Chapter 3 · free to read
The banquet exposed Consort Li. But a knife has a hand behind it, and Wanqing's chambers still keep her secrets from me.
A false bottom. And beneath it, a ledger written in a cramped, familiar hand.
I knew that ink. The oak-gall black we brewed in the apothecary. And the fold — the physician's fold, taught only in my own workroom.
But the entries were sealed in cipher. Numbers wearing masks. I trained on a key-scroll that could strip those masks away.
Artwork and narration generated with AI.