Jiayi didn’t know whether to be glad or horrified. She was excited about the chance to get out of the palace and learn from Zhihao, but he was terribly rude and arrogant. That he called her crazy stung. For years people thought she was either crazy or possessed by a demon. If the empress hadn’t taken her in when she did, who knows where Jiayi would have ended up. She shuddered to think of the possibilities.
“Very good,” the empress said. “However, remember that your job and Jiayi’s abilities must be kept secret. If the wrong people find out that the seal is missing, they could use that information against us. And if anyone outside this room knew what Jiayi could do, she could be in grave danger. She is precious to me. I want her back…in the exact same condition she is now.”
The emphasis on the empress’s final words made Jiayi blush.
“You mean…I am to take her with me?” Zhihao asked. “Has she not already told me all of what she saw?”
“She can still have more visions after she has rested. She might see something useful later. But you can at least start figuring out where exactly you should be looking and start your journey.”
The empress then stood to leave, and Jiayi and Zhihao bowed. They did not rise until she and her entourage had completely left the room. Then they stood and faced each other, but Jiayi kept her gaze to the floor. Even though she and Zhihao were mostly alone, it would not be proper for her to look him in the face. This was the first time in her life, in her real life, that she had ever been alone with a man—a real man at least. Eunuchs did not count as men. She glanced to the side of the room and saw that Eunuch Lo, her minder, had not left the room and was watching her from a discreet distance. She wondered if Zhihao knew he was even there.
Yet here she was about to travel and work with this man she had only just met. Her whole life was about to change, but she was too shy to say a thing. She hoped he would speak soon.
“Will you walk with me, Lady Jiayi?” he asked.
She gave a small bend of her knees to indicate her agreement. “If you like,” she said in nearly a whisper, amazed she could speak at all.
He motioned toward the door. She walked outside first, but then he moved to her side as they walked down a garden path.
“So, tell me more about your…powers, Lady Jiayi,” he said.
“Just ‘Jiayi’ is acceptable,” she said. “The empress titled me ‘lady’ only to be polite, but I am no lady. I was born to a very poor family in one of the city’s many hutongs.”
“And are you Manchu?” he asked.
“I am,” she said.
“And were you born with these abilities?” he asked as they turned down a path toward a koi pond.
“I believe so,” she said, but that was an oversimplification of her past. She remembered the very first day she had a vision in stark clarity. But she did not feel the need to elaborate to this stranger. Perhaps later, if she thought she could trust him, she would reveal more. She looked into the rippling water, hoping to get a better look at his face, but the lighting was not quite right, so they both looked like dark blobs hovering over the darting fish. “I have had visions for as long as I can remember.”
“How does it work?” he asked.
“You saw it,” she said. “There is nothing more to it.”
“There has to be more,” he said. “Can you travel into anyone? Anytime? What about this pocket watch?” He pulled a fob watch out of his sleeve. Manchu style robes did not have pockets on the outside like Western-style clothes, but ones that were hidden more discretely, such as inside the large sleeves.
“I cannot do it all the time,” she explained. She turned toward him and gently touched the watch, running her fingers over the silver of the round watch face. She then resumed walking. “The visions are…very taxing. I knew nothing would happen if I touched your watch just now. It can take hours, even days to recover, depending on how…emotionally charged a vision is.
“And I cannot control it. I don’t know where I will go or who I will be. For example, the seal and the box that contained it are hundreds of years old. They have been touched by countless people, including half a dozen emperors. When I touch the seal, I could end up in any time and at any place. I have been jumping back into the seal’s timeline for years. The empress is obsessed with it. My last vision, when I was Lady Cai, that was the closest I had ever gotten to when the seal was actually lost.”
Zhihao nodded, taking all of this in. “So, you have been an emperor’s lady. Have you been an emperor? That must be exciting for someone like you.”
Someone like her? Jiayi wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but she shook her head. “I have only ever jumped into a woman’s body.”
“And how long do the visions last?” he asked.
“Only as long as I can hold my breath,” she said. “But over the years, I have learned to hold my breath for a very long time.”
“Sounds quite dangerous,” he said.
“There have been times when I was quite scared,” she admitted. “Sometimes the people I jump into are in dangerous situations, in the middle of battles or on horseback or standing on the edge of a cliff. I never know what to expect.”
“Sounds like you have lived a very interesting life,” he said.
She could not help but smile. “In my visions, yes,” she said. “I was still quite young when I was given to the empress. And ever since, she has kept me under lock and key. I am grateful for her protection, for how she has provided me with food and security, but to her, I am little more essential than her Pekingese dogs—ornamental and occasionally entertaining. If I can find the seal, I will finally prove my worth to her. Then maybe she will let me be more than a kept pet.”
