Eastasianinspired Stories

A quiet artist's retreat. A familiar stranger. A cherry tree that shouldn't still be blooming. Deep in the misty mountains of ancient China, a young apprentice lives a quiet life of craftsmanship and silence under a master known only as Lao-shi. Their days are simple. wood, study, and stillness until the sky cracks open and fire rains down. In one night, everything is lost. Some places don't stay buried. And some pasts refuse to burn.

The Imperial House is the Emperor's Garden, and the beautiful consorts who live within its gleaming walls are his Flowers. But beneath the dazzling elegance, the insidious poison of an unknown malice seeps. As whispers of a curse abound, the Emperor orders Lord Jukai to bring the White Sage to the Golden Palace, to weed out the blight that festers in his House. The White Sage is the greatest physician under the sun - or so they say. He can cure any disease, bring the dead back to life, return sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf and speech to the mute. Some say that he is a witch, or a sorcerer of great and terrible power. Others say that he even knows the secrets to the elixir of immortality. But the White Sage is far from what the stories make him out to be - for he, is in fact, a she. And whilst Suyin is no witch or sorcerer, she is a competent medicine-woman, a skilled amateur surgeon, and an expert in poisons. Reluctantly investigating the 'curse' that afflicts the Imperial House, Suyin begins to unravel a torturous web of secrets and lies that has taken root in the Emperor's household. As she discovers, for all her knowledge and expertise, sometimes the most lethal poison lies within the hearts of people.

Evelyn Liora Wrenford did not plan on being dropped into a palace full of silk, secrets, and suspiciously perfect people. She has no title, no clue what's happening, and apparently a talent for noticing things she shouldn't. She's not here to be important. She's just trying not to trip on the floor again.