The city did not sleep that night.
Not because the bells tolled or the streets had been stirred awake by soldiers, but because fear had a scent—and men like Yao Luo were the first to catch it.
He sat in a backroom of a teahouse that pretended not to serve wine, silk sleeves loose, a fan half-opened in his hand though no one believed the gesture anymore.
His informants bled into the room one by one: gamblers smelling of smoke, courtesans with rouge still wet on their lips, boys who played dice and never lost unless he told them to.
The first whisper came from the riverfront. A eunuch had run through the streets like a man chased by his own shadow. Too frantic to hide. Too desperate not to be noticed.
The second came from a gambling den near the south gate. A drunk guard had spat words into his wine about "the young lord" and how "the palace would tear itself apart before morning."
