Zhiyi’s gaze slid across the attendants hovering behind me. “Leave us.” She did not raise her voice, yet it was laced with unmistakable authority. Without a protest, they hurried out, closing the doors after them.

“Are all royal children born with that skill?” I asked.

She sat down, arranging her skirts as they pooled on the floor. “When I lived here, I preferred to be alone. There were too many who spied on me, on my stepmother’s behalf.”

“I am sorry they did.” Not for the first time, I was grateful for my own childhood, simple and solitary though it had been.

“When your wedding date is set, I will return.” Her smile dazzled, an echo of Liwei flashing in her black eyes. “We will soon be sisters.”

Wedding? I reeled from her words, spoken with such sincerity and certainty, unlike the whispers of the court. “Liwei and I are not betrothed.”

Her smile vanished. “Why do you look so frightened? I thought you wanted this, that you cared for my brother. It is certainly what everyone else believes.”

I met her stare without flinching, tired of strangers prying into my affairs. “That is between Liwei and me.”

Her face hardened as she stood. “A warning then. Do not toy with my brother’s heart. I will not forgive you if you do.” Without another word, she strode toward the door.

“Wait!” A question sprang to my lips, one I had not known I wanted to ask. “Do you regret it? All you gave up to live in the Mortal Realm?” The crown had been her heritage, but it would be my shackle.

She did not speak at first, toying with the jade bangles on her wrist. “No, because what I gained was far more. It’s not a sacrifice when there is love enough.” Her eyes fixed on me. “A question in exchange for yours. Do you love Liwei?”

“Yes.” The barest pause, but it was the truth. I would always love him—yet doubt tugged at me still.

For while I had loved Liwei first, I had loved another after. One who had given his life for mine, whom I could not forget. I was learning that death had the kindness of diminishing one’s sins, allowing one to remember the good in them. When Wenzhi had been alive, all I recalled were his treachery and wrongs. But now I could finally think of him without the taint of bitterness, and it gave new clarity to all he had said and done since I let him back into my life.

“I am glad.” She hesitated, before adding, “If not, it would be a greater kindness to end things now.”

I did not reply, irked by her presumption—my temper had grown shorter of late. And yet there was also a trickle of relief that there was another path. I had a choice, difficult though it would be.