The mud in the streets was still drying when the sound of golden trumpets pierced the air. A carriage, far more grand than the Third Prince's, stopped before the Su Manor. It was white and gold, bearing the crest of the Imperial Household.
"The Matriarch of the Su Family is summoned to the Palace!" the eunuch's high-pitched voice rang out.
Inside the study, Su Wan didn't flinch. She had predicted this. In the novel, the Emperor was a man obsessed with immortality and rare treasures. After her "miracle" prediction of the flood and the sudden appearance of her life-saving "Celestial Fragrances," there was no way he would stay silent.
"Madam," Yan whispered, standing in the shadows with his hand on his blade. "This is a tiger's den. If you go, I go with you."
"You'll go as my head guard, Yan," Su Wan said, standing up. She looked at herself in the mirror. Thanks to the spring water, she now looked like a healthy woman in her late thirties—stately, beautiful, and imposing. "But remember, in the palace, the tongue is a sharper weapon than the sword."
She walked out to the courtyard, where her sons were already groveling in the dirt before the eunuch.
"Mother! Save us!" Su Ren wailed. "They say we must go to the palace! We'll be executed for sure!"
Su Wan didn't even look at them. "Get up. You're not being executed; you're being ignored. You stay here and finish cleaning the warehouse. If a single grain of silt is left when I return, I'll sell the house from under you."
She stepped into the imperial carriage with the grace of a queen.
The journey to the Forbidden City was long, but Su Wan spent the time in her Hidden Space, gathering a special "gift." She didn't just want to survive the Emperor; she wanted to own him.
When she finally stood in the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the air was thick with incense and tension. The Emperor sat on his dragon throne, his eyes like cold flint. Beside him stood the Third Prince, Zhao Feng, who looked at Su Wan with a mixture of hatred and fear.
"Su Wan," the Emperor's voice boomed. "They say you knew the river would break before the heavens did. They say you possess a water that brings the dead back to life. Tell me... is the Matriarch of a ruined house a prophet, or a witch?"
The courtiers held their breath. One wrong word meant the executioner's axe.
Su Wan knelt, but her head remained high. "Neither, Your Majesty. I am simply a woman who honors the ancestors. My late husband left me a legacy of secrets, and the heavens saw fit to wake me up when my family was at its lowest."
She reached into her sleeve and pulled out a small, crystal-clear vial. It wasn't perfume this time. It was pure, concentrated spring water from her garden.
"I do not bring prophecies, Your Majesty," she said, her voice echoing in the silent hall. "I bring a tribute. A drop of this in your tea every morning will not make you immortal... but it will ensure that you never feel the weight of your years again."
The Emperor signaled a eunuch to take the vial. As he drank a single drop, his eyes widened. The grey tint in his skin seemed to vanish instantly, and his tired posture straightened.
"What do you want in exchange for this, Su Wan?" the Emperor asked, his voice now filled with a greedy curiosity.
"I want the Su family to be the Sole Imperial Purveyor of Scents and Medicines," Su Wan replied. "And I want a decree that no official, prince, or merchant may touch my family's assets without my personal seal."
The Third Prince stepped forward, his face twisted. "Father, she is a merchant! You cannot give her such power!"
"The Prince is right," Su Wan smiled, looking directly at Zhao Feng. "I am a merchant. And a merchant always knows when a ship is sinking. Your Majesty, wouldn't you rather have a 'prophet' on your side than a son who hides granaries in the north?"
The Emperor's gaze snapped to his son. The atmosphere in the room turned from cold to lethal.
"Wait outside, Zhao Feng," the Emperor whispered. "Matriarch Su... let us talk about these 'granaries.'"
As Su Wan walked out of the hall an hour later, she had the Imperial Seal in her hand. She was no longer a ruined widow. She was the most powerful woman in the Great Zhou trade world.
300 million? she thought, looking at the sunset over the palace walls. That was just pocket change.