Page 73 of The Scarlet Alchemist

The prince let out a tense breath between his teeth, then trudged to the left. We drew closer to the central palace, where the guards bowed and opened the doors, letting us into a hallway tiled with rubies and sapphires and diamonds that cast my reflection back at me in a thousand prisms across the walls. I felt like I was walking through a cave of a dragon’s hoarded treasures. The doors shut behind us, sealing out the setting sun, the gems sparkling quietly in the candlelight like sharp whispers. We turned down another hallway, the lights growing dimmer, the walls paneled in dark wood.

“I’m sorry about this,” the prince whispered, leading me around another corner.

Bones hung from the ceiling by threads of silk, swaying from the quiet breeze spilling through the lattice. The bones formed the shapes of animals, a whole menagerie suspended in the air like strange constellations. I discerned the short snout and claws of what was probably a bear, the needlelike ribs of a fish, the dangling long arms of an ape. Pelts decorated the walls, their jagged edges and outstretched paws making them look like exotic moths.

“Mother conducted experiments on many animals,” the prince said, averting his gaze. “She didn’t want to waste the bodies when they died.”

“What kind of experiments?” I asked, my gaze tracing hairline cracks in a panda’s skull, oozing with dried glue.

“I’ve never asked,” the prince said. “I don’t think I would like the answer.”

He tugged my hand as if to pull me into the next room, but something caught my eye. I let go of him and ducked under the curled spine of a snake, moving deeper into the crypt.

“Zilan?” the prince said. “You shouldn’t go back there.”

But I ignored him, sliding around the hollow gaze of a goat’s skull and the sharp bones of a bird swaying overhead, drawing to a stop in front of a pale, leathery pelt with scorched edges. Fine hair grew in patches, the surface creased like old scroll paper. Toward the top edge, a mess of black thread held the pelt together, one long line of stitches like a slanted smile.

“This is not an animal,” I said quietly.

The prince lingered near the door, half a room away from me. “No,” he said, the word so quiet, hardly more than a thought. A breeze whistled through the lattice, rattling the bones overhead, the whole room shivering.

“Who is this?” I said, my words rising over the sound of wind.

“Their name doesn’t matter anymore,” said a woman’s voice.

At the other end of the room, the Empress stood in an arched doorway, light spilling inside. In the dim light, she looked less like a person than an idea of a person, her skin not even creasing when she offered me a sharp smile.

“I’m not particular about my subjects,” she said. “When an opportunity presents itself, I seize it. Do you like my exhibit, Scarlet?”

My mouth felt too dry to speak. I glanced back at the pelt behind me. “You buried someone without their skin?” I said. “You’re not afraid of angry ghosts?”

“I don’t believe in ghosts,” the Empress said. “I believe in gold.” Then she turned and stepped through the doorway, swallowed by the light. The prince shot me a weak smile and reached for my hand again. This time, I huddled closer to him as we crossed over the threshold.

A cavernous dining hall opened up before us, arched ceilings so high that light couldn’t reach them, like an empty night sky yawned overhead. The Empress sat at the center of a long table, its silk tablecloth spilling onto the floor like a waterfall of gold crashing into the pearly tiles. The table was set for many people, but the hall was empty except for the three of us and a few servants. Smaller tables around the room had the same place settings, with gold incense burners in the center. The smoke rose in spirals overhead, the ceiling churning with misty ghosts and the scent of jasmine. By the far left wall, seven red-crowned cranes with chains around their necks pecked at rice from golden troughs.

The prince let go of my hand, leaving me adrift. The light reflected off the tablecloth burned sharply in my eyes, the cranes’ pecking the only sound in the sea of white mist, this world at the bottom of a well.

“Zilan,” the prince whispered. I shook myself from the daze, kneeling on the floor in a deep bow. When I stood up, the prince took my hand once more.

“Darling,” the Empress said to the prince, “Come sit.” She waved us over, palm facing up, like she was calling a dog.

The prince led me to the far end of the table, five seats from the Empress, where two servants pulled out our chairs.

“I’m so glad you’re joining us, Scarlet,” the Empress said.

I bowed as much as I could at the table, coming face-to-face with my dinner plate. “It’s an honor, Your Highness.”

“It certainly is,” the Empress said.

Servants began filling the cups at all of the tables, even those at the empty place settings, the green tea’s steam deepening the blurry mist around us.

“Will others be joining us?” I whispered to the prince.

“No,” the Empress said, as if I’d spoken to her. She rapped a sharp nail against the table. As if summoned, a servant emerged from the fog, refilling her cup. “We don’t have room for anyone else.”

My gaze drifted to the empty place settings, then back to the prince, who seemed to be searching for the right words. “The other seats were for my brothers and sisters,” he said at last.

The table seemed to stretch longer, the absence heavier now that I knew the seats were for the dead. The table was littered with fine porcelain plates and teacups and bone chopsticks, like a ceramic graveyard. I imagined the table once filled with children talking amongst themselves, laughing and sharing food. I hadn’t known the prince had so many siblings—only the ones in line for the throne were important enough for commoners to talk about. But now I realized that the prince would have sat here every day and watched as one by one his brothers and sisters never returned to their chairs, the table growing quieter, the absence yawning wider, until finally, there was no one but him left.

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