Chapter 13

On the very day of the little prince’s third birthday, news that the Emperor intended to appoint a Crown Prince spread like wildfire.

The night before the birthday, Qin Xiyi, dressed in plain white robes, knelt in the Emperor’s sleeping quarters.

The great hall was empty, lit only by several ever-burning crane lamps.

Liang Shi set down his official documents and looked at the Empress who had been kneeling before him for a long time. When he spoke, his voice sounded like a leaky bellows, devoid of any vitality.

“Rise, Empress.”

For the first time, Qin Xiyi defied an imperial order. She lifted her head to look at this sovereign she had lived with for three years, whose face had grown increasingly pale. “I have come to ask Your Majesty to rescind the order. Do not appoint Liang Ying as the Crown Prince.”

“I have only this one son. If I do not appoint him, who does the Empress think I should pass the throne to?”

“There are many sons of the Liang imperial clan. Your Majesty could easily choose a suitable candidate from among the relatives. I am terrified; I have failed you. But Liang Ying… he is not of your blood…”

If this were ever discovered by outsiders, Liang Ying would become a target for all; the ministers and subjects of Liang would not rest until he was eliminated.

Qin Xiyi could not gamble, nor did she dare to. She only hoped Liang Ying could live as an idle prince, or even a commoner—anything was better than living with a blade hanging over his neck.

The Emperor stood up, his body trembling slightly. He braced himself against the dragon desk. “Who dares say Liang Ying is not my son? Look at his eyes; they look so much like mine…”

“Your Majesty, for three years I have lived as if walking on thin ice. You have never even touched me. How could there be a child…”

Liang Shi seemed to have expected this, yet upon hearing these words, the veins on the hand gripping his brush still bulged.

“Empress, do you feel you have been watching a joke for three years? Now even you dare to mock me?”

The Emperor was impotent. This was a secret known only to Qin Xiyi, and it was Liang Shi’s ultimate taboo.

Qin Xiyi was throwing caution to the wind. She desperately wanted to know what this man—this emperor who was physically frail to the extreme yet maintained a strong front to the world—intended to do with her and her son.

Liang Shi began to cough violently. He hurriedly took a pill, gasping for breath for a long time before regaining his composure.

He walked over and gripped Qin Xiyi’s chin. His expression was grim, yet he forced a thin smile. “I do not care about your conduct in the State of Zhao, nor do I ask whose child this is. If I say he is mine, he is mine.”

“As long as you remember at every moment that you are the Empress of my Great Liang, I will guarantee a lifetime of wealth and honor for you and Liang Ying.”

“And after your passing?” Qin Xiyi winced from the pain of his grip, yet she could not stop her words, which bordered on treason.

“I do not want honor or wealth. I only want peace and happiness.”

That night, the Empress did not return to her palace. By the Emperor’s order, she was confined in the Imperial Ancestral Hall for the entire night.