Jinghe Year Fifteen, the fifteenth day of the eleventh month. The Grand Court Audience.
Morning frost coated the steps. Before the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the officials stood in ranks, their court tablets a forest, their crown ridges rolling waves.
The audience proceeded as usual.
The Directorate of Transmission presented its business, the Ministry of Rites its memorial drafts, and the Ministry of War its frontier reports. Item after item, all perfectly routine.
Yet the gazes of everyone in the hall kept drifting, as if by unspoken agreement, toward the Censorate's ranks.
The wind was blowing wrong today. Not merely wrong-wrong a hundred times over.
For not only had the Censorate's censors turned out in full force, their brows and eyes were lifted with anticipation.
"Your Majesty."
Sure enough, a man stepped out from the Censorate's ranks, court tablet in hand. His clear voice overrode every other sound in the hall.
"Your subject, Assistant Censor-in-Chief Wang Kan, has a memorial to present in person!"
Shen Duan stood at the head of his rank, watching sidelong, his expression unchanged.
"Granted." Upon the Imperial Throne, the emperor nodded his assent.
With imperial permission secured, Wang Kan held his court tablet in both hands and declared:
"Your Majesty, your subject has heard: without compass and square, no circles or squares can be drawn.
"The statutes governing Personnel Administration have stood for a hundred years. Each bureau has its fixed complement of officials.
"The authority over Official Selection belongs to the Selection Office.
"These are the court's rules, the measuring line for all under heaven."
"Yet now a ministerial document has been issued: three additional department secretaries are to be appointed to the Shaanxi Office of Clear Accounts.
"The request came in the name of the Ministry of Revenue; the authorization came from the