Touch

Xiao Lin stopped when he reached the imperial garden.

The child was crouching beside a peony bed in a little apricot-yellow robe, poking a half-open bud with his chubby finger. Two nursemaids and a young eunuch carrying a food box attended him. It was not a large retinue, but enough to make every passing palace servant step aside and lower their head.

Xiao Lin stood at a bend in the paved path and went no farther.

He watched for a long time. The child had no idea anyone was watching him. He poked at the dew on the bud, and a droplet rolled down onto the back of his hand. He looked down at it for a while, then raised his finger to his mouth and licked it. Apparently finding it unpalatable, he scrunched up his little face, lowered his finger, and wiped it on the hem of his robe. Then he went to poke another flower.

These scenes were far too unfamiliar.

This child had been part of his previous life, too. But he did not know when the child had learned to walk. He did not know when he had first called him Father, either. What he liked to eat, what he hated to eat-he knew none of it.

He stood for a moment. The eunuch beside him cautiously drew close and quietly asked whether His Majesty wished to go elsewhere. Xiao Lin did not answer. He clasped his hands behind his back and continued forward, stopping beside the flower bed to look down at the little dumpling.

A nursemaid saw him first. Her face went white, and she dropped to her knees with a thud, her voice trembling. "Y-Your Majesty-"

Hearing the commotion, the little dumpling turned around. His eyes were round and bright as he tipped his face up toward him, his mouth slightly open, as though he had not yet grasped what was happening. Then he clumsily jumped down from the edge of the flower bed. His short little legs could not reach the ground, and he nearly stumbled, only steadying himself when the nursemaid caught him. Once steady, he knelt properly, curling his whole body into a tiny ball, and called in his babyish voice, "Father."

His voice was timid.

Xiao Lin looked down at the whorl on his head. It was very small, his hair fine and soft, with the little tuft tied slightly crooked, probably because the nursemaid was not very good at it. He wanted to bend down and pick him up, but he could not. He had spent a lifetime as emperor and killed more people than this child had ever seen. His hands no longer bore calluses, but he knew what had stained them.

So he simply stood there. Only after a moment did he speak.

"...What were you doing just now?"

His voice had unconsciously softened a little. The nursemaid beside them froze. She had served in the Eastern Palace for several years and heard everything His Majesty had ever said to the crown prince. She had never known His Majesty could speak in such a tone.

The little dumpling raised his head, lowered it, then raised it again. Only after repeating this several times did he make certain Father was asking him. His little hand pointed toward the flower bed behind him. "Looking at flowers." After a pause, he added, "Pretty."

Xiao Lin followed his hand with a glance. They were peonies, the most commonly planted flowers in the palace. Their blooms were too gaudy, their petals coated in dust. There was nothing much to look at.

"I know a flower prettier than these."

The little dumpling blinked.

"What flower?"

"There are a few growing behind the imperial study. They're called weeping crabapples. Pink ones."

Xiao Lin paused.

"Would you like to see them?"

The little dumpling opened his mouth, then swallowed whatever he had meant to say. He turned to look at the nursemaid, who was frantically signaling with her eyes, then turned back and nodded hard. Xiao Lin turned toward the imperial study. After two steps, he stopped and glanced back. The four-year-old child was stumbling after him on his short little legs, his steps too small to keep up, almost running.

He slowed his pace.

There were indeed several weeping crabapple trees behind the imperial study, planted many years ago. They were in full bloom, their pink petals layered upon one another, fluttering down at every gust of wind to carpet the ground in a thin layer. The little dumpling stood beneath a tree, gazing up. A petal landed on the tip of his nose. He sneezed, then reached out to catch another blossom.

Xiao Lin watched him from three paces away. Then he bent down, picked up a freshly fallen crabapple blossom, and held it out.

"Take it."

The little dumpling reached out with both hands and cupped the flower as though receiving some rare and priceless treasure. His hands were so small that a single crabapple blossom covered his entire palm. He lowered his head to sniff it, then looked up, smiling to reveal two little pointed canine teeth. "Thank you, Father."

Xiao Lin watched him smile.

Then he crouched down, his knees pressing into the earth, his eyes level with his four-year-old son's. The eunuchs and nursemaids beside them dropped to their knees all at once. No one dared raise their head. No one had ever seen His Majesty crouch down. His Majesty had stood for nearly a lifetime and had never crouched before anyone.

Xiao Lin did not look at them. He looked at the flower in the little dumpling's hands, then at his eyes.

"Huaijin."

He called his name.

This was the second time he had called that name. The first had been on that snowy night in his previous life, when he had held the youth whose body was slowly growing cold and called again and again, until his throat was hoarse, without receiving an answer. Now it was spring in the eighth year of Jianxi. The crabapples behind the imperial study were in full bloom, and his crown prince was still alive, standing before him. He called the name, then waited a moment and heard the child answer.

"Yes!"

Unlike in his previous life, he did not fall to his knees at every turn. Four-year-old Xiao Huaijin did not yet know what the etiquette between sovereign and subject meant. He only knew that Father had called his name, and he ought to answer.

The corner of Xiao Lin's mouth moved.

