Chapter Text
If one were to ask Maomao directly what Jinshi was to her, beyond the perfunctory answer, she wasn’t entirely certain what she would say.
In the Rear Palace, he’d been the irritating, meddlesome eunuch. Under his employ, he was her superior, benefactor, exactly as irritating and meddlesome as before–-perhaps moreso, despite his seemingly-outrageous workload. It wasn’t until after the ceremony-–the attempted assassination–-that Maomao began to think harder on her exact opinion of the man who would soon be known to her as the Moon Prince.
The Shi suppression effort had been the point at which Maomao knew she had to phase out of the situation, to the extent that she was no longer within the realm of someone who could have a personal opinion on Jinshi.
Of course, things were never as simple as that. Maomao and Jinshi were never as simple as that. It wasn’t that she wasn’t grateful, in a way, for how Jinshi had cut his way through the stronghold. Regardless, though, she had been doing… fine. An overstatement? Maybe. But Maomao was known for her resourcefulness and wit. She'd been likened to a roach, the way she refused to give in, even when the opposing stack of odds started looking more and more like a stone wall. The apothecary hadn’t survived quite this long for no reason. And Loulan and Suirei were there, too. Despite technically wanting to be freed, her situation wasn’t quite as bad as all that; not so bad, that is to say, that a man of Jinshi’s caliber should burst in to rescue her personally. Even if his primary objective was the suppression of a rebellious faction.
And, well, it was truly unfortunate that Maomao was far from ignorant. No, she was quite well-informed–-begrudgingly so. She had acknowledged and subsequently ignored the way the beautiful not-eunuch Jinshi behaved around her; it was for the best, and doubly so now that his status had been explicitly (and, no matter how much she gainsaid, inexplicitly) revealed to her. She was a simple apothecary. This lowly one did not need to be privy to that world.
Despite her best efforts, however, it was entirely impossible to ignore the man’s lips on her own, pressed to the inner wall of a carriage. Even less possible when he began seeking her outright for his bride. At that time, she was really scraping at the dregs of her respect for Jinshi. It might've been one of the few times she was truly, genuinely angry with him.
Yes, it is fair to say that she should not have done such a reckless thing as initiating a torrid, vindictive kiss with the prince at the Western Capital. And yes, Maomao was not entirely sure what had possessed her. Fed up with the tiptoeing, the performative procedures devoid of substance, the childish frustration, the apothecary had just given him what he wanted. What she had thought he wanted.
She was ever more confused when faced with Jinshi’s bone-deep mournfulness once his eyes had cleared, gazing up at her. His sorrowful avoidance thereafter.
It’s not my problem, the apothecary continued chanting in her own head, her mantra wilting in its effectiveness with each passing day. It’s not my problem, and I don’t want to get involved.
Lies were not a luxury that Maomao could afford, however. From the moment she had met Jinshi, the enigmatic eunuch, their fates were forevermore intertwined. And try as she might, thanks to the stubbornness of the Moon Prince and a blazing petaled brand, the man was no longer an eligible bachelor for anybody except for her—at least, not without a good deal of surgery, skin grafts, and recovery. The willful idiot…
So, that was, historically, what Maomao thought about the once-suspicious prince-neé-official-neé-eunuch, Jinshi. Her opinion now? Despite the chaos that followed after that, Maomao found that Jinshi had become much more tolerable. She supposed that, in his youthfulness, he’d still had much growing to do. Perhaps she had as well.
Jinshi’s pursuits had not stopped, certainly, but his aggression had receded to the point where Maomao almost found her conversations with him—however much childish griping he did—enjoyable. He no longer wielded his celestial charm like a sparkling cleaver; his ethereal beauty, cut ruggedly through by the scar on his face and the brand on his flank, was actually a little more tolerable (read: appealing, though she'd never let that idea develop past conception). The self-flagellating streak he seemed to have adopted was significantly more bearable than his attempts at winsomeness, when he wasn’t trying to prove a point by mutilating his own flesh.
Perhaps he could be considered a friend, if it were not too bold of her to say so.
But this lowly one was anything but bold; With a tight glance at Lihaku, babysitting the quack, Maomao returned to grinding the sparse desert herbs under her calloused, unremarkable hands. She still had a job to do, and thinking about Jinshi was exactly the opposite of productive.
The first sign that something was amiss with her was--well, it was when she started thinking about Jinshi at all, but it was when the quack found her distracted in the annex clinic. With everything going on in I-sei, it wasn’t the first time she had something on her mind, no. However, it wasn’t exhaustion, hunger, thirst, or daydreaming about rare ingredients, as were her usual cause for inattentiveness.
She’d hadbeen thinking about medicine stock—Lahan’s Brother was cultivating substitutes for her substitutes now—while staring at her dried seahorse and wondering if she should grind it up. Maomao picked up one of her specimens, feeling a wicked grin split her face—that was normal. She gave a cackle and admired the gift—all good so far. Just when she began fantasizing about its medicinal uses (and toxicity, by the same token), the anomaly began. She was very rudely interrupted by thoughts from someplace unknown to her.
I know that I’ve taken advantage of Jinshi’s generosity before, she pondered, but he would probably collapse if I were to poison myself with this. I should at least thank him first. The gift was nominally from Suiren, but Jinshi had to have been the benefactor. Being in such close proximity with him these days, she’d seen him no small number of times since returning from the farming village, but she’d frankly forgotten to bring it up. Jinshi’s increasingly exhausted face appeared in her mind’s eye, and Maomao frowned. Powdered seahorse could be used to invigorate when mixed correctly, she recalled. Perhaps Jinshi would appreciate it if she were to use his gift for his benefit.
Then again, with the dwindling medicine supply, it would be just like him to refuse her help. Maomao could all too well remember the days when he would show up to the pleasure district seeking her and her concoctions, only to be forced into taking a rest.
I should visit Jinshi. I'm worried about him, something inside of her decided, quite unbidden.
If she hadn’t been interrupted exactly then by the quack, then perhaps she would have had the time to be properly mortified. Medicine. Maomao was crafting medicine. She rewrapped the dried seahorses and replaced them in the folds of her sleeve, shaking her head vigorously.
Where the hell did that idea come from? Worry? Now? For Jinshi? She really needed a break.
Maomao was glad that Chue was out for the day, because she didn’t much feel like explaining her reddened ears to an invasive, flitting sparrow.