Yueyin's POV
The executioner's blade gleams in the morning sun.
I kneel on the platform, rough stone biting into my knees through the thin white prisoner's robe. My hands are tied behind my back so tight the rope burns. Twenty-three years old, and this is how I will die like a criminal in front of hundreds of silent, staring people.
I look up at the palace balcony. He's there. Emperor Qin Yizheng, wearing those dragon robes that should never have been his. His face shows nothing. No sadness. No regret. Just ice.
Three years ago, he was nobody. The forgotten third prince that everyone ignored. We used to talk in the gardens, laugh about stupid court gossip. I thought he was my friend.
Then he killed his own brother and took the throne. Executed my father for treason. And now it's my turn.
The prisoner Xia Yueyin is guilty of conspiracy against the emperor! the official shouts. His voice echoes across the square. She plotted with enemies of the state! She refused to bow to imperial authority! The sentence is death!
Lies. All lies. But nobody cares about truth when you're kneeling with a blade above your head.
I won't beg. I won't cry. If I'm going to die, I'll die making sure he remembers this moment forever.
I stare straight at Yizheng. Our eyes lock. For one second, I think I see something flicker in his expression. Pain? Guilt? But it's gone so fast I probably imagined it.
If heaven has any mercy, I say, loud enough for everyone to hear, I will return. And when I do, I will destroy you.
The crowd gasps. You're not supposed to curse the emperor. That just makes it worse.
But I don't care. I want these to be the last words he hears from me. I want them to haunt him.
Yizheng's hand grips the balcony rail. His knuckles turn white. Still, his face stays frozen.
The executioner moves behind me. I hear the blade rising.
I close my eyes. This is it. This is how Xia Yueyin's story ends.
The blade falls.
Pain explodes through my neck. Cold rushes through my body. Everything goes dark.
I feel myself dying. Actually dying. The world disappears into nothing.
I hate you, I think at Yizheng with my last bit of consciousness. I hate you so much.
Then nothing. Just darkness. Empty. Cold. Alone.
Sudden, bright, warm light floods everything.
I gasp and jerk upright.
Wait. Upright?
My heart pounds. I can feel my heart pounding. Dead people don't have heartbeats.
I'm in a bed. A soft bed with silk sheets. Sunlight pours through a window, making everything golden and warm. This isn't the execution platform. This isn't death.
My hands fly to my neck.
Smooth skin. No wound. No blood. No pain.
What's happening?
I scramble out of bed and nearly fall because my legs are shaking so bad. There's a mirror on the wall I stumble to it and stare.
The face looking back at me is mine. But... younger. Way younger.
I look exactly like I did at eighteen.
My hair is long and shiny, not the tangled mess it was in prison. My face is soft and full, not hollow from months of starvation. My eyes are clear, not dead and empty.
I touch the mirror. The girl in the reflection touches it too, her hand trembling just like mine.
This isn't real, I whisper. I'm dead. This is just... I don't know. A dream before I disappear completely.
But it feels real. The mirror is cool under my fingers. The floor is solid beneath my feet. I can smell jasmine from the garden outside that specific sweet smell from my family's estate.
Wait. My family's estate? But this place burned down during the coup. It's been destroyed for two years.
I spin around, really looking at the room for the first time.
Everything is exactly how it was before. The desk where I used to write poetry. The cabinet full of my fancy robes. The painting of a phoenix on the wall that Mother gave me for my sixteenth birthday.
All of it here. Perfect. Like nothing bad ever happened.
A letter sits on my bedside table. My hands shake as I pick it up.
The date written at the top makes my blood go cold.
The morning of the Lantern Festival.
No. That's impossible.
The Lantern Festival was five years ago. The night when everything started going wrong. The night I accepted Crown Prince Zhengming's marriage proposal. The night that set me on the path to that execution platform.
Five years ago.
I died at twenty-three. This date would make me eighteen.
Yueyin! a voice calls from downstairs. A male voice, warm and happy. Are you awake? You'll be late for the festival!
I drop the letter. It flutters to the floor.
That voice. I know that voice. But it can't be.
Yueyin! the voice calls again. Come down! Father wants to see you before we leave!
Father.
My father.
Who was executed two years before my own death.
My father, who I watched die in this same palace square where I just died.
My father, who's been dead in my memories since I was twenty-one years old.
Is calling me to breakfast.
I walk to the door like I'm in a dream. Pull it open. Step into the hallway.
Everything looks exactly how I remember it from when I was eighteen. Fresh flowers in the vases. Servants moving around doing morning chores. Sunlight streaming through the windows.
I walk to the stairs. Look down.
There he is. Prime Minister Xiamy father standing in the main hall wearing his official robes. Alive. Healthy. Smiling as he talks to a servant about something.
Father? My voice comes out as barely a whisper.
He looks up. His face lights up when he sees me. There you are, sleepyhead! Did you have a good rest?
I can't breathe. Can't think. Can't process what's happening.
Either I'm completely insane,
Or somehow, impossibly, I'm alive. I'm eighteen. And I'm standing in my family home five years before everything falls apart.
Five years before Yizheng becomes Emperor.
Five years before my execution.
I have a second chance.
The realization hits me so hard I have to grab the railing to keep from falling.
I'm back. Somehow, heaven actually listened to my curse. I'm back.
And I remember everything that's going to happen. Every betrayal. Every death. Every horrible moment.
I know exactly who the traitors are. I know when they'll strike. I know how it all ends in blood and ashes.
A cold feeling spreads through my chest. Not fear. Something darker. Stronger.
Revenge.
I look down at my father, still smiling and waiting for me to come to breakfast. Still alive. Still trusting all the wrong people.
Not this time. This time, I'll save him. I'll save everyone who matters.
And the people who destroyed us? Crown Prince Zhengming. Empress Dowager. That snake Shen Qingyi who pretended to be my best friend.
And Yizheng. Cold, murderous Yizheng who ordered my execution without even blinking.
This time, I'll destroy them first.
Yueyin? Father's smile fades a little. Are you alright? You look pale.
I force myself to smile back. I'm fine, Father. Just had a strange dream.
A dream about dying. A dream about the future.
A dream that's about to become their nightmare.
I start down the stairs, my mind already racing with plans.
But then I freeze on the third step.
Wait.
If I'm back five years... and if Yizheng had those dreams about executing me...
Does he remember too?