CHAPTER 8: THE STUDY
The guards opened the door before I could knock.
He was already waiting.
Zhào Chányán stood behind a wide desk covered in maps and reports. No armor. Black robes. The late sun cut through the window and hit his face, and for a second his eyes didn't look human. They looked like molten gold. Like a dragon's.
"Close the door."
My voice stayed steady. "Regent Prince."
The door shut behind me. The sound was final.
He saw me on that rug. He saw the fury before I hid it. He knows I didn't trip. And he knows MěiLíng's hand was on my back.
He didn't tell me to sit. He didn't sit. He just watched me.
"You know why you're here."
It wasn't a question.
Careful. He's fair. But he's not kind. Fair men are worse. They don't bend.
"Yes," I said. "Because of what happened in the Grand Consort's hall."
"Explain."
He wants the truth. Not my truth. The truth.
I met his eyes. Don't flinch. Su blood doesn't flinch.
"Hán MěiLíng pushed me," I said. Clear. No tears. No drama. "I caught myself. You saw. I was angry for a second. I hid it. Then I curtsied and apologized like a good daughter should."
Silence.
He picked up a brush from his desk. Turned it between his fingers. The calluses on his hands scraped softly against the wood.
"And why were you angry, Hán JiāYì?"
Test. He's testing if I'll lie. If I'll play victim.
"Because I'm tired," I said before I could stop myself. "Because I've been pushed since I could walk. Because in the Han Manor, falling means you deserve to fall. And for one second, I forgot I wasn't there anymore."
His hand stilled on the brush.
Too much. That was too much honesty.
But he didn't look disgusted. He looked... focused. Like I was a battlefield map he was memorizing.
"You're Sū RuìXī's daughter," he said finally.
"Yes."
"General Sū WeìGuó's granddaughter."
"Yes."
"Your grandmother opened granaries during the famine without waiting for court approval."
He knows everything.
"Yes."
He set the brush down. Tap.
"Battle seers are real."
The floor vanished under me.
He said it. He just said it.
I kept my face blank. Deep water. Deep water. "I've heard the stories, Regent Prince."
"I fought with one when I was sixteen," he said. His voice didn't change. But his eyes did. They went somewhere far away, and cold. "She told us where the ambush would be. Three days before it happened. We lived. She died a month later. Burned out. Seeing the future eats you alive."
He's telling me this for a reason. He's not sharing. He's warning.
I said nothing.
He stepped around the desk. Slowly. Each step measured. He stopped when we were two paces apart. Close enough that I had to tilt my head up to hold his gaze.
"You hesitated before you fell today," he said. "Not your body. Your eyes. You looked at the rug half a second before your foot touched it. Like you knew it would slip."
My blood turned to ice.
He saw that? No one should have seen that.
I opened my mouth. Closed it. Lie, and he'll know. Tell the truth, and I'm dead.
"I have good reflexes," I said.
A ghost of something crossed his face. Not a smile. Closer to respect.
"Do you?" He studied me. "Your mother sheathed her sword for you, Hán JiāYì. She ended battles so you wouldn't have to fight them. The Su family doesn't hide."
He's giving me an out. Tell him. Now. He's being fair.
But fair men also execute traitors fairly.
"I don't hide," I said. My voice was quiet but it didn't shake. "I survive. There's a difference."
For the first time, he was silent too long.
Then he turned, walked back to his desk, and pulled out a drawer. He took out a white jade tiger. Small. Worn. The same kind Grand Consort gave me when I was ten.
He set it on the desk between us.
"Do you know what this is?"
My heart stopped.
"For when you need to bite," Grandmother said.
"It's a Su token," I whispered. "Given to children. For protection."
"For family," he corrected. His golden eyes pinned me. "My grandmother gave it to my father when he was a boy. He gave it to me before my first battle. It means 'The tiger guards its own.'"
Why is he showing me this?
"You're Sū RuìXī's daughter," he said. "That makes you Su blood. Su blood is Zhao blood now. My father will marry your mother. That makes you mine to guard."
Mine to guard.
The words landed like a stone in a still pond.
"Then why do I feel like you're interrogating me, Regent Prince?"
Stupid. Dangerous. But I had to know.
He didn't get angry. He just looked at me like I was a problem he hadn't solved yet.
"Because tigers bite," he said. "Even their own. If their own threaten the den."
He picked the jade tiger up again. Held it out.
"Take it."
I stared. A test? A threat? A promise?
I took it. His fingers brushed mine. Callused. Warm. Steady.
"Zhao Manor protects its own, Hán JiāYì," he said. "But we do not protect liars. We do not protect threats. Be neither, and no one in this city will touch you. Not the Empress. Not the Han. Not even me."
Not even me.
He's saying if I'm a threat, he'll kill me himself. Fair. He warned me.
I closed my hand around the jade. It was warm from his palm.
"I understand," I said.
"Good." He stepped back. "You may go."
I bowed. Turned to the door.
"JiāYì."
I froze.
He used my name again. No Hán. No title. Just JiāYì.
"Hán MěiLíng will try again," he said to my back. "Next time, don't curtsy. Stand up. Tigers don't bow to sheep."
I didn't turn around. I couldn't. My face would give me away.
"Yes, Regent Prince."
I walked out.
The moment the door shut, I sagged against the wall. The jade tiger was burning a hole in my palm.
He knows. He doesn't know everything, but he knows enough. And he just put me under his protection. Or his watch.
A vision slammed into me with no warning.
Night. Rain. This same corridor. Screaming. I'm running. Behind me, Chányán. Sword out. Blood on his robes. Not his. He grabs my arm, shoves me behind him. Snarls at the darkness, "Touch her and the Zhao family ends your bloodline tonight."
I gasped and the vision broke.
He defends me. But why? Because I'm Su blood? Because I'm his responsibility?
Or because in the future, I'm something else to him?
I looked down at the jade tiger.
The tiger guards its own.
And for the first time since I came here , I wasn't sure if Zhào Chányán was my jailer...
Or my only way out alive.