em x. liu | 雯雯

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“‘I have never known true exhaustion until now / this week of my undoing’,” Heilin recited, speaking out toward the trees. “Do you read Lin Tao?”

“The exiled poet?” Yin Lang blurted.

“Mn.” Heilin hooked a hand through a belt loop. “Someone I once admired quite a lot introduced me.”

“And you—you didn’t sanction them?”

“There’s nothing wrong with reading and understanding,” Heilin said. “It’s important to understand the ideology through which our enemies are driven. But in any case, he’s long dead now.”

“Oh,” said Yin Lang. “Sir, why are you telling me this?”

“No reason,” Heilin said. She turned around, and, bracketed by all of Qiujing’s generated sunlight, it was difficult to make anything out but her hazy details: sharp shoulders, straight legs, the posture of someone who had never bowed with true will. “I’m trying to distract you. Is it working?”