Chapter Text
The Dragon always had an affinity for beauty. For treasure.
Lands. Trinkets.
People.
So when southern rumors—rumors of a curious young girl with fire at her fingertips and blood-red jewels for eyes—reached the north, the Dragon Emperor knew: he had stumbled upon something rare. Something of unmatched beauty.
Hidden amidst the southern province’s destitution was the last survivor of a long-decimated island race. A reminder of the Dragon’s campaign for the Imperial throne. A rare beauty, indeed.
In less than a fortnight, Emperor Yin Vaisra dispatched his troops southward to raze Rooster Province, find the girl, and bring her to Arlong. For when the Dragon learned of rumors within his Empire, he needed to seek the truth—and claim that truth for himself.
In the middle of the night, his father’s guards wake him. Although he longs to remain asleep, to stay bundled in his warm covers until the sun crests the horizon, Yin Nezha rubs the sleep from his eyes, peels himself from his bed, dons his robe and slippers, and follows the Imperial guards.
He longs to know where they’re taking him. Even if he is twelve years of age, hardly a man, Nezha is still a member of the Imperial family. By extension, he should be afforded a modicum of disclosure. His late-night escorts should know this; they should not disturb him without cause or reason.
But the Imperial guards remain tight-lipped, even after Nezha asks for clarity once. Twice. Thrice.
After a fourth time, one guard finally responds: “We’re bringing you to where your father commands, young lord.”
Even at his young age, Nezha has learned to refrain from questioning what happens within his father’s palace. If his father has summoned him in the middle of the night, then Nezha goes. Nezha finally shuts his mouth; he has received his reason, no matter how unsatisfactory. Satiated curiosity is not worth whatever punishment awaits him for continuing to question the Dragon Emperor’s command.
When they arrive at a set of heavy, dark, and ornate doors, Nezha’s steps falter.
He knows this place. And he hates it. Just as much as he hates Arlong’s grottos. His desire to turn heel and sprint back to his bed, to burrow under the covers and convince himself that this was all a dream, overwhelms him.
“Why have you brought me here?” A slight tremor of fear weakens his attempt to sound domineering. Imperial.
The guards do not even pretend to hear him. They are not beholden to the Emperor’s second son. They offered him a kindness by entertaining his questions in the first place.
Two guards splinter from the pack and head toward the door. They each grab a door handle with a gloved hand. The doors open with a loud groan and a low gust of wind.
Nezha’s scalp prickles with cold sweat. Unbidden, he leans back on his heels, prepares to bolt. But a guard places a hand on his shoulder—a firm nudge to descend the staircase before him.
Trembling, on the verge of tears, Nezha obeys.
Slowly and unsteadily, he descends the staircase. His footfall echoes faintly against the stone. He passes flickering torches, walls etched with images of ancient divinity dancing in the shadows.
After a few agonizing minutes, the staircase plateaus. Nezha blinks. His eyes eventually adjust to the dim lighting, and Nezha takes in the underground temple in all its horrific glory.
Nezha has been here one time—and it was one time too many. He has tried to suppress the memories of the columns and statues lining the walls and carved in the Pantheon’s likeness, the phantom feeling of the shackles around his wrists and ankles, the discomfiting sounds of distant chanting, the near suffocation when opium smoke filled the room...
All glimmers of drowsiness have left his body. All Nezha feels now is dreadful anticipation.
He jumps as a guard grabs his upper arm and nearly drags him across the temple. Nezha’s eyes dart around the room. Roughly a dozen cloaked individuals—Imperial spirit guides garbed in cerulean and chrome—circle the temple’s perimeter. They kneel in weighty silence. They ignore the young prince being shepherded through the room. They ignore the low whimpers falling from Nezha’s lips.
The guard brings Nezha to a spot between two guides. He pushes Nezha’s shoulder, a silent order to kneel.
Nezha concedes. And he realizes: he would not be tonight’s spectacle. Relief washes over him in a cool, refreshing wave.
But his fear comes back tenfold.
What horrors await him in this sacred place?
