The last of the fireworks fell, and a pale blue haze of smoke spread across the entire sky above the Yue River.

The ceremony was drawing to a close. The Emperor withdrew with the ceremony officials to the main seat on the platform.

The lights on the platform shifted and changed. Countless palace attendants entered carrying flower lanterns, illuminating the central altar where square and circle were nested within each other. Then performers wearing wooden masks and dressed in seven-colored feathered robes took their places within the circle. The musicians sat in the square pool surrounding the circle, playing drums, bamboo flutes, great panpipes, and reed mouth organs, laying the musical groundwork for the ritual masked drama that was about to begin.

The masked dance had since ancient times been a ceremonial performance depicting deities driving away plague demons. Over time, through choreography and elaboration, it had acquired storylines and become a highly spectacular imperial theatrical performance.

Now, with the masked dance serving as the closing chapter of the ceremony, it was also the signal for officials to take their seats at the banquet.

Civil and military officials who had been waiting on the stone boats on either side of the platform began making their way up onto it. But Xiao Nanhui, hiding in the private room of Tingling Tower, had no desire to move.

According to the original plan, by now she and Xiao Zhun should have dined and drunk their fill and be walking up to the platform together with the crowd.

She tossed the empty wine jar aside with her left hand, then grabbed another handful of candied peanuts, telling herself that once she finished this handful, she must immediately, without a moment’s delay, go downstairs and join the others on the platform.

The officials’ banquet had at least dozens in attendance, if not a full hundred. At a glance it would be impossible to tell one from another. Yet the seats were assigned, and if she failed to appear, there would be a visible gap at the Light Vanguard Camp’s table. If the Emperor chose to make an issue of it at that point, she would be in serious trouble.

Her hand paused over the peanuts. An awkward discomfort came over Xiao Nanhui’s face. She propped herself up on one arm and peered toward the platform on the river through the gap in the window lattice.

They were separated by about a dozen zhang, with a dense, noisy crowd filling the space between them — and yet she spotted him in an instant.

The lights on the entire altar surrounded him. He had changed into a ceremonial robe of moonlit white, with a nine-tassel crown swaying above his head. He sat cross-legged at the center of the richly embroidered silk carpet that had been laid out, the enormous swirling vine-and-flower pattern spreading out beneath him in all directions, like a great bloom of fireworks unfurling flat across the ground.

The pale blue smoke in the air had not yet dispersed, yet Xiao Nanhui felt she could almost make out a subtle shift in his expression, a lift of his eyes where something stirred beneath the surface.

For a moment she could not look away. Only when she finally turned her gaze slightly aside did she notice the person seated beside him.

It was a dark-haired beauty with beaded curtains veiling her face, dressed like him in a moonlit-white gown. As she inclined her head, the stretch of skin from her neck to her chest was exposed — a flash of snow-white, achingly bright. She sat quietly at the sovereign’s side, like a white swan resting beside a lotus.

The peanuts Xiao Nanhui had been pinching in her fingertips had crumbled without her noticing when.

She had grown accustomed to seeing Ding Weixiang’s figure at his side. But she had almost never seen a woman near him. Time had dulled her awareness until she had nearly forgotten his identity as sovereign — that he was meant by nature to be surrounded by flowers in full bloom, by bees and butterflies circling endlessly.

Yet somehow, an inexplicable sense of suffocating unease rose in her chest.

A sudden flash of that night’s experience in the palace lodgings blazed before her eyes. Xiao Nanhui lurched to her feet with a start, her footing unsteady, stumbling half a step backward, accidentally colliding with the side table behind her.

The newly arranged vase of plum blossoms on the side table toppled and fell, shattering against the floor with a crack.

Staring at the wreckage on the ground, Xiao Nanhui stood dazed and could not collect herself.

She slowly raised a hand and patted her chest. Her heart was still there, beating steadily — yet it felt somehow unwell, strangely off.

The sound of footsteps came from outside the room, breaking through her thoughts.

She assumed it was a Tingling Tower attendant coming to investigate the noise, and was feeling somewhat awkward about how to explain, and somewhat anxious about whether the vase had been expensive, when the attendant’s voice was already heard outside the door.

“Honored guest, there is a visitor who says they wish to see you. Would it be convenient?”

