Mingyu let the thought sit where it wanted to sit, knowing that the palace outside this little box would not like the shape of it.
Plenty of men still loved calligraphy more than clean streets. They would compose essays on hospitality while their kitchens went empty. They would forget that his wife, the soon to be Empress slept because he had put her there, not because ink had decreed the right to silence.
"We will treat them like guests," he said at last, "until they behave like dangers."
Deming's brows arched. "And then?"
Mingyu looked at the broken seal on the table. He thought of the cool curve of Xinying's forehead against his mouth, of the weight she had allowed him to take for a moment without trying to carry it herself. He thought of the way she had said I ended it without raising her voice and watched a room full of men remember their spines.
"And then," he continued, a small smile on his face, "we will be polite." A beat. "And final."