After a few beats of uncomfortable silence—an eternity, for Nezha—the temple doors creak open again.
Dragon Emperor Yin Vaisra enters the room. Nezha’s heart leaps when he sees his father. A smile dances at the corner of Nezha’s lips—but Nezha thankfully composes himself. He rearranges his expression to one of stoic indifference: the Dragon Emperor has neither the patience nor the desire for casual affection.
Vaisra glides across the temple’s stone floor. He does not spare his second son any acknowledgement, not even a perfunctory glance. With a whirl of opulent robes, he sits upon a muted throne placed at the circle’s periphery that, in his fear, Nezha had failed to notice. Nezha watches his father sit, sees his eyes grow stern, sees his lips twitch in barely concealed anticipation. In hunger.
“Bring her.” Vaisra’s voice seems to make the stone walls shake.
The eerie silence breaks with a flurry of silk. A handful of spirit guides stand and leave. When they return, they are not alone. Near-feral sounds—grunts, moans, the indecipherable curses of some provincial dialect—now accompany the hushed rustles of the spirit guides’ robes.
The sounds make Nezha want to vomit. He digs his fingernails into his palms, the pain dulling his fear and steadying the tremors that have returned to his limbs. He takes one shaky breath and sneaks a look at the temple’s center.
His lungs squeeze. Sharp. Painful.
They have ushered in a girl: a scrawny girl with angry brown skin and angrier brown eyes. She is not beautiful, not by Nikaran standards. Her skin resembles mud, and her features are provincial and rough. A wide and flat nose. Thick brows and dark, coarse hair that rolls down her back in unkempt waves. She can’t be older than twelve or thirteen years old, close to Nezha’s age. Although given her slight figure and the pinched look around her face, she could be younger.
Her ankles and wrists are shackled. Even from this distance, Nezha can see the blistering redness on her skin. She has been in captivity for a while—Nezha cannot begin to estimate how long; the Dragon Emperor keeps his secrets for as long as he wishes.
With a sickening turn of his stomach, Nezha realizes why her brief respite from imprisonment has been granted tonight.
She is here for the ceremony. And Nezha has been summoned to bear witness.
He recalls Arlong’s jewel-lined grotto, and his back sears with pain. He tucks his chin into his chest and bites his lip to stop himself from crying. He knows his father does not like to hear him cry.
“Begin,” his father commands.
In an instant, the underground temple fills with movement, with sound, with the reverent and bone-chilling drone of prayers long-forgotten. The guides standing along the temple’s walls produce sticks of incense. They light them without flint, with some called-upon magic that makes Nezha shake.
The sickly sweet scent of opium wafts through the air and battles with the incense. The girl’s shrieks grow in fervor and violence. She curses. Her provincial accent is barely discernible over the guides’ never-ending, near-meditative chants.
Nezha cannot take it anymore. He bows, feigning reverence for the ceremony. But, in truth, this is his poor attempt to block out the scene before him, to prevent the opium from entering his system. He has never liked how the drug makes him feel, how it opens his mind and threatens to pull him back into the Dragon’s embrace.
He shuts his eyes tight and presses his brow more firmly onto the marble floor. He focuses on the hard coldness against his skin, on the panting breaths that, despite his best efforts, quicken as they leave his lips. An eternity passes. He blocks out the chants, the girl’s muffled screams, the stifled memories of water filling his lungs, the pain, so much pain...
Silence has descended. An otherworldly quiet.
Nezha peels himself from the marble floor. His palms, clammy with sweat, stick to the cold stone. His body trembles, but he manages to keep his brow smooth. Composed. Worthy of the House of Yin.
In the temple’s center, the girl stands upright, her shackles melted and her eyes glowing red. She burns: flames traverse up and down her limbs, alight her fingertips, crown her head.
The cowering, feral backcountry girl has disappeared. In the middle of the underground temple stands a being both glorious and terrifying. Divinity has graced the Dragon Empire this night.
Nezha stares. Entranced. Mystified.
