"The concubine is isolated," Consort Li says, voice flat.
"She wakes puffy," a maid replies. "Eyes glued shut."
"Good," Consort Li says. "Remove the gardener. She failed to secure the western beds."
"Yes, Your Highness." The maid curtsies, face pale.
Xiao Mei drops a tray and it clatters like a verdict.
"Careful!" I snap. "Pick it up."
"I—" she stammers, hands shaking as she sweeps.
Consort Li tilts her head and watches the sweep, slow and precise.
"Li Mingyue," she says, like a thread pulled through cloth. "Come here."
I step forward.
My feet make no sound on the polished floor.
"You'll be useful elsewhere," she says. "A favor. The Department of Astronomy needs steady hands. Copyists are in short supply."
"A favor?" I echo.
"A promotion of sorts," she adds, lips thin. "You will be removed from... delicate company."
"Excluded," a woman beside her offers. "It will save trouble."
"Save them trouble," Consort Li corrects, nodding like a metronome.
Xiao Mei gulps.
"Is it... punishment?" she whispers later, when the door finally shuts.
"Opportunity," I say.
"Opportunity or trap?" she asks, sharp.
"Both," I answer.
We return to the little notebooks I hide in a seam.
I open one and trace the botanical sketches with my finger.
"Keep that closed," Xiao Mei says. "They might search."
"They will search," I say. "So be cleaner."
"How?" she asks.
"Act like a girl who knows nothing," I say. "Then teach the ledger that lies."
Night passes slow and loud.
Eunuch Gao appears by the door at dusk, cloak smelling of old ink.
"They move pawns quietly," he says. "Consort Li removes the gardener. She plays two moves ahead."
"This is to the Department?" I ask.
"A transfer," Gao says. "She frames it as a favor. But the Department is the heart of the Cycle."
"Why remove me there?" I ask small.
"Because there are things in that heart that need secrecy," Gao answers. "And because she cannot kill you in public."
"Then she sends me to be swallowed," I say.
Gao smiles once—a short, tired thing.
"Make them see a clerk," he says. "Make them underestimate you."
The next morning a eunuch delivers an imperial scroll.
"By decree of Consort Li," he reads without warmth. "Li Mingyue is to serve the Department of Astronomy and Occult Studies. Prepare to depart at dawn."
The scroll flutters in my fingers like a small bird trapped.
"Read it," Xiao Mei says.
"I read it," I answer.
"Do you obey?" she asks, face raw.
"I obey the floor," I say.
She huffs, half-laugh, half-sob.
"Pack only what you need," I tell her. "Leave nothing of value."
"Will Zhao Kang know?" she asks, whisper thin.
"If he watches, he will be curious." I fold the scroll and hide it inside my robe.
"They give you a lute," a maid says, meaning ceremony. "They call it a favor."
"A lute plays on stage," I say. "The Department writes stars."
"I don't like stars," Xiao Mei admits.
"Neither do I," I say. "But the ledger loves them."
At the gate the clerks stare.
Papers smell like dry rivers.
"Name?" the clerk barks.
"Li Mingyue," I say.
"Transfer approved," the clerk says.
He stamps a seal that sounds like a closing gate.
"Move," another eunuch orders.
My limbs are still as stone.
I walk past the courtyard where the western beds lie quiet, a hole where the gardener used to bend.
"She is gone," Xiao Mei says, holding a small bundle.
"Not gone," I answer. "Relocated."
On the carriage I sit like a shell.
"A seat near the window?" a clerk asks.
"No," I say. "Anywhere but the center."
"Center draws attention." The clerk notes it and moves.
We cross the palace and wind past towers that smell of resin and old lacquer.
"You leave to learn the stars," the clerk says. "You will copy ancient maps."
"Maps of what?" I ask.
"Routes of old, sacrifices and charts. The Department keeps records of celestial rites."
His words drop like knots.
I close my eyes for one breath.
"Keep your hands steady," Gao told me.
"Keep your mind still," I say to myself instead.
The Department building sits in a fold of the palace like a closed fist.
Guards do not smile.
"Hands," the head clerk says when they place me before a low desk. "Show your handwriting."
I show my copies.
My strokes are clean, each character a small blade.
"He writes fast," the clerk says, surprised. "This one has been trained."
"No," I say. "I copy."
"Copyists have method," someone mutters.
"Then copy this chart," the head clerk says.
He tosses a brittle page blank with a map and a margin scrawled with a symbol I remember from the Archives.
My stomach clenches.
"The Ling symbol," I whisper, barely audible.
He watches me with a look like an eel.
"Begin," he says.
I set the page on my lap and begin.
Ink smells sharp.
My hand moves like a machine.
The room hums with the scratching of quills and the small cough of old lungs.
"Who taught you the Ling mark?" the clerk asks, voice casual, cruel.
"No one," I answer, voice even.
"Copy it well," he says. "The Archivist will approve."
