After that night, security around Fu Tingyan tightened to a wall of iron. There was no reason for me to visit. From the pass all the way to the gates of Shazhou, I did not see him again. Yin Yao, on the other hand, couldn't be deterred—even full body searches failed to stop her from making a daily pilgrimage to his quarters.
An investigation into the assassination was underway. As I'd guessed, the killers belonged to a village of hired blades. They would carry their employer's name to the grave.
The pace of the march quickened after the attack, and the column reached the walls of Shazhou three days ahead of schedule.
Standing beneath the ramparts—hard-packed earth, ancient as the sand—my heart soared. The three characters etched into the stone above the gate were equal parts familiar and foreign.
A-Yan was just as giddy, tugging at my sleeve. "My lady, our frozen grapes are practically in hand!"
I smiled and peered through the curtained window of our cart. Armored officers stood in a line inside the gate, waiting to receive the Emperor.
Among their faces, I found my father's. I watched until he disappeared from view—then I withdrew, tamped down the storm in my chest, and rode in with the column.
After three days of rest, the troops pressed on to Gaochang. Shazhou would serve as the command center: supplies flowed forward to Gaochang, the rear linked back to Jiayuguan Pass. Attack or retreat, every option stayed open.
The district magistrate had vacated his own estate for the Emperor. We, naturally, could not compare; we were quartered in a nearby courier station.
I was delighted. The Emperor was far from his throne—at last, a chance to meet old friends.
Yin Yao, however, was not pleased.
Weeks on the road had made a simple wash feel like a luxury. Shazhou's bustling Hu merchants meant good spice shops, so I asked the station manager to buy two portions of bath salts—one for me, one for Yin Yao, as a gesture of goodwill.
She snatched the packet from her maid's hand and shoved it back into my arms. "I don't want it! Take it back! I will never accept a favor from you!"
I didn't waste my breath. I took the spice and walked back to my room. A-Yan was lounging with one leg crossed over the other, munching candied fruit. She flashed me a grin.
"Why do you even bother with her? She's clearly never hit rock bottom. You show her a little kindness and she acts like you've insulted her ancestors."
"Don't talk like that." I swatted the back of her head. "This isn't your house."
A-Yan spat a pit into her palm. "It's not hers, either. Putting on airs for nobody."
Still annoyed, she rolled her eyes in Yin Yao's direction, then snapped to attention as a thought struck. She spun to face me, excitement sparking.
"My lady, when do we hit the market? I need frozen grapes!"
"All you think about is food."
"If we don't go now, who knows if the Emperor will even let us out once things get busy—"
I tucked the spice away and thought for a moment. "The Fire Festival is coming up soon, isn't it?"
"Yeah, and the streets will be packed and crazy. Getting out at all will be a hassle."
A-Yan deflated, already picturing herself marooned inside the station during the festival. She sighed.
"We'll figure it out later." I ignored her gloom, crossed to the table, and poured myself a cup of water. "First things first—I need to see my father."
* * *
In Shazhou, Fu Tingyan operated much the same way as in the palace—twelve double-hours a day, grinding nonstop. The forces he'd brought were already positioned outside Gaochang, and his relentless pace dragged every officer down with him.
I waited half a month before I finally found an opening to see my father.
He hadn't known I was in Shazhou until the day before, when I sent word.
He was overjoyed. His eyes shone as he led A-Yan and me into the receiving hall, and we talked through everything that had happened in the year and more since we'd last been together.
When I finished, he let out a long breath. "Marrying into the imperial household is no walk in the park—but it still beats being handed off to that shameless Marquis of Bowang."
The Marquis was already dead. In the early days of Fu Tingyan's reign, the Marquis had been thick as thieves with the treasonous minister Zhou Zheng, undermining the throne. So when Fu Tingyan purged Zhou Zheng, he swept the Marquis away with him.
The Marquis's fief had encompassed three cities of Shazhou, and he'd lived here for years. The man had no hobbies to speak of—except beautiful women. No family in the district had more fiancées lined up than his; he collected brides the way other men collected porcelain.
When his eye fell on me, my father refused. His countermove was to enter me in the imperial draft.
If she has to be someone's concubine, better the young Emperor's than a sixty-year-old marquis's.
