The last stroke broke. Ink feathered outward like frost. Zhao Hengyuan stared at it, the ruined line, the mess he had made in his need to control the page.
"Leave it," Mingyu instructed. "We value accuracy."
Zhao Meiling, suddenly very young under the powder, took a breath that shuddered.
"Your Majesty," she tried again—this time to Mingyu, because Xinying had denied her the shortcut—"I don't want to be a problem. If you send me home, I will go home. If you send me to a temple, I will count bells. I will do whatever eases the hall." Her eyes flicked at last toward Xinying. "I wanted to hate you. I… can't. Like my father, I am a servant of Daiyu, do with me what you will."
