Chapter 14: Sword-Bearing Page

Before him lay a sealed packet. He opened it — inside were four small silver ingots, twenty taels of white silver in all.

"Ah!"

Zhao Han sighed, reached out, and toyed with the ingots.

In two lifetimes, this was the first time he had ever seen a real silver sycee with his own eyes.

Not nearly as neat and fine as on television — all four ingots before him were crudely made, their surfaces riddled with dense pores large and small.

Zhao Zhenfang could already walk again. She came to her brother's side. "Second Brother, are those silver? That's so much money."

"Yes, so much money," Zhao Han said.

Zhao Zhenfang asked, puzzled, "Now that you have silver, Second Brother, why aren't you happy?"

Zhao Han gave a self-mocking smile. "Just that my hopes were too high."

Since Magistrate Wang had sent silver — neatly wrapped, with all due courtesy — yet did not summon Zhao Han to see him, he clearly wished to have nothing more to do with him.

To go to such elaborate lengths to distance himself from a child who had offered useful counsel — Fei Yinghuan had to be behind this!

And was this not, in its own way, Fei Yinghuan demonstrating his sincerity?

To exert so much thought and effort merely to recruit a household servant — he certainly was not recruiting one just to beat, curse, and mistreat.

At the very least, once they reached the Fei household, Zhao Han and his sister would not live too harshly.

Zhao Han weighed the silver ingots in his palm. Twenty taels of white silver — not much, but not little either. Enough to scrape by.

But what the two siblings truly needed was a stable environment to grow up in, not a hand-to-mouth existence.

Enough.

…

It was the ninth month by the old calendar, the season of late autumn; the weather was gradually turning chill.

Zhao Han pushed open the door, cloaked in moonlight, and went next door to hash things out with Fei Yinghuan.

"Please come in, young brother." The one who opened the door was Wei Jianxiong, who seemed to have been waiting for some time.

Fei Yinghuan was reading by lamplight. Hearing the noise outside, he asked with a smile, "Have you brother and sister finished your discussion?"

"We have," Zhao Han replied.

"And?" Fei Yinghuan asked.

Zhao Han said, "This boy is willing to sign a ten-year long-term contract with the Fei clan."

Fei Yinghuan, who had been somewhat smug, frowned at these words. "You wish to be a hired laborer?"

"Exactly," Zhao Han said.

To curb the practice of commendation, the court, during the Wanli years, had classified all household slaves who did not cohabit with their masters as hired laborers. Though it proved utterly useless, it did mean that nowadays, most hired laborers were people who had commended their land.

Such a master-servant relationship lacked strong binding force!

"Why?" Fei Yinghuan asked.

Zhao Han explained, "This boy is unwilling to change his surname or given name."

"That is easily handled," Fei Yinghuan said, pointing at Wei Jianxiong. "Old Wei has followed me fourteen years and to this day has not changed his surname."

Wei Jianxiong immediately chimed in, "Haven't changed it."

Fei Yinghuan continued to entice him. "I will permit you to sit the civil examinations. If you can pass the xiucai exam before the age of fifteen, I will formally adopt you as a foster son!"

"A household slave can sit the examinations?" Zhao Han asked, puzzled.

Fei Yinghuan countered, "Once adopted as a foster son, you would enter the Fei clan's main household registry. In terms of household registration alone, you would be no different from any son of the Fei clan. Why could you not sit the examinations?"

Zhao Han suddenly understood. So this sort of thing could be arranged.

But the Great Ming was nearly finished — what damn use was passing the xiucai exam?

If everything went smoothly, xiucai at fifteen, juren at twenty, jinshi at twenty-five, then two years as a capital official — just in time to open the gates for Li Zicheng. And then be seized by the Dashing King and tortured for silver?

Whatever the case, Fei Yinghuan had already shown ample goodwill.

The terms were so generous they aroused suspicion. Zhao Han asked, "Why does Master Fei hold me in such high regard?"

Fei Yinghuan smiled. "The hunter's thrill at spotting worthy game, nothing more."

Fei Yinghuan was out of options. For two generations, the Fei clan had produced no jinshi, and he himself was the family's sole juren — and on top of that, his son was a hopeless fool who could not be propped up!

Coming across a child prodigy so suddenly, naturally he would invest in him. In the future, there were only three possible outcomes.

First, the Shang Zhongyong case: brilliant in youth, unremarkable in maturity. If Zhao Han turned out useless, the Fei clan would at most be feeding an idle mouth.

Second, Zhao Han would prove a capable man, able to manage the household for Fei Yinghuan's worthless son.

Third, Zhao Han would prove a pillar of talent — then he would be sent to take the examinations and formally inducted into the Fei ancestral hall.

Great houses of old often did this, especially wealthy merchant magnates, who every year would select children to train. A household slave who reached the pinnacle could directly take charge of affairs, becoming the overall head of an entire region's trading operations.

This was more secure than recruiting from outside, because a household slave's registration was held in the master's hand!

Moreover, a truly great clan did not fear a household slave usurping the master's place.

The Yanshan Fei clan had many branches, most of them located very close to one another. The Goose Lake Fei branch to which Fei Yinghuan belonged was merely one of them.

If one day Zhao Han turned traitor and bullied the widow and orphans of the Goose Lake Fei, the other Fei branches would laugh themselves sick. They could assume the role of righteous champions, wave the banner of purging a wicked servant, collude with the authorities to throw Zhao Han in prison, and then carve up the property Fei Yinghuan left behind.

