The decoy letter had been placed, the ink still drying when Li Ziyan dismissed her attendants. She had slept little; every hour the palace pressed closer, its shadows carrying whispers to Lord Gao, to the Southern Bureau, even to the eunuchs who fed gossip like birds at the morning gate. But tonight, her trap was set. Whoever reached for the false letter would betray themselves.
She had expected Gao's spies. Perhaps even her father's. She had not expected Lianhua.
Ziyan stood in the quiet chamber, the blank scroll spread between them. The candlelight licked at the edges of her friend's face, casting her eyes half in gold, half in shadow.
"Why, Lianhua?" Ziyan asked at last, her voice quieter than the rain against the eaves. "You could have walked away from all this. You told me your family fell because of greedy nobles. That you stood with me because you believed justice was worth defending. Was that all a story?"
Lianhua's hands trembled, just slightly, before she folded them into her sleeves. Her gaze softened — not cruel, not mocking, but touched with a sorrow that cut deeper than anger.
"My family did fall," she said, her tone steady. "But not to merchants or nobles. It was soldiers from Qi, Ziyan. Soldiers who burned my father's granaries, who hanged my uncles as traitors when they refused to pay tithes twice over. Your father's seal was on the edicts that sent them. His name written in the blood of my household."
Ziyan felt her throat tighten, but she forced her breath to stay even. "And so you came to me. To smile at my table. To walk at my side. All the while waiting to strike?"
Lianhua lowered her eyes. "At first, yes. I was told to get close. Xia wanted to know what you were — if the phoenix was real, if you were dangerous. I thought it was fate, that I could serve both vengeance and country. But then…" Her voice faltered. "Then you became my friend. And I wanted that friendship to be true, even if it was built on lies."
Ziyan's pulse hammered. The phoenix vision stirred in her veins, that subtle burning clarity that had never failed her. When she had looked at Lianhua in the past, she had seen brilliance — loyalty, quick wit, courage. But now, in this moment of confession, she understood: the vision showed what someone was capable of, not what path they would walk. A blade could cut bread or slit a throat; the fire could warm a hearth or consume a city.
The gift had never promised goodness. Only power.
"Then tell me," Ziyan said, her words sharp as steel drawn in the dark. "Which are you, Lianhua? Friend, or traitor?"
For a heartbeat, Lianhua's face crumpled. Then she straightened, resolve settling over her like a veil. "I am both. I wanted to stand beside you, Ziyan, but I could not turn from my blood. Xia has given me the means to avenge my family. And you —" her voice wavered, then hardened, "— you are too much your father's daughter to see that justice is written in fire."
The candle hissed. Rain slid down the lattice window like threads of ink.
Ziyan felt the words strike her deeper than any blade. Not because Lianhua hated her, but because Lianhua's eyes still held affection — twisted, conflicted, unyielding. A friend who loved her and yet chose betrayal all the same.
At last, Ziyan exhaled. "Then you will take what is false, believing it true. And you will find the door closed behind you."
Lianhua flinched, her lips parting — perhaps to argue, perhaps to plead — but the moment broke with the heavy knock of a guard.
"Minister Li," came the voice from the hall. "There is movement near the Pavilion."
Ziyan turned back once more. "Go," she said to Lianhua. "If you mean to take what is not yours, then do it. But know this: my vision no longer blinds me. The phoenix does not burn for traitors."
Lianhua hesitated, anguish flashing across her features — then she bowed, low and trembling, before slipping out into the storm.
The night stretched on like a blade's edge. Ziyan did not follow her. She knew Lianhua would be drawn to the false letter, as surely as a moth to flame. The trap was not in the ink, but in the eyes watching from the shadows.
Yet as she sat alone in her chambers, listening to the drum of rain, a presence stirred.
"You know now," came a voice from the darkness.
Ziyan rose sharply, hand at her sleeve — and froze. From the far corner of the room, a figure stepped forward, cloaked and lean, his hair damp from the storm. Wen Yufei.
For a moment, neither spoke. He had been gone since that night, swallowed by rumor and silence, a ghost in the corridors of memory.
"You," Ziyan whispered.
Yufei's gaze was unreadable, but his voice carried something like grief. "You've seen it now. The truth that I tried to bury. Your father's hand… and the blood it has written across both Qi and Xia."
Ziyan's heart clenched. "Lianhua said—"
"She spoke no lies," Yufei cut in, though his tone was gentle. "The edicts, the raids, the burning fields. Minister Li was no bystander. He forged alliances with generals who saw Xia not as a rival, but as a granary to be plundered. It is why they trusted him, why they feared him. And why he kept me hidden — because I knew."
The storm outside seemed to press closer, every drop a drumbeat of revelation.
"You should have told me," Ziyan said, her voice breaking at the edges.
"I should have," Yufei admitted. His eyes, for a flicker, softened with something that might have been longing. "But the truth is a fire, Ziyan. Once you light it, it cannot be put out. Your father thought he could shield you. I thought I could spare you. We were both wrong. You know now. And you cannot unknow."
Ziyan felt the weight of it pressing down, the betrayal of Lianhua, the shadow of her father, the vision of the phoenix shifting from gift to burden. Her path — once lit by hope — now twisted through smoke and ash.
The silence stretched between them, taut and fragile. Then Yufei stepped back into the gloom.
"Be careful," he said softly. "Hope is still yours to hold. But if you cling too tightly, it will be the thing that burns you."
And with that, he was gone, leaving only the storm, and Ziyan staring into the candle's dying flame.