YUN SHI QI (雲诗琪)

  Day 2, 4th Month of the Lunar Calendar, 6000th Year of the Yun Dynasty, Taishan Province, Tian’an Sect

  “Disgrace! Disgrace! Disgrace!” Empress Huangmei screamed as her nails raked across my face.

  My face burned with agony that was almost familiar now. Each strike carved into my skin like she was trying to scratch me out of existence. I blinked and tasted iron.

  I stayed kneeling, though my legs trembled beneath me. They’d gone numb a while ago, but somehow the ache always found its way back. I kept up the position. Because that’s what you do when no one stands up for you. You kneel. And bleed.

  No one came to help. Of course not. I don’t know why I still checked the corners of the room. The guards were long gone. The maids? Disappeared the moment her voice rose. Even they knew better. Everyone knows better than to get in her way. Better to risk a whipping for cowardice than endure what she does when she’s angry. When she sees me.

  She always sees me.

  “I apologise, Your Majesty,” I said, my voice flat. It’s always flat. Easier that way.

  Maybe if I just kept saying sorry, it would mean I was trying. Maybe if I let her break me enough times, she’d see that I wasn’t trying to ruin her life. That I didn’t mean to be born. That I never asked to be here. I wanted to scream sometimes, that I didn’t choose this—that I didn’t ask to be the constant reminder of her failures.

  It had been years since the truth was revealed. Years. And she still looked at me like I was a curse.

  Her shame. Her walking embarrassment. A mark on her otherwise unblemished reign. She never said it directly, but she didn’t need to. It was in the way her voice curled with disgust when she said my name. In the way she touched everything I had touched with her sleeves, like she feared contamination.

  She dropped her hands to her side. “Do you know your wrongs?”

  “No, Your Majesty, please explain,” I lied. I knew exactly why she made my life a living hell. And it was all because of her pride…and that promiscuous man who had sired me.

  I glanced up at her through swollen lids, the Empress of the Realm with her perfect robe and perfect hair and perfect loathing. She looked at me the way one might look at a fly in a porcelain dish.

  Too disgusted to touch, too annoyed to ignore.

  “Liar,” she spat, stormed back to the dais, and threw herself into her throne. “You’re just as slutty as your mother. A filthy temptress who bewitched the Emperor and defiled this bloodline.”

  Her words never changed. New day, same dagger. Every insult a recycled curse, sharpened not by originality but by the frequency with which she wielded it. The blade found flesh every time.

  “I apologise, Your Majesty,” I whispered again.

  The Empress flicked her hand with all the regal contempt of a queen tossing aside rotten fruit. “You need to be married off.”

  Ever since I came of age, she had been obsessed with marrying me off. As if binding me to some noble stranger would wash away the stain of my existence. But I wasn’t stupid. I knew what waited on the other end of that wedding veil. Not a new family, not freedom. A knife. A slit throat. The quiet erasure of an inconvenient girl.

  I tried from an innocent approach.

  “Mother, I—”

  “I am not your mother,” she hissed, each word a whip crack. Her gaze bore into me, sharp and ravenous, waiting for me to stammer. To fail. To beg. I hated her. But I was disgusted with myself more, for the instinct to appease her, to survive her, to keep folding smaller and smaller until I disappeared entirely.

  Every word I spoke had to be weighed with the precision of a poisoner’s scale. Too strong, and she’d strike. Too soft, and she’d smile. A cold, triumphant curl of the mouth that told me I’d lost.

  Anyone listening would think I was the reason Taishan rotted from the inside out. Me. The illegitimate mistake who ruined everything. As if I was the architect of political disaster simply by refusing to marry her nepotistic excuse of a nephew.

  I didn’t want to marry Sui Zhuxin. He was her shadow in man’s skin, and if I agreed to that union, I might as well carve the word property into my forehead.

  But I deserved it, and time would tell that Empress Huangmei was right. After all, no one disagreed with her for long. Unless they were her offspring.

  I would never be anything like Yun Rongxian.

  “I apologise, Your Majesty,” I said, forcing my voice into the thinnest thread of submission.

  She massaged her temples with the weariness of someone burdened by my very presence. “Tang Shiqi, you swore an oath to the Emperor. To be a faithful wife to whoever he chose. Instead, you fool around with other men like some prostitute.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.” I said nothing more. There was no dignity in resistance. The less she knew of my thoughts, the less ammunition she could twist into arrows.

