Chapter 14: The First Cut Leaves No Blood
The palace held its breath that morning.
Not a single breeze crossed the Lotus Pavilion. Not a single servant dared raise their voice. Something in the air had changed — something even the birds seemed to notice. And I? I was already dressed, seated at my writing table, ink brush in hand.
Lady Shen's second lesson had come before sunrise.
"Your silence is your strongest armor," she had told me. "So learn how to speak without saying anything."
She handed me a scroll. Blank.
"Write a letter," she said. "One that threatens a man without using a single insult. One that makes a woman panic without giving her a reason why."
Now I sat, staring at the rice paper. At first, my fingers hesitated.
But then I remembered Meiyan's face. Her eyes when she watched me drink poison. How her fingers brushed the Emperor's robe like she had earned it. Like she belonged there.
I dipped the brush in ink and wrote without mercy.
---
By noon, I sent the letter through a backservant who owed me a favor.
It was addressed to Concubine Ning, a minor beauty in the Eastern Wing. Useless to the Emperor. Overlooked by the court. But dangerous, because she listened. Because she stored secrets like grain.
She received the scroll in the middle of her meal. I watched from the corridor.
Her chopsticks froze.
One of her maids leaned in. "Mistress?"
Concubine Ning said nothing. Her face stayed still. But her hands trembled. Barely. Just enough to show me the words had landed.
I didn't need her to act. Not yet.
I just needed her to fear me.
---
That evening, Xiao Yuren passed me in the Moon Gate Garden. He walked with a scroll tucked under one arm. He didn't stop. Just murmured low enough for only me to hear.
"You sent your first shot."
I kept walking. "Was it loud enough?"
"No." He paused, just slightly. "But it hit the right bone."
---
In my chambers, Jiu'er set down fresh ink.
"You're changing," she said quietly. "You're... colder."
I looked at her. "Would you rather I die again?"
"No," she said quickly. "Never."
"Then let me become what I need to."
She bit her lip and nodded. But her eyes looked at me like she didn't recognize what she saw anymore.
---
That night, I stood by the window again.
A third note waited on my table.
Shorter than the last.
"The fox is watching the snake. Choose who you kill first."
No name. No mark. No loyalty.
The game was no longer mine alone.
And the players were growing bold.
Chapter 15: The Face Behind the Screen
I did not sleep that night.
I watched the candle burn low and the ink on the anonymous note dry into silence. My thoughts crawled in circles. The fox is watching the snake. Choose who you kill first.
Someone was mocking me. Or warning me. Or both.
By sunrise, I had made my decision. If they wanted to play with riddles, then I would give them silence. And wait for their footsteps to slip.
---
Lady Shen met me before breakfast. She didn't bother to greet me with bows anymore. I think she liked that I didn't care.
"There's someone you need to see," she said. "Today."
"Who?"
"Your future husband's other teacher."
"The Grand Tutor?"
"No. The man behind the Grand Tutor."
I raised a brow. "There's someone behind him?"
"There always is."
---
He lived in a crumbling pavilion near the outer gardens. They said he was retired. They said he was sick. They said he was mad.
But when we entered, he was already sitting at the low table, grinding ink with steady hands.
"You're late," he said, without looking up.
I stayed silent.
Lady Shen only smiled and bowed slightly. "As you wished, we've come."
He looked up at me. His eyes were dull black, like old coal that hadn't burned in years.
"You," he said. "You've killed before."
My spine straightened.
"Not with your hands," he went on, "but with your silence. With your choices. That's more dangerous."
"And you?" I asked.
"I've killed with words," he replied. "Words sharper than any sword. That's why I was buried out here."
He poured the ink and handed me a fresh brush.
"Write a confession."
"I haven't sinned."
He looked amused. "Then lie. Learn what it feels like to make the truth tremble."
---
Back in my chambers, I unwrapped the scroll he gave me after we left.
There were three names written on it.
Each name had a red mark beside it.
I recognized one.
The Emperor's brother.
---
That evening, Jiu'er lit the lanterns in silence. She had been quiet all day.
"What is it?" I asked.
She hesitated. "A maid from Concubine Ning's quarters... she was caught near your window. Just after sunset."
"And?"
"She claimed she was lost."
I smiled.
"No one gets lost here."
---
The game was no longer in the shadows.
It had stepped into the light.
Chapter 16: A Smile That Meant Trouble
The next morning came with a knock I wasn't expecting.
Not Jiu'er. Not Lady Shen.
It was Concubine Ning.
Or at least, her servant girl — the one with too much eyeliner and a voice soft as boiled silk.
"My mistress sends her regards," she said, bowing so low her forehead nearly kissed the tiles. "She wishes to invite you for tea this afternoon."
I tilted my head. "Just tea?"
"She has prepared sweets as well."
That made me laugh, quietly. "Tell your mistress I prefer bitter things."
---
When she left, Lady Shen was already waiting by the window. She didn't even pretend to be surprised.
"She's afraid," I said.
"She's curious," Lady Shen corrected. "Fear comes later."
I turned to her. "Should I go?"
She plucked a petal from the sill and crushed it between her fingers.
"Only if you're ready to start turning friends into weapons."
---
The tea was served in a smaller pavilion at the edge of the lotus lake. Quiet. Private. Far from gossiping ears.
Concubine Ning greeted me with the soft smile of a woman who'd survived by saying very little and hearing too much.
"Your Highness looks radiant today," she said, pouring the first cup herself.
"And you," I said smoothly, "have excellent taste in location."
We sipped.
For a while, we didn't speak. It was a delicate dance, silence pressing against the edges of every word we weren't saying.
"I've heard rumors," she said at last. "That you've become... colder."
"Colder than what?"
"Colder than death."
I smiled. "Maybe death just taught me better manners."
Her eyes flickered. She didn't laugh, but her lip twitched. That was enough.
---
Halfway through the second cup, she leaned in.
"I lost a sister in this palace," she said. "Three years ago. She was pregnant. The child wasn't the Emperor's."
"Who was the father?"
"A guard. They both vanished. No records. No burial."
I waited.
She set down her cup. "If I help you, will you help me find the truth?"
That was what she wanted. Not alliance. Not loyalty. A trade.
"You think I'm building something," I said.
She didn't deny it. "A storm is coming. I'd rather be near the eye than under it."
---
I left the pavilion with a folded note hidden inside my sleeve. Names. She had given me names.
One of them belonged to a woman I thought long gone. A name I hadn't dared speak since my first life.
Madam An — the midwife who vanished after delivering the Empress's last stillborn child.
But I had not been pregnant.
That lie had been planted by someone. And now the roots were showing.
---
Back in my room, I found Jiu'er frowning over a bundle of robes.
"What is it?"
"This wasn't here this morning," she said, lifting a silk underrobe with a symbol stitched into the hem.
A white fox, barely visible. Almost playful.
I touched the thread. "It's a message."
"From who?"
"I'm still deciding," I said.
But I was lying.
Because I knew.
Only one person ever called me Little Fox.
And he had died before I ever became Empress.
Or so I thought.