The First Fracture
Dawn gilded the palace walls in rose-gold light, yet the Crown Prince's chambers remained frozen in perpetual twilight.
"Where was she last night?"
The Prince turned a memorial scroll with deliberate fingers, his voice calm as a sheathed blade. The kneeling shadow guard kept his forehead pressed to the floor.
"Your Highness... we lost track of her near the rear gardens. She reappeared alone at midnight, but—" A bead of sweat slid down his temple. "Her robes were disheveled. Her gait... unsteady."
The scroll snapped against the desk.
"Mo Xuanli." The name slithered through the room like a dagger drawn from silk.
——
I stood by my study window, teacup warming palms that still remembered another's touch. The summons came like a death knell:
"His Highness demands your presence."
——
The Eastern Palace's annex was colder than midwinter. The Prince stood framed by sunlight, his golden robes rippling like a gilded cage.
"You wandered the gardens until midnight?" He turned, all courtly warmth stripped away.
My fingers twisted in silk. "I needed air."
"With him?" He closed the distance, voice deceptively soft. "Does Mo Xuanli still haunt your shadow?"
"We have no connection." The lie burned my tongue.
The Prince's smile turned lethal. "I don't care about your dalliances. Only what secrets you might have spilled in his arms."
His grip seized my wrist—bone grinding against bone. "Did. He. Touch. You." Each word a scalpel peeling back layers.
I held my silence like armor.
"Remember," his breath iced my ear, "this palace tolerates no straying songbirds." Releasing me, he resumed his imperial mask. "Henceforth, you exist only where my eyes can see."
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and then Add to home screen.