A young man near the end of the hall bows. “Imperial Majesty, I live to serve!”
“Go to the brothel where the Merchant Prince is staying. Summon him and his retinue.”
Throughout history, scholars of all stripes have agreed on one thing: It is unwise to question an absolute sovereign. It is especially stupid to do so when—as in Hokkaro—that sovereign rules by divine mandate. If O-Shizuka wanted, she could have the entire staff executed. All it would take was a simple word to the guards to kill every single person in that hallway. Easy as breathing.
The palace staff is conscious of this. O-Shizuka has a fiery temper, it is true—but she has yet to have anyone killed. In this, as in all things, she improves upon her uncle Yoshimoto. Not a week passed on his watch without an execution. It reminded people, he said, of the divine order.
O-Shizuka does not kill servants who displease her. She dismisses them. If they greatly displease her, or if they commit a crime, she metes out judgment as she sees fit. Few say she is kind—she has not been kind since Ink-on-Water—but none say she is unfair. In her three reigning years, she’s lopped off ten ears, ten right hands and ten left hands; she’s made perverts leave her presence stark naked and blooded; she’s had the tongues of would-be blackmailers served to them on platters.
O-Shizuka does not kill her servants. But she is not kind to criminals.
Knowing this—knowing her reputation for swift justice, knowing that he exists solely at her whim—the young man speaks up. “Imperial Majesty, Fire of the Heavens, it is Last Bell,” he says. “If the Merchant Prince is awake, he is surely entangled with the entertainment—”
“You were not asked for your opinion,” O-Shizuka says, and the young man recoils as if he’s been cut. “I do not care if you have to pull him out of her yourself. You shall bring him and his retinue to me, immediately.”
The young man touches his forehead to the ground and leaves.
The Empress arrives in the throne room. Her guards turn their backs to shield her modesty; she has not yet stopped to think about it. No, as she sinks onto the Phoenix Throne, only one thing is on her mind.
She is an idiot. For the past two days, she’s isolated herself to read Shefali’s letter. For the past two days, she’s insisted on refusing all audiences, even that of the Merchant Prince of Sur-Shar. Prince Debelo.
The very same Debelo Shefali was traveling with two years ago, when she departed for the Mother’s Womb. The very same Debelo who sheltered her, whom she spoke of as a friend, has been here in Fujino for two days.
She wants to scream. Can it be possible? Can it be that Shefali has been in this city for so long, and O-Shizuka has not felt her near? Have they been apart so long?
Though the brothel is not far, the messenger seems to take an eternity. Eighty gold and jade pillars cast eighty flickering shadows by torchlight, each one a false promise. Her mind shapes them into tall, bowlegged silhouettes.
Why has he not yet returned? Does it take so long to round up a Merchant Prince and fifty retainers? Does it take so long to pay singing girls? What if they were attacked? What if, when they arrive, Shefali is not with them?
What will she say then? What excuse will she give to the prince?
No. Too many thoughts, too many things she does not want to take care of at the moment.
Except that if she left—if she walked the streets of Fujino after Last Bell in her nightgown—she’d be there by now. She’d know. She’d be wrapped in Shefali’s warm embrace. Why hadn’t she gone on her own? This waiting is agony, like an arrowhead digging into muscle. She tries to remind herself that she cannot leave the palace whenever she wants. Dark swords hide everywhere, and if she dies now, then there will be no one to follow her.
Shizuka tries to tell herself this, but she knows full well she would slay anyone who crossed her.
But the thing is done already. And there sits the Empress of Hokkaro on the Phoenix Throne, in her nightgown. If any of the guards turned, they’d catch sight of her sacred collarbones, her delicate ankles, her pearl toenails. Each lock of unbound hair is a brushstroke against her pale skin.
Yes, if the guards turned now, they’d see O-Shizuka glowing. She’s been known to do it on occasion. It is a soft glow, no brighter than a candle, but it wraps around her like a cloak. No one dares mention it to her. No one mentions the Empress’s mangled ear; of course no one mentions how she sometimes becomes a paper lantern.
It is their little secret. Their confirmation that, for all her temper and her arrogance, O-Shizuka’s blood runs gold with divinity. For they have all seen it: when she is angry, it takes sharp shapes; when she is excited, the aura stands on end.
But it is there. And it is especially visible now, in the dark, the most visible it has ever been.
The Empress is glowing.
After no more than an hour’s time, the messenger returns. He scrambles through the great doors alone and falls to his knees.
“The others?” asks O-Shizuka.
“They are following, Imperial Majesty,” he says. “One of them carries a phoenix feather!”
O-Shizuka rises.
The air tastes different. Like milk, she thinks. Like fermented milk and horses. Like the cutting cold winds of the steppes.
Her heart drops to her knees, her breath leaves her for some distant land. She runs. Bare feet meet cold tile. Yes, she can feel it now—the painful thrumming in her chest, her lungs burning, her whole being vibrating at once.
And when O-Shizuka throws open the doors to the palace, when she gazes upon the expansive courtyard and gardens her ancestors built, she has eyes only for one.
Bare feet against stone.
First Bell rings inside the palace. The sky above is rich with stars, each one the soul of an honorable person, each one looking on in envy as the two lovers are reunited.
For, yes, there is Barsalyya Shefali, wearing her tiger-striped deel. Strapped to her back is the bow no man can fire. Her left eye is a steel peony covered in filmy black. Hanging from a cord around her neck is the laughing fox mask. An iridescent phoenix feather is tucked behind her ear, though the feather pales in comparison to the laughing green of Shefali’s right eye.
And, yes, she has changed a bit. Her full cheeks are hollowing out; her warm brown skin is turning charcoal gray. Pointed ears peek out beneath her now dull blond hair. And when she sees O-Shizuka, when she smiles wide as the Wall of Stone, her teeth are all pointed.
But it is Shefali all the same.
O-Shizuka runs into her wife’s embrace.
The rest can wait.
Read on for more in the world of
THE TIGER’S DAUGHTER
An early found remnant of the unfinished memoir by the Poet Prince, O-Itsuki
CREATURE OF BEAUTY, CREATURE OF TRUTH
If in twenty years I die, with Minami Shizuru at my side, then I wish for two things to be made known to the whole Empire.
First: I died happy.