十二
The Demon Palace was rarely so quiet as it was the day Madame Qiu arrived.
She was led through the gates, her figure stooped but dignified, her hair silvered with age, and her gaze sharp as a hawk's.
The guards regarded her with respectful wariness; it was clear she carried a weight of secrets, and perhaps a few grudges older than the palace itself.
Cang Yan received her in the Hall of Shadows, flanked by Zheng Yu and a pair of silent demon guards. He regarded the matron with narrowed eyes, fingers drumming on the arm of his throne. "You raised the healer, did you not?"
Madame Qiu bowed, her eyes never wavering. "I kept her alive, as best I could, my lord."
He wasted no time. "Tell me where she came from. Who left her at your orphanage?"
Silence stretched, thick with unspoken defiance.
Madame Qiu's lips pressed thin. "She was not more than a few months old when I found her. It was a stormy night. I saw nothing, heard nothing, except the cry of a child at the gate. She was wrapped in silk patterned with moons and clouds."
She hesitated, her eyes flicking to Zheng Yu, then to the guards. "There was... one other thing."
Cang Yan leaned forward, hope rising in his chest. "What?"
"I saw a mark on her forehead, glowing pale green. It vanished before dawn. I never saw it again." Her voice gentled. "Who left her, or why, I cannot say. No letter, no clue. Only that mark, and the midnight cloth."
He pressed her further, voice low and cold. "You are sure you remember nothing more?"
Madame Qiu's shoulders stiffened. "If I knew, I would not keep it from the child. Not for all the treasures in your palace, Lord Cang Yan."
He dismissed the guards with a flick of his hand, leaving only Zheng Yu in the hall. Cang Yan's jaw tightened, frustration etching new lines in his face. "Useless," he muttered, rising to pace. "Every trail ends in mist. Every clue leads nowhere."
Zheng Yu watched him, tail flicking. "She's not hiding from you, you know. She's hiding from herself."
Cang Yan shot him a look. "I am not accustomed to being denied."
Before Zheng Yu could answer, the doors swung open, and a breathless demon attendant entered, bowing so low his forehead nearly touched the floor.
"Forgive the interruption, my lord. A messenger has arrived from the Heavenly Grandmasters.
They request your presence, and that of the Moon Healer, at a banquet in two nights' time. It is... an official summons."
Cang Yan's eyes narrowed dangerously. The High Heavenly Grandmasters, rulers in name over all the realms, rarely deigned to visit the Demon Palace, and never for pleasantries.
He was their equal in power, but not in favor.
Their politics were subtler, their ambitions sharper.
Their interest in Yue Lian was a warning in itself.
He dismissed the attendant and turned to Zheng Yu. "They have heard the rumors. They want to see her for themselves." His lips curled in a thin, predatory smile. "Let them look. They will find their gaze as useless as mine."
Zheng Yu hesitated, worry flickering in his golden eyes. "They are not our friends, Cang Yan. And they are not yours."
Cang Yan's gaze was cold, but beneath it was the brittle edge of pride. "No. But neither do I fear them. Let them plot and whisper. Yue Lian is under my protection. She will attend the banquet as my guest, and as my warning."
Meanwhile, in Yue Lian's chamber, Madame Qiu was finally allowed a private audience with the girl she'd raised. The matron's hands shook as she brushed stray hair from Yue Lian's brow, searching her face for the lost infant she'd loved.
"I wish I could give you answers, child," she whispered. "All I know is what I told him. You were left to us in storm and darkness, with only silk and that strange, glowing mark. It faded by morning. I never saw it again. I loved you as my own, but you have always belonged somewhere else."
Yue Lian blinked back tears, the ache of not-knowing growing deeper. "Thank you, Madame Qiu. For everything."
The old woman kissed her forehead. "Whatever you become, remember you are more than the secrets other people chase."
That night, as Yue Lian tried to sleep, the palace was alive with whispers of the coming banquet.
Servants polished silver and hung new lanterns.
The White Fox Twins prowled the halls, stealing sweets and rumors in equal measure.
Zheng Yu found her before dawn, pressing a honey cake into her palm.
"Whatever happens at this feast, remember, you're not alone."
The day of the banquet arrived, and with it a new kind of tension. Yue Lian was dressed in silver silk, her hair pinned with moonstone. Cang Yan met her outside the banquet hall, his expression carefully neutral, his eyes burning with something sharper than curiosity.
"Stay close to me," he murmured, offering his arm. "The High Grandmasters are not as benevolent as they pretend. They want something, perhaps you. If they try to touch your spirit, let me handle it."
She hesitated, then took his arm. For that moment, they were neither captor nor captive, but two souls on the edge of a storm.
As the doors swung open and the assembled immortals turned to stare, Yue Lian lifted her chin, and Cang Yan's hand tightened at her side.
The secrets of the moon would not be surrendered tonight, not to the High Grandmasters, nor to the world.
But the game had changed, and every eye in the realms was now watching her.
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