Page 14 of Empire's Curse

The man led her down the hallway and Daiyu hurried after him. Her heart wouldn’t stop racing wildly. She kept looking over her shoulder, expecting the man to chase her down.

He had a dragon tattoo.

Only royalty had that.

And she had just run away from him.

5

When Daiyu arrivedin Lanfen’s room, she couldn’t stop trembling. Lanfen rubbed her back and had asked her several times what had happened, but Daiyu couldn’t utter a word. She kept replaying the conversation she had with the man in the bathing chambers and couldn’t shake her unease. If he truly was the emperor, she could easily be executed for speaking to him so rudely, so casually. Not to mention she had invaded his privacy.

“Daiyu—” Lanfen began for the dozenth time.

The door to Lanfen’s room slid open with a loud crack. The woman barely looked at them as she glanced down the hallway, her expression panicked. “Come to the waiting room.Now.”

“Why?” Lanfen rose to her feet.

“Everyone is to report there!” The woman’s eyebrows came together when she finally took notice of Daiyu. “Who are you?” A commotion in the hallway grabbed her attention and she waved at them. “Well, never mind that! Come now!”

Lanfen and Daiyu were ushered into the room with the couches. About fifty or so women were rounded up and filled the room. The smell of perfumes pervaded the air and Daiyu wanted to stick her head outside a window to just breathe properly.

“Ladies!” An older women waved the stragglers from thehallways into the main room. “Come now! His Majesty is coming this way!”

All the color drained from Daiyu’s face just as an excited murmur filled the room. It couldn’t be, could it?

Was he coming all this way to drag her out of here and kill her?

Her gaze flicked over at the glass bead curtains sectioning off the interconnected room. No one seemed to be going there, so if she had to guess, the emperor would remain in the main room.

Daiyu gave Lanfen’s hand a squeeze and leaned close to her ear. “I’ll be in the next room, all right?”

“What, why?” Lanfen’s eyes were wide as saucers and despite the heavy, mature makeup, she looked so young. “You’re going to leave me alone here?”

“Come with me too, then.” They both headed toward the glass beaded curtain with a swirling dragon design.

A hand grasped Daiyu’s shoulder and a stern voice asked, “Where do you both think you’re going?”

The older lady in charge gave them both a once-over, her mouth parting as she took in Daiyu’s outfit—she never did get the chance to change out of her clothes.

“Who are you?” the woman demanded, tightening her hold on her shoulder.

“Sh-She’s new!” Lanfen said, but the woman wasn’t buying it.

The other women in the room giggled, lost in their own chatters about the emperor visiting, and their voices increased in volume. Daiyu shot a glance at the entrance. Was the emperor almost here?

“Well? The woman dug her fingernails so deep in her shoulder that Daiyu flinched.

“Please don’t hold me like that.” Daiyu wrenched her arm from the woman’s grasp and rubbed where the woman had held her. “I’m not supposed to be here?—”

“I can see that!” The woman’s attention turned to the doorway and she quickly shooed Daiyu. “Go to that room! I’lldeal with you after His Majesty leaves! And don’t you dare show your face in front of him! I’ll not have him think that I rounded up a”—she looked Daiyu up and down with distaste—“a dusty, country bumpkin as his potential concubine. Now go!”

Daiyu and Lanfen turned back to the curtains, but the woman pulled Lanfen back.

“Not you.”

Daiyu reached forward to grab Lanfen, but the other woman was already dragging her toward the mass. For a moment, Daiyu was torn on whether she should take her sister back, or run behind to the next room. But the crowd hushed to silence and she chose the latter. She barely ducked through the curtains before she heard a chorus of, “Good afternoon, Your Majesty.”

Daiyu’s heart was pounding, adrenaline coursing through her flesh. She flicked one of the beaded threads of the curtain and peeked into the room. All the women were kneeling in front of a man dressed in heavily embroidered clothes and a gold threaded headdress. Three guards accompanied him, but Daiyu barely noticed them. Her entire attention was on the man. The air around him rippled, and even with her minimal experience with magic, she could feel the heaviness of it in the air. He demanded the attention of the room with a single glance.

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