The eunuch beside them secretly rubbed his eyes, thinking he must have seen things. Then he decided he certainly must have. For the movement at the corner of His Majesty's mouth lasted only an instant before his cold, stern expression returned.

He reached out, his hand hovering above the little dumpling's head. He paused and paused again, then finally lowered it. His fingertips touched that soft, crooked little tuft of hair and pressed it gently.

"...Come. Let's look at other flowers."

He stood and clasped his hands behind his back again. The little dumpling followed beside him, his steps still unsteady, but this time he did not need to run. For Father was walking very slowly, so slowly that he seemed a different man from the one who sat upon the dragon throne before all the civil and military officials of the court.

At dusk, the nursemaid brought the little dumpling back to the Eastern Palace. He held the crabapple blossom the entire way, refusing to let go. Only when the nursemaid said it was time for his evening meal did he carefully set it on the low table beside his bed. After going to bed, he climbed up to check on it several times, afraid the flower would disappear.

The nursemaid tucked in his blanket and was about to withdraw when the little dumpling suddenly spoke, his voice very small.

"Nanny."

"Are you still awake, Your Highness?"

"Did Father like me today?"

The nursemaid opened her mouth. She wanted to tell His Highness not to read too much into it, that His Majesty had merely been in a good mood today. But she could not say it. In her years serving in the Eastern Palace, she had seen His Majesty leave the crown prince outside the Hall of Mental Cultivation for half an hour. She had seen the crown prince feverish and dazed, calling for Father, while His Majesty never even showed his face. She had never seen His Majesty act as he had today. She did not know what had happened, but she dared not snuff out a four-year-old child's hope.

"...Yes." She lowered her head. "His Majesty likes you, Your Highness."

The little dumpling rolled over, hugging his blanket, and soon fell asleep with the corners of his mouth lifted. The crabapple blossom kept him company at his bedside.

That night, Liu An came to the Eastern Palace with a verbal decree. "The crown prince is to come to the imperial study tomorrow at the hour of the dragon. I will personally begin his education."

The nursemaids and the servants of the Eastern Palace stood in the courtyard and exchanged looks after hearing it. According to ancestral custom, the crown prince's first lessons should be overseen by the grand tutor, with a memorial submitted to the Hall of Mental Cultivation only after an old scholar from the Hanlin Academy had been selected. His Majesty never took the initiative to inquire about the crown prince's affairs. Yet today, not only had he inquired, he actually intended to teach him himself.

No one knew what to say. In the end, the nursemaid broke the silence.

"Dress His Highness in that newly made apricot-yellow robe tomorrow. The one with the slightly long sleeves. I'll alter them tonight."

Xiao Lin sat in the Hall of Mental Cultivation. Several books lay open on his desk, retrieved by a eunuch from the imperial study's library. He had never read the simplest ones as a child. When he had lain on the ground in the cold palace, writing with a twig, no one had selected primers for him. He leafed through the Three Character Classic, then the Thousand Character Classic, and finally chose the thinnest volume. He remembered the child at four years old, standing outside the Hall of Mental Cultivation, reciting the Thousand Character Classic at the top of his voice-"Heaven and earth, dark and yellow; the universe, vast and primordial"-stumbling over the words. He had not turned around. Now he wanted to start over from the beginning.

He set the book at the corner of the desk and picked up another to leaf through. Then he rose and walked to the window. A lamp was lit in the direction of the Eastern Palace. The child was not yet asleep. He stood by the window for a long time, until the night wind had penetrated his thin sleeping robes, before turning back to his desk.

At the hour of the dragon the next morning, when Xiao Huaijin entered the imperial study holding the nursemaid's hand, Xiao Lin was already waiting beside the low table beneath the window. Sunlight streamed through the eastern window, falling on the low table and on the copy of the Three Character Classic that had been leafed through all night.

The little dumpling paid his respects properly, then sat down beside the low table. It was too high, his chin barely reaching the tabletop. Before even half a cup of tea's time had passed, he began to fidget, his short little legs swinging beneath the chair. Xiao Lin opened the book and taught him the first line. "At birth, human nature is good." The little dumpling repeated it after him, unable to pronounce the words properly, saying "beginning" as "coarse" and "good" as "fan." Xiao Lin paused.

"...Read it again."

The little dumpling read it again, still unable to get the pronunciation right. He tilted his face up toward Father, his eyes pleading, as though awaiting a rebuke. Looking at those eyes, Xiao Lin suddenly remembered his previous life-in that life, the child had finished reciting the entire Thousand Character Classic and stood outside the Hall of Mental Cultivation, waiting for his praise. Without even listening, he had merely said, "Passable." Now this child could not even read the first line correctly, but he wanted to praise him.

He remained silent for a long time, so long that the little dumpling thought he had done something wrong, and his eyes began to redden. Then he reached out and turned to the next line.

"By nature, people are alike; through habit, they grow apart."

Outside the window, the wind shook a few petals loose from the weeping crabapples. They drifted inside and landed on the page. Xiao Huaijin looked down at the petals, then up at Father.

"...Father, flowers."

Xiao Lin said, "Yes, flowers."

He picked the petals off the page and placed them back in the little dumpling's palm.