Chapter 14 · The Scream He Never Got

The token hits the floor with a crack that sounds too loud in the quiet. I can't stop staring at it. Lin Yuan's signature is carved right there in the jade, official seal and everything. The date's from three years ago. Two days before they dragged my mother into the extraction room.

Gu's still holding me but his grip goes stiff. I feel his breath stop against my hair.

"Lin Yuan." His voice comes out flat. Dead. "Your cousin signed the execution order."

I pull back. My legs don't want to hold me up but I make them. The floor's cold under my bare feet and the chains around my wrists are heavier than they were five minutes ago. Everything's heavier.

"He was sixteen," I say. Don't know why I'm defending him. Maybe because if Lin Yuan did this then I've been living with my mother's killer for three years and didn't know. Maybe because that's worse than anything else that's happened tonight.

Gu picks up the token. Turns it over. His hands are shaking. "Sixteen's old enough to hold a brush. Old enough to know what this meant."

"He's family."

"So was she."

That shuts me up. Gu's right.