The Royal Physician, Gu Hua, paced outside the Emperor’s bedchambers. Plopping heavy steps back and forth along the empty halls, Gu Hua’s round face was an expression of worry. Sighing, she looked at the sky. The golden drop of light which bright shine to her soon became devoured by the clouds.

The middle-aged spinster stamped her foot angrily and cursed while swinging her arms about. Despite her pure white robes symbolizing her prestige, if one were to chance upon her now, the Royal Physician would be mistaken for a criminal stripped of her identity bitterly waiting to wash her neck.

“Argh, Ling Ling is going to have my neck! Chopped up, sliced, and then skinned,” she grumbled to herself. Moaning, she crouched against a pillar and began to beat on it with both fists. “I should never have taken this job no matter how good the pay was. How will I enjoy life if I am dead?”

“Who is going to die? The Emperor?” A gentle voice drifted down the long stretch of halls. Those who heard such a melody would swear it was as if the voice was Heaven’s tears washing away their sins. To the current Gu Hua, it simply felt like rain. Wet and uncomfortable rain.

Raising her head, she slowly turned to face General Bo Ling. She then closed her eyes. Dressed in his armor, the handsome man strolled toward Gu Hua.

With each step, Gu Hua envisioned the silver dragons coiled around the general’s shoulders to come to life and bite off her head. With every passing second, Gu Hua predicted it would be soon when the demonic dragon emblazoned on the chestpiece to start to breathe fire. With each breath, Gu Hua felt it would have been best to die rather than suffer the insane pressure choking her stomach.

The general stopped walking. Gu Hua opened her eyes. Staring back at her was a pair of blue eyes as profound as the oceans.

“Gu Hua greets General Bo Ling, may he prosper nine thousand years,” she quickly kowtowed.

The Six Generals of the Blooming Lilac Empire were all half a step from godhood and were all a half step from falling. With a single gaze, General Bo Ling could rupture the internal organs of a normal mortal like Gu Hua. She may be the genius healer in all the Empire, but even she cannot put back together organs if the organs became tofu pudding.

“Why are you kowtowing? Aren’t I just Ling Ling?” He asked with a smile. He stopped the middle-aged spinster before her head could bleed. “We can’t have that smart head of yours break now, can we?”

The Royal Physician waited for the general to stand up before she also stood.

“Now, what is the condition of the Emperor — may he live a thousand thousand years,” the man inquired as he strolled toward the courtyard garden to admire the lotus pond. With a wave of his hand, a wind swept through the garden and brought the biggest lotus in the pond to his hand. 

Sniffing at the scent, the famous general looked like an unassuming poet. Unlike Wei Zhao who had murky muddy eyes, or Mo Yun with her sharp dagger-like eyes, the general had sleepy eyes which hardly seeme to ever open beyond a slit.

“A coma,” the royal physician whispered. The general did not respond. Gu Hua knew her words were heard.

The poet began to tear apart the lotus apart. He scattered the petals into the pond. The petals were thrown with such weight that ripples tore through the water and drowned the prior petals. Bo Ling did this silently. One petal at a time. When he threw the last petal into the pond, he threw the stalk at Gu Hua’s feet. The stalk pierced the earth.

“Hua'er, did I not tell you to call me Ling Ling,” the man muttered with a glum expression.

“Yes, Ling Ling,” the physician said anxiously.

“The Empress Dowager told you to do your best, did she not?” The general asked with crossed-arms.

“Yes, she did.”

“And I told you to do your best too, right?”

“Yes, you did, but that fox’s poison was just —”

“Only General Hong concocts such poisons, yet you could not even do your work properly? If the Emperor was saved, you would be hailed as a Buddha reincarnated. If you had failed, no one would blame you, after all, only General Hong concocts such poisons. Yet, you are now stuck between a dagger and a sword. One might say you botched up the surgery on purpose.” The man’s eyes opened wide. Those great blue ocean orbs. “One might suspect you are in cohorts with the assassins.”

The physician paled.

“Well, this is the outcome. I cannot do anything more about this. How likely is the chance of the old tiger waking?”