  Her eyes glinted. “And yet you still see him.”

  The Empress didn’t say his name. She never did. Naming made things real, and reality was something she couldn’t stomach when it didn’t bend to her design.

  Her Majesty paced like a cat circling prey, robes rustling over the marble with the eeriness of a ghost.

  “Know this,” she said finally, her voice low and chilling. “Sui Zhuxin is the only man you will ever marry.”

  She reached toward the candelabrum, pressed her finger to the flame. Held it there. Red candle wax dripped from the holder onto the floor…like blood. She blew out the flame slowly, deliberately, a thin smile playing on her lips.

  She didn’t need fire to hurt me. She had always been more precise than that.

  Would Father pity me? Unlikely. He’d crafted this whole fa?ade of care, but he’d never shielded me. Not during these beatings, not when the bruises didn’t fade. I was only allowed to exist because his blood ran in me. That was my one divine qualification.

  And my real mother? She had left me. Dropped me into this viper’s nest and disappeared into silence.

  My little sister would have pitied me. But she was long gone.

  The Empress blamed me for that as well.

  I blinked.

  The room faded back into focus just in time for me to catch the Empress’s scowl. She was waiting. Not for an answer, but a mistake. Something on which she could pounce. What did she want this time? To weep on cue? To collapse in a pitiful heap of guilt and shame?

  Yes. That’s exactly what she wanted.

  I folded my hands in my lap, back straight, voice soft. “Your Majesty, as your subject, I shall obey your command.”

  “Good,” she said, but I could hear the disappointment layered in her tone. She’d wanted more of a reaction. I’d paused for far too long and that, to her, was weakness. I knew all too well the true character of Her Majesty. The Empress cared only about herself.

  “Does Your Majesty request anything else?” I asked with the politest smile I could muster, one that scraped the insides of my cheeks like glass. It was amazing how quickly I learnt to kiss the boots of my enemy.

  She cocked her head and that awful smirk returned. “A sparrow may fly high,” she said, “but it will never become a phoenix.”

  Do not forget your place Tang Shiqi. I was dirt. I was nothing. I was a bastard child in silk robes.

  “We wouldn’t want to disturb Governess Pan (幋) now…would we?” she added.

  My body turned to ice. The sound in the room collapsed into a single rhythmic drip of candle wax pooling on polished stone.

  Drip.

  Drip.

  Drip.

  I clenched my fists in my lap, hard, trying to stop the tremor. Not here. Not now. If she saw the tremble, she’d twist the knife again.

  She waved her hand lazily. “You’re dismissed.”

  I stood, legs unsteady and walked out of her cursed pavilion with all the grace I could force through my rattled knees.

  The sunlight greeted me like a slap. I shielded my eyes. I hated how beautiful the view was from her balcony. How ironic that the best sunsets belonged to her.

  “Is it you, Princess Changping?”

  I turned my head in the direction of the voice.

  Governess Pan.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  She smiled as she approached, bowing with practiced elegance. “My blessings, Princess Changping.”

  Even now, she used my title. Like I deserved it.

  She had been a gift, once. My first and only refuge when I arrived at the palace. And like all good things, I ruined her.

  “No need for formalities. Please,” I said, attempting to pull her up from her crouched stance.

  “I mustn’t step out of line, Your Highness.”

  “Please.”

  She lifted her head at the change in my intonation. “Of course, Your Highness.” She stood. “Why are you here, Your Highness.”

  “I was speaking with Her Majesty.”

  “Of course,” she replied, her breath forming mist in the air between us. “Princess Changping, the cold is worsening. You should return to your quarters soon.”

  She produced a scarf from her basket, as if by magic. That basket—woven from reeds and dreams. As a child, I used to imagine she carried an entire world inside it. A safer world.

  Her hands trembled as she offered me the scarf. Gnarled and disfigured now.

  It had been my fault.

  She caught my gaze, then looked down at her hands. Still smiling. Her smile emanated motherly warmth, causing small wrinkles to appear at the edges of her eyes. They were the only wrinkles on her face that weren't permanent; the ones on her forehead remained as a mark of her age.

  “It wasn’t your fault, Your Highness,” she said softly. “A servant should always protect her master.”

  How did she always know? Did I wear my guilt that plainly? Was my shame a beacon?

  “You didn’t need to,” I blurted, the words sharp and wrong. I didn’t mean to accuse her. I wanted to fall into her arms and cry. But my body didn’t know how to ask for comfort anymore.

