Chapter 101 - 82: Turning the Tables
In the thick, syrupy darkness, Noble Lady Gu’s eyes were like a thin sheet of ice in the arctic. Beneath their clear, shimmering, cold light, no one knew how vast an iceberg lay hidden.
The little eunuch, who was picked up like a baby chick, shivered and forced himself to continue the act. "You... you look just like the woman who pushed me down the well back then... It was you... It was you who harmed me..."
He had been castrated as a child, so his voice was naturally high and thin. By flattening it slightly, he could affect a feminine tone. Clearly, he intended to see the "female ghost, who died unjustly in the depths of the late Emperor’s palace years ago and has now mistaken her killer" script through to the end.
"Nonsense! My mistress has been in the Imperial Palace for less than a year. How could she possibly be the one who harmed you?" Zhenqiu couldn’t help but retort.
In this situation, offering an explanation was the inferior move.
As expected, the little eunuch became even more brazen in his performance. "Haha! What goes around comes around! I’ve finally waited for you! You were jealous that I was more favored than you, so you lured me out in the middle of the night and pushed me down the well... Two should not look into a well together, two should not look into a well together!"
A sudden gust of night wind rose, and the rustling leaves seemed to carry a mournful, plaintive sound, as if echoing the grievances of one who had died unjustly.
So what could Jiang Xian, who had been deliberately misidentified, possibly do?
Jiang Xian, still gripping the back of his neck, took two steps forward, stopping right at the edge of the well. "How did she push you down the well? Let me demonstrate for you right here. You don’t mind, do you?"
"..."
The dark, gaping maw of the well was right in front of him.
He didn’t know where this Noble Lady Gu found the strength, but she had lifted him so high that his feet were dangling over the well’s opening, swaying gently.
The little eunuch swallowed hard. "You’re going to harm me a second time."
"That’s right," Jiang Xian admitted readily. "If I could push you down a well back then, I can do it a second time today. And a third. I’m staying in Changle Palace for a month. I’ll push you in every single time I see you."
Under the moonlight, the newly favored concubine’s face held a pleasant smile. It was as if pushing people down wells was a mundane affair for her—something done after a midnight snack and a trip to the latrine, casually shoving a couple of rivals down a well on the way back to aid digestion. Utterly unremarkable.
The little eunuch’s voice faltered. "Perhaps I have mistaken you for someone else. You look so young; you couldn’t be the one who harmed me. Please, put me down."
"You haven’t mistaken me,"
Jiang Xian cheerfully affirmed. "And now I’m going to push you down."
With that, she acted as if she were really going to let go.
This scared the little eunuch half to death. He didn’t dare pretend to be a ghost anymore, and his voice reverted to the sharp pitch of a eunuch. "Your Ladyship, please don’t! This servant was wrong! I beg Your Ladyship to spare this servant’s life! This servant was just being mischievous and had the idea to play a prank on Your Ladyship. I beg Your Ladyship to spare this servant’s wretched life!"
In his panic and terror, he still didn’t dare expose Noble Princess Consort Rong.
Jiang Xian raised an eyebrow and gave him a cool glance. "Just being mischievous? The kind of mischief where you enjoy playing with the heads of your nine exterminated clans, hanging from your waist? Zhenqiu, go fetch a bucket of water."
Zhenqiu was incredibly efficient, drawing up a full bucket of water in less than two minutes.
Jiang Xian shoved the little eunuch’s head into the bucket, then used her hand to splash the black grime from his face before pulling his head back up. Jiang Xian hadn’t intentionally tried to suffocate him, but he still choked on two mouthfuls of icy well water out of fear.
Zhenqiu lifted his face and said angrily, "So it’s a eunuch!"
The little eunuch begged for mercy nonstop.
He had assumed that Noble Lady Gu, having only recently entered the palace, would be softer-hearted than the more senior concubines. To his dismay, Jiang Xian smiled. "I am only a Noble Lady. I am not worthy of being called ’Your Ladyship.’ The person who sent you to frighten me is the one who deserves to be called ’Your Ladyship.’"
