The capital's gate loomed like a jeweled maw, swallowing them in with hundreds of others. Merchants shouted their wares, children darted between carts chasing dyed paper balls, a wedding procession forced them to pause as musicians clanged bright cymbals in a joyous discord.
But underneath it all lay a tremor. Ziyan saw it in the quick way mothers pulled sons closer, in how men cast worried eyes at every new patrol. They wore bright autumn robes and carried baskets of apples as if nothing was wrong, but the Empire was quietly bleeding. Sons and daughters pressed into war wagons for noble houses they'd never meet, fighting across borders they would never see.
At the teahouse, the door swung open before Ziyan could even knock. Lianhua stood there, eyes wide and bright, her mouth splitting into relief.
"You're back," she breathed. "Finally—"
But her gaze caught on the empty space beside Ziyan. No Feiyan's sardonic grin, no Shuye's gentle shrug. Then her eyes dropped to Lian'er, who peered shyly from behind Ziyan's sleeve.
"Who is this?" Lianhua asked, voice carefully neutral.
Ziyan led them inside, and the moment the door closed behind them, she sank onto a cushion with a long sigh. Then, in low tones, she told everything — the ruin of Nan Shu, the villagers stepping from fear to hope, Feiyan's decision to stay, Shuye's new forge rising from burned-out timbers. Lian'er nestled close, listening with wide, almost glassy eyes.
By the time Ziyan finished, Lianhua was silent, her knuckles white where they gripped her skirts.
"It's… good," Lianhua managed, though her voice cracked. "Someone had to start putting the pieces back. Feiyan always was better at hammers and scowls than court masks."
She reached out and brushed Lian'er's hair from her brow. The girl leaned into it, smiling faintly. Something in Lianhua's shoulders eased.
But the calm did not last. Ziyan leaned forward, her mark burning dull under her sleeve.
"Tell me exactly what my father said when he visited."
Lianhua stiffened. Then, slowly, she recounted the Minister's quiet arrival — how he had admired the ledgers, spoken of cracks his daughter left behind, warned that the family watched. There had been no raised voice, no overt threats. Only the calm weight of certainty. As if her fate was already chosen.
When she finished, Ziyan sat back, her mind spinning. Her father was Minister of Education, a position with neither troops nor vast coin houses under his seal. Yet he walked with the assurance of a man whose hand rested on deeper levers.
That night, unable to sleep, Ziyan lay on her narrow cot in the back room, Lian'er curled at her side. The child's breathing was soft and even, utterly trusting.
And memories came unbidden.
She was perhaps seven, peeking through the slats of a carved screen in her father's study. She had thought it a game — hide and watch, wait for a laugh, be caught and scooped into his lap.
But he never looked her way.
Men and women in rich silks sat in a half-circle, some with small silver pendants shaped like ravens, others wearing discreet marks on their sleeves she hadn't understood. A figure stood by the window — broad-shouldered, the back of his head peppered with gray. He laughed in a way that made her stomach twist.
The word "phoenix" drifted to her. A quiet agreement about bloodlines, about shaping fate with old contracts. About keeping the Emperor's line "untainted by failure."
And another word — "Zhao." Said with a cold respect. Her father had nodded to this man, spoken in tones she'd never heard before, calm and deep as river stones.
Then something else, half-whispered. A promise of a demon who would sleep inside a chosen vessel until the time came to awaken it.
Ziyan had fled back to her room, heart hammering. The next morning, her father's smile was gentle, his fingers smooth as he fixed her collar. "You dream too much, little one."
Now she lay there with Lian'er's small hand against her chest, feeling the slow echo of that old nightmare turning real under her skin. Her father had always seemed unambitious, satisfied with polite dinners and dry scrolls. But maybe that had only been the mask he wore to keep the court's sharper knives at bay — while working a far older game.
At dawn, Lianhua found her already awake, scribbling notes at the low table.
"You're planning something reckless," Lianhua said flatly.
"I'm planning to rip out the Merchant Guild's throat," Ziyan replied. "And while they howl, I'll bait the nobles closest to my father's circle. If he's truly tied to what killed Zhao, they'll show their teeth — or try to cut mine out first."
"And if your father's hands are clean?" Lianhua asked, though her eyes betrayed her own doubts.
Ziyan's mouth twisted. "Then we will see how far he goes to protect his secrets."
She stood and reached for Lian'er, lifting the sleepy girl to her hip. "But first, we start with the guild. They're too fat on war prices to notice the blade until it's in their gut."
As they left the teahouse, the streets were already alive with grim energy. New regiments paraded past, priests waved incense before them, chanting blessings that felt thin and hollow. A vendor tried to sell them blood-red scarves "to honor our boys at the front."
Lian'er touched one scarf, then pulled her hand back as if burned. "It's not for life," she whispered. "It's for sending life away."
Ziyan shivered. Even children felt the weight of what the nobles had begun.
Li Qiang moved close, hand resting briefly on her shoulder. "One battle at a time. We'll cut through them all."
And with the capital's towers glinting like cruel spears ahead, Ziyan set her jaw. Whether by ledgers or blades, old blood pacts or demon marks, she would drag every secret into the sun — and if it meant razing half the Empire to do it, then so be it.