Spring in the capital did not arrive all at once. It crept in quietly, hiding in the cracks between training days.
Lan Yue measured it in three ways.
First, in the plum tree.
At the start, its branches had been dark and bare against the grey sky. Then, one morning when she stumbled out after drills to gulp water from the basin, she saw the first tight bud—a small, hard knot of white at the tip of a branch.
The next week, after a particularly brutal set of laps, the tree was dusted with blossoms. Pale petals clung to her hair when the wind stirred. She didn't mind. She let them stay until they fell on their own, scattered ghosts on her sleeves.
Second, in the drills.
At first, every lap felt like drowning; every form left her arms shaking. Gradually, the drowning became swimming, the shaking became a deep, manageable ache. Her feet found the rhythm of the parade ground. Her falls grew fewer; when she hit the dirt, she rolled and stood faster.
Drillmaster Han still barked at her. The juniors still groaned when he added laps. But the smirks when she joined the line turned first to curiosity, then to a cautious kind of acceptance.
By the time the plum blossoms began to drop in earnest, Chen Wei had stopped calling her "little sister" and started calling her "Lan sword."
Third, in the princes.
The first week, Crown Prince Zhao Shen watched more than he spoke. He would train with the senior guards as often as with the juniors, his movements precise, his face unreadable. When he corrected Yue's stance, his touch was brief, almost distant.
The second week, his comments sharpened.
"Your shoulder rises before your cut," he said quietly once, passing by as she practiced alone in the small east yard. "Power leaks upward instead of forward. Let it sink."
Another time, when she overextended and nearly slipped, his voice drifted from the shade of the wall.
"Greediness of reach is how a swordsman loses fingers," he drawled. "Or heads."
She had flushed, half with embarrassment, half with the sudden awareness that he had been watching for longer than she'd thought.
By the third week, he no longer pretended he wasn't.
When Drillmaster Han paired them during footwork drills, no one was surprised. The whispers still came, but they were quieter, edged less with resentment and more with speculation.
"His Highness takes personal interest," Chen Wei muttered once, under his breath. "You're lucky."
"Or doomed," another boy said. "Imagine making a mistake in front of him every day."
Yue tried not to imagine it. She made enough mistakes without extra pressure.
Zhao Yuan appeared often too, sometimes joining the drills, sometimes simply sitting on the low wall, swinging his legs and making commentary that made Han sigh and the juniors grin.
"You," he said to Yue one afternoon, after she had finished a set of partner drills and collapsed against the wall to catch her breath, "look less like you're being murdered now."
"That's the kindest thing anyone has said to me all week," she replied dryly.
He laughed.
One evening, after the last rays of sun had slipped off the roof tiles, Lan Zhen called Yue to the little table under the plum tree.
"Sit," he said.
She dropped onto the stool, rubbing at a bruise on her forearm. "If this is about me nearly hitting Han in the nose with my practice sword, it was an accident."
"This is not about Han's nose," Lan Zhen said. "Though you can apologise tomorrow."
She ducked her head. "He moved into my swing."
"He told you to watch your surroundings."
"I was," she muttered. "I watched my target."
Lan Zhen's mouth twitched, then flattened again.
"What did Drillmaster Han say about your performance on the parade ground?" he asked.
Yue straightened a little. "He said I'm not the worst."
"Exactly how did he phrase it?"
She winced. "He said, 'You are no longer the worst. Now you are merely small.'"
Lan Zhen's shoulders shook once. Yue realized with a start that he was trying not to laugh.
"That is praise, coming from him," he said. "You've worked hard."
Warmth bloomed in her chest. "I will keep working."
"I know," he said quietly.
He watched her for a heartbeat, then drew in a slow breath.
"Yue'er," he said, "do you remember what I told you about the palace rats?"
"In silk, not under the floorboards," she recited automatically.
"Good." He tapped the table once with his knuckles. "They've scented you."
Yue frowned. "Because of the drills?"
"Because of the drills. And because the Crown Prince has been seen training you himself."
"I didn't ask him to!" she protested. "He comes on his own."
"I am aware," Lan Zhen said. "His Highness does as he wishes. But others will write their own stories about why."
A faint chill slid down her back.
"You mean gossip," she said slowly.
"I mean knives you can't see," he replied. "Words sharpened into edges. There are families who have spent years placing their daughters in view of the throne. They will not be pleased to see some dusty little warhorse trotting into the same yard."
She grimaced. "Are you calling me dusty or a warhorse?"
"Both." His gaze softened, then hardened again. "Some will try to befriend you. Some will try to step on you. Some will smile and hope you fall on your own."
"Wen Ruo," Yue muttered.