In his short life, Yin Nezha has become intimate with the beautiful, with the horrifying. And yet he is certain: this girl—this Phoenix Goddess incarnate—is the most beautiful and horrific creature Yin Nezha has ever seen.
Nezha awakens with a fitful start. He lies on his bed, back in his chambers. His mouth tastes foul, and his head painfully throbs. Haunting images of the ceremony—the cerulean cloaks, the heavy fog of opium, the burning girl—return in bits and pieces. He is not sure if they are reality or fragments of a nightmare.
He falls back into a dreamless sleep.
Days, weeks, months pass. During that time, Nezha is not summoned to the underground temple again. He sees neither hair nor hide of the provincial girl crowned in flames. He convinces himself it was all a dream.
For Yin Nezha, for now, life in the Imperial Palace goes on.
Nikaran Imperial rule allows concubines. The Palace has homed and housed countless women to grace the Emperor’s bed, as well as the would-be heirs sired from these unions, for generations.
For years, however, the Dragon Emperor did not take a concubine of his own. The people of Nikara believed that the Dragon Emperor would forsake this generations-old tradition. Many believed he deemed the tradition unnecessary, since the Dragon Empress Saikhara had borne him three sons. Some gossiped that Empress Saikhara, who spent many formative years in Hesperia and often expressed blasphemous beliefs regarding the Nikaran ways and gods, wielded an unhealthy amount of influence on the crown. Still others thought that Emperor Yin, with his painfully discerning taste, had not yet found a woman worthy of his bed.
So the news that the Emperor had finally—finally—taken a concubine sweeps through the country like a typhoon.
Nezha is certainly surprised. He had known about the practice, in theory. But the implications of what concubinage means—for his father, for his family, for himself—remain murky. Downright confusing.
For some time, this concubine remains a specter; Nezha receives no form of confirmation that she actually exists. Imperial law dictates that concubines remain hidden, away from potentially covetous eyes: only the Dragon Emperor and choice members of the Inner Court—women, eunuchs—can look upon and interact with the Emperor’s favored ones. The Dragon Emperor alone can decide if a more public presentation should be made.
So the Empire erupts in jubilation when the Emperor Vaisra announces the scheduled presentation of the Radiant Consort, the Dragon Emperor’s new Phoenix Bride. The court organizes a celebration to be held throughout the streets of Arlong: a festival filled with jubilant music, festive dances, and rich foods. Vaisra orders a palanquin constructed to parade his consort before his subjects. The people of Arlong are ordered to pause their commerce, to cease their studies: nothing is more important than bearing witness to the Dragon Emperor’s new bride.
Nezha’s siblings betray a kaleidoscope of emotions. Disbelief. Humor. Righteous anger on behalf of their mother, on behalf of their future rights as prospective heirs to the Imperial throne. But Nezha himself mainly feels curiosity: he longs to see the being that has unceremoniously disrupted his established way of life.
For the Radiant Consort’s presentation, the Emperor’s wife and children have been given a place of honor. They are seated on a dais positioned along the high streets of Arlong, near the Imperial Palace. Nezha’s sister and oldest brother mirror their mother’s demeanor: sitting demurely upon the dais, her brow bejeweled and her porcelain skin covered in gauzy, richly dyed fabric, Dragon Empress Saikhara is stiff yet regal. Her distaste rolls off her in icy waves. She coolly lifts her hand toward the people gathered at the foot of the dais, and her acknowledgment—no matter how brief, how distant—stirs the crowd into a frenzy.
“I’m eager to see this Phoenix Bride,” Nezha’s sister Muzha whispers, softly enough for her siblings’ ears alone. “Do you think she is lovely? It’s difficult to believe so, if she hails from the Rooster Province.”
“She’s a Speerly,” Nezha’s brother Jinzha, the eldest and the one most like their father, spits. “That’s what the courtiers are saying.”
“A Speerly?” Muzha’s face, as delicately beautiful as their mother’s, although without the blatant disdain, crumples. “I thought all the Speerlies had died during the Second Poppy War.”
