The court smelled of rain that had not yet fallen. Incense hung too heavy, thick enough to choke the throat, as if someone meant to drown the rafters in sweetness before blood began to spill. I stood where the light from the jade windows did not reach, watching ministers shift like reeds in a current they could not control.
Wu Ling moved among them with her veil of crimson. She did not need to speak loudly; her words walked the air themselves. Wu Kang shadowed her flank, his armor burnished, his jaw locked tight as if clenched by another's hand. I remembered him once as my brother — reckless, but his own. Now he was a blade Wu Ling had ground to an edge, sharp only in the direction she chose.
Her eyes found me through the veil. "South," she said, and the syllable carried across the chamber like a stone dropped into still water. "You went south and returned with chains hidden beneath your sleeves."
The name she meant was not mine. It was Wu Shuang's.
Whispers crept like vermin across the floor. Cousin. Prisoner. Southern pawn. Some mouths shaped the word "witch," though none dared voice it loudly. I did not answer at once. Silence is a weapon; wielded well, it unsettles more than a shout.
When I did speak, my voice was calm. "The Southern King gave her into my custody. That was his choice, not mine. Would you accuse me for receiving what is placed in my hand?"
Wu Kang barked. "You carried her back as if she were treasure, while the city burned in your absence! The Hall of Still Waters is ash. Soldiers whisper of marks carved into stone. You brought this shadow with you!"
His fury was real, but it was fed to him, each word a seed planted in his mouth by her. He thought himself righteous. I saw only a puppet gnashing its teeth.
Wu Ling raised one slim hand, stilling him. The motion was delicate, but it rang through me like iron. "She is no gift, brother," she said. "She is an omen. You blind yourself by calling her blood."
I could have shouted, denied, named her venom for what she was — but the Lord Protector's shadow lay across the hall, and I remembered the weight of his eyes. He had not spoken since, but his silence was worse than any judgment. Every word now was weighed against his stillness.
The Emperor sat unmoving, but I felt his gaze shift between us, subtle as the drawing of a bowstring. He did not speak, yet there was a stillness to him that was not emptiness, but waiting. The court called him puppet, yet I began to wonder whether the strings were his to cut.
The herald struck his staff. The moment broke like brittle bone. Ministers scattered to their corners, muttering of omens and flames.
When the hall thinned, Wu Shuang stood at my side, hood drawn low. Her face was hidden, but her silence carried its own weight. She had said little since her return, but the eyes of the court sought her like wolves seek the weakest calf. I felt it pressing — the inevitability of their blame.
Outside, the bells tolled again, each strike heavy, the sound of a city measuring its own fear.
That night I dreamt of spirals. They spread across the riverbank, into the walls, into my ribs. I walked among them, and every step landed where I did not will it. At the center sat the monk with his beads like skulls, smiling the smile of a man who had already seen me choose.
"You brought her," he said. "South's gift, North's burden. Count well, Prince."
I woke with blood on my tongue.
The next day, Wu Ling struck.
It was not the blade of open accusation, but the needle of rumor sewn into silk. A letter appeared in the archives, penned in a careful clerk's hand, naming Wu Shuang as envoy of the South. Another in the barracks claimed she had spoken with soldiers in the night. By dusk, three ministers whispered that I meant to sell the city gate to the Southern King.
When I entered the hall, the air itself recoiled. Even the eunuchs kept their distance, as if I carried plague in my sleeves.
Wu Ling was at the center of it, the weaver of webs. She did not accuse me directly — she let others do it, her veil trembling faintly as if with sorrow, her voice soft with regret. "I would not think it of him," she murmured to the Minister of Rites, loud enough for me to hear. "But one cannot ignore the signs. The South does not release prisoners for nothing."
Wu Kang stood like a drawn sword beside her. "If my brother's loyalty is true," he said, "let him prove it by yielding the girl. Let Wu Shuang be questioned before the Emperor."
The court murmured agreement. The demand was dressed as justice, but I saw the snare beneath. To yield her was to admit she was theirs to question. To refuse was to stand guilty in silence.
I met Wu Ling's eyes across the chamber. She tilted her head, veil brushing her cheek, and I understood: she was daring me to protect Wu Shuang, knowing it would condemn me.
The Emperor raised his hand. The hall stilled. "The cousin will be brought," he said, voice level, calm. But something in his gaze lingered on me, something sharper than his words. Not the emptiness of a puppet, but the patience of a man weighing stones before casting them.
I bowed, but my blood burned.
That night, Liao Yun urged me to move her — to take Wu Shuang beyond the walls before dawn. Shen Yue said nothing, but her eyes told me she agreed.
But I remembered the Lord Protector's silence, and the Emperor's gaze, and the monk's smile. Running now would mark me guilty before the bells finished their toll.
So I stayed.
The city did not sleep. Fires lit the alleys, not of rebellion but of fear. Spirals were carved again — on doors, on wells, on the very steps of the palace. No hand was seen, yet every mark was the same. Ministers muttered of omens, soldiers whispered of curses. And through it all, Wu Ling moved like a shadow dressed in crimson, her whispers tightening around my throat.
I knew then: this would not end in words.
When the summons came at dawn, the bells struck like hammers on bone. Wu Shuang was to stand before the court. I walked at her side, my hand never straying from my blade. The soldiers who escorted us wore no crest of mine.
As we passed beneath the palace gate, I looked once at the bells. They did not sway with the wind. They tolled as if moved by something deeper, something waiting.
And I thought: perhaps it is not only Wu Shuang on trial. Perhaps the court means to measure me — whether I will break, or whether I will draw steel.
Either way, I felt the spiral turning.
And I knew: Wu Ling had set the board. But boards break.