The Empress of Bright Moon (The Empress of Bright Moon, #2)

by Weina Dai Randel

“Fear,” she said from the pavilion, “is a roof. If you do not break it, you shall not see the sky.

“You cannot live in a pavilion built with fear, Luminous Lady. It gets smaller and smaller, hotter and hotter inside, until you cannot breathe.”

There was some truth in what she said, that the pavilion built with fear would shrink. I could see there were only two ways that could happen next: either you let the roof crush you, or you destroy the roof.

Could I fight against rumor? I did not think so, for rumor had no grave and only bore seeds. It germinated in the air, thrived in the sun, and ripened in the shadows. It would not die in the rain and fly only higher in the wind.

Was this life? How bitter it was. We spent our whole lives seeking the fruit of happiness, trying to feed our hearts’ desire, and when we finally found the fruit and cupped it in our hands, it took us only a moment to savor its sweet taste, and then it turned sour.

And perhaps, even as death broke our hearts, in the dust of cruelty, our love would heal us both and make us whole again.

And Empress Wang, despite her twisted personality and her murderous heart, was not born a monster; she was made into one. Like many hapless women before her, she was simply a victim of her own fate.

Ahead of me, the sun was rising, its golden rays brightening the edge of the distant sky and throwing shining threads through the gap of the trees, and soon, the area where I stood was cloaked in a transparent, iridescent veil. Everything—the leaves, the branches, the ground—was illuminated. Everything sparkled. And the moon was still there, still bright, placid, and shining, like an empty silver plate ready to accept gifts.

“When one treats people with benevolence, justice, and righteousness, and reposes confidence in them, the army will be united in mind, and all will be happy to serve their leaders.”

I thought of all the days my Oriole would miss: cloudy days, sunny days, the days with warm breezes, the days with chilly frost. And the seasons that would pass without her, the spring blossoms that would bloom without her, and the warm sunlight that would dance without her. Children were birds, and mothers were trees, and no matter how far they flew, no matter how high they soared, they always craved the branches of the tree, and the nest, to rest.

I hoped my bird would know that the tree would always be there, its roots deep in the earth, its branch of love spreading, growing, waiting, in every season and every year. And I would tell her the scent of the blossoms in spring, the song of cicadas in the summer heat, the color of autumn’s leaves, and the warmth of the sunlight during frosty days. I would tell her the shapes of the clouds, the echoes of the wind, and the reflections of the light. I would tell her everything I would see, everything I would know.

Just yesterday, we had talked, reminiscing about our past. We had known each other when we were so young, and after this ceremony, we would be known as husband and wife, father and mother. We would face the kingdom as one.

She decided to renounce the Tang Dynasty and founded her own dynasty, Zhou Dynasty, and declared herself the Emperor of the kingdom.

So a man named Wu WAS the end of the Gaozong dynasty after all mhmm