Jinzha shrugs. “Well, I suppose one managed to survive. Like a fucking cockroach.”
“‘Man’s life cannot be contained in the abundance of all that he possesses,’” the Dragon Empress murmurs, “‘but in the abundance of all that the Maker provides.’”
Nezha’s siblings frown at their mother’s cryptic words, before dissolving into frenzied musings of what they imagine this concubine, this Speerly, could look like. All the while, Nezha’s mind wanders. He thinks of all he knows of Speer. Like many noble youth within the Empire, he has learned of the downfall of the island nation—a necessary loss in the rise of the Dragon Empire, a crucial stepping stone to the House of Yin’s ascent to power. He was an infant when the his uncle, the Dragon Emperor Yin Riga, ordered the decimation of the island. It was a betrayal to the Imperial crown, enough of a political folly to enable his father’s successful coup for the throne.
“Gēge.” Mingzha, the youngest and kindest Yin sibling, appears at Nezha’s elbow. Round-faced and smiling, he presents a handful of marbles, pristine and ocean-blue. “Can we play a few games together, please?”
Nezha smiles and ruffles his younger brother’s hair. “Not now,” he chastises. “We need to behave. But we can play after dinner, after all the festivities are done.”
Mingzha frowns but settles onto his tufted chair. Nezha smiles at him, although—as always happens when he gazes upon his younger brother—guilt lightly tugs at his heart. He smooths Mingzha’s furrowed brow.
Suddenly, the nearby crowd roars in approval and glee: the Radiant Consort’s parade has arrived at their dais. Nezha straightens in his chair. He is no better than any of the other Arlong citizens with his eager curiosity: he wants a glimpse of the Phoenix Bride; he may never have another chance after today.
As the palanquin approaches and his father’s new concubine enters his view, Nezha’s heart lurches.
He knows this girl.
For it is, indeed, a girl. The girl.
Enough months had passed for Nezha to convince himself that he imagined the ceremony in the underground temple, that the burning girl and her curses and screams were fabricated from horrific nightmares.
But she is here, standing before him and his family. Her hair has grown even longer and has been brushed out into lush waves, pinned back with ruby-studded combs. Her dark brown eyes have been rimmed with kohl. Her brown skin visible beneath her vermilion, gold-threaded robes—her arms peeking through the draped sleeves, the sliver of collarbone, her thin neck draped with glistening, jewel-studded chains—have been painted gold. She gleams in the sun. Perched on the palanquin and standing above the cheering people of Arlong, she radiates, indeed.
To Nezha’s left, Jinzha makes a noise. “She’s a vile looking thing, isn’t she?” His voice lilts with condescension and humored disgust. “It’s hard to believe that Father willingly wants that thing in his bed.”
Muzha tuts. “An uncouth thing to say, gēge.”
Jinzha snorts, an unprincely sound.
And Nezha continues to stare, as transfixed on the girl now as when she burned in the temple. The growing din of the crowd mirrors Nezha’s beating heart. His veins pulse. The Dragon’s brand on his back throbs.
The Emperor’s wife and children stand in stilted obligation. Nezha grabs Mingzha’s hand—yes, to keep the young boy close but also for Nezha to steady himself as he rises on shaking legs.
Bejeweled and beautified to befit her place within the Dragon Emperor’s concubinage, the Speerly girl bows.
“I am pleased to serve you and the House of Yin, Your Imperial Majesty.” The girl’s words sound stiff, obviously rehearsed. Nezha would not be surprised if the words were beaten into the girl, to ensure she would speak them correctly, respectfully, at this exact moment.
At first, Empress Saikhara remains silent. A muscle twitches in her jaw. But she inclines her head, demure yet defensive. The Imperial subjects cheer at the wives’ mutual acknowledgment.
Nezha continues to stare at the Speerly girl. He is torn between wanting to meet her gaze and to remain unnoticed. He hopes that she will not recognize him, the young Dragon prince who witnessed her torture and did nothing.
As it did that fateful night, Nezha’s blood burns. Horror and awe fill his veins.