The following morning, Li Yun found himself staring into the koi pond in the southern garden, his reflection distorted by the ripples.
The surface was calm. But beneath it, fish circled in slow, deliberate patterns—always watching. Always silent.
Just like this household.
He hadn't slept.
Not after what he read in his mother's letter.
He had gone through seven more. Each spoke in guarded words, describing things he hadn't seen as a child—faint tremors in the night, servants who vanished, secret meetings between his father and masked figures from distant sects.
But one name repeated, over and over.
Shen Lihua.
Lady Shen.
His stepmother.
His father's second wife.
The woman who now lingered in his memories and stood too close in the corridors of his mind.
She knew something. That much was clear.
What he didn't know was whether she had been a victim… or a player in the very game that took his mother's life.
The sound of soft footsteps stirred the air.
He didn't look back.
"I expected you to find me here," he said.
Lady Shen stepped up beside him. She wore a pale lavender robe today, her hair tied in a high knot with a silver comb. Calm. Controlled. Regal.
"I knew you'd have questions," she said.
He turned to her, expression unreadable. "What I want is the truth."
"And if the truth hurts you?"
He didn't blink. "I'd rather bleed than be blind."
Lady Shen looked away. "Then let me show you."
She led him deeper into the garden, past the well-manicured hedges and into the wilder parts of the estate where no servants dared go. Here, weeds grew between stones, and vines crept over forgotten shrines.
"This place was my sanctuary when I first arrived," she said. "Your father didn't like it. Said it reminded him too much of the past."
Yun's gaze didn't waver. "The past you shared with my mother?"
Lady Shen stopped walking.
"No," she said slowly. "The past he wanted buried."
She knelt by a worn stone tablet half-consumed by moss. With a single gesture, she brushed it clean.
A name emerged—faint, almost erased.
Li Mei.
His mother.
Yun swallowed. "This isn't her grave."
"No," Lady Shen said. "It's the last place she ever prayed before she died."
There was incense. Burned offerings. A jade token with a broken string.
"She knew she was being watched," Lady Shen continued. "Your father suspected her of conspiring with outer sects. She came here to ask the ancestors for clarity. For protection."
Yun stared at the token. "Why didn't you help her?"
"I tried."
He turned on her. "Then why did she say not to trust you? Why did she write it in every letter?"
Lady Shen's lips parted. Pain flickered through her eyes, but she didn't retreat.
"Because I lied to her."
That stopped him.
"I was sent here by the Azure Pavilion Sect," she said. "As a spy."
Yun's eyes widened. "You were what?"
"They wanted to know what deals your father made in secret—what forbidden arts he was buying. I was meant to gather information, nothing more."
Her voice cracked slightly.
"But then I met your mother. And she… she treated me like a sister. Like someone who belonged. I warned her, once. Subtly. But she didn't believe me. She trusted your father too much."
Yun's voice turned cold. "And when he ordered her death?"
Lady Shen clenched her fists. "I begged him to spare her. He told me to choose—my allegiance, or my life."
Silence wrapped around them like smoke.
"And you chose yourself," Yun said bitterly.
"I chose you," she said sharply. "I knew he would marry again, and I made sure I was the one he chose. So I could watch over you. Protect you from what took her."
His mind raced. Too many truths. Too many lies.
He looked down at the token again.
"Why tell me now?"
"Because someone else in the manor has started moving again. The same person who orchestrated your exile."
Yun narrowed his eyes. "Who?"
She shook her head. "I don't have proof. Not yet. But they're after your mother's paintings. They contain things—marks, sigils—that she discovered in her final weeks. Hidden curses. Rituals your father's allies were preparing."
Yun clenched his fists.
He thought he'd left the war behind at the sect.
But it had followed him home.
That night, he sat in his room again, unfolding another letter.
This one was different. Not a message. A map.
The back garden. The lotus well. Midnight.
A location and a time.
A trap? Or one last message left for him to find?
He didn't care.
He would go.
And he'd finally learn whether his mother's ghost whispered from love…
Or warning.