Xiao Nanhui froze. There was a moment of silence inside the room.

Was it Xiao Zhun?

Had he not decided not to come?

From the distant river surface came the sounds of the performers singing the masked drama. The lyrics went: “From this night on, I no longer cherish the beautiful night — let the bright moon set beyond the western tower as it will.”

She suddenly found herself at a loss, unsure how to face whoever stood beyond the door at this moment.

The attendant had waited a long time without a response and was about to lead the visitor away, when Xiao Nanhui hurried to speak.

“Come in.”

The attendant complied and drew back the bamboo curtain hanging before the room.

After a soft rustle of fabric, came the sound of soft-soled shoes stepping on wooden floorboards.

Strange — that sound was somewhat quick and short. It didn’t sound like Xiao Zhun’s footsteps.

“Xiao Nanhui.”

A woman’s voice came from beyond the folding screen. The next moment, a slender shadow appeared on the screen. The shadow rounded the corridor pillar and emerged from the darkness — unmistakably, it was Bai Yun, dressed in plain hemp robes.

“He will not come. The person looking for you tonight — is me.”

The woman stepped into the light. There were faint traces of blood on her clothes — whether her own or someone else’s was unclear. Only her eyes, reflecting the lamplight from the window, seemed to hold flames burning within.

Xiao Nanhui could not conceal her shock. Looking down, she discovered that the fetters on the other woman’s feet had vanished entirely — and her alarm rang out: “How — how did you get out?!”

Bai Yun made no attempt to hide it. She raised a hand and drew from her hair the hairpin made from the withered plum branch.

Only then did Xiao Nanhui notice that the portion of the hairpin hidden within the dark hair had been carefully carved into the shape of a key.

“They knew my capabilities, so they confiscated every piece of copper and iron from me. It took some effort, but I ground the shape out of wood. Today was the first time I found it worked.”

Xiao Nanhui stared at the frail branch that had achieved something so terrifying, as though seeing for the first time the fragile yet frightening woman before her.

Yesterday her appearance at the guest courtyard had been an accident. But in that brief instant, Bai Yun had already devised a way to exploit her sympathy, and had deceived her with effortless ease.

In the silence, the woman seemed already to have sensed what she was thinking, and gave a soft laugh. “You needn’t be angry. It is true that I took advantage of your compassion — but it is equally true that I cherish this plum branch.”

A woman of exquisite perception, who killed without drawing blood. An ice-cold beauty.

Xiao Nanhui’s gaze turned cold. Her hand moved to rest on the dagger at her waist. “I am not my adoptive father. He would show you mercy — I will not.”

“Oh? You intend to kill me?” Bai Yun’s expression remained entirely calm, as though she were not the least bit afraid that Xiao Nanhui might seize her on the spot. “Kill me, and you will lose many secrets.”

Xiao Nanhui’s hand did pause.

She herself had no secrets anyone could use against her. But she thought of Xiao Zhun.

“You are the adopted daughter he took in, and you have been of one mind with him all these years. Let me ask you — to what lengths are you willing to go for him?”

The other’s words were unfinished, yet Xiao Nanhui caught a different meaning within them.

Recovering Bijiang had been a great undertaking, but they had accomplished it. What remained was the unresolved shadow over the Xiao Family.

The case of the massacre was bound to involve matters of great weight. Whether one sought to uncover the truth or to bide one’s time for revenge, neither would be easy — she had understood this from the moment she was old enough to reason.

But to what lengths was she willing to go for Xiao Zhun?

Through all these years, she had never once asked herself this question. She had simply done what needed doing, without knowing how far she would hold on when faced with a matter of life, death, and great principle.

She recalled the question Mei Qiao had put to her that day at the Mei household.

If there came a day when she was required to commit treason and revolt against her country, and to personally kill the one she loved most — would she be willing even then?

The words rolled through Xiao Nanhui’s mind again and again. She could not give an answer.

From outside the window came the sounds of the excited crowd. The masked drama on the platform had reached its climax. The performers wielded bronze swords hung with bells, and in their rising and falling strikes they split open the jade disc representing the sun and moon. The jade and beads scattered in an instant, clattering to the ground, drawing cries of surprise and a scramble from the crowd gathered below.

