Tattooing

For a moment, Zongzheng Heng did not realize what she meant to do.

Only when the needle tip touched the skin beneath his collarbone did his whole body stiffen. The fog in his mind was split apart almost instantly, leaving him as clearheaded as he could possibly be.

"Stop!"

He struggled violently, pulling the silk ribbons around his wrists taut until they bit into his flesh:

"What are you doing!"

Qiao Shuyi's needle came to a halt.

Her eyes were clear as she tilted her head and looked at him:

"Zhigui, tell me, aren't you mine?"

Zongzheng Heng drew great breaths, the needle tip still pressed against his skin. Suppressing the anger and humiliation filling his chest, he said:

"Yes. I'm yours."

If he did not placate this madwoman, was he really going to let her tattoo characters on his body?

Qiao Shuyi sighed.

"But now, I don't believe you anymore."

Her fingertips brushed the skin beneath his collarbone. Her voice was as soft as melted honey, yet it sent a chill down the spine:

"Zhigui, how about I tattoo my pet name, Shushu, right here on you?"

"That way, you'll be mine for the rest of your life."

Zongzheng Heng's dark eyes grew utterly bleak, as deep as a bottomless abyss, as dark as a fathomless, icy pool.

"Shushu, you know what tattooing means. This is ab-so-lute-ly out of the question."

Qiao Shuyi naturally knew.

In ancient times, tattooing was a form of punishment.

Penal tattoos were inked onto the face and forehead, while those sentenced to exile were tattooed on their limbs. Both were proof of guilt branded into the flesh, a disgrace carved into the bones and blood.

The sages said that one's body, hair, and skin were received from one's parents, and that not daring to damage them was the beginning of filial piety. To harm them was unfilial; to be unfilial was to disgrace one's family name and stain the ancestral temple.

All the more so because he was an imperial.

Of heavenly blood, a son of dragons and descendant of phoenixes, if he bore the mark of a penal tattoo on his body, it would not be his shame alone. It would dishonor all the ancestors in the imperial ancestral temple and slap the entire imperial family in the face.

If the great noble clans learned that the Son of Heaven of Great Zhang bore the mark of a man punished for a crime, it would mean his virtue was lacking and he was unfit to rule.

Deposing the emperor, forcing him to abdicate, or installing a new ruler-any of them could be justified.

But she was going to tattoo him anyway.

Even if Zongzheng Heng came to hate her to the bone, what of it?

Once he obtained the evidence against Qiao Nanyu, she would fake her death and disappear anyway.

Let him hate her, think of her, be unable to forget her or let her go.

The more he hated her, the more he would remember her.

Over the next two years, he would be busy with court affairs, consolidating power, and balancing the various factions. He also had no shortage of consorts in his harem. She did not dare gamble on how long he would remember her.

And a tattoo, for an emperor, was a disgrace carved into his very bones.

He would certainly hide it from everyone.

Anyone who learned that he bore this mark would be killed by him.

That might become the knife she could borrow to kill when she entered the palace in the future.

When she returned two years later in the guise of an amnesiac, she would not remember what was tattooed on him.

He would then have a reason not to kill her.

Once she had gained a firm foothold in the palace, once she had borne an imperial son and he was made crown prince, if Zongzheng Heng displeased her, this tattoo would be the sharpest blade in her hand.

Several gains with one stroke.

Qiao Shuyi's voice was soft, carrying a coaxing gentleness:

"Zhigui, I'm putting it somewhere hidden. As long as you don't let anyone see the skin here, no one will ever know."

"Or do you mean that, apart from me, you still want other women to see your body?"

"Only if I tattoo you can I trust you. Trust that you're mine, trust that you won't leave."

"You're so unwilling. Could it be that you're still thinking of leaving me?"

Zongzheng Heng clenched his molars and forced the words out through his teeth, one by one:

"This is a disgrace! A disgrace to me and to my family! My body, hair, and skin were received from my parents and must not be harmed! You-how could you do this!"

Qiao Shuyi looked into his eyes, scarlet with fury, and smiled gently.

"But in this world, apart from me, there will never be a second person who knows."

"Zhigui, you once told me that both your parents were dead, that you were all alone, with not a single relative left in this world."

"But now you have me, and only me. What do other people's opinions have to do with us? What does their gossip matter? This isn't a disgrace. It's the finest testament to what we've shared."

