Chapter 18: Pins

Murong Yue's hair reached the backs of her knees, and it took Qinglan most of an hour to pin it.

The dressing room was grey with early light.

Chunyu had laid out the ritual robes on a stand: scarlet silk, gold phoenixes, a heavy crown frame of gold filigree and kingfisher feathers.

Then she had looked at the two women, at the stool, at the comb in Qinglan's hand, and gone out.

She had closed the door without being asked.

Yue sat on the stool in her white under-robe, her back to Qinglan, as straight as a spear.

"You are slow," she said.

"I'm careful. It's thirty years of hair."

"Seventeen."

"You said it reached your knees at seventeen?"

"It was shorter."

"Hold still."

Qinglan drew the comb from the nape to the ends, again and again, and watched the black length gather its shine.

She twisted the first section up and around, and pinned it with a long gold pin shaped like a crane.

"Tight?"

"No."

"Tell me when it hurts."

"It does not hurt. It is simply a great deal of hair."

Qinglan took the second section, and the third, building the coil at the crown.

Her fingers brushed the back of Yue's neck every time, and every time she felt the smallest hitch in the Dowager's breath.

She set a pin.

She touched the skin under the ear.

Yue's shoulders rose.

"Qinglan."

"Hm?"

"You are doing it on purpose."

"I'm testing your pulse."

She leaned down, laid two fingers on the side of the pale throat where the vein ran, and counted.

It was fast.

"Rice," she said.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Empress Dowager's Pulse Raced for the Palace Physician from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.