  She glanced toward the Empress’s doors. Her face tightened.

  “Forgive my impudence,” she whispered, “but if I hadn’t stepped in…she would have killed you.”

  My spine tingled.

  “Governess Pan!” came a voice from the pavilion. A Half-Immortal stood at the entrance. “Her Majesty has summoned you. Why are you delaying? Surely you do not want to rouse Her Majesty’s anger.”

  “This servant apologises. I will come right away,” Governess Pan answered, bowing slightly. She turned but paused to look at me.

  “Take care, Princess Changping.”

  “Thank you Governess Pan,” I said.

  Then she was gone, swallowed into the firelit maw of that cursed pavilion.

  Governess Pan had always been too good to be the lady-in-waiting of an illegitimate child. Too good, too kind, too trusting; the perfect kind of pawn to be used by the Empress. She had never belonged to a snake pit like this. But that’s exactly what happened.

  The Empress organised for the na?ve Governess Pan to be my loving mother-figure. I saw it now. She was a plant. A prop. A perfect decoy to win my trust. And it worked. The Empress bade her time, until I loved her and depended on her. Like a fool.

  Then Her Majesty did what she did best.

  She sank her claws in deeper. Governess Pan became my leash. My collar. One wrong move, and she would suffer for it.

  I hadn’t known then, but now that I knew, I wished more than ever to be ignorant. But I could not let go of my feelings.

  I stared down at the scarf in my hands.

  Even this—this kind gesture—was scripted. Allowed. A reminder. A warning. If I disobeyed the Empress…if I refused to marry her nephew…Governess Pan would be next.

  I’m so stupid. I should have just left.

  I tossed the woollen scarf on the floor. Sorry.

  I waved my hand to summon my internal qi and teleported off.

  ***

  I landed in the open courtyard of my estate. The magnolias were blooming—fat, pale things, like cupped hands cradling invisible pearls. They’d been beautiful once. Now, their browned petals littered the white stone tiles like forgotten offerings. Almost poetic, really. Everything lovely in my life seemed to rot at the edges eventually.

  “You finally returned. I didn’t think you would. I thought I would have to wait in the cold the entire night.”

  A smile relieved my frown from duty. Not even Fate, with all its theatrics and carefully choreographed humiliations, could not stop the heavenly nymph himself. Gan Yuanxiao (干援霄) perched on the roof of my garden pavilion, his long leg dangling like he belonged there.

  I used qīnggōng to float up beside him. “You wouldn’t have to wait the entire night. The sun’s still here.”

  He was reclining with effortless grace, but even that seemed like a beauty pose. His robes fanned out like an artist’s masterpiece against the ceramic tiles, but he didn’t seem to mind that I was stepping on them. He never cared about that sort of thing with me.

  “Is that so?” he said, tilting his head with a smirk. “Should I come back later, then?”

  I moved closer until my shadow blocked the dying glow of dusk, “No need. I can think of something we can do in the meantime.”

  Gan Yuanxiao raised himself up. “And what would that be?”

  Dark obsidian eyes held mine. His face was so close I could see my own reflection in his eyes.

  What would that be.

  I swallowed. This is why I shouldn’t flirt.

  But gods, he was so beautiful. So unfairly beautiful. And despite all his choices, he kept choosing to show up.

  Each day, he came to visit me just before dusk, and he stayed well into the night. It wasn’t for the services I offered: as far as I knew, I hadn’t given him anything.

  But he had given his patient, listening ears.

  No one else did.

  His hand reached out towards me.

  Is this happening? The next step.

  I’m not ready.

  We’re on a roof.

  Why am I like this?

  Isn’t this what couples do? We are a couple right?

  His fingertips had almost reached the start of my left ear, when I lurched out at him, locking him down in a hug.

  That would have to do for now.

  I patted his shoulder as I pulled away, forcing a smile. “You can tell me about your day.”

  I didn’t want to think about what he thought we should be doing. Cowardice I knew. But I didn’t want to ruin what we had now.

  I didn’t want it to end.

  At first, he seemed stung by my abruptness and obvious attempt to change the situation from where we both knew it was going. But then he laughed with that honeyed voice and beamed back his gorgeous smile, and I knew it was okay.

  He was always patient with me.

  Gan Yuanxiao leapt off the roof and opened his arms as if he wanted me to jump into them. “Will you join me?”

