The Apothecary Diaries – 14 – A Whimper and a Bang

The big news in the Inner Palace this week is the arrival of the New Pure Consort, Loulan. She arrives under cover of darkness on a snowy night with only her retinue of ladies-in-waiting. Upon entering her parlor, she removes a jeweled hairpiece, unceremoniously drops it into a box, sits down, and … well, that’s pretty much it.

The arrival of a new consort spurs both Gyokuyou and Lihua to recommend that all four high-ranking concubines undergo some concubining lessons, and they both recommend to Jinshi that Maomao be their teacher. Maomao is all for this as it means she gets paid a bonus.

Like a curious Jinshi, the exact content of the lesson is kept secret from us, but we can assume that it involves the bedroom knowledge Maomao has learned from her big sisters at Verdegris House, some of which she already imparted upon Lihua to great success.

In all honesty, I hoped we would learn a little more about Loulan, but she proves far too cool for school, yawning frequently, avoiding eye contact, and saying nary a word. She’s either uninterested or unimpressed with Maomao’s lesson.

Maomao don’t care; she’s getting paid either way, plus Gyokuyou and Lihua got something out of it (Lishu, on the other hand, was simply scandalized). That night she’s exhausted, but hears a distant blast. But not wanting to get on Suiren’s bad side, she resists the urge to investigate. The old man with an eyepatch, however? He’s immediately on the scene.

That changes the next day, when Maomao is gathering herbs when she spots her old pal Lihaku with another military officer next to a bombed out warehouse. Lihaku says it was a small fire, but it doesn’t take long for Maomao to determine that an explosion occurred. Inside she finds the warehouse quite dusty, and a burnt smoking pipe on the ground.

Maomao has a theory, and to test it, she borrows some wood, nails, flour, flint, and a rope fuse for a little experiment out in the courtyard. When she lights the fuse she runs for cover and urges Lihaku to do the same, but just as he’s asking why the flour blows up in his face.

Maomao and his adjutant put him out with water, but Maomao’s theory seems to be confirmed: someone, possibly an undereducated warehouseman, lit his pipe in the warehouse and ignited the loose flour in the air. The only issue is that the pipe seems far too fancy for a mere warehouseman. Was this just an accident, someone else’s experiment, or something else? Like Loulan, it remains a mystery to be solved.

The Apothecary Diaries – 13 – Return to the Garden

Exerting what authority he has, Jinshi manages to use his largess to successfully wrest Maomao back from the Verdigris House lest she eventually fall into the same line of work as her big-in-more-ways-than-one courtesan sisters.

In a way, it’s a soft reset for her life in the palace: no longer the victim of a kidnapping or on a forged ledger as the relative of a disgraced lady-in-waiting, both her dad and her sisters now know where she’ll be, and she’ll be able to return home without subterfuge.

On her last night under her dad’s roof before returning to the palace, she pulls her futon right beside his, declaring it a cold night. He notes she hasn’t done this since she was little. While she’s not able to ask him about the circumstances that got him tossed from the palace, she can be his little girl for one more night.

When Jinshi arrives with Gaoshun to collect Maomao, he finds she’s been dolled up to the nines by Meimei, Pairin, and Joka, to the point she looks like a high-class courtesan and  fourth Verdigris princess. Loading her up with things she’ll need and beautifying her for her sendoff are their way of expressing their love for her.

Jinshi cannot help but blush at the sight of her, and when she gets compliments by passersby upon entering his carriage, she blames him. He almost tells her it’s not his fault she’s so pretty, but can’t quite manage it. Even if he did it would only engender confusion in Maomao. Will Jinshi ever be able to properly express what she means to him?

Maomao learns she won’t be returning to the garden of the Inner Palace due to politics, but rather the adjacent Outer Court. Specifically, she’ll be living and working in Jinshi’s own sprawling residence and offices. She meets Jinshi’s one and only attendant, the older Suiren, who like Gaoshun addresses Maomao as Xiaomao (which I believe can mean “kitten” but also “reverent towards the aged”).

She’s up early her first morning, which allows her a look at Fresh-out-of-Bed Jinshi. She notes he exerts a dangerous amount of sexual energy, such that she considers whether she could bottle his essence as an aphrodesiac.  But Maomao is happy to help Suiren, whose housekeeping duties are a considerable load for one woman, Jinshi pointedly doesn’t want Maomao to be his servant.

This is the Outer Court, where the women are not courtesans but “court ladies”, educated, resourceful, and proud, but also not a part of the emperor’s “garden”—that last point is especially important to Jinshi. But to become a full-fledged court lady Maomao must observe, learn, and study a pile of textbooks.

Books aside, her proximity to Jinshi gains some unwanted attention from the established court ladies, who approach her en masse to ask her what exactly her frikkin’ deal is. Maomao gets slapped for asking if they’re jealous, but changes tack by noting her ugliness, revealing her poison tesbed left arm, and assuring them she’s a pity case for Jinshi.

It seems to work on most of them, but one court lady in particular isn’t as animated in her disapproval of Maomao, nor is she quite buying what Maomao is selling. Another day, when spotting some medicinal herbs to harvest in a dark corridor, this same woman bops her on the head and tells her she shouldn’t be wandering past a certain point.

Part of me believes this woman isn’t trying to put Maomao in her place or establish dominance, but is simply warning her and actually has her back. I hope we get her name at some point, because aside from Jinshi and Gaoshun, Maomao could use some friends in this new place.

While the Outer Court is a “safer” place for Maomao as far as Jinshi is concerned, it’s a lot more dangerous than the Inner Palace in one key aspect: it’s full of men. Men who still have their men parts. Military men.

Gaoshun warns her to stay away from them in particular, and I hope she’ll heed them, but like a cat, sometimes her curiosity gets the better of her. One older fellow with a monocle appears intrigued by Maomao’s arrival; I’m sure we’ll learn what his deal is before long, and whether he’s friend or foe to Maomao and Jinshi.