Page 14 of The Blood Orchid
“Resurrect him?” I said. “Who said the Crown Prince was dead?”
But the man’s sharp smile only widened, and then I was certain that this was not a normal boy raised in a desert village.
As far as the public knew, the palace massacre had been nothing more than a failed coup. All the royal alchemists had sacrificed their lives protecting the House of Li, and Emperor Gaozong had tragically died from his illness during all the chaos. Officially, Empress Wu and the Crown Prince were alive and well. How could they not be, when their bodies were so clearly walking around the palace?
There were only four people besides me who knew that the prince had actually died that day.
My siblings, who had borrowed the royal family’s bodies.
Zheng Sili, the alchemist who’d tried to resurrect the Empress—last I’d heard, he’d run home to Guangdong, and this certainly wasn’t him.
And of course, the Empress herself.
The man who called himself Junyi seized my wrist, but I held tight, digging the blade harder into his throat in warning.
That was when I saw it.
His sleeve slid up as he gripped my wrist, revealing two jagged characters branded into his forearm.
?
?
Wu Zhao.
The Empress.
Chapter Three
My gaze locked with Junyi’s, and for a moment, the walls of the sunbaked clay hut fell away. The harshness of the desert sun dissolved, replaced by frigid golden tiles, a throne room soaked with blood, pale sunlight cast across me in sharp diamonds through the elaborate lattice windows. I would know those eyes anywhere, even if the face had changed.
“Who said the Crown Prince was dead?” I said again, leaning into my knife, a desperate edge to my words.
“No one had to say anything, Scarlet,” Junyi said, his smile glass-sharp. “I was the one who killed him, after all.”
Then the Empress’s grip tightened on my wrist. She shoved my blade away, and I couldn’t even think to fight back, could barely even breathe. I had killed the Empress, ripped her throat out with my teeth. What kind of monster would have resurrected her? If she still lived, then everyone had died for nothing.
“You’re creative, Scarlet, I’ll give you that much,” the Empress said, releasing me and crossing her arms. Her expression shifted, no longer the weathered and determined face of a villager who’dlost everything, but the proud glare of someone who owned the entire world.
I shook my head. “You’re—”
“I’ve thought about it a lot, you know,” she said. “The fact that you surprised me. There’s very little that I don’t foresee. In another life, maybe you could have been my adviser.”
I couldn’t bring myself to move, my feet rooted to the ground.I’m dreaming, I thought.I dream about the Empress all the time. This is nothing new.
“But the more I think about it, the more I realize that you couldn’t possibly have planned all this,” she said. She raised one hand to cup my cheek, her touch searing. “You couldn’t have known what necklace I would wear, or that the pearls would roll in front of you. All that happened is you got very, very, lucky. Isn’t that right?”
I tried to form words, but the Empress’s touch was stronger than any venom. Distantly, I was aware of the knife sliding from my limp hand, clattering to the floor.
“You’re not a great alchemist, are you?” she said, thumb caressing my cheek. “You were just struck with dumb luck and seized your chance. Good for you, Scarlet. Fate favored you this once. But victory is not a single moment.”
The Empress leaned closer, and her next words came as warm desert winds whispered across my face, lips a breath from mine, speaking into me, through me. “This kingdom belongs to me,” she said. “I earned it. I will die a thousand times before I let you take it from me.”
Her grip tightened on my face, and something about the sting of her nails piercing through my skin shocked me awake. I took a step back.
“Then I’ll kill you a thousand times,” I said. “China belongs to Hong, not you.”
The Empress’s eyes widened, then she let out a sharp laugh. I kept talking, afraid I’d lose confidence at the Empress’s next words.