The Apothecary Diaries: Volume 1

She must have been much admired for her beauty in those halcyon days before she had arrived at the palace, but when she got here, she discovered she had known as much about the outside world as a frog who had spent its life in a well.

“My sincere apologies,” Maomao said. “I couldn’t think of compensation that would be worthy of you, Master Jinshi.”
Would’ve been rude to give a eunuch an invitation to a brothel, right?

Maomao was a relatively objective thinker for a girl of seventeen, but she had a few qualities that continually dogged her. For one, curiosity; and for another, a hunger for knowledge. And then there was her budding sense of justice.

It was always possible he was the current emperor’s guardian, but considering Jinshi looked to be about twenty years old, it was hard to imagine. Maybe he was the son of the Emperor or something, but then why become a eunuch?

Presumably this was all healthier than the women lusting after each other instead, but still it puzzled Maomao.

her. With ample funds for her livelihood, of course.” Spoken like a woman who was both intellectual and perhaps too kind for her own good.

So say there was some kind of poison in the face powder. If the mother were to use it, it would impact the child; if whatever was in the powder got into the mother’s milk, it might even end up in the child’s body. Neither Jinshi nor Gyokuyou knew what such a poison might be. But if the mysterious message was to be believed, it was how the young prince had met his end. By simple face powder, makeup used by any number of people in the rear palace.

“Ignorance is a sin,” Gyokuyou said. “I should have taken more care with what was going into my child’s mouth.”

“I’m guilty of the same crime,” Jinshi said. It was ultimately he who had allowed the Emperor’s son to be lost. And there may have been others who had died in the womb.

“I told Consort Lihua about the face powder, but anything I say only makes her dig in her heels,” said Gyokuyou. Lihua had dark bags under her eyes even now, and used ample helpings of the white makeup to conceal the poor color of her face, never believing it was poisonous.

Jinshi gazed at the simple cotton cloth. He thought it looked strangely familiar. The hesitant quality of the characters appeared to be a ruse, but the hand had an unmistakably

Well, he certainly seemed especially slimy.

The voice was sweet, too, like honey

“Indeed. I think you might have a visitor this evening.”

They had weighed their lives against their beauty, and in the end had lost them both.