Chapter 13

Shen Yulan's courtyard- Orchid Pavilion...

Inside the Orchid Pavilion, once the pride of the eastern wing, porcelain shattered like birds hitting glass.

A second vase followed the first, its blue glaze catching the lamplight a second too long before it exploded against the floor, shards spraying across the marble like ice over black water.

"Useless!" Shen Yulan's scream ricocheted off the carved eaves. "All of you—useless!"

She stood amidst the ruin like a painting torn from its frame. Her chest rose and fell in ragged waves beneath embroidered gauze, sleeves twisted around clenched fists like silk strangling a bird. Her hair—once her pride, once the envy of every girl at the poetry gatherings—had come half-undone, ink-dark strands clinging to her cheek, her temples.

At her feet, a servant girl knelt on the cold marble, her forehead nearly brushing the floor. A fresh handprint bloomed across her left cheek, deepening from pink to crimson with each second.

"M-Miss, we… we couldn't—"

"Shut up!"

Shen Yulan's scream cracked like a whip. She swept her hand across her vanity. A lacquered box of rouge skidded across the surface and tipped, spilling in a dusty pink arc across the floor. Hairpins crashed like miniature spears. Jade bracelets, a mother-of-pearl comb, a silver mirror—all the treasures that once adorned her—scattered in chaos.

For a heartbeat, no one moved. The only sound was the faint drip, drip of oil from a cracked lamp onto the floor.

And then—like a storm breaking through a brittle silence—came the voice.

"Enough."

Su Wanning's voice didn't rise. It didn't need to. Its softness was worse than a slap.

The pavilion's doorway framed her like a painting in dusk: a silhouette of elegance turned cold steel. Her robes were a deep plum, the golden peonies embroidered across her chest gleaming in the flickering light. The candle flames caught in her earrings—dangling bloodstones that swung slightly as she entered—and made them seem to pulse.

Shen Yulan froze. Her fury stilled, but it hadn't cooled. It trembled just beneath her skin, making her jaw tighten, her eyes shine with unshed rage.

Su Wanning's gaze swept the wreckage, the kneeling servant, the cloud of rouge still lingering like blood in the air.

Then her eyes locked on her daughter. "You think this helps?" she said quietly, stepping inside, skirts brushing against the broken porcelain. "Screaming like a child, throwing tantrums like a market brat—do you want to give her more to laugh about?"

Shen Yulan turned to her, lips trembling, hands trembling harder.

"She humiliated me, Mother! She made me a fool in front of everyone—Father, the servants, the housekeepers—she twisted everything! She made herself look clever, and me—like I was…" Her voice cracked. "Like I was petty. Jealous."

"And were you not?" Su Wanning asked, her voice still calm. "You let your temper win. You gave her everything she needed."

"I was trying to protect us! To protect you!" Shen Yulan shouted. "She—she used Father against me! Do you know what he said afterward? He said I should learn restraint. He's never said that to me before. Never!"

Su Wanning's lips thinned. "I've already told you before, there was something unsettling with her. But you said that I was just reading in too much at that time. If I've not told you to watch her closely, we might never have discovered just how deep she was hiding herself."

Shen Yulan's breath hitched. She sank onto the cushioned stool before her shattered vanity, silk rustling like dry leaves. "She's different now. It's not just her words. It's her eyes. The way she looks at people—it's cold. Detached. Like she's playing a game and we don't even know the rules anymore."

Su Wanning stepped closer, her footsteps measured, precise, the hem of her robe parting the scattered shards like a blade through ice.

"She's changed," Shen Yulan whispered, still staring at the floor. "She used to flinch when I raised my voice. Now she smiles. Smiles, Mother."

There was silence.

Then Su Wanning reached out and cupped her daughter's face. Not gently. Not harshly either. Just firmly. Controlled.

"Then don't let her climb any higher."

Shen Yulan blinked, startled.

"Let her build her illusion," Su Wanning continued. "The perfect daughter. The wronged heir. Let her gather sympathy, forge connections, pretend to be reborn. The higher she rises, the more it will hurt when she falls. And she will fall."

Shen Yulan's eyes sharpened. "You have a plan."

"I always have a plan."

Shen Yulan leaned forward, her pulse quickening despite herself. "Tell me."

Su Wanning's hand dropped from her daughter's cheek. She stepped back and folded her arms behind her, the gold-threaded sash at her waist catching a shimmer of light.

"She wants to be the phoenix rising from ashes," Su Wanning said, voice low and deliberate. "Let her. But what do people fear more than arrogance dressed as humility?"

"…Madness," Shen Yulan murmured.

"Exactly."

Su Wanning turned and paced to the latticed window, pushing aside the bamboo blinds. Outside, the wind stirred the garden's shadows. In the moonlight, the outline of a swaying plum tree flickered—petals drifting like snow.

"We start with the servants," she said. "The quiet ones, the ones who gossip most. The maids in the back kitchens, the old women who sweep the corridors at dusk. Plant whispers. Just enough."

"That she's unstable?" Shen Yulan guessed, brows lifting.

"That she's… unraveling." Su Wanning turned, eyes sharp. "Say she talks to shadows. That she wakes screaming at night. That she spends hours alone in her late mother's room, staring at walls. Don't accuse her outright. Let the servants wonder."

Shen Yulan's mouth twisted into a cruel smile. "A little fear goes further than a hundred insults."

"And it spreads faster," Su Wanning said with a nod. "Especially when it's dressed as concern. We're not slandering her, no, no. We're simply worried. She's suffered so much, after all. Her mother died, her reputation shattered… no wonder she's not herself."

Shen Yulan began to pace, the pieces falling into place. "And if someone repeats it to Father…"

"He won't believe it at first," Su Wanning said. "But doubt is like rot. It starts quiet. Then it spreads."

Shen Yulan's expression turned calculating. "And once people think she's unstable, she'll lose their trust. No one would believe her. No one would want to visit her."

"Isolation is our goal," Su Wanning agreed. "No allies. No visitors. Let them treat her like a cracked vase—too beautiful to discard, too dangerous to hold."

A moment of quiet passed between them, heavy with implication.

"And if she fights back?" Shen Yulan asked, eyes narrowed.

"Then it only proves the whispers were true," Su Wanning replied, her voice silk-wrapped steel. "Let her shout. Let her strike. The more erratic she seems, the easier it is to say she's slipping."

A slow, gleaming smile curved Shen Yulan's lips.

"She thinks she's already won," she said. "That today's little performance at the family hall made her untouchable."

"She's mistaken," Su Wanning said, walking back toward the divan. Her robe brushed past a sliver of porcelain, and the faint chime it made as it shifted under her heel sounded like a funeral bell. "The storm hasn't passed, child. It hasn't even begun."

Shen Yulan sank into the cushions beside her mother, shoulders no longer trembling, her mask of elegance sliding back into place.

"She's clever now," she said. "Colder. Stronger. But she's still alone. Still grieving. Still pretending to be someone she's not."

"Exactly." Su Wanning reached for a folded fan from the side table and flicked it open with a soft snap. "A girl who hides her claws must be taught she's not the only one who knows how to draw blood."

Their eyes met. And for the first time that evening, a quiet understanding passed between them—one not of comfort, but of shared cruelty, honed like a blade.

Outside, the wind stirred the garden again, rattling the bamboo blinds like distant applause.

Inside the Orchid Pavilion, mother and daughter sat together amid the wreckage—two serpents in silk, their venom pooled in silence.

The house believed the storm had ended.

But storms, as it turned out, could wear perfume too.