Seducing a Eunuch - Chapter 2

Early the next morning, I got up and decided to go kneel outside Consort Shu’s bedchamber.

For a servant, disobeying one’s mistress was a grave offense.

What I hadn’t expected was that someone would beat me to it.

It wasn’t payday. Why was anyone so eager to get to the front of the line?

The person kneeling there was Hongxiao, a second-rank palace maid.

In my previous life, after I climbed into the old emperor’s bed and was made a Lady of Talent, Hongxiao had been promoted to senior maid to attend Consort Shu personally.

On the day I died, it was Hongxiao who had been ordered to bring me the poisoned wine.

The poison took effect in moments, but the burning agony lasted four hours.

Hongxiao had taken a knife and slashed my face, cut after cut.

With each stroke, she voiced another grievance.

Only then did I learn how long she had resented me.

“We’re both servants. Why do you get to be a senior maid while I have to answer to you?

“I’m younger and prettier. Why did Her Highness give only you a chance to become a mistress?

“Why do you get all the luck?”

She had cut me beyond recognition, leaving not a single patch of skin intact on my face.

Now Hongxiao knelt before Consort Shu, her clothes disheveled, her pretty face wet with tears.

“Your Highness, I never meant to seduce His Majesty! I only wanted to take him some sobering broth, but he wouldn’t let me go. I didn’t dare disobey him, Your Highness!”

As she spoke, she kept knocking her forehead against the floor.

In my previous life, obeying my mistress and climbing into the emperor’s bed had made Hongxiao sick with envy.

This time, when I turned toward Li Huai’s room, she had seized the chance to take my place.

She thought becoming the emperor’s concubine meant good fortune.

She had no idea it was the beginning of a nightmare.

Hongxiao was made a Lady of Talent. However unwilling Consort Shu might be, she had to let her leave and live in a separate palace.

Once Hongxiao was gone, Consort Shu snapped at me, “Kneel!”

A wooden board lay on the floor in front of me, densely studded with long needles.

It was her favorite way of punishing servants.

Kneel on it, and hundreds of needles would pierce your knees.

Hongxiao had just been kneeling on that very board. She had trembled as she left, blood soaking through her skirts.

Over the past few years, Consort Shu’s temper had grown increasingly vicious. After I became a Lady of Talent in my previous life, she had constantly found excuses to summon and torment me.

Eventually, my knees had become ulcerated. On rainy days, the pain was unbearable.

Even then, I had never thought of betraying her. I believed I must have done my work badly and made my mistress angry.

After so many years of servitude, I had forgotten I was a person at all.

Given another life, I had to live for myself this time.

“Your Highness, it was all my fault.”

I knelt on the bare floor beside the board, sobbing so hard I could barely speak.

“You’ve been so good to me. If I failed to win His Majesty’s favor, wouldn’t I be letting you down? But if I did win it and became a mistress myself, who would attend you? What am I, to deserve the same position as Your Highness?”

I was sure those words would please her.

Consort Shu had never regarded maids or eunuchs as people. Whether it was me in my previous life or Hongxiao now, any maid who caught the emperor’s eye earned her hatred.

Sure enough, her voice softened a little. She did not force me onto the needle board.

“Where did you go last night? You let that wretch Hongxiao get into his bed! Can’t you manage even this much?” Her words were still venomous, but now most of that venom was aimed at Hongxiao.

“I would never dare disappoint you, Your Highness.”

I produced a jade pendant and handed it to her.

“I know I’m unworthy to become a mistress like you. If I could pair with a eunuch and be of some small use to Your Highness, I would count myself blessed beyond measure.”

Before I left that morning, Li Huai had given me the pendant.

“You have to make her believe I care about you. Only then will she give up trying to send you to the emperor’s bed. Otherwise, after the first attempt, there will be a second.”

I had stroked the jade, still warm to the touch, and looked straight at him.

“Weren’t you telling me yesterday what a respectable thing it was to become the emperor’s woman? Why have you changed your mind already?”

Instead of answering, he had hurried away, the tips of his ears red.

Consort Shu took the pendant and recognized it at a glance.

“Silly girl, what are you still kneeling for? Get up, quickly.”

My professions of loyalty could not move her.

She cared only whether what I did served her interests.

Gaining the services of the emperor’s chief personal attendant was far less risky than sending someone to his bed.

If one of her servants became the emperor’s woman and later bore him a child, who could guarantee she wouldn’t start scheming for her own child and turn disloyal?

That was why Consort Shu had been so eager to kill me once her position was secure in my previous life.

This time was different. I was a eunuch’s woman.

I would not compete with her for favor, much less for the succession.

I…

Only wanted her dead.