SU TANG (素醣)

  Day 4, 5th Month of the Lunar Calendar, 6000th Year of the Yun Dynasty, Shuishang Province, Huadu Sect

  “Looks like we were worried for nothing.”

  “Well, I wasn’t worried at all.”

  “Ahahaha, you don’t need to pretend Yue’er. We all saw you bawling your eyes out.”

  “Shut up! I was just afraid that I would get in trouble for her stupidity.”

  “Yes, of course ~”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, stepping into the kitchen like I hadn’t been eavesdropping for the last ten minutes.

  First day back.

  Straight into the viper’s nest.

  Fitting, really. There was always something about kitchens that was perfect for gossip. A place where soft hands made deadly things and rumours simmered until they boiled over.

  Ying Yue, who was alive, breathing, thank god, turned to me with a face that looked like someone had wrung it out. The others, a rotating cast of chambermaids and errand girls, mirrored various shades of scandal, relief, and rage.

  “Oh, nothing important. Except Ying Yue, of course,” Li Jing giggled, tossing her words over her shoulder like flower petals. I never knew that Princess Changping’s most loyal maidservant would be a gossip.

  Ying Yue, goddess of restraint that she was, pinched Li Jing’s arm with the grace of someone who had absolutely had it. Li Jing stumbled away with a squeak which had been the responsible thing to do in the first place.

  “You’re so stupid,” Ying Yue snapped, looking at me now.

  I put down the tray I’d been balancing. “I know. Qi Qi already filled me in,” I replied smoothly.

  “If you think anyone here actually cares about your sorry little life,” Ying Yue hissed, “you’re deluded. Just don’t drag us down with your antiques.”

  Her words were vinegar, but her eyes betrayed her. That quiver. That half-second delay before she looked away. Relief, or the closest thing she could bring herself to express.

  I gave her the slightest nod and tugged at my sleeve, the cotton catching faintly on the rough scab beneath. If only she knew what was still crawling under my skin.

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  “Aha! Found it!”

  The voice came from across the kitchen, one of the younger maids, who’d been circling Ying Yue like a crow spotting something shiny. A second later, she held a tiny phial aloft like a war trophy.

  Ying Yue lunged, but the girl was quicker, skipping back with the arrogance only shared by the truly young and the truly annoying.

  “Ying Yue jiejie, if you really don’t care,” the girl said, waving the bottle, “then what’s this doing in your pocket? It’s for bruises and muscle aches. Sounds a lot like Su Tang’s condition, doesn’t it?”

  The girl twirled, and suddenly her face was far too close to mine. Big curious eyes, as though I were an oddity on a display stand.

  “I’m Pei Pei. Pleased to meet you!”

  I blinked at the hand she stuck out. What was I supposed to do with it? Admire the calluses? Predict her fortune from her palm lines?

  “I—pleased to meet you too?” I tried.

  She laughed and shoved the hand into her hair like it belonged there. “Don’t you remember me? I’m Chen Yahui’s maidservant.”

  As if that cleared anything up.

  Pei Pei pressed the bottle into my hand with all the subtlety of a bleating goat. “Some medicine from Ying Yue—I mean, something she just happened across. Totally not a gesture of concern or anything.”

  Her tone was bright as sunlight. Her words, not so much. She wasn’t just poking the bear—Ying Yue. She was hitting it with the stick, repeatedly, whilst grinning.

  Ying Yue pinched her lips so tight they nearly vanished. I offered her the smallest smile I had left. She looked away.

  “Show-off,” muttered Xue Wan’er, dragging attention back toward the coal stove. “Okay, party’s over. We’ve got work to do. Or rather, you all do.”

  The other girls started grumbling about laundry and linens, and began trickling out, leaving behind the scent of ginger, gossip, and woodsmoke.

  Only a few of us were left now.

  Pei Pei threw an arm around Wan’er’s shoulder. “Don’t be such a downer. Think about it—you survived. Even though your lady…”

  She didn’t finish the sentence, but her tone filled in the gaps.

  Wan’er shrugged her off like she was made of ash. “She didn’t. I know she didn’t.”

  Ying Yue scoffed. It was rather forward of her, but I could hear her seething. She had a near death experience all because of some unwarranted attack on the royal entourage. And if it the rumours were true, Ze Lujin’s sons, were the instigators.

  Wan’er’s eyes narrowed. “It was your jealous biǎozǐ of a lady who did this.”

  “How dare you?” Ying Yue spat, a full step forward. “You speak of the Empress like that? Ze Lujin is a lunatic, a murderer. It’s time she was put down like the rabid dog she is.”

  My arm twitched—pain coiling up like a ghost—and for a second, all I saw was blue. Blue like the veins that had surfaced under my skin, like the prince’s lips before the needle struck. Blue like the memory of the poison that hadn’t fully left my system.

  Wan’er smiled thinly. “Funny. I was wondering who was barking. Turns out it was you.”

  That was the final spark. Ying Yue screamed and flew at her; hands curled like claws. Pei Pei had to catch her mid-lunge while Wan’er stepped back, chin tilted like she didn’t care if she bled.

  I watched them for a moment, dazed by the violence, by the fact that we all had shadows now, cast by the same fire.

  “Hey! Enough.” Pei Pei forced herself between them, arms out. “We came here to welcome Su Tang, remember? This is not our fight. Not anymore.”

  Ying Yue paused. Her breathing was ragged, a single lock of hair slipping free from her strict bun like it, too, had had enough. “Yes,” she said, low and bitter. “You’re right.” Then she turned and left, her steps sharp, controlled, but her shadow flaring behind her like a storm cloud.

  My arm twitched again, this time with a flash of white pain. I masked it with a smile.

  “I’d best be going too,” I said softly. “Thank you…Pei Pei, was it? Yes. Thank you.”

  I pocketed the bottle and stepped out.

  Time to see him.

  To finish the case.