That night, Zhihao crept out of his tent. When he arrived at Jiayi’s tent, Eunuch Lo was still awake, guarding the entrance.
“I need to speak to Jiayi,” Zhihao whispered. “I need to talk to her more about her visions. I have some more theories.”
Eunuch Lo nodded and let Zhihao enter, but he left the tent flap open a crack so he could keep an ever-watchful eye on them.
Jiayi was sitting on the blankets she was going to sleep under later. On her lap was a stack of papers and she was holding a charcoal pencil in her hand. Her face blushed when she saw him and quickly moved to hide what she was working on. She was wearing a long thick robe—even in summer the nights would get chilly north of Peking—but she clutched it closed at the neck upon seeing him, gray streaks of charcoal staining the fabric in the process.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said as she clumsily tried to stack her pages into a folio with one hand.
“Eunuch Lo is watching us,” he said.
Jiayi pressed her lips and then nodded. “He always is,” she whispered as she pushed her folio aside. “He guards me at the palace as well.”
Zhihao wasn’t sure what to think of that or why she was telling him such a thing. It was odd that the empress felt the need to guard the girl, as if she might run away or be stolen. Jiayi had told him she was like a kept pet. Maybe she felt like a prisoner.
“Are you sketching something new?” he asked, remembering that she said she sketched the things she saw. “Something you have seen? Can I see them?”
She shook her head. “It’s nothing that would be of any use.”
He doubted that and figured she was just being modest, but he accepted her excuse for now. “I was just wondering if there was anything else from your vision you learned,” he said, folding up a blanket to sit on across from her.
“I think I told you everything,” she said. “Are you documenting what I have told you? The things about history that might not be correct?”
Even though he had already stated to Jiayi why he was there, she naturally spoke around the topic at hand, making polite conversation first. Zhihao often found this sort of tradition annoying—he was a busy man who liked to speak plainly—but he found that he enjoyed his conversations with Jiayi, so he did not push her to tell him more about her visions until she was ready.
“I have been,” he said. “But I am not sure what I will do with the information. I don’t have any concrete evidence to back up my claims. This isn’t like any of the digs I went on in Egypt.”
“What is a ‘dig?’” she asked. “And what is Egypt?”
“Oh, sorry. I mean an archeological dig, where we look for old artifacts and cities buried under the ground. Egypt is a country in Northern Africa. That is where there are pharaohs and pyramids. Lots of exciting things are being unearthed every day. The excavation model being followed in Egypt is something China should look to. Our thousands of years of history should not be lost.”
Jiayi smiled as though she was uncomfortable. “Forgive me. I must be terribly stupid. I only understood half of what you were talking about.”
“Not at all,” he said. “You should forgive me. I am used to speaking to men and women who are in the same field as I am and understand the lingo.”
“There are women in your field?” she asked. “Women…archeologists?”
“Sort of,” he said. “Few women go to university, and even fewer are willing to battle the elements of the desert or attempt to survive in an alien culture. But some brilliant women are linguists…err, people who study language, or women who try to fix old paintings or sculptures. Those sorts of jobs seem naturally suited to women.”
“I would be willing to learn such things,” Jiayi said. “I want to learn many things. I feel like my mind is empty and begging to be filled. I have already learned so much from you.”
“We can hope that the end of our expedition will not be the end of our—” He wanted to say friendship, but that would have been too personal. “Of our…adventures together.”
Jiayi nodded. “I do hope,” she said. “My visions are like dreams. Have you ever had a dream so real, so vivid, that you thought you were living in it? And when you awoke, you thought you would never forget it? But later, when you try to tell someone about your dream, you cannot hardly recall it at all?”
Zhihao nodded.
“My visions are like that,” she said. “If I do not relay them immediately, I forget.”
“You should try writing them down,” Zhihao said. “Not only so you can use the details to find artifacts, but just because they are interesting. And what if there are links between your visions? Or patterns that could help you deduce when or where you might travel to next. They would be fascinating to analyze.”
“I do suppose you are right,” she said with a tight smile and then looked back at the lantern instead of having to make eye contact with him.
“Do you remember anything else from your vision earlier?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I just remember that Minister Shun was very intimidating. He was frightening. He threatened Lady Cai with the Death by a Thousand Cuts.”
“Well, she wasn’t put to death, we know that,” Zhihao said. “So we know his threats came to nothing.”
“Oh, I wanted to ask,” Jiayi said. “You are sure you don’t know anything about Lady Cai being disgraced?”
“Records from the Inner Court, the court of the women, are sparse,” he said. “I suppose historians and scholars don’t think the lives of women are important enough to include in official records.”
Jiayi scoffed, and Zhihao laughed a little.
“I didn’t say I agree with it, just stating their viewpoint,” he clarified. “After all, women exert a lot of influence over their husbands and often run the household while the men are doing other things. It would be interesting to know just how the women of the Inner Court have influenced government policy throughout history.”
“I don’t think many men could handle the shock,” Jiayi said with a smirk.
“Perhaps not,” he agreed. “Your vision today was probably before the seal was lost,” he said, changing the subject. “Minister Shun could have threatened Lady Cai here, after their first day on the road, telling her she needed to find something to use against the emperor. Two days later, they are attacked at the Conghua Pass. The emperor gives Lady Cai the seal. Lady Cai realizes that Minister Shun could use it against the emperor and gives it to him.”
“Or she didn’t give it to the minister,” Jiayi said. “There is no record of a coup, and she wasn’t executed for treason. Maybe she hid it or gave it to someone she could trust.”
“Perhaps,” Zhihao said. “But if that was the case, why not retrieve the seal later?”
“When we find the seal, I am sure we will find out,” she replied.
Zhihao laughed. “Indeed. When, not if.”