Lan Zhen gave a small nod. "Minister Wen is no fool. He may counsel his daughter to be more careful than she was with you. But there will be others."
Yue thought of silk hems brushing past stone, of jasmine-scented air, of Wen Ruo's cool eyes.
"I didn't ask for His Highness's attention," she said again, quieter.
"You did," Lan Zhen said.
She blinked. "When?"
"The day you stood in front of the Vermilion Gate and told him you wanted to protect his world," he said. "A prince does not ignore someone who declares intentions like that. Especially not if he believes them."
Yue stared at her hands.
"So what should I do?" she asked. "Stop training?"
He snorted. "If I told you that, you'd be sneaking out at midnight to run laps."
She opened her mouth to protest, then decided not to bother.
"You will continue," he said. "But you will be… more than careful. In drills. In words. In where you walk and who you sit with."
He held her gaze, his own hard.
"And above all, Yue'er, you will remember this: you are a guard's daughter. We stand with our backs straight and our eyes open. We do not scramble for favour like dogs under the table."
Something proud rose in her chest.
"I won't," she said.
He studied her for a moment longer, then nodded.
"Good. Now go wash. You smell like ten miles of mud."
She made a face. "That's rude. At most eight."
"Seven and a half," he allowed.
The next morning, the sky was the colour of steel when Yue reached the parade ground. Mist clung low over the packed earth, swallowing sound. The usual drill calls seemed muffled, breath turning to ghosts in the air.
"Today," Drillmaster Han announced, "we see who has been listening with their feet."
He split the squad into pairs for sparring drills—wooden swords only, no armour.
"We stop when I say stop," he barked. "You go soft, I double your laps. You go wild, I take your sword and show you the meaning of regret. Understood?"
"Yes, Drillmaster!" voices chorused.
Yue flexed her fingers around her wooden hilt. Sparring was different from forms. Forms were predictable; sparring had teeth.
"Lan Yue," Han called. "With Chen Wei."
Chen Wei groaned. "Why do I always get paired with the ones who bruise easily?"
"You complain, I pair you with Meng," Han retorted.
Both boys glanced involuntarily at the largest youth in the squad, whose arms looked like they had been carved from tree trunks. Chen Wei blanched.
"Lan Yue is perfect," he said quickly. "I love bruises."
"On yourself," Han said.
Yue fought a grin and stepped into position opposite Chen Wei.
They bowed, tapped their wooden swords together, then began.
Chen Wei fought like he talked: fast, a little messy, but with flashes of cleverness. He feinted high and swept low; she blocked, turned, nearly lost her footing once and recovered, teeth gritted.
Han moved among the pairs, calling corrections, occasionally grabbing a wrist or slapping a shoulder into proper alignment.
"Don't reach," he snapped once at Yue. "Let him come to you. The sword doesn't chase. It waits."
She adjusted, resisting the urge to lunge. When Chen Wei overextended on his next attack, she stepped inside his guard, tapped his chest with the flat of her blade.
"Point," Han said. "Again."
They went on until Yue's arms burned and the skin along her forearms sang from blocked blows.
"Enough," Han finally called. "Switch partners."
Groans rose, quickly cut off.
"Lan Yue," another voice said. "With me."
Her heartbeat skipped.
Crown Prince Zhao Shen stood a short distance away, already holding a wooden practice sword. He must have joined quietly while they were focused on their own fights; Yue had not seen him enter.
Han opened his mouth.
"Drillmaster," Zhao Shen said calmly, "if she wishes."
Every head in earshot turned.
Yue's throat went dry.
"I—" she began.
"It's just me," Zhao Yuan called from where he sparred with a taller boy. "He doesn't bite. Much."
Zhao Shen's eyebrow twitched, but he said nothing.
Yue drew a breath and stepped forward.
"I don't mind," she said. "Your Highness."
Han's gaze flicked between them, then he nodded once, sharply.
"Very well," he said. "Remember: wooden swords. We still need all our heads today."
Zhao Shen gave him a brief nod, then walked to the centre of the ground.
They faced each other, mist curling low around their boots.
"Salute," he said softly.
She raised her sword in front of her, the gesture more formal than with the other juniors. He mirrored it, the wooden blade looking small in his long fingers.
"Attack when ready," he said.
Her grip tightened.
Attack the Crown Prince.
Every instinct screamed at her to be cautious, to hold back. But another voice—her father's, Han's, even Zhao Shen's own—echoed in her skull.
If you're going to walk a dangerous path, better you learn where the pits are.
She exhaled and moved.
Her first strike was a simple downward cut, more a test than a true attack. His blade met hers with effortless precision, turning it aside. The impact shivered up her arms.
"Again," he murmured.
