The spring breeze brushed against their faces, already carrying warmth.
The young ladies waiting before the palace gates vied to outshine one another, each dressed in her own distinctive style, showing not the slightest fear of the wind.
Those who knew each other had already gathered in clusters to chat. Still, under the watchful eyes of the eunuchs and palace maids, none dared overstep.
Before long, a stern-faced female palace official emerged from the gates, and the attendants bowed to her, addressing her as Palace Matron Xu. Those with connections had long since learned her temperament, and early on they reined in their smiles, lowering their heads slightly and putting on demure airs.
Palace Matron Xu was not one for idle talk. After a few brief words, she led the young ladies through the palace gates to have their identities and health verified first.
Senior nannies specifically assigned to the task handled it, one candidate to a room.
By noon, every examination was complete.
Those whose health did not meet the standard were weeded out on the spot, while those who passed had, in effect, crossed the threshold, and they allowed themselves a small breath of relief.
Female palace officials escorted the rejected young ladies back out the gates, while Palace Matron Xu led the ones who had passed deeper into the palace. They would be living in the Palace of Side Apartments for some time.
Though stern, Palace Matron Xu was not unkind.
On the way to the Palace of Side Apartments, whenever there was something the young ladies needed to be warned about, she would speak up, one matter at a time.
So that these new arrivals would understand the places where they might one day live and work, she made no effort to steer them down back paths, letting them pass by exquisite, scattered gardens as well.
The imperial court sprawled over an enormous stretch of land. After walking so long, some of the young ladies were already tired, though none dared show it. Just as the procession was passing silently through one of the gardens, a rustling stirred in the flowering bushes nearby.
The sound was not loud, but it went on and on.
Every so often, it was punctuated by the crisp jingle of little silver bells.
Palace Matron Xu frowned slightly and glanced at a female palace official behind her. The woman inclined her body in acknowledgment and stepped forward at once to investigate, but before she could part the bushes, a small dark paw popped out first.
The little furry hand patted around, as if searching for something it couldn’t find, then hooked inward and slowly withdrew.
Then a small head burst through the flowers.
Like a spirit monster grown straight out of the blossoms, petals still perched atop its head.
“Meow.”
The little creature gave a cry.
It was a cat.
The palace official’s manner grew all the more deferential as she said softly, “So it is the Little Ancestor here. Have we disturbed you?”
“Meow!”
The cat called again, then turned back and dug through the bushes, emerging with a small stick in its mouth.
A bell dangled from the end of the stick.
That was where the ringing came from.
The young ladies trailing behind Palace Matron Xu caught sight of the cat as well.
Pure black from head to tail, with only a patch of white on its belly.
Its fur was fluffy and slightly long, its eyes pure gold.
An ill-omened black cat, the sort that made people a little afraid.
But adorable, too.
It left several young ladies itching with temptation, unable to look away.
They wanted to pet it.
Palace Matron Xu’s manner softened just as the official’s had. She looked toward the other entrance of the garden and, sure enough, palace attendants stood guard there, presumably watching over this Little Ancestor. She waved the official back and gave a quiet instruction: “Let’s move along quickly. We mustn’t drive the Little Ancestor off.”
With that, Palace Matron Xu led the young ladies swiftly away.
Once they had left the garden, one of the bolder, brighter young ladies asked, “Palace Matron Xu, that cat just now…”
“His Majesty keeps it as a pet by his halls. He is terribly fond of it.”
Palace Matron Xu said only that much and said nothing more.
It counted as a small hint in its own right.
“Achoo!”
“Achoo, achoo!”
In tiny sneezes, Rendong let loose several in a row.
He couldn’t even hold onto the cat teaser wand. It clattered to the ground, and the cat flopped down after it, covering his nose with furry paws.
Wow, so many people.
So many nice smells.
But way too strong. Stronger even than the Palace of Peaceful Longevity. His poor cat nose was going to break.
The sneezes had been small, but Qingyun, keeping watch at the entrance, seemed to have heard them. She hurried over and crouched down, anxious. “Are you feeling unwell somewhere? Oh no, is there a doctor at the Imperial Cat Bureau?”
Rendong gave a little mew, telling her he was fine.
But Qingyun couldn’t understand, and she only grew more worried.
So Rendong turned around, picked the teaser wand back up in his mouth, and shoved it into Qingyun’s hand.
The instant she took hold of the wand, whatever she’d been about to say lodged in her throat, and she found herself swinging it without thinking.
Hehe. That was the magic of a System-made cat teaser wand!
Anyone who touched it would be powerless to resist teasing the cat.
The cat was extremely satisfied with this feature!
One very happy Rendong went tumbling and rolling about.
Ha! Take a paw to the face!
But Qingyun clearly hadn’t forgotten the matter. After they returned to the Hall of Blessed Tranquility, she reported it to Yu Zeming anyway.
Given their standing, maids like Qingyun and Qinglian would rarely have the chance to speak with the Grand Palace Steward. But ever since the palace attendants had been assigned to wait on Rendong, he had instructed them that anything concerning the cat was to be reported at once, and none of them dared slack off.
Duty aside, they were all especially fond of Rendong.
He wasn’t the clingy sort, but he was endlessly cute, a remarkably lively little cat.
Not to mention, he had saved their lives.
Yu Zeming took Qingyun’s report to heart and quietly sent for a physician. Even a man of his position couldn’t summon the very best, but a physician or two of ordinary rank was within his power.
When the imperial physician arrived and discovered he’d been called to treat a cat, he gave a helpless smile. “I was trained to treat people. I can’t promise I’ll make sense of a beast.” Even so, he set about examining Rendong.
