A Magic Steeped in Poison (The Book of Tea #1) (43)

“Do you know where I can find Steward Yang?” I ask.

He stops and wipes his face with a cloth before answering. “At this time, she is usually reviewing the kitchen accounts in her room. Go past the Fish Department and through the far gate to the women’s quarters. Give them my name or find A’bing if you run into any trouble.”

I duck my head in thanks and hurry through the twisting corridors past the kitchens, keeping to myself. No one stops me, everyone busy attending to their own tasks.

Steward Yang is my only connection here to my mother, my hope of finding out more about her past. I don’t want her to be the one who betrayed me, but I know her loyalty is to her immediate family first and then to her staff in the kitchens. I’m only a disruption to her, a potential threat.

I enter the women’s quarters and walk down the open-air hallway, checking each door. The ranks of those who reside within are hung on plaques beside each doorway, but no names are recorded. Her room is near the end of the quarters, only one plaque beside the doorway—with her position as supervisor of the kitchens, she is afforded her own private room. The door is open, and through it, I see her sitting at a table, brush in hand.

I raise my fist and rap on the door twice.

She starts, turning her head to look at me. Then she frowns. “I thought I told you not to come to the kitchens again.”

A part of me shrivels, wanting to apologize. But another part of me is ready for answers, and ready to tear things apart to find them.

I cross her threshold without invitation and stand in front of her with my arms crossed. She tosses her brush to the table, prepared to throw me out for intruding in her space.

“Did you switch out the Silver Needle on my tray?” I ask her, imagining my words like fists, striking the first blow. “Was that why you warned me, because you had already been tasked by the Marquis of ānhé to sabotage me?”

Her expression changes from anger to confusion. “The marquis? Why would I help him?” She curls her lip, then, as she ponders this, the reason I am standing there seems to dawn on her. “Close the door. We can’t be seen together by the others.”

Even though I bristle at her forceful tone, I still obey.

“Now, sit down.” She points at the bamboo chair across from her when I return. “Tell me everything.”





CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


I tell her what happened during the second round of the competition—the rules, what we were tasked to do, and my discovery that it was the wrong tea in my cup. Her face grows pale as I recount the events, her finger tapping a frantic beat on the table.

“You are certain it was not Silver Needle?” she asks.

I nod.

“But how?” she ponders, deep lines forming on her brow. “One of the royal physicians handed me the tea leaves, and I prepared all the trays … It must have been one of the servants.” She looks perturbed at this realization.

“It seems like the stars have different plans for you. Your mother fled this place and told me she would never return. Now you are here in her stead.” She shakes her head. “Ah, Yiting … how could fate have been so cruel to you?”

It seems like she genuinely cared for my mother. I think they must have been friends.

“You said she left because of a scandal. What was the reason?” Memories are all I have left of her, and I’m desperate for any other knowledge.

“It was a bitter cold winter, and the empress was pregnant with the princess…,” she tells me. “The empress fell ill, as did the midwife who was in charge of her care. Same with many of the royal physicians. Your mother used magic from Shénnóng to save her, and she found favor in the eyes of the emperor and the empress.”

My uncle—my mother’s brother—had always bragged about how he could have attended the imperial college but chose to remain with the family business instead. He always looked down on my mother’s profession, even though the process to become a shénnóng-shī was similarly selective, if not more so. Why did my mother never mention that she attended to the empress herself?

“The emperor had arranged for a suitable match for Yiting, for all who serve at the palace may leave at the age of twenty-five to start their own families. But during that winter she fell in love with your father, an up-and-coming imperial physician, and he with her. And to refuse the emperor’s blessing means a death sentence.”

I envision in my mind this younger version of my mother and father, with their own dreams, their imagined futures lit up in front of them like lanterns glowing in the sky. The tenderness in my father’s face as he watches her while she shapes pottery for the kiln. The way she laughs when they prepare herbs to dry in the storeroom.

“With the permission of the empress, your mother began to secretly study for her shénnóng-shī trials. She managed to win the attention of the Esteemed Xu when he visited the palace, and gained a token for admittance to the next trials at Hánxiá. She returned from the academy with her name inscribed in the Book of Tea, and she asked for an audience with the emperor and the empress. She requested that they honor the boon they offered when she saved the life of the empress and the princess, asking to be freed from the engagement the emperor had arranged for her. The emperor was furious, but the empress was understanding. She helped your mother flee the palace in one of her own carriages when Yiting admitted she was with child.”