She feinted left, swept right. He shifted half a step; her sword met air.
"Don't chase my blade," he said. "Cut where I will be, not where I am."
Frustration sparked.
She pressed harder.
Their wooden swords clacked, slid, sprang apart. He rarely struck at her directly; most of his attacks were re-directions, counters. When he did move to hit, the blows were controlled, landing with just enough force to sting without bruise.
Her world narrowed again: the angle of his shoulders, the way his weight sat on his back foot, the tiny flinch in his left wrist before a parry.
She began to see gaps.
On the seventh exchange, she slipped inside a high guard and aimed a thrust at his ribs.
He twisted. The tip of her sword brushed fabric—no more.
"Better," he said.
They parted, circled.
By the twelfth pass, sweat trickled down her spine. Her breath came in harsh pulls. He was breathing harder now too, though his face gave little away.
"You like to rush," he observed, deflecting another enthusiastic strike. "It makes you predictable."
"I don't—" she grunted, pivoting, "—see you complaining when I stand still."
"I am not complaining," he said. "I am pointing out why you are about to lose."
She blinked.
He stepped in.
For a heartbeat, she saw nothing but the flick of his wrist, the blur of the wooden blade.
Her sword flew from her hand.
It hit the ground with a hollow clatter.
She stared at the empty space where the hilt had been, fingers still clenched around air.
The parade ground fell utterly silent.
Zhao Shen lowered his sword.
"Point," he said calmly. "To me."
Yue's cheeks burned. The urge to dive for the fallen blade, to erase the mistake by sheer speed, surged—but she forced herself to stand still.
"Your mistake?" he asked.
"I… overreached," she said hoarsely. "My grip—"
"Your grip was fine," he interrupted. "Your mind ran ahead of your body. You saw an opening and forgot your balance."
She swallowed. "Yes."
He tilted his head.
"What should you have done?" he pressed.
"Waited," she said. "Closed distance slower. Tested—"
"Or retreated," he said.
The word tasted like failure.
"Retreated?" she echoed.
"Even the best swordsman must sometimes step back," he said quietly. "There is no shame in that. Only in failing to see when it is necessary."
He stooped and picked up her fallen sword, turning it once in his hand.
"Again?" he asked, offering it to her.
She hesitated.
Around them, she could feel the weight of eyes. The story that would spread: the guard's daughter disarmed by the Crown Prince. The little warhorse knocked on her nose.
She reached out and closed her fingers around the hilt.
"Again," she said.
Something like approval flickered in his gaze.
They reset. Saluted. Began once more.
This time, she did not rush. She let him press. When he shifted suddenly, leaving a tempting line open, she bit her tongue and stepped back instead of in.
"Good," he murmured. "Now attack."
She did.
They went on until Han called halt. When they parted at last, both breathing hard, the mist had burned away. Sunlight slanted across the ground, turning sweat to shine.
"Enough royal entertainment," Han grumbled, though there was a spark of grudging satisfaction in his eyes. "Back to partners who won't get me executed if you break their noses."
A ripple of laughter eased the tension.
Zhao Shen inclined his head to Yue, the gesture almost formal.
"You learn quickly," he said.
"I won't drop my sword again," she blurted.
"You will," he said, without cruelty. "Everyone does. What matters is what you do with empty hands."
She chewed on that as she trudged off the ground, legs leaden.
That afternoon, after drills and chores and a lecture from Han about over-committing on feints, Yue returned to the plum tree courtyard to find a small, plain box on the table.
Her father was not in sight.
She glanced around, half-expecting a maid or messenger to leap out and announce some rule about who could or couldn't touch palace packages.
No one appeared.
She approached carefully.
The box was unadorned, made of simple dark wood. No seal. No name. Just a narrow bamboo tube laid on top, tied with a red string.
Her pulse kicked.
She picked up the tube first. It was light. The stopper came off with a faint pop.
Inside, a rolled slip of paper.
Her fingers clumsy, she teased it out and unrolled it.
Four neat characters stared up at her, ink strokes firm and even:
根重於翼根重於翼
Roots heavier than wings.
The same phrase Zhao Shen had said to her on the ground, now fixed in ink.
Below, in smaller characters:
"Lan Yue. For when you forget where your balance lies. – Z.S."
The breath went out of her.
She read the line again, then again, the strokes swimming a little. No one had ever given her words like this before, carved and offered as if they were something valuable.
She rolled the slip carefully and slid it back into the tube, fingers oddly careful.
Then, only then, did she lift the lid of the wooden box.
Inside, on a bed of plain cloth, lay a pair of bracers.
They were not ornate—not the sort of gilded armguards the ceremonial guards wore on festival days. These were practical: sturdy leather backed with thin metal plates, light enough not to slow an arm, strong enough to turn a glancing cut.
