Page 2 of Dynasty of the Wicked

She cleaned her blade absentmindedly. She couldn’t see the missing finger anywhere on the floor. When would anyone find it? When it was already partially decayed? She was sure it would cause an uproar if a maidservant came across it randomly. The corner of her mouth rose at that thought.

“Your Highness?” The guard further from her gave her a hesitant smile. “Would you like for us to escort you to your room?”

They were being overly official. Nobody in the palace seemed to know how to treat her. Should they be as formal as they were to the other princes and princess? Or should they treat her however they pleased? Did it really matter, since she was the daughter of a disfavored concubine? Especially since her father,the emperor, couldn’t care less for her? It was all a mystery, it seemed. Even Zhi Ruo herself wasn’t sure what to expect.

Zhi Ruo handed back the handkerchief with a shrug. “Do whatever you’d like.”

She didn’t look back at them as she headed in the opposite direction down the hallway. She could hear them scramble after her, but their steps slowed, and eventually, they retreated back to their spots in the hallway. She didn’t have to glance behind to know that she was completely alone.

She breathed out deeply as she slid the dagger into its scabbard, and strapped it back onto her calf, where no one could see the bulk of it. She hadn’t expected to actually use it when she had pilfered it from her brother’s room that morning, where he had berated her tonotcause a scene today.

If she hadn’t had it on her ….

Zhi Ruo tried to shake those thoughts away, but her fingers shook without meaning to, and she flexed them inward, then outward. She kept it up, trying to ignore the feeling of that man’s hands pressed against her waist. She pushed the memory of his drunken kiss from her mind and how he had shoved her against the wall. The helplessness she had felt. The way she had frozen up in that minute. But as much as she wanted to banish the memory, it kept replaying, over and over. Forcing her to accept a different possibility.

“Your Highness!”

Zhi Ruo hadn’t even realized she had entered her chambers until that moment. Her only maidservant, Liena, was sitting on her couch cleaning a piece of jewelry with a cloth. An array of hairpins and trinkets were laid across the tea table sectioned in two piles: one polished, one not.

“I didn’t expect to see you back so early,” Liena began, setting down the sharp metal pin into the heap of other polished hairpins. She tucked back a strand of loose black hair that hadfallen from her simple low bun. “I would have thought you would be enjoying the festivities! Heavens knows I would too, but there’s just so much work to attend to and not enough time, and it’s not like I have anyone to enjoy—” Her words cut out sharply when she noticed Zhi Ruo, and her forehead creased immediately. “What’s wrong, Your Highness?”

Blinking, Zhi Ruo smoothed down her dress with trembling fingers, noticing how crumpled the scarlet and bright pink skirts had become. She hadn’t even realized how shaken up she was until that moment, until she was finally somewhere safe.

“Nothing.” Her voice was barely a whisper. She tried to smile, but it came out forced. “Liena, you should have gone to the festival with that one guard you like. What was his name? Li? Hao? I know you have a soft spot for him and I know he does too.”

Liena crossed the distance in the room and peered at Zhi Ruo with concerned eyes. “You can’t fool me. What’s wrong, Princess Zhi Ruo?”

“Nothing.” Zhi Ruo took her hands and gave them a slight squeeze. “Now, tell me why you’re cooped up in my room instead of enjoying the festival yourself?”

Liena didn’t look too convinced, but she didn’t question her further and took her to her vanity, where she began undoing Zhi Ruo’s hair and pulling out the various pins and jewels she had put in just mere hours ago.

“I’m too old to enjoy festivals, Zhi Ruo,” she finally said, her deft fingers working quickly to undo the elaborate braids, knots, and pins she had secured into her hair. It had been supposed to last all night, not a few measly hours. “And I know you think I have a sweet spot for acertainguard, but I assure you, I do not. And besides, it’s too cold to have a festival, in my opinion.”

Zhi Ruo’s hair slowly but surely became lighter as all the accessories were drawn out from it, and she closed her eyesas her scalp was pulled this way and that. The smell of sweet jasmine and cinnabar swayed over her face from the small, woven scented sachet Liena wore around her wrist. Zhi Ruo had a similar one full of crushed and dried chrysanthemum and cloves, but she had lost it after her tussle with the now-fingerless man.

“A certain guard would have taken you to the festival if he had the balls to simply ask you,” Zhi Ruo said with a long sigh once Liena was done fussing with her hair. Now with the weight free from her head, she wanted nothing more than to crawl under her covers and fall into a deep slumber. She rubbed her sore, taut shoulders and exhaled again. “I think it best that you make the first move. He doesn’t seem keen on doing anything. You both like each other, I’m sure.”

Liena made a low, throaty sound of exasperation and rolled her eyes as she plucked all the shiny jewels and hairpins from the vanity. “Your Highness, I’m fairly certain he has more interests in a woman more suited for him. I’m old, divorced, and unable to bear children. I’m hardly the top choice.”

“That’s not true—” she started.

“Tsk.” Liena clucked her tongue and gave her a look that told her arguing was out of the question. “Stop trying to pair me with Cheng. I understand I played an important part in helping to teach you life lessons when your mother passed away—may she rest in peace—but I am your servant, Princess Zhi Ruo. Let’s please keep it that way.”

It was the same conversation she had heard many times the past year and although it had stung to hear it the first time, Zhi Ruo was now desensitized to Liena’s efforts to distance herself. Liena was just trying to remain formal to remind Zhi Ruo of her place as a royal princess, but all it did was make her feel like she was a pretend-princess pretending to be important.

“All right, I’ll stop,” she grumbled.For tonight.

She wouldn’t stop her matchmaking efforts until the woman was married, though.

Zhi Ruo stripped out of her silk dress and quickly donned her sleeping robes with Liena’s help. They both situated themselves on the couch. Liena went back to polishing the jewels while Zhi Ruo tucked her legs close to her body and watched her quietly.

Liena was exactly twice Zhi Ruo’s age at thirty-eight, but she didn’t look it. Or maybe Zhi Ruo refused to see the small lines forming around her eyes when she smiled, or the three gray hairs that were woven in her midnight locks, or the thinning of her once-plump lips. Liena was simply Liena. Intelligent, caring, no-nonsense. The one person who had stuck to her side the past ten years, since Zhi Ruo’s mother passed away.

“Your Highness.” Liena eyed Zhi Ruo with a serious expression. “Has it been decided who you will marry?”

Zhi Ruo flinched and averted her gaze. She picked at a loose thread on the couch to distract herself. Father was thinking of marrying her off to one of his vassals. The only problem waswhichvassal. Knowing his concubines and his wife, they would want Zhi Ruo to marry a titleless noble who would squander any chance she had to rise up in power, so that she could continue to live in desolation, while they laughed behind their silk fans.

“He will announce it tomorrow,” Zhi Ruo whispered, hating the way pressure built in the back of her eyes. She blinked at the prickles and breathed deeply.

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