I copy the lines.
The symbol sits on the margin like a sleeping eye.
"Why does it show in a map of tribute?" I ask under my breath.
The clerk's head turns.
"Speak up," he orders.
"It is only ink," I say.
"Good," he says.
I keep copying until my fingers ache.
At dusk Gao appears again, shadow long.
"They watch," he says.
"Who?" I ask.
"People who do not want questions," he answers.
"Then they will find none," I say.
He watches the symbol on my desk.
"Careful," he whispers. "Ling is dead, but it leaves traces."
"I saw a ledger," I say. "It mentions a cycle."
"A cycle is a problem," Gao says.
He taps his cane.
"Stay far from the rituals."
"What if the rituals seek me?" I ask.
"Then be a boring clerk," he says. "Be a tool."
I lower my head.
Tools can be useful.
Days fold into each other.
I copy maps, tally tributes, clean smudges.
"Who sent the sachet?" a clerk asks one afternoon, eyes on a folded bit of paper.
"No one," another says.
"Small wars make large harvests," the first clerk answers.
I do not speak.
At night I write in the margins of my own book.
I mark names, small and crooked, like bait.
"Who is the current Grand Astrologer?" I whisper into the dark.
"No one answers," Xiao Mei says from her pallet.
"We find him," I whisper back.
A rustle at the window.
The moon reads like a ledger now, pale and thin.
"I place the hidden copy inside a hollow of the desk," I say. "If they search me, they find only a clerk with neat hands."
"They watch hands more than eyes," Gao says when he slips me a folded ribbon at dusk. "Tie it where you will. It marks you as favored by none."
"Good," I say. "Favored people break faster."
"Then break them," he says in a voice low enough that a rat would not hear.
I smile without teeth.
Weeks pass.
I learn the smell of the ink and the rhythm of the quill.
"There's a ledger from seventy years ago," an Archivist says one morning, sliding a faded folio across to me. "Ling family name appears. Markings of damnation."
I run my finger along the margin.
"Link?" I ask.
"Old politics," he says. "Burned in a purge."
"Or hidden," I reply, careful.
He frowns but does not stop me.
"Be cautious," Gao says later. "We are near the core."
"The Cycle spins," I say. "Better to be the hand on the wheel."
He laughs, brief and ugly.
"The wheel cuts often," he says. "And fast."
On a rain-thinned night a tile falls from the roof above the Department.
It crashes on the ground at my feet, shards like broken vows.
I look up.
Rain slaps the roof, hard and clear.
"No one there," Gao says. "A message or a warning."
"A tile is small," I say.
"A tile can also miss," he answers. "Either way, watch your step."
I tuck the folded ribbon inside my sleeve and press my palm over it.
Outside, palace light flickers like a hinge.
Inside, ink dries and waits.
My hand trembles only once.
Then I return to the map, and copy the Ling mark again, clean and precise.
The quill sings.
"They call it a favor," Gao says. "They call it exile."
"Same coin," I say.
"Do you want my hand?" he asks.
"No," I answer. "I want a path."
"A path is risky," Gao says.
"Paths die," I say. "Paths also lead."
"Walk the back alleys of the charts," he says. "Don't follow the parade."
"Where hide a ledger?" I ask.
"In plain sight," Gao replies. "Write smallest. Hide inside trade notes. Star men ignore market paper."
"Use the market to hide a ritual," I murmur.
"Exactly," he says. "Merchant dust buries ink."
"Will Zhao Kang watch?" Xiao Mei whispers.
"He watches everything," Gao says. "But merchants draw his curiosity."
"Curiosity is danger," I say.
"Curiosity draws him to windows," Gao agrees. "Windows see other windows."
"Then I'll be a blank window," I say.
"You're not blank," Gao says. "You have hands that remember."
"Hands forget when busy," I say.
"Busy hands keep heart safe," he answers.
A soft foot on the corridor.
A courier appears, breath misting.
"Message for Li Mingyue," he says.
"From Consort Li?" Xiao Mei asks, voice thin.
"Yes," the courier says, placing a sealed strip.
I break the wax.
The paper is short.
"Consort Li invites you to the Moon Banquet," I read aloud. "Tomorrow night."
"Tomorrow?" Xiao Mei's fingers go white on the cloth.
"She tightens the noose with song," Gao says.
"Then we dance," I say.
"With eyes on your feet," Gao warns.
"With ink in my sleeve," I answer. "And a plan."
"One blade for ink," Gao says. "One blade for silence."
"I prefer two pens," I say. "One writes, one cuts."
"Either way," Xiao Mei breathes, "we have no choice."
"We have a choice," I say. "We move."
Gao places a palm on my shoulder.
"If they break you, they show their hands."
I nod.
Xiao Mei folds her hands.
"Come back," she whispers.
"I will," I promise.
We step into the dark with careful feet.
And a tile falls where my foot should have been.