“You are afraid?” Bai Yun’s voice, amid the clamoring noise, seemed to come from both near and far. “What a pity. I had already made up my mind to tell you the truth.”

The truth?

“What truth?”

The noise around her sharpened gradually into a ringing in her ears. Xiao Nanhui felt as though she were trapped inside a box — a coffin — suffocating.

For a long time now, the seed buried in the darkness seemed suddenly to have begun stirring and sprouting, struggling to break through the soil.

“Don’t you want to know what truly happened during that spring hunt all those years ago?”

The spring of the thirty-ninth year of the Tiancheng Suiyuan era — the spring when catastrophe fell upon the Xiao Family.

Xiao Nanhui could not comprehend how anyone could do terrible things and then carry on as though nothing had happened.

“It was the Bai Shi clan that revolted — that slaughtered the Black Feather garrison and the Subei standing army — and then, fearing Prince Shuo would lead troops in pursuit, struck the killing blow—”

Her words were cut off by Bai Yun’s laughter.

There was no mirth in that laughter — only a piercing, desperate bleakness.

“Wonderful — the Bai Shi clan revolts and strikes the killing blow!” She quenched her laughter in an instant and fixed her eyes on Xiao Nanhui’s. “Did you see it with your own eyes? Hear it with your own ears? Did the historian who took up the brush to write that passage of history see it with his own eyes? Hear it with his own ears?!”

Reason told Xiao Nanhui: the woman before her had gone mad.

But somewhere deep in her heart, she could not help but want to know the so-called truth and its answer.

“I am not one for going around in circles. If you know something, say it now. Otherwise I’ll take it as nothing but raving.”

“Are you quite certain? Those who know about this matter, aside from myself and my father, are only those who did what was done. Once you know — you will have to make a choice. To stand with him, or to forsake him and become his enemy.”

After a long silence, Xiao Nanhui drew a deep breath. “I cannot make you that kind of promise. Even if my adoptive father himself were standing here, he could not grant what you’re asking.”

Bai Yun gradually fell quiet. The beauty mark at the corner of her eye seemed to come alive, setting off a kind of desolate, devastating beauty.

“You truly are his pupil. Even in temperament, you are exactly alike.”

Did Xiao Nanhui resemble Xiao Zhun? It seemed she did — yet what Xiao Zhun had lived through was not what she had lived through. They were inevitably different people.

“If what you call the truth is not a fabrication, why not tell my adoptive father directly, rather than playing word games with me here?”

Bai Yun lowered her eyelashes halfway, her voice light.

“Once — long ago — I would have given my life to tell him the truth. But so many years have passed. His ties to this place have grown too deep. I cannot bear to watch him be tormented. But you are different.” She paused, then said, word by word: “You do not belong here to begin with. Isn’t that so?”

At those words, Xiao Nanhui felt as though she were a fish stripped of its scales — exposed and bare, stripped of every last shred of dignity.

She clenched her jaw and looked at the woman before her. “What do you want from me?”

Outside the window, the masked drama on the platform had reached its climax.

The performers’ colorful banners and ritual pennants flew up and down. The high priest representing the fire deity Taiyi breathed out burst after burst of flame. The blazing heat and vivid colors stirred the night into frenzied confusion. The drumbeat was dense as a sudden downpour; the clash of bronze rang ceaselessly, carrying with it a cold gleam and killing intent that shook the air in all directions.

At some point, Bai Yun’s figure had drawn to within only a few steps of her — close enough that she could clearly see the undisguised hatred on the other woman’s face.

“Look carefully. The one who brought blood debt upon the Xiao Family, who caused my entire Bai Shi clan to wander homeless and unable to return to their homeland even in death — that person is sitting right now at the center of that platform, in the brightest light.”

Following Bai Yun’s gaze, Xiao Nanhui slowly looked toward the figure on the platform.

In truth, she did not need to look. She already knew who, at this moment, shone the most brilliantly.

He was still sitting there quietly. The moonlit white of his robes caught the lamplight and haloed outward in rings of glow, calling to mind the snow-capped mountains of the northern lands — unbroken, sacred, venerated. He was the central figure of this great spectacle, yet the commotion and splendor all around him seemed to have nothing to do with him at all.

On the platform, the performers spun at breathtaking speed, their colorful robes blooming open into flower after brilliant flower.

