Chapter 12: The Hall of Wounds

The Hall of Wounds stood at the top of the palace hill, and it took eighty-one steps to reach.

Jiang climbed them with his wrists tied in red cord and a jade comb in his sleeve.

Lin walked beside him in white ceremonial silk, with his hair bound under a gold circlet and his face smooth as lacquer.

He did not look at Jiang once.

His fingers brushed Jiang's at the fortieth step.

That was all.

The hall was a long dim room with black pillars and a floor of dark stone.

Forty elders in black caps sat in two rows along the walls.

Above them hung banners with a hundred years of royal wounds stitched on them in gold thread.

An arrow, a sword, a poisoned cup, a fall from a horse.

At the far end stood an altar of black lacquer with a glass case on it.

Jiang could not see inside from the door.

Wen Lanxi stood at the back with a pale face and a roll of papers.

Du Heng was beside him in a clean servant's coat, trying to stand like a man who was not about to be sick.

In the gallery, in the third row, in mourning white, sat the widow.

She had come.

Jiang did not know what that meant.

"The Council is met," Cen said.

He stood at the head of the right-hand row with his gold armor polished and a jade rod of office in his hand.

"For the Rite of Answering, as the law has stood since the founding.

A wound to the blood royal has been given.

It is for the wounded to say, with the Council's voice, whether it is answered in blood or in mercy."

Keep reading free with an account. Start I Was Sent as Tribute to the Prince I Shot from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.