And somehow—impossibly—Fu Tingyan chose me. Nobody had predicted that. I sailed through the selection without a single obstacle and emerged as Imperial Consort.
* * *
Seeing me safe and well, my father visibly relaxed. He told A-Yan to keep a close eye on me—make sure I didn't do anything reckless.
I nearly choked.
That directive should have been reversed. A-Yan's temper was a powder keg. One lapse in supervision on my part and she'd stomp on some consort's skull.
We were still laughing when a maid stepped in and said the household had just finished a batch of dried meat strips. The cook was asking whether the Imperial Consort would like some.
Old Chef Wang had been with the household since before I left. His jerky was legendary.
A-Yan and I turned to the maid in unison, eyes glowing like wolves sighting prey. I pointed; A-Yan nodded furiously.
"I'll go get them."
"Grab as much as you can! If you run out of hands, ask Chef Wang for a sack—he's got plenty!"
She was out the door before I finished the sentence.
With her gone, I remembered something—a thread my father might be able to pull.
I told him about the assassination attempt outside Shazhou, and about the poisoning inside the palace—though I kept my own collapse out of it.
"Someone has been tracking Fu Tingyan's movements. This will only get worse." I paused, thinking, then looked up. "Is there anyone in Shazhou who has contacts with the assassin villages? Can we find out who ordered the hit?"
He scratched his chin, troubled. "Those villages… almost nobody can locate them."
"If they want business, they have to connect with the outside world somehow. Complete isolation isn't possible."
"Actually—there might be one person." His eyes lit up. "Let me look into it. If I hear anything, I'll tell you."
* * *
The visit to my father lifted a weight off my chest. When A-Yan and I walked out of the garrison residence, each of us carried a bulging sack of jerky. We'd cleaned the kitchen out—left not a scrap behind.
This was home. Even after being away so long, simply standing on these streets wrapped me in a sense of safety I couldn't manufacture anywhere else.
Fu Tingyan had insisted I bring guards whenever I left the station. I let the order slide in one ear and out the other. I knew every alley and rooftop in this city better than any soldier he could assign.
We strolled back toward the courier station. The Fire Festival was only days away, and the mood was climbing. Some houses had already hung crimson tassels and wind lanterns above their gates.
The people of Shazhou worshipped fire. The festival rivaled the Capital's Lantern Festival in spectacle—every family prepared a torch to carry, a symbol of fortune and life renewed.
A-Yan stared at the decorations, still daydreaming about the festival night. Life in the palace had been isolating, and her wild childhood meant she'd never fully outgrown the craving for revelry. I promised her that if no urgent affairs came up, she could attend the bonfire feast.
A spark of hope ignited behind her eyes. With an answer in hand, she calmed down considerably.
Back in my room, I divided the jerky and asked for a food box. The poisoning had taught me caution: I personally sliced a corner off every strip and tasted it first. Once nothing happened, I packed a portion for Fu Tingyan.
I'd barely reached the bottom of the stairs when I spotted Yin Yao at the front entrance, grilling her maid in a taut whisper. I listened. Is the hairpin straight? Does the dress look right?
I turned on my heel and went back upstairs.
If I pretended that the past year and more at Fu Tingyan's side had left me untouched, I would be lying.
Every small moment—the daily routines, the incidental touches—had been a strand of invisible silk. Fine and fragile, yet it wound tighter with every pass, layer upon layer, until the day I noticed I was wrapped inside a cocoon of my own making.
What does the love of an Emperor look like? I couldn't decode it. I didn't dare try.
One stray thought about Fu Tingyan and these walls would become unbearable. I'd spend every day being pulled apart by longing and dread because of a single man.
And the years inside these walls stretched very, very long.
Fu Tingyan had told me I wasn't the Empress. He'd said I still had choices.
If I truly had a choice, I'd walk out of the palace. I wouldn't be anyone's concubine. I'd want a man who belonged only to me.
But I had no choice. So Fu Tingyan was a liar.
Night had deepened. I sat by the window, still dressed, staring out. Snow had started with the first darkness and now drifted down in thick, silent curtains, ankle-deep on the sill.
The candle on my desk swayed. Red flame, western window, a world gone white. I reached out and pushed the shutter open. Wind and snow rushed in, snuffing the flame. The darkness swallowed the room whole.