“I want you to kill him. Kill him, and you will avenge Xiao Zhun.”

The golden drums fell abruptly silent. The spinning performers froze where they stood, raising above their heads the heart of a wild ram — still dripping with fresh blood — and prostrated themselves, offering it toward the direction of the main seat.

This was the heart of every sacrificial ceremony — the “sacrifice.”

Blood dripped onto the white silk carpet, rolling out trail after trail of crimson, as though foretelling that a slaughter was about to be staged here.

The sovereign slowly rose to his feet. His moonlit-white robes rolled across him in wave after wave of shifting light. He reached out and dipped his finger in that drop of fresh blood, then inscribed an ancient symbol on the high priest’s forehead.

Xiao Nanhui could not stop herself from staring fixedly at that figure, her fingertips clenching tight without realizing it.

How could it be him? How could it possibly be him?

Could those hands truly be stained with the blood of the Xiao Family?

And yet the events were from over a decade ago. He had not yet taken the throne then. A prince with no power and no authority — how could he possibly have had any connection to something like that?

She trusted her own reasoning. With firm conviction she said: “Affairs of the imperial house cannot be placed on a single person’s shoulders.”

“Why not?! When the Xu clan brought calamity upon my people, did they ever sort out the distinctions?!”

Xiao Nanhui was left speechless — yet still she could not simply give up. “He is different from the others—”

Bai Yun’s movements suddenly stopped. She stared intently at Xiao Nanhui, and something like bewilderment seemed to pass through those eyes of hers, clear and bright as autumn water.

“Can it be that you and he are—” She paused. The bewilderment in her eyes gradually shifted to certainty. “You like him.”

That light, offhand remark instantly sent the blood rushing to Xiao Nanhui’s head. Her entire mind rang with a sharp hum, and even her frantic denial came out stumbling: “You — you’re talking nonsense!”

Bai Yun watched the other woman’s reaction, and an expression somewhere between amusement and curiosity crossed her face. “I only said it casually. I had not expected that, looking at it now, it turns out to be true.”

Xiao Nanhui’s mind was in turmoil. She felt that appearing at Tingling Tower tonight had perhaps been a mistake from the very start.

“You left the guest courtyard without permission — that is already a grave offense. If you don’t want to implicate your adoptive father, come back with me and report the situation to the Commander—”

“Xiao Nanhui.” The other woman suddenly called her by name. “I’ve changed my mind.”

The next instant, Bai Yun suddenly moved close.

Xiao Nanhui caught the intoxicating fragrance drifting from her, flowing with the breath of her words and surging against her ear.

“Let me do you a favor, shall I?”

“What kind of favor?”

She instinctively wanted to pull back. But the woman had already stepped away.

“Help you see clearly — the person in your heart, is it Xiao Zhun, or the man seated at the main place over there?”

Before her words had finished falling, Xiao Nanhui saw only a flash before her eyes.

The other woman moved with great speed — a pivot of her feet and she was already behind her. Her footwork was exquisite and practiced beyond what any ordinary person could match.

Xiao Nanhui’s mind had already been thrown into chaos. By the time she reacted and turned to look, she felt a jolt in her chest.

The white horn bow that had been leaning in the corner behind her had fallen into Bai Yun’s hands. The woman’s slender jade fingers brushed across the bowstring, and for an instant a look of absolute resolve crossed her eyes. Then her five fingers spread slightly — a black shape slid from her hand and was already fitted steadily onto the string.

The moment she realized what Bai Yun was about to do, Xiao Nanhui felt as though she had plunged into a pit of ice.

She intended to assassinate the Emperor.

A smile returned to Bai Yun’s profile — like a patient who had long lain bedridden in suffering, finding release at last in this moment.

The sound of the bowstring being drawn taut was swallowed by the cheers of the crowd outside the window. Slender pale fingertips released without a sound. The bowstring snapped up a puff of dust in the moonlight.

Everything slowed as though frozen still.

Xiao Nanhui’s pupils contracted sharply. Her body hurtled forward almost like the arrow itself on the string, lunging toward that white figure.

But still she was a step too late. The slender black-feathered arrow had already left the bow.

The shaft turned into a black shadow piercing through the window lattice and splitting the cold air, flying toward the Emperor on the platform above.