Chapter Four:
The Empress's Smile
The summons came at dawn.
Xiao found it pinned to the inside of the lacquered door a folded card, its edges dusted with crushed petals. The characters were written in perfect, elegant brushwork. Sira couldn't read them all, but she recognized the crest stamped in red wax at the top.
The Empress.
For three weeks, Sira had walked the palace as a ghost observed, whispered about, but never formally acknowledged by the woman who ruled every inch of silk and silence.
Now, the silence had broken.
Sira stared at the note as Xiao unwrapped a gown of pale violet and gold-threaded cranes too fine for a servant, too modest for a consort. A message in itself. Not favored. Not shamed. Only summoned.
A guest in the Empress's web.
She dressed with trembling hands.
The Garden of Cranes was nothing like the rest of the palace. There were no singing bells or flute music, no painted parasols or humming maids.
Only water.
Still and glassy, it pooled around raised stone walkways where lotus petals drifted like ghosts. White cranes moved in slow arcs through the reeds, unbothered by the still air.
And there, beneath a parasol of pearl silk, sat the Empress Mei Lin.
She was more beautiful than rumor allowed. Tall and lithe, with skin like polished ivory and eyes the color of rain-soaked ink. Her robe shimmered in cascading layers of silver and jade, her hair coiled high with pins shaped like dragons and chrysanthemums. A flawless statue come to life.
She didn't rise when Sira approached.
She didn't smile.
She only motioned to the cushion opposite her.
"You may sit."
Sira did slowly, carefully, her knees brushing cool stone.
A servant poured tea. Mei Lin lifted her cup but did not drink.
"It is strange," she said softly, "to look upon the woman who carries my son."
Sira flinched. The word my clanged in the air like a broken bell.
"I did not ask for this," she said.
Mei Lin's lips curved faintly. "Nor did I. And yet, here we are."
She finally took a sip, fingers wrapped in silk gloves that hid every inch of skin. Her eyes never left Sira's.
"In my land," Mei Lin said, "we believe power is not something you inherit. It is something you survive."
"I'm trying to survive," Sira replied carefully.
"No." The Empress's voice turned cold. "You are trying to matter."
Silence settled like frost between them.
"Let me be plain," Mei Lin continued. "I do not hate you, girl. You are a solution to a problem. A necessary fire. But fire, left unchecked, consumes the home that shelters it."
Sira stared back, pulse thudding in her neck. "Then perhaps you shouldn't light it in the first place."
A beat.
Then the Empress laughed low, melodic, and dangerous.
"You're clever," she said. "No wonder my husband enjoys speaking to you."
Sira stiffened.
"He visits your chambers now. Walks in silence beside you in gardens. Reads to you from his scrolls." She set her cup down. "You must understand how... irritating that is."
Sira didn't answer.
"You've begun to believe you have power," Mei Lin said softly. "Let me disabuse you of that. You are not his equal. You are not his companion. You are not his flame."
She leaned forward, voice now sharp and precise.
"You are a womb."
The words hung in the air like ash.
Sira didn't speak. She couldn't.
Instead, she met Mei Lin's gaze and held it until the Empress blinked.
"I understand," Sira finally said.
But her voice was like ice.
And behind her still expression, a fire roared.
That night, she sat by her window long after the palace bells had quieted.
Xiao brought her lotus soup and a linen bundle.
Inside it was a delicate handkerchief, embroidered in white thread with a single, perfect character.
Endure.
Sira folded it carefully.
Then looked to the stars.
****
The next day, her food was different.
The rice tasted bitter. The soup was darker. Even the tea left a strange numbness on her tongue.
She said nothing.
But Xiao noticed. Her fingers trembled as she cleared the tray.
Later, she brought Sira fresh mint hidden in her sleeve and tapped three times against the tray.
Danger.
Sira waited until dusk, when shadows lengthened and guards grew lazy with heat.
Then she knocked on the door to the physician's hall.
Han Xiu answered, surprised. "You're not scheduled today."
"I need a blood test," she said.
He looked at her, frowning. "Why?"
She stared him down. "Because I think the Empress is trying to kill me."
By midnight, Han returned with results.
"She's using blue lotus extract," he said quietly. "Very small doses. Enough to weaken you. Possibly enough to provoke miscarriage if sustained."
Sira's knees buckled.
"But why?" she whispered. "She needs the baby."
"She doesn't need you," Han said. "Once she's certain the pregnancy is secure, you're a threat. You become... disposable."
Sira felt the walls of the palace close around her.
She thought of the scrolls.
The other girls.
All discarded once their purpose was fulfilled.
She would not be one of them.
She could not.
The next morning, Sira changed her routine.
She let the tea cool before drinking.
She tested her soup with her finger before sipping.
She feigned sleep when maids brought scented oils she hadn't requested.
And slowly, silently, she memorized the faces of those who lingered too long.
There were three:
A tall maid with a mole on her cheek.
A cook who never looked her in the eyes.
A scribe who delivered messages but never spoke.
They were the Empress's eyes.
Sira was being watched.
Then, one afternoon, the Emperor appeared again.
He brought no guards.
No flute.
Only a scroll in hand.
"I brought you something," he said quietly.
Sira didn't take it.
He placed it gently on her writing desk.
"It's from the Lotus War chronicles. You said you liked stories."
She stared at him. "Why do you keep coming?"
He looked at her for a long moment.
Then, softly: "Because when I'm here, I remember that I'm a man. Not just a throne."
She turned her back to him.
"You're not protecting me."
"I'm trying."
"Try harder."
Later that night, she read the scroll.
It was about a warrior queen who wore men's armor and died on the battlefield before her name was ever written in ink.
A line was underlined in dark red:
> The woman who births a nation is more dangerous than the man who conquers one.
Sira closed the scroll.
And finally allowed herself to weep.
By the end of the week, she made her first move.
She asked for a private herbal garden "to calm her nerves," she said, "to tend to something living."
The Empress approved the request.
Sira smiled as she watered the seedlings.
Not because she wanted flowers.
But because gardens had roots.
And roots had secrets.