After Fei Yinghuan's death, Zhao Han and the Goose Lake Fei would share glory and ruin alike — he would have to serve the young master with all his heart and soul!

Unless, that is, Zhao Han grew powerful enough to devour the entire Yanshan Fei clan.

Zhao Han thought for a moment, then asked, "The xiucai exam in Jiangxi — it's not so easy to pass, I imagine?"

Fei Yinghuan said with a smile, "Indeed. To pass the xiucai exam in Jiangxi before the age of fifteen — I won't say it's rarer than phoenix feathers and unicorn horns, but it is certainly not common. So you must exert yourself to the utmost. If you succeed, you may enter the Fei ancestral hall; if you fail, you can only remain a Fei household slave."

To hell with your xiucai exam. If I'm going to spend time reading the Four Books and Five Classics, I'd rather study a few more military treatises and befriend a few more bold spirits…

Zhao Han asked again, "May I ask what arrangements have been made for my little sister?"

Fei Yinghuan said, "I have two daughters. The younger is seven this year. Your sister may serve as my young daughter's playmate."

Zhao Han asked, "How should I address Master Fei?"

"Then call me Father," Fei Yinghuan said with a smile.

"I'd still rather call you Young Master," Zhao Han insisted — that form of address always made him feel like a kept man.

Fei Yinghuan pointed at Zhao Han and said to Wei Jianxiong beside him, "This kid is exactly like you were back then."

Wei Jianxiong lifted his head and puffed out his chest. "A man with real ability naturally has a stiffer temper."

……

The next day, the party set out southward.

Wang Yongshi, swamped with official duties in Jinghai County and unable to be in two places at once, did not come to see them off.

The little sister, just recovered from a serious illness, was carried on Wei Jianxiong's back; her book chest was temporarily entrusted to a yamen runner. They boarded a merchant boat at the wharf outside the city.

Fei Yinghuan was still his usual flamboyant self, impeccably groomed and exuding an air of noble elegance — his bearing alone was enough to impress a great many people.

As for Zhao Han…

Until he returned to Yanshan, he was temporarily filling in as Fei Yinghuan's servant boy — in other words, the legendary "page boy."

His hair was done up in two little horns, and he was dressed rather androgynously.

A servant boy was a refined sort of presence, brought along on excursions, social calls, and visits to friends, and often appearing in poetry and prose. There were wine-serving boys, whose sole duty was to present cups and pour wine; there were zither-attending boys, whose sole duty was to hold the zither and tune the strings; there were even fishing-attending boys, whose sole duty was to assist their master while fishing.

And of course, there were bedchamber-attending boys — certain gentlemen were fond of the back passage.

At this moment, Zhao Han was filling in as a sword-attending boy, tasked specifically with staying at Fei Yinghuan's side and holding his sword.

Once they had boarded the boat and settled in,

Fei Yinghuan summoned Zhao Han and questioned him: "At what age did you begin your schooling?"

Zhao Han made up an answer off the top of his head: "Seven."

Fei Yinghuan asked again, "You are now ten. Have you ever sat for the child student examination?"

Zhao Han shook his head. "I have not."

Fei Yinghuan pressed further: "Never mind the Four Books and the Five Classics — you must at least have finished reading the Lesser Four Books?"

Zhao Han said, "My family is poor. I have not read the Lesser Four Books in their entirety; I learned only what my father taught as he went along. However, I have browsed quite a few miscellaneous books that my father borrowed."

Fei Yinghuan sighed in resignation, took brush, ink, paper, and inkstone from the book chest, and said, "Grind the ink!"

Zhao Han slowly took out the ink stick and, drawing on this body's memory, poured a little water and worked the ink smooth.

"Write. Anything," Fei Yinghuan said.

Afraid of making mistakes between simplified and traditional characters, Zhao Han picked up the brush and wrote out "Quiet Night Thoughts." He considered his calligraphy passable enough — he had practiced for a few years in a training class during elementary school.

Fei Yinghuan stared at it with a headache. "How on earth did your esteemed father teach you to write? Even my fool of a son writes better than this!"

All Zhao Han could say was, "My family is poor. We cherished paper and ink, so I had few chances to practice writing."

"Never mind, just practice diligently from now on…" Fei Yinghuan suddenly fixed his eyes on the poem and asked in astonishment, "Who taught you this script?"

Zhao Han answered, "My father created it."

Fei Yinghuan could not help clapping in admiration. "Your esteemed father is a master calligrapher! Such a script — it resembles the Chancery style yet is not the Chancery style. Clean, steady, neither fawning nor vulgar, and the character structure is exquisitely refined."

Well, it was just the Qigong style. Calligraphy training classes all practiced this.

Fei Yinghuan hastily added, "Quick, write a few more poems. I must study this script thoroughly!"

Even if he was not going to train Zhao Han as a priority, merely cultivating him as a page boy, Fei Yinghuan still intended to instruct him personally.

A good personal attendant boy could serve as his master's public face.

One could picture the scene: several scholars traveling together, each with his own boy in attendance. Suddenly, struck by poetic inspiration, one would summon his boy to grind ink and take dictation — his own verse superb, his boy's calligraphy brilliant, each enhancing the other. What extraordinary style.

For this reason, a boy favored by his master was often spared all menial labor, tutored personally by the master, and spent his spare time solely on reading and practicing calligraphy.

Fei Yinghuan was doing exactly that — personally tutoring him — but, captivated by the Qigong style, he had spent the entire journey studying calligraphy instead.

(End of chapter)