Chapter 33: Smoke in the Snow
The festival did not wait for me to feel ready. It never did. Morning arrived whether my heart had steadied or not. The bells rang from the east tower at dawn, thin and cracked from years of weather, and that sound carried across the palace like a hand shaking everyone awake.
I rose before Jiu'er did. She stirred when I moved, her braid a dark rope against the pillow. For a moment I thought of letting her sleep, but she was like a sparrow. One twitch and she was up. Sure enough, her eyes fluttered and she was on her feet, rubbing them with the back of her hand.
"Today," she whispered, as if I didn't know.
"Today," I said back, my voice flatter than I intended.
We dressed without much talk. Layers upon layers, silk that whispered, stiffened collars. My fingers kept fumbling with the knots, and Jiu'er had to fix them twice. She tried to hide her worry but she never could. I caught her glance once in the mirror's bronze surface. Her mouth was tight.
The corridors outside were already alive. Servants with trays of sweet rice cakes rushed by. Guards shifted at their posts, cloaks snapping in the cold. Somewhere someone was laughing too loudly. The sound grated against my skin. Today of all days, who laughed like that?
---
The courtyards were washed in red and gold. Lanterns hung in lines above us, so many that the sky itself seemed netted. They bobbed faintly with the winter wind, and I kept thinking one might fall, set the silk sleeves of a passing consort aflame. A foolish thought, but I couldn't shake it.
The smell hit next. Fried sesame, candied plums, chestnuts roasting, smoke from pinewood fires. My stomach turned over. Hunger or nerves, I wasn't sure. Probably both. I pressed my hand against my middle like I could quiet it down.
The festival drew everyone out. Courtiers in heavy robes, servants darting like fish, the Emperor's guards standing stiffer than the statues. I walked through it all and felt the stares. Some openly, some sidelong. Princess Lianhua with her plain lantern. Princess Lianhua who bent but did not break. The whispers had already spread from yesterday.
I hated them. I needed them.
---
The Hall of Painted Clouds was swollen with light. Dozens, hundreds of lanterns burned already, their colors bleeding together. Phoenixes, rivers, plum blossoms, mountains. It was almost unbearable to look at. Too much at once, a painting where every brushstroke fought the next.
Mine sat in its place. Indigo silk. White frost threads. Bamboo bending.
Jiu'er touched my sleeve. "It is beautiful," she whispered. Her eyes were shining as if she believed it could carry me through.
I did not answer. Because I was afraid if I spoke, the words would betray me. They might come out as fear or bitterness or worse, hope.
Meiyan was already there, of course. Surrounded by her attendants, her phoenix lantern standing taller than all others. She looked at me this time, openly. Her smile was slow, deliberate, almost kind if you didn't know her. But I knew her. The sweetness was poison.
I forced my feet to keep moving. Each step echoed louder than it should have.
---
The Emperor arrived when the sun bled pale gold through the high windows. Again, no trumpets. No ceremony. Just silence that stretched thin until it snapped.
He entered, and the room bent toward him. People lowered themselves like grass in a storm. I followed, bowing until my forehead brushed silk. The floor smelled faintly of cedar and old dust. Strange, the things you notice when you are trying not to breathe too loudly.
He moved through the hall. His eyes cut across lanterns, attendants, the very air. Servants trailed him with cautious steps, as if even their shadows might offend.
When he stopped, the silence grew teeth.
Meiyan's turn again. She stepped forward with the grace of someone who had practiced every angle of her body. Her phoenixes burned in the light. The Emperor touched them once, then twice. His expression did not shift.
Next, Yulan. Blossoms scattered across silk waves. Then Huarong with her lantern of mountains, tall and sharp. He looked at each, his face unreadable, a mask carved from stone. The women smiled as if they had been blessed. Perhaps they had.
And then he came to mine.
I could feel the sweat prickling under my collar, sliding slow down my back. My heart did not beat in rhythm. It slammed and faltered, slammed and faltered. His shadow crossed my lantern. Indigo darkened under it.
He bent, slow. His hand brushed the crooked line again. That flaw. My flaw. Or maybe my weapon. I could not tell anymore.
"Bamboo," he said, almost to himself. Then louder: "It bends."
"Yes, Your Majesty," I forced out.
Another silence. He did not smile. He did not frown. But his gaze lingered longer than on the others. It lingered long enough that I thought my knees might give.
Then he turned away.
The hall breathed again.
---
After, there was food, music, chatter too loud for the size of the room. Servants poured plum wine, spilled some on the floor in their haste. I stood by the pillar, the same place I had worked on my lantern, and let the noise wash past.
Jiu'er tried to press sweet cakes into my hand. I let them crumble in my fingers. Couldn't eat. Couldn't swallow.
Meiyan passed close once. Her perfume clung thick. She leaned just enough for her sleeve to graze mine, then tilted her head as if to whisper, though she said nothing. That silence was worse than words.
Later, Consort Yulan came to me quietly. Her smile was thin, fragile as the frost on the plum trees. "He noticed," she said. Her voice was a hush under the laughter. "That is more dangerous than being ignored."
I met her eyes. They were tired. "I know."
She touched my arm lightly, a brief, human thing. Then she was gone, swallowed by the silk and noise.
---
The rest of the festival blurred. Drums. Songs. A girl spinning ribbons in the snow, her hands bare and red with cold. I watched without watching. My lantern flickered in the corner of my eye, its frost-thread catching the light. Crooked. Defiant.
When night fell, fireworks split the sky. They were too loud, too bright. I should have marveled, but I only flinched with each crack. Beside me, Jiu'er gasped like a child. Her hand brushed mine once, searching, maybe, for something steady. I let her hold it.
The snow started again, thin flakes catching fire in the light before they died.
I thought of my mother's knife, chipped, steady. I thought of the Emperor's eyes, unreadable. I thought of Meiyan's smile, all teeth hidden.
And I thought of bamboo in the storm, bending, bending, waiting for it to pass.
The night stretched on. I did not sleep.