The bells did not stop when we left the Hall of Judgement.
They changed.
From bronze to bone, or so it seemed—each stroke landing softer, nearer, as though the city itself had drawn closer to hear what we would do next.
Liao Yun fell in on my right, Shen Yue on my left. Guo Sen walked between us, bound but unguarded; there was nothing left in him to run with.
"Three fires," Liao murmured, watching ash drift like winter over the outer court. "All on the riverline. Someone is tracing a path."
"Not a path," Shen Yue said, eyes on the horizon. "A circle."
We crossed the jade bridge beneath cranes carved to watch emperors die and princes forget their names. The water beneath had taken the color of steeped tea. A thought—the kind that did not belong to me—floated up and then submerged: when rivers go dark, the fish turn their eyes inward.
I shook it loose.
"Secure Guo Sen in the western annex," I said. "Iron on the door. No prayers, no candles. If he asks for water, you give it. If he asks for fire, you do not."
Shen Yue's mouth flickered as if pulling tight a stitch. "Yes."
We turned in through a side gate to my allotted quarters. Guards I did not choose pretended not to notice we carried the city's newest spark under our arm. In the antechamber, Wu Shuang stood by the lattice, a strip of silk between her fingers. She had not slept; it made her look younger. Or older. I could not decide which was kinder.
"Three fires," she said, not looking at me. "One bell more than we counted."
"Did you see him?" I asked.
"The monk?" She shook her head. "But my shadow did."
A child's riddle, or a soldier's truth. With her it was often both.
Guo Sen sagged to a stool. He touched the tabletop with fingertips that did not seem to belong to him. "Paper," he murmured. "Warm when it should be cold."
Shen Yue led him away. Liao Yun lingered as if the air had begun to taste of rust.
"Speak," I told him.
"Two of the temple wardens we questioned are dead," he said. "Both with ash under their nails. Both with spirals scratched into their palms. From inside."
I did not answer. He knew by now the shape of my silence and did not fear it.
When they were gone, Wu Shuang remained. We listened to the bells change their minds again.
"You will be summoned," she said.
"I was just dismissed."
"You will be summoned," she repeated, and set the strip of silk on the sill. It was black, but when the light caught it, the threads showed red beneath, like flesh under soot.
She left.
The room shrank like a held breath.
He came as she promised—that same hour, as if the bell had been his messenger.
No herald. No guards. Only a knock soft enough to be mistaken for a memory. The door slid. The Emperor stepped in.
His robe was simple, deep blue. He looked less like Heaven and more like a man who had decided to stop pretending he was not.
We faced one another without bowing. Some bridges were crossed without ceremony.
"Your witness," he said.
"Mine," I agreed. "But yours to judge."
He studied my face as if reading a scroll he disliked and could not legally burn. "The court expects me to chain you at the gate."
"The court expects you to be made of paper," I said.
His mouth did not move, but the tired light in his eyes shifted. "Then let us disappoint them."
He walked to the screen and drew it half-closed, as if privacy were something two planks of painted wood could guarantee. I watched the shadows and counted them: mine, his, the candle's, and a fourth that did not belong to the room.
He did not seem to notice.
"I told you," he said quietly, "that I wore the robe because your father wore the sword. They gave me an Empress chosen by the North. I have smiled through councils that were not mine and signed edicts that were only mine in ink."
"And now?" I asked.
"Now the swords are pointed at each other," he said. "And the ink is crawling off the page."
He turned fully then. The dragon in his eyes had stopped pretending to be carved.
"I will give you a choice," he said.
We stood very still. The city listened at the window.
"Two doors," he said, not unkindly. "One leads to a throne-room crowded with witnesses. The other leads to a room with only a table and a blade. I will not tell you which is which." His smile was a cut, not cruel. "You have a talent for finding the one you need."
He waited.
I said nothing.
Not because I had no answer. Because the thing inside me had lifted its head and tilted it, like a beast measuring a scent behind a wall.
His gaze flicked—just once—to the place where my hand rested over my heart. He saw nothing. Or chose not to.
"Decide by nightfall," he said. "Before others decide for you."
He started for the door, paused.
"And, Wu An"—his voice lowered, not conspiratorial, but human—"if your father returns to the hall before you choose, it will not be because he has healed."
He left. The screen sighed shut. The fourth shadow lingered until the candle guttered and then folded itself back into the dark like a patient flag.