Zongzheng Heng's pupils contracted slightly. He opened his mouth, but for a moment could not think how to refute her.

She spoke as though it were only natural, as though right were entirely on her side-as if she were not carving the mark of penal tattooing into him, but tying a silken cord around him as a token of love.

Ridiculous.

Absurd.

In that instant when he was stunned,

Qiao Shuyi lowered her head, and the fine needle coated in cinnabar descended steadily.

The needle tip pierced his flesh, and cinnabar seeped into the wound. The pain burned fiercely.

She knew Zongzheng Heng was a ruthless man.

If he wanted to cut the mark away later, it would take no more than a single slash.

So she drove the needle in deep, so deep that he could not cut it away.

She was not afraid of his hatred.

She feared only that he would forget.

Zongzheng Heng's eyes turned blood-red in an instant.

He struggled violently, but could not break free, could not break free!

"Qiao Shuyi!" His voice was so hoarse it had almost changed pitch. "Don't tattoo me! If you go through with this-"

He stared at her, his gaze filled with killing intent so thick it could not be dissolved:

"I'll kill you!"

He meant every word.

He was the Son of Heaven.

To have characters tattooed on his body, and a woman's personal name at that, was no longer a matter of romantic attachment. It was a disgrace to the dignity of the state.

Under the law, with a penal tattoo on his body, how would the Son of Heaven differ from a criminal?

By the standards of propriety, submitting beneath a woman's skirts would leave a man's dignity utterly destroyed.

At court, this would be a living example of "calamity brought by a woman," ironclad proof that the Son of Heaven was being controlled in the palm of a woman's hand, a weakness that could shake the foundations of the state.

If word got out, his hold on the throne would be insecure.

While admiring the flowers today, he had still considered sparing her life.

She was only a madwoman. Keeping her outside the palace and granting her a lifetime of wealth and honor would have been a way to honor the affection they had shared over the past dozen or so days.

But she insisted on tattooing him.

If those characters were truly etched into him, she would no longer be his woman, but an enemy with his life in her grip.

He closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, most of the scarlet had faded from their depths, leaving only a clarity cold to the extreme.

He had to kill her.

Qiao Shuyi sensed the hatred churning in his eyes.

But what of it?

He had come to Jinzhou in the first place to find evidence of Qiao Nanyu's rebellion and wipe out her entire Qiao clan.

In using him, she was merely turning his own scheme against him.

But he was using her to send her whole family to the executioner's block.

What was wrong with her tattooing a few characters on him to secure a knife for herself in the future?

She looked down at his face, flushed red by the drug. Beads of sweat covered his forehead, and his veins stood out, as if he were enduring the agony of being consumed by fire.

"Zhigui, your head is covered in sweat. I know it's hard for you to endure."

She made one puncture, then another:

"Soon. It'll be over very soon."

Half an hour later, the two characters "Shushu" had been left forever, stroke by stroke, on that patch of skin beneath his collarbone.

The cinnabar seeped into his flesh like a flower blooming within it, a red so vivid it pierced the eyes, so vivid it shook the heart.

She put down the needle and raised her hands to untie the silk ribbons binding his limbs.

The instant the ribbons loosened, Zongzheng Heng, like a trapped beast freed from its shackles, suddenly rolled over and pinned her beneath him.

His eyes were so clouded that he could no longer make out her face; all that remained was instinct, driven to its limit by the drug.

He lowered his head and kissed her lips.

Scalding, urgent, bearing all the restraint and suppression he had accumulated over the past days, it was like floodwaters bursting through a dike, impossible to hold back once unleashed.

Qiao Shuyi frowned.

He had been held back too long, and this was his first time. He truly... did not know how to be gentle.

"Ah-" She drew a sharp breath, her fingertips digging into the muscles of his back. "It hurts..."

But Zongzheng Heng could hear nothing.

The drug had burned away all his reason. He was only seeking an outlet, a moment's peace for a body that was close to bursting.

In his searing, urgent, heedless movements, there was no tenderness, no lingering intimacy, only the most primal taking.

Qiao Shuyi bit her lip and gazed at the bed curtains swaying faintly overhead, her eyes dark and distant.

She knew this was only for the moment.

His present surrender was nothing more than an illusion brought on by the drug.

He had forgotten the humiliation of being tattooed, forgotten the pain in his flesh.

But once the drug wore off, once he came to his senses-

His hatred would reach its peak.