YUN SHI QI (雲诗琪)

  Day 15, 4th Month of the Lunar Calendar, 6000th Year of the Yun Dynasty, Taishan Province, Tian’an Sect

  “I cannot believe that Sui Zhuxin harassed you again. What a nerve he has,” Governess Pan said, her soft voice laced with ferocity.

  I turned to glare at my maidservant. But the action awoke pain that I was completely unprepared for. My back screamed in protest as the movement reawakened every welt, every bruise given by Sui Zhuxin’s relentless beating.

  Li Jing bowed her head deeper. What was she thinking, airing my shame to Governess Pan?

  I cleared my throat. “How did you know?”

  “Oh, well…never mind that! The most important thing is that you must be stronger, braver, Your Highness.” Governess Pan leaned over the embroidery table, her expression softening. “Your embroidery is divine, Your Highness.”

  I abruptly stopped. Embroidery? Right. I forgot to pretend.

  My face heated in embarrassment at being caught out on my own stupid lie. I had asked Governess Pan to teach me double couching, but truthfully, I just wanted someone to spend time with me.

  I wanted her to worry about me, to think I was fragile and worth saving—not disgusting and pitiful. Just someone she could care about. That wasn’t so bad, right?

  I watched her eyes scan the room. From the curtains to the bedspread, even the rugs, every piece of fabric had a touch of my needlework. Of course, she knew I didn’t need teaching. But she came anyway. That made my throat tighten in something like hope, something sharp and unbearable.

  Maybe if I bled, she'd stay longer.

  So, I jabbed the needle into my finger. Deliberately. It hurt, but not enough. A bead of blood welled up and dropped onto the silk handkerchief like a teardrop.

  “Oh my! Your Highness are you well?” she cried, fussing over me, pressing bandages—so quick, so ready, like she’d been waiting for me to break again.

  Yes. Yes. See? I can make you care. If I bleed enough, you’ll never leave.

  “I’m okay,” I whispered, savouring the weight of her concern. I loved saying that. It gave me a little rush, like pretending I didn’t want her arms around me when all I wanted was to cry into them.

  “Your Majesty, this servant was not trying to disturb Princess Changping’s rest, I was teaching her embroidery.”

  Why was she suddenly apologising?

  I looked up, and my gut turned to stone. Gold-hemmed sleeves. The cloudy-jade hairpin. The Emperor.

  Yun Yanlin.

  I dropped my eyes. “Royal Father.”

  The Emperor took slow strides into the room like he owned the air I breathed. And he did, didn’t he?

  He peered around the room, ducking to avoid brushing his head against the silk-embroidered posters that dangled from the ceiling. Rice-paper scrolls were messily piled up in the bookshelf, spilling out their contents in a jumble of Buddhist scriptures, poetry, and martial art manuscripts. For once, I felt conscious of the state of my recreation room. He gestured awkwardly at the room.

  “You’ve been reading recently?”

  His line of sight fell on a particular silk poster, the black as night calligraphy printing out Du Fu’s eternal words:

  From family and friends comes not a single word,

  Old and sick, I have one solitary boat.

  “I didn’t know you liked Du Fu,” Yun Yanlin said. No, you don’t. You don’t know a thing about me. I don’t even like poetry. He continued, “If I had known, I would’ve lent you my personal collection.”

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  I hated the sound of his voice. Sweet, cloying, like honey on spoiled fruit. Fake. Manipulative. I scanned his face, searching for the cruelty I knew must be hiding there. There had to be some catch in his words. Some trick. That’s all this was. I was nothing more than his prized bargaining chip. With me in his hand, I guessed he assumed Xuanji Province wouldn’t dare make a move against him; too bad that he miscalculated.

  My birth mother couldn’t care less about the existence of an illegitimate offspring…she’d rather I was gone. My existence, my breathing, was enough to shame her out of current position as the head of Fengyu Prefecture in Xuanji Prefecture.

  It was all his fault. This lustful Emperor who coveted what was not his. As if I wanted anything else from him.

  I stood so quickly the stool scraped. “Governess Pan, I would like to go to my room.”

  Governess Pan turned her head toward me, then to the Emperor, unsure of what to do. Who to obey.

  I could see her falter, and it made me sick with guilt. I hastily guided her to the door. “You’re dismissed.”

  My eyes followed her figure as she left the room, along with my only hope of escaping from reality. And escaping that monster that now stood in my room.

