Page 67 of Forest of a Thousand Lanterns

Kang was by her side, patting her dazed face. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

But she could not find it in herself to answer him. Away from her visions of might and power, reality came back to her in a devastating rush. She might frighten the wits out of Lady Sun, but it still didn’t change the fact that the General would receive the woman’s letter. Even now, he could be reading it and preparing to throw Wei out of the gates.

Wei’s dream had come to an end... and so had hers.

It was over. It was done. She had let the Fool defeat her.

Xifeng raised her head and let out a scream of fury, ignoring Kang and the maids as they all fell back in fright. What would Guma say if she knew how Xifeng had failed? She pictured Lady Sun sitting on a throne and the Emperor placing a crown on her head.

Xifeng’s crown. Xifeng’s throne. They belonged to her; the cards had promised.

You know what to do,the creature had told her.There is only one choice.

In the hot springs, the mirror-water had shown Lady Sun’s heartglittering in her chest. But Xifeng had turned away in horror, believing it to be too cruel and herself too weak. Perhaps she had been wrong. Perhaps it had been the perfect solution all along. If Lady Sun lived, it would mean the Fool had triumphed.

Xifeng clenched her fists. She had let this go much too far.

The wounds came back.

Xifeng had climbed into bed to wait for the Empress’s household to fall silent. She hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but she woke with both of her cheeks burning. It felt as though Guma had just struck her with the cane, as though Lady Sun’s nails had raked across her jaw moments ago. Blood soaked her pillow, and she stumbled out of bed, one hand over her face as she shakily lit a candle. The cuts and gashes were hot trails against her palm. She screamed, nearly fainting at the mutilated face that stared back at her in the mirror from a mess of shredded skin.

“What’s wrong with you?” demanded the lady-in-waiting who shared her chamber. “Do you know how late it is?”

“My face,” Xifeng sobbed, her bloody hands trembling so hard her whole body shook. “How could it be?”

Lifeblood had a permanent healing effect. Guma had taught her that, promised her that. The scars had never,neverreturned before.

“Why?” she moaned as blood dampened her tunic. “Why am I being punished like this?”

Rough hands grabbed her shoulders as the woman turned her. “There is nothing on your face,” she said in a flat voice.

Xifeng tugged at her tunic and thrust out her hand. “Look at the blood!”

But the woman looked, instead, into her eyes. “You’ve had a bad dream, child,” she told her slowly. “Go back to sleep now and you’ll feel better in the morning.”

Xifeng stared at her in disbelief, then glanced down at her clean palm and clothing. Her face in the mirror was as smooth and unblemished as it had always been, but her eyes were wild.

“How could it be?” she repeated in a whisper.

She had felt the hot blood on her hand and touched the edges of the gaping wounds. She had seen the injuries with her own eyes.

The woman returned to bed, grunting, and Xifeng went to her own, embarrassed.

Her pillow was covered with blood.

“What is it now?” the woman snapped, hearing Xifeng’s choked scream.

“N-nothing. I’m sorry to have woken you.” She stared at the dark red smears, her heart pounding so fast she thought she might collapse. She sat on the edge of the bed farthest away from the pillow, breathing in and out slowly for a full minute before turning her eyes back to it. The white cotton was now as clean as if it had been freshly laundered.

Xifeng bit her knuckles to keep from crying out again, finding relief in the sharp edges of her teeth. That had been no dream—the bloodstains had been real, as had the torn flesh on her face. A vicious cut where Guma’s cane had bitten into her cheek, and five trails ofripped skin where Lady Sun’s fingers had scratched her. What could this mean?

She burned with the need to see Guma: her aunt would know what this meant; she would know how to deal with Lady Sun. Then, perhaps Xifeng would find a way to intercept and destroy the concubine’s letter. Surely the General had been too preoccupied to read it; the Empress’s ladies had been buzzing with news that the Emperor and Crown Prince were at odds again, this time over a military matter that had called for an emergency council. A wild hope lodged itself in her breast.

Eyeing the pristine pillow the way she would a snake, Xifeng muttered some excuse about her moon’s bleeding—though the lady-in-waiting was already snoring—and fled the royal apartments.

The tunnel felt different when she slipped into it from the gardens—charged and alive, like she had unwittingly entered the veins of some predatory animal. The slimy stone wall seemed to pulse as she trailed her fingers along it, though it might have been her own thundering heartbeat. She touched her smooth face again, cursing the day she had met Lady Sun. Her bare feet pattered a rhythm on the dirt floor:she must die, she must die...

There would be no going back if she harmed the woman. She would never again be the girl who had yearned and struggled, the girl Wei adored. She let her intention run through her mind, over and over, until she almost believed it, too: she would give up that former self to protect him, to save his dream. If that wasn’t love, she didn’t know what was.

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