At this, Rendong was rather well-behaved.
Back in his stray days, plenty of cats had died of illness.
He curled his paws and lay on the soft couch, letting the physician squeeze his paw pads and stroke his tail… Hold on. Are you taking advantage of me, human? Petting me under the guise of medicine?
Still, the cat wasn’t warm anywhere, so he wasn’t sick.
The cat knew.
The physician reached the same conclusion.
Though he had never treated an animal, a physician could still observe, listen, question, and feel the pulse. Judging by how lively and vigorous the cat looked, there was clearly nothing wrong.
Only then did Yu Zeming relax. No trouble was good news.
His Majesty had grown ever more devoted to Rendong, and Yu Zeming dared not let anything happen to the cat.
When he re-entered the hall, Emperor Taichu, who had been reviewing imperial memorials, glanced up at him. Yu Zeming’s mind turned swiftly, and he said softly, “Your Majesty, Qingyun came to report just now, worried the Little Ancestor had caught some illness. This servant took the liberty of summoning an imperial physician to look at him.”
He knew his coming and going could not have escaped the Emperor’s eyes.
Emperor Taichu lowered his gaze and pressed the memorial flat. “And?”
“The physician says the Little Ancestor is fine. Perhaps he was simply bothered by the fragrance of the palace maiden candidates passing through.” Yu Zeming condensed Qingyun’s account into a few brief sentences.
Something stirred in Emperor Taichu’s memory, and a faint shadow of gloom crossed his handsome face. His eyes were like a dark, damp pool, or a cold, dreadful viper, carrying a violence on the verge of breaking loose.
His voice was soft, but cold. “Yu Zeming. How long does a cat live?”
Yu Zeming froze, caught off guard by the question.
Emperor Taichu rarely concerned himself with such small matters. After all, when human lives could be erased at a whim, beings as fleeting as mayflies mattered even less.
He tried to speak and was startled to find his throat somehow blocked. He had to push harder before the weightless words squeezed out: “…According to the eunuchs at the Imperial Cat Bureau, a cat generally lives a dozen years or so.”
A dozen years.
For a cat, that was longevity.
But a mere decade or so was, to a human, only a small stretch of a single life.
Rendong charged into the hall like a little whirlwind, ears pricking up in alert.
Danger detected!
But he sniffed and sniffed and couldn’t find anything amiss. Yu Zeming stood at his post, and the other attendants kept their heads bowed in silence.
The humans didn’t smell bitter, either.
The cat wandered over to where the human worked, rose up on his hind legs, hooked his paws over the edge, and patted around until he found something warm and firm.
The human’s thigh.
Satisfied, the cat leapt up and settled lightly into Tantai Tian’s arms.
Then he plopped his bottom down, his tail sweeping rudely back and forth across the human’s stomach, shedding even more fur.
Tantai Tian looked down at the cat.
The cat’s head was round, his pointed ears flicking twice before he tilted his face up to look at him. Those brilliant golden cat eyes reflected a tiny little human.
The cat wasn’t one for clinging to people.
But no matter how long he ran wild outside, no matter how often he pressed his face against surveillance cameras just to soak up the sight of humans, whenever he came back, he always had to make his rounds to Tantai Tian first, confirming that not a single hair on the man was harmed before he could rest easy.
Tantai Tian caught hold of Rendong’s wildly flailing tail and, starting from the tip, slowly and deliberately pinched his way up to the base. Pinched until Rendong’s bottom tilted up, and then, with a sudden bound, the cat sprang lightly onto the desk and sat down firmly on his own tail.
Human! That is sexual harassment!
Rendong launched a tiny thunderous hiss, baring his sharp little teeth at the man.
Then the human reached out and squeezed his teeth.
The cat froze for a moment.
Mean!
Like a tiny stapler, Rendong clamped down on the man’s fingers.
The cat would leave staple marks on this human!
Crunch, crunch, crunch!
The little stapler worked with all its might, leaving several red dents of moderate severity across the fingertips.
As he gnawed, the cat flopped over on the spot, hugging the man’s arm with his front paws while his hind legs kicked excitedly, kneading as he licked, that pink tongue dragging across the man’s fingertips and leaving a rough, warm wetness behind.
Tantai Tian lowered his eyes and let Rendong play. The cat’s thrashing tail swept across the piles of imperial memorials, slapping down several times in a row and scattering them everywhere. The clatter of falling papers startled the cat, and he shot up like a little cannonball, arching his back with a hiss at the offending documents before curling up, a fluffy ball, against Tantai Tian’s arm.
The cat had grown a bit.
A round of puffing up after each bout of bristling fur made him look bigger still.
He used to be so tiny, so frail, like a creature that could not possibly survive.
In the past, Tantai Tian had never worried about this, because the cat had been fake.
A false creature, ironically, could truly last forever.
But then the illusory cat had become the real Rendong.
Once the cat was real, he would have his springs and summers, his autumns and winters. He could be born at dawn and dead by dusk.
Just a cat. Ten-odd years was already a long life.
Thinking of Yu Zeming’s words from earlier, Tantai Tian smiled faintly.
Only, the smile was thin and cold, a chill without warmth.
Watching that smile, Rendong’s fur bristled even harder.
So strange.
The cat sniffed all around, then buried his head in the man’s chest and sniffed again.
Bristling on one side, shrinking into Tantai Tian’s arms on the other, he let those large hands stroke through his fur.
Could it be that the human wasn’t the problem, and Rendong’s instincts had broken?
This was hardly the first time.
Rendong gnawed on the man’s finger, sinking deep into a crisis of cat-life faith.
