he especially got De Qing to stay, and passed the ball of paper in his sleeves over.

“This is the pattern for secret communications of the Liang dynasty. When this old servant was serving the former emperor, this servant has had the fortune to see it a few times.” The hand De Qing was grasping the paper with slightly shivered, he fixed his expression, then said, “Since the Xing dynasty perished, chaos rose up, each country, to pry into information, would mutually send out spies. This old servant has once heard that these spies were present long in the ancestor’s reign when this servant was following the former emperor, but this servant rarely saw the former emperor use it, this servant originally thought it was long died to the realm, but didn’t think……”

The rank of a Ministry of Rite’s Etiquette Drafter was not high, but Fu Huai Qian was still a person from the Pinewind Faction, and never participated in faction fights, with few faults in the many years he served the government, his nature is also upright and outspoken, and was quite popular in the courts. Also, though he was of common birth, he excelled in statecraft, able to speak and dared to admonish, not fearing stronger authority, and was the object of admiration from the neutral parties in the court.

“Your Majesty.”

Xiao Zuo got startled, and saw beneath the illumination of the dim yellow candlelight, De Qing with his two locks of mottled white hair, underneath his frightened attention, slowly and steadily knelt down.

“De Qing, what are you doing!”

De Qing removed the hand helping him up, his eyes, due to age, carried a sliver of moistness, yet looked at him precisely. He arduously straightened the back that became humped after being pressed by the years, and spoke each and every word clearly, “Your Majesty, in the present, Jin has been belittling the Liang people who have surrendered, and rebellions still rise all around Nan Liang. For Sir Fu to give us this, is to let your Majesty not to lose the will to fight, our Nan Liang still has hope. Now that your Majesty has gotten the trust of his Highness the Crown Prince, this is precisely the opportunity the heavens have bestowed to our Nan Liang.”

Xiao Zuo blankly looked at him, “You…… you mean to let me……”

“Your Majesty, Nan Liang’s commoners are still waiting for your Majesty.”

He blankly looked at De Qing’s wrinkle-filled face, yet even he himself could not say, when his gaze went past De Qing, if what he saw was the imperial garden’s views and spring breezes, or if it was the gentle profile of He Xuan’s face when he was being affectionate.

“If your Majesty is not willing……” Though De Qing kept his voice down, these words in Xiao Zuo’s ears were no quieter than a heaven-shocking strike of thunder, directly shocking him so much he widened his eyes.

Xiao Zuo froze for a moment, like he was abruptly seized by some giant embarrassment, and quickly and undoubtedly refuted, not daring to give himself the leeway to hesitate, “No.”

He lightly swayed his head, like he was wearing an invisible red crown, heavily pressing on him to the point he could not raise his head up.

After the night came, the outside of the room had fine rain again.

The inside of the room was only left with a candlelight as small as a bean, dim, swaying, and hazy like Xiao Zuo’s feelings, chewing on the strange thoughts he had when thinking about the country just now.

He still remembered last year in the middle of summer, it was also this kind of rainy night when the head of national security, against the rain throughout the night, came into the palace to report that Jin’s army brazenly invaded the borders, and took city after city in a flash with the force one used to break bamboo.

After that day, he no longer had a peaceful sleep, each day, the military reports from many miles away were urgently placed on his desk, he did not even dare to open to look at them.

Inside each memorial would be countless troops who died to the battlefield, countless wrong souls who died innocently. He was pressed by this overly heavy responsibility to the point he could not breathe, to the point that on that day the country fell, his actually felt a bit of liberation from being released from the heavy burden.

When Father was still here, he would always say his nature was too soft, and could not bear important matters, but Xiao Zuo did not take it to heart. He had Father, had Mother, even if the skies collapsed, he was not needed to bear it, he only needed to peacefully be a small highness who played with cats and dogs and stroked the qin and painted, the years belonging to him, were typically very light [of responsibility].

But everything changed too fast. Father and Mother got sick one after another and left the world, and even did not have the time to instruct the little highness who was ignorant of the world, the world was dangerous, in the future, anything arduous and dangerous will need him to bear it himself. He was mercilessly forced by fate to sprout and grow up, yet never was there anyone who asked him if he was prepared for it or not, and whether he could bear it all.

Xiao Zuo shrunk himself into a ball and hid in the corner of the bed. The dark night very easily peeled away the frailty he was not willing to show others in the daytime, and kindly used the darkness to hide it for him. He deeply buried his head in the crook of his arms, the light-coloured sleeves were dampened by the tears, turning the spots into bunches and bunches.