Chapter Forty-Five: The First Glimpse of Peace

Pei Min had recently been weighing a question: should he go and take the Ministry of Personnel’s reexamination?

The civil service examinations of the Tang were still fairly simple then, nothing like the later maze of child scholar tests, prefectural examinations, preliminary tests, provincial examinations, and palace examinations, one after another in endless layers. At that time there were only the three most basic stages: the local qualifying examination, the metropolitan examination, and the Ministry of Personnel’s reexamination.

The local qualifying examination granted access to the metropolitan one, and the metropolitan examination was where one sought the jinshi degree. But in the Tang, even if you passed as a jinshi, you still could not directly enter official service. To step onto the path of office, you had to undergo the Ministry of Personnel’s reexamination. Only after the Ministry of Personnel, which oversaw official appointments, had reviewed you would it assign you to a suitable post according to your performance.

Pei Min had no objection to this way of selecting and appointing officials. The jinshi examination tested talent, but a man of talent was not necessarily fit to govern. Besides, people had different strengths: some were clever and quick-witted, suited to the Ministry of Works; some were honest, frugal, and meticulous, better fit for the Ministry of Revenue. The Ministry’s reexamination existed precisely for this reason, keeping those unfit for office from entering while assigning those with administrative ability to posts suited to their nature.

Pei Min had long since decided to place himself under Xue Ne’s command. With the identity of a literary champion, and perhaps soon a martial champion as well, not to mention his connection with Xue Ne, his resume already stood high enough. For him, the Ministry’s reexamination was optional. If he passed and the court assigned him to a post he disliked, would he refuse it then, or obey?

Just as Pei Min was making up his mind, news arrived that Princess Taiping had summoned him.

“Could it be that the matter has come to light?” Pei Min thought. Although he had no real tie to Princess Taiping, he had once used her formidable influence to teach a lesson to the foreign monk Huifan. If Princess Taiping were narrow-minded, she might well have taken offense. Yet he had foreseen this possibility long ago. In order to guard against Huifan, whom he had offended, and Princess Taiping, whom he had made use of, he had deliberately cultivated his own fame, making himself the center of public attention. Reputation was a double-edged blade: it could wound others, and it could just as well protect oneself.

Princess Taiping possessed an intense obsession with power. Whether she had ever harbored the ambition of becoming a second empress, Pei Min did not know, but her yearning for ever greater authority was common knowledge. Otherwise she would not have clashed so fiercely with Li Longji. It was precisely because Li Longji was too heroic and formidable that Princess Taiping feared he would one day slip beyond her control, and so she tried every means imaginable to have him removed.

For someone standing at the very summit of power, reputation was the only weapon worth trusting.

Pei Min looked at the present situation with calm certainty. He was riding high in Chang’an, and with the current political winds, Li Longji might at any moment set out for the frontier, while Princess Taiping’s faction was enjoying every advantage. In such a favorable position, she would hardly risk the infamy of jealousy and spite merely to do something that would bring the condemnation of all under heaven.

Winning him over was far more likely than anything else.

With that conviction, Pei Min accepted Princess Taiping’s invitation at once. He was curious too: he wanted to see for himself what this princess famed throughout the realm was really like.

Riding to Mount Joy, Pei Min gazed from afar at the residence where Princess Taiping lived, and in the depths of his heart he felt as though he had arrived at the imperial palace of a future capital: from the scale of this estate alone, he could already imagine how staggering Princess Taiping’s power must be.

“Young Master Pei, Her Highness the Princess has been waiting for you for some time.” He was greeted by a small group of five female attendants. Young and beautiful, each of them moved with grace and propriety, pleasing the eye and soothing the spirit without ever giving rise to contempt.

Following behind them, Pei Min entered the estate. Within the compound there were so many halls and pavilions that it was impossible to tell how many. Layer upon layer of splendid chambers and corridors stretched on without end. The tall buildings were at least three or four stories high, and some reached seven or eight. With the distance to the ground so great, they looked, to the naked eye, like the towering skyscrapers of later ages.

Led by the attendants, Pei Min wound through the buildings like a man lost in a labyrinth. Only after more than half an hour did he finally come before Princess Taiping.

The courtyard where Princess Taiping received him was not as opulent as the way there had suggested. It was simply furnished, yet heavy with dignity, and every piece of furniture inside was made of the finest rosewood. Most striking of all was the enormous rosewood couch plated with gold, set directly opposite the entrance to the main hall. And upon that great couch, high above the rest, sat the master of this vast courtyard—Princess Taiping herself.

Princess Taiping had always done as she pleased. She preferred the ease of a couch to the stiffness of kneeling in formal posture, and could sit or recline however she liked. Before Pei Min arrived, she had even been lounging lazily; only when word came that he was at the gate did she sit up, lest she reveal too much. The instant Pei Min stepped into the room, her gaze brightened for no clear reason, and for a moment she seemed faintly astonished.

She had seen many handsome men in her life. The most famous, and the most beautiful, was surely the Lotus Six Lang, Zhang Changzong, a man as lovely as a lotus flower and so fair that even women envied his face. But Pei Min, who now entered her hall, was very different from Zhang Changzong. In features alone, Pei Min might be a little less refined, but he possessed a heroic bearing that Zhang Changzong could never match, and he made her think unexpectedly of one person: her first husband, Xue Shao.

Xue Shao had been youthful and valiant, elegant and charismatic, with brilliance in every glance. He had been the white horse prince of countless maidens’ dreams, and their marriage had once been praised as a match made in heaven. Yet that happiness had collapsed when they became entangled in the rebellion case involving Xue Yi and Li Chong of the imperial clan. In the end, her husband Xue Shao had allowed her own mother to be starved to death. From that day on, there was no more love in her heart, only desire for power.

Princess Taiping studied Pei Min closely. Seeing that his handsome presence and his age were much like Xue Shao’s had been when he married her, and perhaps even surpassed it, she could not help but praise him inwardly: “What a gallant and extraordinary young gentleman. Even the Xue Shao of old may not have compared with him... No wonder he drives countless young women to sleeplessness and loss of appetite.”

Pei Min, for his part, also finally saw the true face of the princess famed throughout the land. Princess Taiping was nearly fifty, yet time had left surprisingly few marks upon her features. She remained a dignified and splendid beauty. Only her eyes were sharp as an eagle’s, giving one the uncomfortable sense that she could not be looked at directly.

“Greetings, Your Highness,” Pei Min said, bowing. He felt a little thrill of excitement as well. To be able to see in person this legendary princess of history was no small matter.

“No need for such ceremony.” Princess Taiping smiled faintly and pointed to the seat beside her. “Sit. I hear you have a taste for tea. Conveniently, I have some fine tea here. You may as well try it.”

Pei Min took his seat as instructed.

Princess Taiping tugged a fine cord at her side, and from outside the hall came the clear ring of bells. Soon after, a lovely maid entered with both hands holding a tea set, which she set down lightly before Pei Min.

With practiced ease, the maid brewed him a cup of tea and offered it with both hands.

Pei Min thanked her, took the cup, and inhaled the fragrant steam. He sipped carefully, and it was indeed richer in flavor than the tea he had bought in the western market. The key point was that it had a hint of mint...