The Fake Phoenix Reigns - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Kneeling before the dragon bed, my first reaction was not fear.

It was the memory of the redwood dowry chest my mother had closed with her own hands before I left home.

A double-happiness character had been pasted on the lid, and the lock was new.

She had cried so convincingly then, clutching my hand as she said, “Ah Yao, you’re the only one left who can save the Shen Family.”

I had thought the chest held my sister’s wedding robes, gold hairpins, and dignity.

Now that dignity might very well be lying inside, with a knife still buried in its throat.

The man behind the bed curtains sat up, and candlelight fell across his face.

He wore a bright yellow sleeping robe. His features were young, and a patch of dark red had seeped through the fabric at his left shoulder.

Everyone in the palace said the New Emperor, Xiao Jingheng, had ascended the throne in his youth, that he was cold by nature and hated people coming near him most of all.

But the way this man looked at me carried none of an emperor’s contempt for a minister’s daughter. If anything, it was as though he had just found another unlucky accomplice.

I swallowed.

“Your Majesty, are you testing me?”

He gave a soft laugh.

“If this were a test, you would already have been dragged out.”

Outside the hall, the night watch drum sounded once.

He walked to the dowry chest and reached for the lock.

I seized his hand at once.

“Don’t open it.”

He lowered his eyes to me.

I looked right back at him.

“If His Majesty’s corpse is really inside, then the moment it opens, I become the murderer who killed the emperor.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“And if we don’t open it, you’re an accomplice hiding a corpse.”

I trembled with anger.

“What about you, then?”

“Me?”

With his uninjured hand, he drew out a bloodstained Jade Thumb Ring and placed it in my palm.

A coiled dragon was carved into the jade, and there was a tiny crack along the inner side.

“I suppose I’m the first poor bastard forced to attend court in a dead man’s place.”

Holding the Jade Thumb Ring, I felt a chill run through my fingertips.

I had seen this thing before.

Three years ago, when my elder sister Shen Mingzhu came of age, the palace rewarded her with an imperial portrait.

In the portrait, the New Emperor sat beside a waterside pavilion, wearing this very Jade Thumb Ring on the thumb of his right hand.

At the time, I had stood behind a screen and listened as my sister laughed. “His Majesty is so handsome. No wonder Father is willing to risk his life to send me into the palace.”

Father said, “Hold your tongue.”

Father was already dead.

Three days ago, he had died in the imperial prison, convicted of leaking military intelligence from the Northern Border.

Two days ago, an imperial edict arrived at the Shen Mansion, ordering my sister to enter the palace as a consort.

One day ago, my sister vanished.

Tonight, I put on her wedding robes and was carried into Weiyang Palace by eight palace attendants.

I thought I had come here to die in my sister’s place.

I never expected an emperor to have died in the palace first.

Seeing me stare at the Jade Thumb Ring, the man asked, “You recognize it?”

I returned it to him.

“Recognizing it does me no good. I am only an unfavored concubine-born daughter stuffed into a bridal sedan.”

“Concubine-born?”

He glanced at the phoenix coronet and red wedding robes on me.

“The Shen Family dares send the emperor a concubine-born daughter. How bold.”

I gave a cold laugh.

“You dare pretend to be emperor before the whole world. You’re no less bold.”

For once, I had left him speechless. A moment later, he actually laughed.

The smile only surfaced for an instant before sinking away again.

He walked to the chest and tapped it with a bent knuckle.

The wood gave a muffled sound.

It was definitely not empty inside.

A chill crept up my back.

Just then, a palace attendant’s voice came from outside the hall.

“Your Majesty, the Empress Dowager heard that Her Ladyship has entered the palace and specially ordered this servant to bring the nuptial wine.”

The man’s eyes changed. He immediately pulled me to the bedside.

I stumbled, and my whole body fell into his arms.

The smell of blood on him was heavy.

I was just about to struggle when he said in a low voice, “Cry out.”

I froze.

“What?”

He clasped my wrist, his voice brushing against my ear.

“On a wedding night, the Empress Dowager sends people to listen at the wall.”

I understood at once, and my face burned hot.

The palace doors were pushed open.

Two palace maids entered carrying wine cups. Their eyes did not dare lift, but their ears were pricked higher than anyone’s.

The man lowered the bed curtains halfway. His fingers slid from my wrist into my palm, his touch very light.

I closed my eyes, gritted my teeth, and let out a low moan.

The hall fell terrifyingly silent.

The palace maids’ footsteps stopped.

The man suppressed a laugh and lowered his head to look at me.

I glared at him.

Then he suddenly gave a muffled groan, sounding even more convincing than I had.

The wine cups in the palace maids’ hands trembled slightly.

“Set them down.”

His voice went hoarse, as though his pleasure had truly been interrupted.

“Get out.”

The palace maids hurriedly placed the wine on the table and withdrew.

As soon as the doors closed, I shoved him away.

The wound on his shoulder had split open, and blood flowed down his sleeping robe.

I should have pretended not to see it.

But he had just helped me evade the Empress Dowager’s eyes.

I pressed my lips together and took a small bottle of hemostatic powder from my sleeve.

When he saw the medicine bottle, something shifted in his eyes.

“You brought that into the palace?”

“When an unfavored daughter gets married, if she doesn’t bring medicine, is she supposed to bring dreams?”

I pulled open the fabric at his shoulder.

The wound was not deep, but it was long, as though a thin blade had grazed him.

He did not dodge, only watched my hands.

“Shen Mingzhu doesn’t know medicine.”

I sprinkled the powder over the wound.

“That is because I am not Shen Mingzhu.”

“What is your name?”

“Shen Yao.”

He repeated it quietly.

“Shen Yao.”

Those two words in his mouth sounded as though he were confirming something from long ago.

I looked up at him.

“And you? You can’t expect me to keep calling you Your Majesty.”

He was silent for a moment.

“Pei Zhao.”

My hand paused.

The surname Pei was rare in the capital.

The Marquis of Zhenbei, whose entire household had been executed three years ago, had borne that surname.

I was just about to ask when a very faint sound suddenly came from inside the dowry chest.

It was like someone inside had scratched the wooden planks with a fingernail.