The Girl King (The Girl King #1)(74)

But when her mother spoke again, it was of a much different subject: “You know that as empress, you will be expected to provide your emperor with an heir.”

Min felt her face heat in spite of herself. “Yes, of course.”

“You’re still young yet,” her mother reassured her. “Things being as uncertain as they were, it was necessary to wed you immediately. But it will be at least a year, likely more before you’re expected to even attempt to conceive. The physicians will first examine you, and the water priests will consult the stars and their vision pools to determine the most auspicious dates for conception.” Her mother sighed. “They did the same for me, though they were wrong about you by a good two months.”

“What about Lu?” Min asked, so lulled by the stroking in her hair and the rhythm of her voice that she forgot herself. Her mother’s fingers stuttered for a heartbeat but then resumed their steady plaiting.

Careful, Min scolded herself. What perverse impulse had driven her to ask that question?

“Lu,” her mother said tightly. “The monks did not see her coming at all. Perhaps Set is right to bring in that Brother of his. Perhaps the old mul ways no longer serve us as well as they once did. People say in the early days of the Hu conquest, when they still had their own religions, they would enlist their shamanesses for the job. Apparently, they were more accurate—”

“Shamanesses?” Min blurted, a flash of red obliterating her careful calm. “Like the Yunian shamanesses?”

Her mother’s hands stilled in her hair. “Yes, I suppose they were similar. Why? What do you know of the Yunian shamanesses?” The empress’s voice had gone odd and quiet, but it wasn’t dangerous, not yet.

“Just a bit, from my history lessons,” Min said quickly. She hadn’t had the exhaustive education that was granted her sister, but Amma Ruxin had taught her enough to hold a conversation.

“Is that all?” The empress reached the end of one plait and tied it off with a thong. She let the heavy rope fall. The hairs were laid less artfully than Min’s nunas were capable of. A few were pulled too tightly, and they tugged meanly at her scalp.

“Yes. That’s all,” Min forced her voice to be strong, as though saying a lie louder might make it true.

“I know girls your age tell their mothers everything,” Brother’s voice echoed in Min’s head.

Was that really so? Even before, she hadn’t told her mother everything, not truly. Not the contents of her dreams or how much she loathed her painting classes. Not when she ate an extra egg tart at dinner. Not the bawdy jokes Butterfly whispered to the room after the nunas had blown out the lamps.

She saw then in her mind’s eye the hairpin she had accidentally stolen off her mother’s vanity, the day of Lu’s aborted Betrothal Ceremony. A beautiful trinket of agate and pearl shaped like a lily. Butterfly had told the other nunas in hushed tones about how she’d heard from a maid that the empress had Amma Wei flogged for losing it. Min had felt terrible for a moment. But servants were terrible gossips, weren’t they? Everyone knew what they said wasn’t always true.

Min had threaded the pin into the plush underside of a chair, where not even the chambermaids would see it. The chair was scarcely two paces away from the empress. That was a secret. She had secrets.

Stupid trivial things, she told herself dismissively.

But how stupid and trivial were those things, really? If you piled enough little things together, they could grow quite big.

Maybe all those little things together were bigger even than what her mother did know of her.

What was it that her mother knew of her? Just her too-round face and unkempt hair. That she was milder than her sister, more obedient, kinder, slower. Younger. Smaller. In the end was that really anything at all? A daughter understood only in relief—defined by what she wasn’t.

Her mother’s hands moved over her hair again, lacquered nails combing down loose hairs, scraping lightly against Min’s scalp.

“I was thinking,” the empress murmured. “With things being so hectic in the capital now, it might be nice for you to take a trip somewhere, before it gets too cold. Maybe the summer palace out east, or my family’s manor in Bei Province. You’ve never met my side of the family. It’s about time.”

Min turned in surprise. “Would Set come?”

“No, of course not. He has duties here.”

“I,” Min hesitated. “I heard he would go north again to lead the fight against Yunis.”

“That is one idea some people are insisting on feeding him.” Min had a good idea who those some people her mother was referring to might be—one person in particular. “It’s absurd. He needs to stay here. Things being as they are, everyone is still gauging whether he is deserving of their loyalty. The court is full of snakes, and he must put in time courting those he can sway, and excising those he cannot. Controlling the empire means first controlling the capital. But there’s no reason why you and I can’t enjoy some time away while he settles things here.”

“But . . . I’ve only just married. I’m not supposed to—I can’t leave my husband so soon. I need to stay here and help him”—Min’s voice faltered—“don’t I?”

Her mother turned toward the vanity, setting the scattered bottles and combs there to right. “Like I said, Set is very busy, child. He has much to attend to.”