  Peering down, I teased, “I thought you were going to tell me about your day.”

  “I need a partner to make the story more realistic.”

  I slipped off the roof and deliberately avoided his embracing hands that I couldn’t trust myself to stay innocent around.

  “I’m not much of an actor.”

  “And I’m not much of a storyteller.”

  I scoffed, masking the giggle I refused to let out. It wasn’t his words, but the way he looked at me. Like I was the only thing in his world. How could anyone be that sincere?

  I stared at the floor. When did his gaze start making me feel like this? I was sure it didn’t always.

  When I looked back, he was already in front of me. His hands were on my shoulders, guiding me backwards until I bumped into one of the garden’s many stone benches. He gestured for me to sit.

  “Imagine you’re me.”

  As if I could.

  Gan Yuanxiao walked a few paces ahead. “You’re just sitting by yourself. Silent. Waiting. And nothing happens.”

  I tilted my head. “And?”

  His hands disappeared into his sleeves. When they reemerged, he held a silk handkerchief. I opened my mouth to ask the question again, but instead, he pressed the fabric to my cheek.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t ignore it,” he said.

  It was only when he had said that, that the sting in my cheeks returned. I’d forgotten. The chill of the evening must’ve numbed.

  So that’s why he’d reached for me earlier. Not to flirt. Not to take what I couldn’t give. But to tend to my wounds. Of course, my love-drugged brain thought he was trying something else.

  I had forgotten to conceal it.

  I had forgotten to hide my shame.

  Gan Yuanxiao lifted my chin up. “Does it hurt?”

  His gaze held such tenderness I wanted to vanish. He deserved to know. He deserved the truth. But I couldn’t let him see me like this. Not him. I could stand everyone’s humiliation, but not his pity. I shouldn’t make him worry; he was my lamp.

  “I’m fine,” I said, clutching his wrist.

  He bit his lower lip, concern flickering in his eyes. I almost expected him to start demanding answers. That’s what everyone demanded of me.

  “I’m here to listen,” he said quietly. “You can trust me.”

  Damn him for knowing the right words. He was the perfect gentleman; polite and beautiful.

  I closed my eyes. Why are you so perfect?

  “Sorry?” he said.

  I covered my mouth. Did I just say that aloud?

  He dabbed the cloth to my cheek, then leaned closer, blowing gently on the wound. “Does it still hurt?”

  No. That already stopped hurting long ago. But my heart’s about to explode if you keep doing that.

  I pushed his hand away. “It’s okay.”

  Gan Yuanxiao put the handkerchief into my hands and straightened. Is he going to leave? I wanted his company, his kindness, his beauty. But I had given him nothing; I had been rude, and I had rejected him.

  I had been so selfish.

  Fear awakened and I grasped his hand just as he turned around.

  “Please don’t leave me!”

  In the darkness of the evening, with nothing but stars to light the courtyard, there was just me.

  And him.

  In the moment I grabbed his hand, he pulled me into his embrace instead. I leaned into his warm chest as he buried his face into my neck. Just me and him. I closed my eyes, breathing in his scent of honey tree bark and wishing it would cover me entirely.

  “I wish you’d tell me what’s in your heart,” he whispered into my collarbone. “I want to help you.”

  But I don’t deserve it. I was selfish, holding him here to be with me. He didn’t deserve to have his life wasted because of my poor hand of fate.

  “I’m afraid,” I admitted.

  “What are you afraid of?”

  Afraid of everything that we had. That this moment could be so violently ripped from me like a dream.

  Afraid that the Empress was right, and maybe I didn’t deserve freedom. Shouldn't have freedom.

  Afraid that all I could ever be. I was a stain. A disgrace. A bastard child playing dress-up in a princess’s clothes.

  Afraid that I was lying to him all this time because I knew that he would never be able to walk down the path I cut.

  I stepped away.

  Warmth left my body instantly.

  “I just want to have some time alone,” I said coldly.

  For a moment, his hand reached to me. Then it fell.

  “Okay,” he said.

  He took a step toward me. I cowered, preparing for him to force me to tell him. For him to walk away like everyone else had.

  But instead, he cupped my cheek gently.

  “When you’re ready, you can tell me.”

  His words knocked the breath from me. I nodded dumbly, and I knew a pink blush was spreading up my face.

  Then, with a wisp of green light, he vanished.

  And I was alone again.