Page 71 of Forest of a Thousand Lanterns

Xifeng did not stop until the heart was gone. The cavern hummed with energy, vibrating with the power within her. Hands and lips drenched in blood, she dragged the hollowed body to the water andslipped it in, watching it land beside the rat she had killed. The concubine lay faceup, her hair streaming around her face like the petals of a flower. In the water, her skin shone pure white and her lips were as red as the blood that still oozed from her gaping chest.

In time, that beauty would fade. It was inside Xifeng now, dancing through her veins. She had given Lady Sun a gift, really, by ensuring the woman would continue to live through her, by harnessing her power. And there were so many other hearts that might do the same—so many other enemies who would not be wasted by death, who would instead contribute their essence to the night that had begun inside her.

And there was no going back now; there were no second thoughts.

The world was hers.

Guilt. Self-hatred. Fear.

Whatever Xifeng might have felt afterward, it was none of those. Instead, she woke and faced the day with a light heart. She and Wei were safe, Kang was avenged, and the Empress would no longer be tormented. Lady Sun was gone and the danger she posed had ended.

“Everyone’s saying she finally left him as she threatened to do for years.” Kang sat beside her at the morning meal, eating with more vigor than usual. “She didn’t even bother to take her precious son.”

Xifeng thought of the little boy gazing up at the map, babbling about sea monsters, and forced herself to harden her heart. “What will happen to her children if she doesn’t turn up?”

The eunuch shrugged. “They’ll go back to her family, I suppose.”

The banquet hall seemed even noisier and more crowded this morning. Xifeng watched ladies-in-waiting gossiping, maidservants scurrying, and eunuchs tossing dice in the corner of the room. A woman’s life had ended, but everyone else’s would continue—including her own.

Not a shade of suspicion touched her. No one truly knew what had happened aside from herself, the Serpent God, and his servant, who seemed unlikely to talk. She wondered who he was, this slave of the dark god. From his build, he could have been a soldier or a guard. A man sworn to protect the Emperor by day... and do the god’s bidding by night.

“Everyone is saying His Majesty questioned all the guards and eunuchs in the city of women, and dismissed many of them,” Xifeng said.

“He got angry because they all gave conflicting accounts of whether they’d seen Lady Sun in the tunnels, or outside her apartments at all. I was questioned, but even Master Yu vouched for me,” Kang added cheerfully. “I’m famous for my snoring, you know, and I’m told I provided remarkable music the night Lady Sun left.”

From then on, Xifeng felt different. She felt the concubine’s essence in the way she greeted each day, her feet like bronze claws ready to seize the world. Her skin glowed and her hair hung blacker than ever, and neither the ladies nor the eunuchs could take their eyes from her. The wounds returned every so often and her cheeks burned as though they’d been scraped raw. But she reminded herself that the injuries weren’t real, and then the blood would vanish and her face would return to its usual perfection.

Now, when she spoke, even the highest-ranking women stopped to listen, drawn in by her voice, beauty, and newfound power. She pitied their ignorance. They were so jealous, so eager to explain away her sudden popularity. She was something fresh for His Majesty, they whispered, and she would be nothing again once he got tired of her.

They didn’t know her secret lay within each and every one of their hearts; they didn’t know the magic of Lady Sun’s heart now coursed through her veins, placing each and every one of them under her spell.

And they could never imagine Xifeng was here to stay, or that she had just cleared away the last remaining obstacle in her path.

Well... not quite thelast.

•••

Autumn came, bringing fiery touches of red and gold to the gardens, and Xifeng sensed that she had completely slipped out of the Empress’s favor. Her Majesty no longer sought her out, and chose other ladies to accompany her to the Boat Festival. Xifeng sorely felt the absence of her motherly care, and resented it, too. She had, after all, done the Empress a great favor by destroying Lady Sun.

“Her Majesty knows the Emperor’s affections for Lady Sun were souring,” Kang told her. “Still, she must be thoroughly pleased to be without a rival for the first time.”

“And everyone knows Lady Meng’s days at court are numbered,” Xifeng added. The eunuchs were placing bets on whether His Majesty would send her back to her village or to a monastery to live out the rest of her days.

“It seems, my dear, it isyouto whom Their Majesties’ eyes have turned.”

“I doubt that. The Emperor hasn’t sent a single message or come to the city of women for weeks.” It stung to say it, no matter how true. Yet if he wanted to see Xifeng, wouldn’t he have sent word? Or come on the pretext of visiting his wife? “The Empress can’t possibly view me as a rival. And even if she does, she thought of me as a daughter once. She should give me a chance to explain, instead of jumping to conclusions.”

“Queens may jump to conclusions as much as they like. Heads have rolled because of it.”

“Would she do that?” Xifeng asked.

“What, behead you?” He shrugged. “She let Lady Sun live, didn’t she?”

•••

But as the days grew shorter, Xifeng began to doubt. She woke most nights with a sweat-soaked pillow, drenched in fearful visions of Lady Sun returning from her watery grave. Sometimes, her ghost whispered gleefully in the Empress’s ear, as though they were conspiring, and the Empress would give Xifeng the concubine’s feline smile. Lady Sun had died... but had the Fool? Perhaps Xifeng had guessed wrong. Perhaps she had allowed thetrueFool to persist. She had defeated Lady Sun, but was she truly any closer to sitting on the throne?

She spent her nights in painful uncertainty and her days in loneliness, sewing in solitude, as the Empress called every other lady-in-waiting except Xifeng to attend her.

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