The wind carried a strange scent that morning — not incense or spring blossoms, but something sharper. Almost like salt. Liora paused at the open window, her fingers brushing the edge of the silk curtain, sensing what the air refused to say aloud.
The Queen's pregnancy had entered its final stage, and with it came an unspoken dread. The courtiers smiled, bowed, and offered blessings — but Liora had seen the way the older maids avoided the nursery hallway at dusk. Even the midwives flinched at the mention of twilight prayers.
Something old stirred beneath the marble and gold.
"Bad dreams again?" Lady Hua asked as she entered, brushing a faint wrinkle from her pale green sleeve.
Liora didn't turn. "Not dreams. The air. It feels heavy."
"It's the season," Hua offered — but too quickly.
Behind her, Lady Zhen and Lady Wen followed, both unusually quiet.
Zhen gave a graceful nod and lowered herself into a seat. "The Queen has closed her quarters. No visits. No offerings. Even the child priests were turned away this morning."
"Because she fears them," Wen muttered. "Or she fears what they see."
Lady Hua added softly, "Some say she has hired a mountain woman — one who reads fate in blood. It's been whispered."
Liora didn't flinch. Her own hands flexed at her sides.
She had not used magic since the day of her selection, when the wind had stilled around her carriage and the mirrors had cracked in the hall of offerings. But something in her blood remembered. Something ancient, buried, and waiting.
"Let her seek shadows," Liora said finally. "She'll find only reflections of herself."
Lady Hua leaned forward. "The lower-ranked consorts trust you now, but they do not follow. If you want to root your son as more than the Grand Priest — if you want him safe, in truth — you need silent loyalty. From the ones who wash linens and refill inkstones. They hear everything."
Wen nodded. "The Queen still holds the court in ritual. But in conversation, you're the name they speak first."
Liora turned slowly. "Then we must make sure I am the name they say last."
Outside, a bird struck the pavilion roof — and the silence that followed made the air feel colder. Zhen rose, closing the window gently.
"There's one more thing," she said. "A concubine lost her child last night. Fifth Moon Court. They say she tripped."
No one spoke.
But they all knew.
"It's not the first," Wen whispered. "It won't be the last. Not until…"
She didn't finish.
Liora didn't need her to.
The Queen's womb had become a battlefield, and children — hers, others' — were now weapons, or shields.
"I want quiet offerings sent to the Temple of Nine Lanterns," Liora said, voice cool. "And incense lit at my son's altar, every evening. Not just for strength, but for concealment."
Hua blinked. "Concealment?"
"He will shine, in time," Liora said. "But now is not the moment. Not while another son is about to be born… or not born."
Zhen looked up sharply. "You mean to…"
"I mean to survive," Liora cut in. "As we all must. Mei will be moved to a quieter courtyard. No one is to speak of it."
"And the Queen?" Wen asked.
Liora walked to her writing desk, trailing her fingers over the seal her son had touched just the day before — a mark of his position, glowing faintly when she brushed it. No one else noticed.
"The Queen," she said softly, "has long feared what she cannot name."
She opened the window again. This time, the breeze brought warmth — but in its center, a strange hush.
Like the world was waiting.
Like something had already begun.