But knowing didn’t make it easier.
“Remember what I told you,” she whispered. “You are Emperor now. Emperors do what must be done.”
I closed my eyes and took one breath, then a second.
Then I opened my eyes and lit the pyre.
Flames consumed my brother, consumed the silk, the carefully arranged dignity, the illusion that he’d died peacefully. Within moments, there was nothing but fire and smoke and heat fierce enough to sear.
I stepped back, handed the torch to the priest, and watched.
We all watched.
Two pyres climbed toward heaven, smoke rising like prayers. The heat was immense, the light blinding, the sound like a living thing—crackle and roar and the deep, hollow boom as green wood exploded in the flames.
Mother made a sound, something worse than a scream. It was a low, broken keen that came from somewhere deeper than her chest. Her knees buckled, and her ladies caught her, held her upright while she stared at Kioshi’s pyre with those terrible, burning eyes.
I wanted to go to her, wanted to hold her hand, to share her grief, to be her son one final time before tomorrow came.
But emperors stood alone.
So I stood alone and watched my family burn.
Chapter 27
Haru
That night, after the funerals, I couldn’t be alone. The priests insisted solitude was the foundation of tranquility—or some such nonsense—and had locked me in my chamber with a pot of tea and a single cup. The least they could’ve done was leave a bottle of sake. A post-funeral, pre-coronation night deserved that much, didn’t it?
I tried to surrender to seclusion. I really tried.
I’d dismissed my servants, waved away the guards, and retreated to my chambers with every intention of spending my final hours of being human in quiet contemplation, but the silence was unbearable.
In the quiet, all I could hear was Mother’s broken keen.
All I could see was smoke rising from the pyres.
All I could taste was ash.
A knock came just after midnight.
“Haru?” Esumi’s voice, soft through the door.
Relief flooded through me. “Get in here.”
He slipped through the door and closed it behind him. His eyes found mine in the lamplight, and I saw my own exhaustion reflected back.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, but there was no force behind it.
“Probably not.” He crossed the room slowly. “But I thought . . . you might not want to be alone tonight. It’s your last night before everything changes.”
My throat tightened. “How did you know?”
He grunted what sounded like a strangled laugh. “Because I know you.” He stopped close enough that I could feel his warmth. “And because your grandmother told me you’d need someone. She said, and I quote, ‘My little fish shouldn’t spend his last human night alone with his thoughts. They’ll eat him alive. Besides, that boy thinking scares me more than all thewakoships in the harbor.’”
Despite everything, I barked out a laugh. “She said that?”
“She also said if I hurt you, she’d have me thrown from the palace walls. I’m taking a calculated risk here.”