  “Shiqi, do you despise me?” the Emperor said.

  Yes.

  Yes.

  Yes.

  I took in a breath. What could I say? How could I turn around and grin? I tightened my fist, noticing a sense of familiarity envelope me. That same suffocating atmosphere that plagued the imperial court had made its place in my room. I almost wanted to cry; my secret room I used to escape from reality had been ruined by the unrestful nature of the Emperor.

  Yet, it awakened my ability to hold a fa?ade. I willed myself to look upon the face of that man.

  “How could I, Your Majesty? You have given me everything.”

  I made a deliberate effort to gesture that my whole room belonged to that man. I hated myself for the answer. For the way it slipped out with such ease.

  He did not smile as I expected. The only movement was something that dissipated from his glassy eyes. He stared at the scroll again. “Qi’er, why do you read Du Fu’s poems?”

  No compassion. Just cold accusations. Interrogating and questioning me, over what? Nothing, but a poem I accidentally happened upon.

  “I found it interesting,” I quietly replied. I hated my lack of self-confidence. If only I could tell him to get out.

  He began walking around the room, not caring that he now thoroughly dirtied every part of my happy place with his presence. Yun Yanlin spoke, “It is a sad poem. Young people shouldn’t read such sad poems. It’s unhealthy. It robs you of your youth.”

  Is that what he thought? My sadness came from poetry?

  “Well, I thought, I—” I shut my mouth. What was the point of trying to argue? I had no explanation for why I had a poem about a man grieving the consequences of war. I just did.

  He eventually reached my desk, brushing a hand across the scrolls that flapped with the breeze. Even the words I wrote on paper were trying to escape this hellish place. His hand stopped at the sight of my newly embroidered handkerchief. He rubbed a thumb against the smooth surface, a perfect portrait of a pair of mandarin ducks.

  I wanted to slap myself. That was for Yuanxiao…not you.

  “Who’s the lucky one?” he said, a playful tone colouring his words. I had nothing to say. Well, nothing that he would have liked to hear. After all, I was meant to have pure thoughts, fixed on no one other than my soon-to-be fiancé.

  “Well?” he smiled. Usually, I would have been frightened into telling the truth. But the tone in his voice was far from interrogative.

  “Just someone,” I said, my flushed cheeks betraying me.

  The Emperor’s smile broadened, and he reached a hand towards me. “Look at you, you’re so mature in court, but inside you’re just a little girl.”

  I wanted to scream. Why was he acting? Why was he pretending? He had never treated me like a daughter. Just a pawn. A pretty thing to parade when it suited him. He didn’t even raise me. Governess Pan did. Governess Pan, who I hurt just to keep her close.

  Perhaps it was all a trick and when it was all over, he would secretly laugh in delight at being able to extract a reaction from me. But I let myself be lulled by his warmth. I wanted so much to believe that he really was my father. That I was really his daughter. Not a bargaining chip. Not just—

  Get it together. Do you think he could actually care for you? Do you think someone like you can be like Yun Rongxian, the legitimate heir to Taishan?

  I looked away, toward the window. His hand hovered, then fell.

  He cleared his throat, breaking the moment. “If you like poetry,” he said, fumbling in his sleeve, “perhaps you’d enjoy Li Bai more.”

  I pinched the paper from him with the speed of a snail. How long had he been watching me? Spying on me, surveilling my supposedly, secret place, knowing that I hung up silk posters of poetry.

  Li Bai’s poem, zhúliguǎn—Within a Bamboo Grove—was handwritten in the folded-up sheet:

  Sitting alone, somewhere in a bamboo grove

  Plucking on a zither, whistling along

  Deep in the forest, where I can’t be found

  At least, not until the bright moon shines.

  How did he see me so clearly? I hugged the paper to my chest. It hurt. I hated that he could do this to me.

  I longed for the peace and serenity that the poem spoke of. Since Empress Huangmei knew of my existence, I had spent my life searching for a quiet place I could call my own.

  A quiet place, like a bamboo grove.

  Looking at the poem again, a realisation came upon me like a bucket of cold water. I looked into my father’s eyes. I had thought that no one knew my true self. I thought I had perfectly covered up everything with a fa?ade. I believed I looked like that perfect child who was pure, beautiful, and innocent. I thought that if ever there was one thing I controlled and nobody knew, it would be my thoughts. But I was wrong.

  Even my own thoughts weren’t safe from him.