The spring examinations of the twenty-fourth year of the Jianping reign finally drew to a close, amid the hair-pulling and suffering of half the scholars in the realm.
Half a month later, the apricot placard of results was hoisted high.
The common folk and scholars of the whole capital went mad, surging toward the Ministry of Rites to read the list. And at that very moment, in a private booth on the second floor of Taibai Tower, Su Mian sat with his legs crossed, listening to a little tune on one side—and to the latest battlefield dispatch the elderly steward came scrambling in with on the other.
“Passed—he passed! Young Master! That Xie Wei actually passed!” The old steward was so worked up the wrinkles on his face were trembling. “And not just passed—second place in all the land! Second only to the young Marquis of Anyang, and that seat was prearranged!”
Su Mian raised an eyebrow and sipped his Longjing tea, clicking his tongue in admiration. “Late-stage obsessive-compulsive, through and through. The man actually ground his way up. With the top seat prearranged, second place is the ceiling for a man of humble birth. So—what's the whole capital saying now?”
The old steward's expression turned wonderfully complicated. He hemmed and hawed. “Well... the common folk naturally praise Lord Xie... ah, no, forgive me, Young Master Xie's genuine talent. But the court's upright faction and the candidates who failed are whispering behind their sleeves that Xie Wei only took second place because... because...”
“Because he ate this young master's soft rice?” Su Mian finished smoothly, even letting out a light laugh.
“You see right to the heart of it, Young Master!” The old steward slapped his thigh. “They say there's a solid-gold token from the Grand Princess's household hidden in Xie Wei's book box—even the chief examiner yields three parts of the way on seeing it. That 'second-place scholar' title was probably fed to him on 'family connections.' And now, on his way to give his thanks at the Ministry of Rites, people point and whisper at him the whole road. His face... tsk tsk. Blacker than the bottom of a pot.”
Hearing this, the smile at the corner of Su Mian's mouth deepened.
If you don't drive yourself, who rewards your horse? The glory Xie Wei had traded his very life to grind for now wore the label “Su Mian's charity.” To a grind addict of his breed—so fiercely proud he valued his dignity above his life—that hurt worse than killing him.
He was still thinking when a sudden commotion rose from the long street below Taibai Tower.
Su Mian looked down through the window. The procession of new jinshi, riding in triumph through the streets, was coming slowly along. Xie Wei sat astride a white horse in the crimson robes of the second-place scholar. This should have been the proudest moment of his life—yet his spine was ramrod stiff, like welded iron.
His hands were locked white-knuckled on the reins. The jeering stares of the young lords of the great houses, the contempt in the eyes of the 'upright' scholars—they were dull knives, one after another, hacking that proud dignity of his raw and bleeding.
So-called going with the flow is just powerlessness in disguise. I thought I had won on merit alone—and in the eyes of the world, I am still just the dog Su Mian keeps. Xie Wei smiled bitterly inside, and the tide of grief and shame nearly drowned him where he sat.
Just as his horse passed beneath Taibai Tower, Xie Wei seemed to sense something. His ice-cold gaze snapped upward—
And landed, precisely, on Su Mian, sprawled on the windowsill with a fistful of sunflower seeds, watching the show in perfect comfort.
At the sight of those kill-a-man eyes, Su Mian did not look away. On the contrary, he flaunted his gilded folding fan, waving it at Xie Wei across the distance, and mouthed, word by word, three silent syllables:
“Lord. Xie. Sir.”
In that moment, those words carried none of their old teasing. They carried a strange, immovable certainty—I say you can be a lord, so a lord you are now. Let the others set their horses free as they please; this young master's horse, you have already mounted.
Xie Wei stared hard at Su Mian. His face, pale with humiliation, flushed faintly red with rage and shame. He yanked the reins hard, dragged his eyes away, and rode off in a cloud of dust.
“Young Master, Lord Xie looks about ready to come take a bite out of you.” The old steward shrank into his own neck.
Su Mian dusted the sunflower-seed shells from his palms and rose, entirely at ease. “Let him bite. This young master's made of meat. Come, back to the estate. The show's over—and next, it's time to go see how Lord Xie is settling into his new life as a wage slave of the bureaucracy.”