“I, I don’t know. Since he is of the White Tiger’s lineage, these things are hard to judge.”

“Ling Ling, you forgot to add that. Again,” he muttered.

“General Bo Ling! General Bo Ling!” A young servant called for the man. The boy ran up to the man and handed him a hawk and a common sparrow. Then he quickly left, tripping over his own feet.

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Reading the letters attached to the two birds, General Bo Ling’s face contorted more and more with every line. After finishing the two letters, General Bo Ling had Gu Hua go into the Emperor’s chambers to borrow paper and ink. He quickly wrote two replies in large, swift unruly strokes. The hawk flew toward west and the sparrow fluttered its wings toward the south.

“W-What did the letters say?” The Royal Physician asked with a squeak. She clasped her hands uneasily.

The general only ever opened his eyes when he felt extreme emotions.

“Wei Zhao let the girl go, and Senior Sun is dead.” He said and closed his eyes.

Hesitantly, the middle-aged spinster asked, “What are we going to do?”

“I need you to restore Senior Sun’s face. If possible, find a puppeteer. If not, then the matters concerning Hong’er would become exceptionally tedious, and people will suspect you to be in on the conspiracy.”

“Me? Why me? I’m the Royal Physician!”

General Bo Ling snatched her cheeks and pulled her face toward his. “A Royal Physician who botched a job.”

The spinster tore her face away from his hold and said bitterly, “Everyone knows you were exceptionally close to that fox.”

“We all were. It was the three of us who won that throne for the old tiger.” The general glanced at the Emperor’s chambers. “It is a heavy feeling to have old friends betray one another.”

The spinster narrowed her eyes and made a difficult expression. She sighed and changed the subject. “What of the girl?”

“We need the girl. However, it seems she is under the protection of the Yue Yun Sect.”

“I don’t see the issue. We can easily oust the sect from the Empire’s favor on basis of not only the fox and her husband being from the sect, but the sect holding the daughter of those two criminals. Then we can take the girl.”

The general smiled. “Oh, this is exactly why your peach blossom has not bloom in all 29 years of your life. Not only are you grossly naive, you are slow. Idiot girl! If we oust the sect with such a motive, the Empress Dowager, no matter how emotionally exhausted she is, will protect the girl. Not because she is the incarnation of Guanshiyin. But because no one who has survived in these courts survive because they are righteous.

“We cannot get the girl for now, but it does not matter. If the girl cultivates the Yue Yun Arts, she will die. Let us not worry about something we do not possess or control. We shall oust the Yue Yun Sect, if only to appease some of our aggravations. Rather, I need you to brew some medicine. My sister is in a state of hysteria because of last night. I need to pay her bedchambers a visit regardless.”

“The same as last night’s?”

“Yes, but make sure all the bowls and pastels are clean. No, I will have my men send you an entirely new set. It never hurts to be cautious.”

The Royal Physician nodded and gave thanks.

“...and what of the Emperor’s son. I believe he was witness to last night’s events. He may be useful.”

“Hmph,” the general snorted. He laughed cordially. “You truly will never see the bloom of Spring, Hua’er. You truly fit your name, Bone Flower. He is the Emperor’s son, even if by a low consort, he is the next in line. We have no right to speak to him, even if the Empress Dowager allowed it. No matter what he saw, being so young, he will not remember or understand it.”

“We should still send men to watch over him. For safety’s sake.”

The general nodded as he went over to the pond once more. “What of Consort Mu?”

The Royal Physician widened her eyes and then squinted suspiciously. “You almost never ask for my opinions.”

“A woman’s intuition is best when dealing with other women.”

“Send men to watch over her. It is unknown whether the Empress Dowager will extend kindness to her. It is likely in any case.”

The general nodded and then left. The red cape behind him waved about heroically. The Royal Physician looked at the sky and saw the clouds darken further.

“Better go and mix the herbs,” she muttered to herself. “Deer antlers, reishi mushrooms, gingers…”   

Author's Note: I tried to write this chapter so everything was somewhat ambiguous, but also somewhat obvious. I am unsure as to how well it worked. Tell me in the comments. Thanks for reading. I will post another chapter later. Today was simply a long day.