She watched the changes in his expression without looking away for a second.
In this situation, direct questioning would get her nowhere.
People lie. They obfuscate and downplay.
Jiang Xian spoke in a tone of certainty. "Suppose I drag you before the Empress Dowager right now. You’ll say no one put you up to this, right? I believe you. So, I will tell the Empress Dowager that I found you near the latrine well, pretending to be a ghost and performing a dark, cursing ritual."
The Empress Dowager had been a vegetarian and a devout Buddhist for many years, with a reputation for mercy; she certainly wouldn’t want to have someone killed in Changle Palace. For trying to frighten a concubine, the worst he could expect was a beating and, if he was lucky, being sentenced to hard labor. The eunuch hadn’t expected his opponent to be so adept at escalating the stakes. ’You say no one sent you? Then you’ll die a much more horrible death in their stead.’
This was intimidation.
Jiang Xian mused aloud, her tone leisurely. "Performing dark rituals in the Imperial Palace is a major crime. I can already picture the soldiers pouring boiling water into the ant hills in your family’s backyard and slicing the earthworms in half, lengthwise."
The little eunuch collapsed to his knees, kowtowing and begging for his life.
"I beg my Young Mistress to show great mercy and spare this servant and my family! This servant was bewitched and took money to lie in ambush by the latrine. That person... she has my entire family’s lives in her hands! I beg my Young Mistress, seeing as this servant didn’t even succeed, to please let me go. This servant will never dare to do this again. If I have the chance, I will repay my Young Mistress’s kindness even if it means spilling my own blood and brains!"
The little eunuch stealthily raised his eyes to peek at her expression.
Noble Lady Gu’s beautiful face, illuminated by the moonlight, looked like white jade. It was suffused with a faint smile, and his heart instantly sank.
’This Young Mistress... she’s not soft-hearted at all.’
Jiang Xian said, "Don’t be afraid. I just thought of something funny."
The eunuch thought to himself, ’It’s over. She’s smiling because she’s happy at the thought of killing me.’
What Jiang Xian actually found funny was that the little eunuch was making her an empty promise.
She didn’t speak right away. Silence was the best form of pressure. Sweat trickled down the little eunuch’s forehead. When the night wind blew, the cold brought with it both clarity and regret.
"I can spare you."
After a moment, a voice that was the most beautiful sound the little eunuch had ever heard spoke from above. He immediately kowtowed. "This servant thanks my Young Mistress for her mercy! I’ll return the money first thing tomorrow morning. This servant can’t do this job! I’ve made a fool of myself before my Young Mistress."
"Return it? No need. You’ve earned it. But you must remember, that money wasn’t given to you by *her*. It was given to you with *my* permission." Jiang Xian’s lips curved into a secretive smile. From his reactions to her chain of threats, she had already deduced a psychological profile of the true culprit.
’The person who bribed him with a large sum of money is certainly powerful enough to threaten his family. And yet, all they did was try to scare me and make me a laughingstock in Changle Palace. Spending a lot of money on a small matter means that to the mastermind, this sum is, at most, the equivalent of a six-yuan first-purchase bonus in a palace-intrigue game—a very cost-effective move.’
’At the same time, the little eunuch must have been a last-minute hire. He doesn’t trust the mastermind and doesn’t believe they would protect him, which is why he was so easily frightened by me.’
’This means the whole ghost charade was a spur-of-the-moment idea.’
"I only need you to do one thing for me." As the little eunuch looked up at her in fear, Jiang Xian slowly named her target. "I want you to go back and report to the Noble Consort that the plan was a great success. Tell her I was so scared my face lost all its color, and I fled back to my room with my palace maid. But as I was running away, I said something you didn’t understand. You must memorize this line. You need to put on a better performance than the one you just gave me and repeat it to the Noble Consort."
"I said..."