I Was Sent as Tribute to the Prince I Shot novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: The Emperor's Window

The Emperor of Liang lay in a bed by a window that looked down on the river.

He was sixty and looked eighty, with a yellow face and hands.

Two physicians stood against the wall.

He sent them out with a lift of one finger.

"Sit," he said.

His voice was a dry scrape.

Jiang did not sit.

He stood at the foot of the bed in his grey tribute robe.

The old man looked him up and down.

"You shot my son."

"Yes, Majesty."

"You are not sorry."

"I told him so."

"He told me."

The old man's mouth moved, and Jiang realized it was a smile.

"He laughed for the first time in a year.

My chamberlain wept."

Jiang said nothing.

The river slid by below, brown and slow, with ice at the edges.

"I'll ask you one thing, General, and I will know if you lie.

I am a sick man.

I won't be here at the solstice, whatever the Council thinks.

When I am gone, my son will have a Marshal at his throat and a Yan general in his bed.

Will you kill him in his sleep?"

It took Jiang a moment to answer, and he did not pick the words.

"I'd carry him out of a burning house first."

The Emperor was quiet.

Then he nodded once.

"He said something when he woke," he said.

"After the barge.

Fever for nine days.

On the tenth he opened his eyes and the first thing he asked for was a name.

Yours.

Cen said they would take your head.

My son said, 'Give him to me.'"

"Why?"

"I asked that too."

The old man turned his face to the window.

"He said, 'Because no one else will look at him properly.'

I did not understand it for a year.

I think I do now."

He closed his eyes.

"Go, General.

And guard the shoulder."

Jiang walked back through three courtyards with that sentence in his head.

No one else will look at him properly.

That night Lin was waiting in the dark.

He lay on the bed with his hair loose and his robe open to the waist.

A small jar of oil stood on the quilt beside him, orchid and something warmer.

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