She realized that Zhihao had stopped walking. She glanced up and saw that he was staring at her. She felt her face go hot. “I cannot believe I said those things!” she said. “Forgive me. I am so stupid. I…I should go…”
As she turned, she felt his grip on her elbow. “Stay,” he said. She finally chanced a glance at his face, just for a moment. He was quite handsome, with smiling eyes and smooth lips. She did not allow her eyes to linger, though, since it would not be proper.
“You believe me now?” she dared to ask.
He laughed, an open and pleasant sound louder than any of his stifled snorts that escaped during the audience with the empress. “Well, you are entertaining if nothing else,” he said.
The smile dropped from her face. What was wrong with this man? Every time she started to think he might not be completely terrible, he would say something else rude.
He seemed to notice her change in mood and quickly tried to placate her. “What I mean is, you are a brilliant storyteller. You should be a writer. You can write about all these fantastical visions you see.”
Her shoulders dropped. What would he think of her if he knew she couldn’t read or write? She already told him she was born to a poor family. He probably had no idea what that was like. She felt so stupid around him. He had traveled and been to a foreign university. He knew English and was friends with Prince Gong before his death. Without her visions, she would be nothing, just another dirty peasant living off scraps or a prostitute in a filthy flower house. She could never tell him these things, though. He already thought she was a fraud. She didn’t have much, but she did have some dignity. She would hold onto what little she had.
“Sometimes I sketch the things I see,” she said. “I’m not very good, of course, but the drawings help me remember.”
“That’s excellent,” Zhihao said. “You will have to show me someday.”
The two stood together in awkward silence for a moment, staring into the koi pond they had walked a complete circle around. Zhihao cleared his throat. “I can see I have upset you,” he said. “Forgive me, I…this is all just so…”
“Crazy?” she spat.
“No,” he said slowly. “I was going to say new. Simply…new. It is going to take some time to process. You must understand my point of view. In a world full of fake fortune tellers and astrologists, the idea that you can see the past…Well, it is hard to believe.”
“So, because some fortune tellers are fake, then I must be fake too?” she asked rhetorically. Not giving him time to answer, she continued, “Perhaps you need a new perspective. If I am real, maybe some fortune tellers are too.”
His jaw dropped, and she could not control the edges of her lips as they tugged upward. He then broke out into laughter again. “You…you, girl. You are, as the English would say, quite a corker.”
“Corker?” she asked, trying to imitate his English.
“It’s a compliment,” he said. “Like brilliant.”
“Can you teach me English?” she asked.
“I don’t see why I can’t teach you a few things,” he said. “It will take us a while to travel the road to Jehol and back. And there will be plenty of evening time when it is too dark to search.”
“And history?” she asked.
“You want to learn about history?” he asked.
She nodded. “Very much so,” she said. “I always thought that if I knew more about history—the places, the people, the dress, the customs—I could better interpret my visions.”
“I see,” he said. “Well, I’m sure we will both learn a lot from each other over the next few weeks.”
A slight breeze blew and she looked up and noticed the sun was high in the sky. “I should return to the empress,” she said.
“Yes, of course,” he said. He bowed at the waist, took her hand, and lightly kissed the back of it. Her hand was ensconced within her floor-length sleeves, so his lips did not actually touch her skin, but the mere act left her in a state of shock. Men and women never touched each other, in public at least. He froze, hovering over her hand as though he also realized his great blunder too late.
“For…forgive me,” he stammered. “I…You know how sequestered Chinese women are. I rarely interact with them. I’m more accustomed to British women, and that is the gentlemanly way to say goodbye. I…I should just go,” he said. He quickly dropped her hand and turned on his heels. He was heading the wrong way to exit the Forbidden City, but Jiayi was not about to call out to him to correct him. The last thing she wanted was to get his attention again.
She looked around the garden to see if anyone had seen what happened. Of course, she was nearly surrounded by people! Eunuchs and maids, working or just walking. Palace guards. Ministers. Then, of course, there was Eunuch Lo, hovering under a nearby tree. He was always watching. Jiayi shuddered. The empress would find out what happened long before Jiayi made it back to her. Zhihao was so confusing. He looked Chinse and he spoke Chinese, but he was also so…foreign. He seemed to know nothing about Chinese decorum, which was strange for a man of his stature. His parents should be ashamed.
But at the same time, he was so exciting. She had never known someone who had seen and done so much. She yearned to learn from him. Maybe there was more she could do with her life than just have visions for the empress.
Who was she kidding? The empress would never let her leave. She would spend her whole life as a trick pony on a golden chain.