東方之日兮。
彼姝者子、在我室兮。
在我室兮、履我即兮。
***
Evening had fallen over the Imperial Palace, the peony blossoms slowly moved with the wind. The trees were almost empty now that Autumn had arrived, and under normal circumstances Xiān Chí would have been outside since the earliest morning light.
Normal circumstances. She would have wandered through the gardens, let her hands graze through the many flowers slowly descending from the sky, and stayed till the night guards had told her she truly needed to go back inside.
Now she had stayed inside as she had done for months before and would for many more. No walks outside following the traces of the peony blossom in the moonlight, her skin paler than when she was brought into the palace.
Her hand laid against the window, Xiān Chí had no strength left to hammer against the bars of her prison. All that had left her long ago, when she had still hope to leave this ruined place. Hope.
Hope had pulled her through those first few months when the pain and grieve had still laid close on her chest. It had made her believe she would be released once everything became clear. When the real perpetrators were found and prosecuted for their crime.
Hope had made her believe the key in her pocket would actually lead somewhere.
Now she knew better, it was all a lie. No one would come apart from the maids that spoke no words and pushed leftover food through a hole in the only door in the cold palace. No one would come to set her free, tell her what had happened after she was put away. No one would be found guilty as they had already someone to blame.
Motive, opportunity, and no alibi to speak of.
It had been over and done before it even began. Locked up in the Cold Palace without a single other soul, a place so far away from anyone else that even the sounds of festivities couldn't reach her in the dead of night. Only a rusted old key left within, yet no lock to use it for.
Her freedom long forgotten, withered away like the peony blossom once winter came.
***
The sun is in the east,
And that lovely girl, is in my chamber.
She is in my chamber; she treads in my footsteps, and comes to me.
《東方之日 - Dong Fang Zhi Ri》 Odes of Qi
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Eastern Sun
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