The next morning, Prince Jing’s residence received a familiar visitor.
Shang Luoshu had expected Lu Yinxi to come—he’d even been warned she intended to visit that day—but he had not expected her to arrive so early. That could only mean the matter she wanted to raise was urgent.
“Your Highness.” The girl bowed with formal precision. Seeing the seriousness in her eyes, the prince dismissed the servants waiting about without a word.
“You sent word last night saying you wished to see me on urgent business. What is it?” he asked.
“I want to work with you. I want to bring down Regent Shang Mozheng.”
Her opening line hit like a blow.
Who in the realm dared speak like that? Most would be thought mad or suicidal to voice such a thing. Yet Lu Yinxi said it with quiet certainty; her phoenix-bright eyes held nothing of fear—only resolute purpose.
Shang Luoshu’s pulse skipped. Yesterday, when she’d come begging to save her father, she’d shown a mixture of fearless streak and tremulous dread toward Regent Mozheng. Tonight she had none of that. Whatever had happened overnight, it had steeled her into a singular courage.
“What do you mean by this, Miss Lu?” he asked.
She bit her lower lip, then spoke plainly. “I don’t like beating around the bush. Prince Jing, you want Regent Shang removed too, don’t you? I could tell from the fact you planted eyes inside his household.”
“You were told by Minister Lu,” Shang Luoshu said without question. Lu Yinxi’s look confirmed he’d guessed right.
A strange flush rose to his face and he hurried to explain. “Don’t misunderstand—this is recent knowledge. I’ve been looking into it these last few days. I planned to tell you directly, but what happened those years ago… it’s difficult to describe—”
“Harsh?” Lu Yinxi finished for him with a small, bitter smile. She even nodded as if confirming a fact. “Yes. It was cruel.”
The mother driven to madness at the mere mention of the Regent. The ancestral house reduced to a single remaining bloodline. The manor overrun by cruel servants, the original owners reduced to scraping by. Any listener would call those events brutal.
She pressed her emotions back down until her voice was hoarse and steady. “So, Prince Jing—will you work with me? You know I have a word-power.” One sentence from her could end the Regent’s life.
Shang Luoshu felt the appeal of her offer. He had chosen to step away from the battlefield years ago and live the life of a nonchalant prince at court in order to help the young emperor reclaim what was rightfully his. Born an orphan, he had been taken in by the late emperor at six and publicly declared the emperor’s adopted son. From nothing to the emperor’s child—that was a leap few could imagine. Even after the emperor’s death, Shang Luoshu had never forgotten his gratitude and reverence. When the current emperor sought his help three years ago to reclaim imperial power, he bent his will to the task. The outward image was a harmless, genial prince; behind closed doors he raised confidants and trained troops in secret. All of it was preparation to remove Regent Mozheng.
He had expected the day to come in some far-off future; he had not expected it to arrive so suddenly.
“What’s your plan?” he asked at last, shaking himself free from memory.
Lu Yinxi’s expression hardened. She had the power to kill the Regent with a single sentence—but Shang Luoshu’s hesitation was reasonable. What would become of the networks and forces Regent Mozheng had built? What of the secret army he controlled? Officially the Regent avoided touching military power, but from gathered whispers Shang Luoshu had learned a secret force existed in the Regent’s hand. If Mozheng were killed and that army were left unattended, it could explode into disaster.
Shang Luoshu had been a general once; he had seen war enough to dread the chaos of an uncontrolled army. He did not want to exchange one tyrant for a different kind of ruin.
Lu Yinxi watched him. His dark gaze was often shadowed; she could not see his full thoughts, but the silence told her enough.
“Do you not want to cooperate with me?” she asked flatly. “Or do you not want the Regent dead?”
“Neither.” He shook his head. “Do you think killing the Regent will make everything right?”
“Wouldn’t it?” she asked, blunt and practical in a way only someone who’d survived the worst could be. To her, Regent Mozheng was like the overlord of a horde of shambling corpses—slay the leader and the rest would scatter. “Kill him and the others lose their head. Shouldn’t that be easy enough?”
“It’s not that simple.” Shang Luoshu’s voice was quiet but firm.
Across the city, in a dimly lit study, Lin Zihan had been bent over documents so long his shoulder ached. “Young Minister,” a clerk said, placing piles of testimony on the desk, “the statements from the households of those officials are all here.”
“Leave them.” Lin Zihan barely looked up; his brush still danced across paper.
The several officials implicated in the spring examinations scandal had all died on the same night—each dispatched cleanly by a single stroke. That kind of work had the mark of professionals. Given the victims’ posts in the Ministry of Rites and the backers who stood behind them, Lin Zihan had a suspect in mind. What he lacked was proof.
Fortune favored persistence. After twenty-four hours of interviews, a minor servant finally produced something.
“Reporting to you, sir—when I went out that night, I heard some noise. I was too tired to notice much, but—I found this.”
Without warning, the servant’s hand stilled and Lin Zihan found himself holding an ordinary iron token—the sort messengers and minor officers of the city carried. But a minute mark had been stamped in the upper right-hand corner: a tiny character, wolf.
“Wolf Guard,” Lin Zihan muttered. The name leapt into his head. Rumors had long swirled through the capital about Regent Shang’s fearsome Wolf Guard—men reputed to kill within ten paces and vanish without a trace. If they had done this, it would explain the swift, clinical deaths.
“Minister Zhang is here.” The newcomer’s voice snapped Lin out of thought. He slid the token into his sleeve.
“Why has Teacher come?” Lin Zihan asked. It was the first time they’d spoken since a quarrel, and the question held a cautious note.
Minister Zhang did not answer his question. Instead he thrust his hand forward. “Give it.”