When she lifted one, it fit the length of her forearm almost perfectly.
Her heart climbed into her throat.
There was no crest. No emblem. Only, on the inside of the right bracer, a small character cut into the leather: a single 月—moon.
"Yue'er?"
She nearly dropped the bracer at her father's voice.
Lan Zhen stepped into the courtyard, stopping short when he saw the open box.
His gaze flicked from the bracers to the bamboo tube in her hand.
"Who delivered that?" he asked, voice deceptively mild.
"A… a palace runner," Yue stammered. "He left it and ran."
"Did he say from whom?"
She hesitated, then held out the bamboo tube.
Lan Zhen took it, unrolled the slip, read. His jaw worked.
"Zhao Shen," he said softly.
"That's… the Crown Prince's personal name, isn't it?" Yue asked.
"Yes," Lan Zhen said. "Used here with no title. Bold."
He rolled the slip back, more roughly than she had, and returned it.
"Do you… want me to give them back?" she asked, throat tight.
He lifted one bracer, turning it over.
"Good leather," he murmured. "Proper plates. Not show pieces. Someone knew what they were ordering."
"That means… I can keep them?" she asked, hope leaking into her voice.
He exhaled heavily.
"If you refuse a prince's gift outright, you insult him," he said. "If you accept it blindly, you risk others reading too much."
Her heart sank. "So…"
"So you will wear them," he said at last. "In drills. Nowhere else."
Her head snapped up. "Really?"
"Better they protect your bones than sit in a box gathering dust," he said. "But—" His gaze speared her. "You will remember they are not ornaments. They are tools. You will not let them go to your head, or to your sleeve."
She nodded so hard her hair ribbon slipped. "I won't. I promise."
He watched her for another long moment, then gave a tiny, tired smile.
"You'd only use your sleeves to wipe sweat anyway," he muttered.
She grinned.
As he turned to go inside, he paused.
"Yue'er," he said without looking back, "do you know when a gift becomes a chain?"
She frowned. "When someone says you owe them for it?"
"Sometimes," he said. "More often, when you begin to believe you cannot do without it."
Her gaze dropped to the bracers in her hands.
"I trained before without them," she said slowly. "I'll still be able to even if… they're gone."
"Good," he said. "Remember that."
He left her standing under the plum tree, petals drifting down around her like slow, quiet snow.
Yue slid the bracers onto her forearms. The leather hugged her bones, warm from her palms. When she flexed her wrists, the plates moved smoothly.
She drew the bamboo tube from her sash, unstoppered it again, and read the four characters once more by the fading light.
Roots heavier than wings.
She wasn't entirely sure what Zhao Shen wanted her to remember, but she knew this: when she stepped onto the parade ground tomorrow, she would do so with her feet more firmly on the earth than ever.
Far across the palace, in his own room, Zhao Shen sat at his desk, fingers steepled.
"Do you think she'll wear them?" Zhao Yuan asked, sprawled on the couch with a half-eaten pear in hand.
"She needs something on her arms," Zhao Shen said. "Han's drills are not gentle."
"That's not what I asked," Zhao Yuan said. "I asked if she will. She's proud."
Zhao Shen's lips curved almost imperceptibly.
"She will argue with herself," he said. "Then she will decide the practical benefit outweighs her pride."
"That's a very nice way of saying she'll give in," Zhao Yuan snorted.
Zhao Shen didn't respond.
Instead, he turned his gaze toward the window where a branch from some distant tree brushed against the lattice in the wind.
"When you give someone armour," Zhao Yuan said idly, "everyone expects you want something protected."
Zhao Shen's fingers tightened fractionally.
"Everyone expects many things," he said. "Very few of them know what they are talking about."
"And you?" Zhao Yuan asked. "What do you want?"
The room was quiet for a long breath.
Zhao Shen's eyes lowered.
"To see," he said softly, "how far she runs before she looks back."
Zhao Yuan rolled onto his back, staring at the ceiling.
"You're strange," he decided. "Most people pick pretty girls in silk and poetry. You pick a guard's daughter who smells like sweat and mud."
Zhao Shen's mouth twitched.
"Pretty silks tear easily," he said. "Mud washes off."
Zhao Yuan laughed, bright and young.
"Careful, brother," he said. "If you keep saying things like that, the ministers will have heart attacks."
"Then they should strengthen their hearts," Zhao Shen replied.
Outside, the plum blossoms fell.
And in a small courtyard, a girl with a wooden sword and new bracers tightened the red ribbon in her hair and made a silent promise:
Someday, I'll protect the world he's standing in. Not just look at it from the gate.