"What you must remember, Hiroko dear," her grandmother told her as they sat in the vast greenhouse over which Dowager Pearl Hiroko held court, "is that the machinations of the Gem Court do not end at marriage. Their schemes run deep. Did you really think you being sent to Golden Moon Tower was anything but politics?”

  Hiroko bent her head over a tray of seedlings she was helping her grandmother repot. It was a pleasant way to relax. Except for the times when she was required to do something related to her upcoming wedding, she had nothing to do but relax. This was a lovely way to pass time with her grandmother. "I don't understand what you mean.”

  "I think you must," the Dowager told her.

  Hiroko had loved spending time with her grandmother as a little girl and had wept when being told she was to leave the gardens of the Emperor and go to Golden Moon Tower, there to join the Gem Court and make the best marriage for herself that she could. "It's always been my duty to marry well."

  Dowager Hiroko scoffed and set down the plant she was pruning. There was dirt under her fingernails and in the crevices of her skin. Her face was sun-weathered, though she was still beautiful, especially to Hiroko. She looked older than most of the other dowagers here in the harem. They tried to hide their age as though they might somehow lure the Emperor back to them. Hiroko's grandmother wore the white robes that all the cloistered dowagers shared, but she had a cheerful red-and-yellow-checked apron covering most of hers and her sleeves rolled back and tied up to keep the dirt off of them.

  "I know that all of you children are kept in a state of ignorance about so many things," Dowager Hiroko mused. "But I thought your eyes had been opened by your time in the outside world. Perhaps you just haven't spent any effort to consider why you were sent away from the garden."

  "I have," Hiroko said, because her grandmother was right. There were simply not enough indigo royals to send them off to backwater tower culls at the far end of Empire, where the most impressive unmarried cultivator had been that pathetic waste of lux, Feng.

  True, she had met Joshi and Chang-li there, but no one could have known that when she was given her orders to leave the garden. "It must have been a ploy. Some enemy of my father's wanted my marriage to distract him from his duties. I suppose Prism Eri was at the bottom of it."

  "Possible," Dowager Hiroko said briskly. "But don't jump just to that possibility. What other options can you think of?"

  Hiroko frowned. She hadn't considered that there might be, be any options. She held up her fingers and ticked off her thoughts as she spoke. "An enemy of my father, such as Prism Eri, wanting to use my marriage as a lever against him," she said, ticking it off. "Um, that's still my most probable thought." She frowned. "It could have been a scheme by my father or one of his allies to get me out of the garden, but I think if that were the case he would have taken more steps. Unless..." She frowned, staring unseeing at the tray of seedlings in front of her. "Unless he thought he'd have more time. If he knew how dreadful the prospects at Golden Moon were…. Perhaps he would have expected me to reject Feng out of hand."

  Dowager Lin-ya at Golden Moon Tower had urged Hiroko to make a better match than Feng, after all, and had aided her when she decided to leave. But Hiroko had been so intent on her duty, at first. She would have married Feng if Fate and Joshi hadn't intervened.

  Then again, her father couldn't have known that, couldn't have understood how her mind had been fogged by years of teaching about duty.

  "Go on," Grandmother Hiroko encouraged.

  Hiroko frowned. "There's only a few dozen indigo royals of marrying age, of course. Still, enough that simply removing me from the crowd here in the capital city wouldn't have guaranteed any other princess a marriage she had, her heart set on. Especially when I wasn't in any courtship negotiations when I left."

  Her head had been so full of dreams when she had left this place. She'd imagined herself a central linchpin in the Emperor's grand design for the well-being of all of his people.

  She still took her role seriously. But she wasn't quite as naive as she once had been. "The Gem Court handles all the assignments, so it had to be with their aid."

  Dowager Hiroko nodded her head once. "Indeed."

  "Which of them would care about my marriage?" Hiroko shook her head. "I just don't feel like I have enough clues to go on, Grandmother."

  "The last option," Dowager Hiroko said softly, "is that someone hoped that letting you free from these walls would open your eyes to the reality of the world beyond, would let you see and make your own choices."

  She smiled kindly at her granddaughter. "Are you happy now, Hiroko?"

  "I am," Hiroko said, turning to her grandma and beaming. "I love Joshi. He is a good man and a great cultivator. Together, I feel as though there's no limit to how far we could go."

  "Then let there be no limit," her grandmother said, stressing the last two words as she reached out and took Hiroko's hand, squeezed it. "Go. Find your place in this world. Always remember who you are, but don't let your past cage you in."

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  Hiroko looked up, saw a pair of eyes so very like her own staring down at her, smiling but clearly trying to communicate something. A flood of realization washed over her.

  Was her grandmother hinting that she had been the one behind Hiroko's assignment? That she had arranged for Hiroko to be sent away, in the hopes that she might find some happiness outside the Imperial schemes?

  If so, it had been a mad gamble, but one that had paid off.

  "And remember," her grandmother continued, "the games don't end when you marry. Even now, your sect is about to be..." She paused, obviously considering her words. "Not the pawns on a chessboard, but the board itself, the battleground for a complicated game of maneuvering between the Gem Court and the Charter Sects." Her grandmother raised a finger to her lips.

  Hiroko glanced around. None of the servants seemed close enough to overhear, but she knew how powerful lux was, and that a hint of it in the right place could let a private conversation be overheard. "You know this?"

  "I have friends in the Gem Court," Dowager Hiroko said. "Friends who have told me how Morning Mist is to be celebrated with a Moonlight Revel starting tonight at dusk at the Imperial Annex."

  The Annex? That was half on Imperial grounds. It was where sects were permitted to come and mingle with cloistered members of the harem under extreme supervision.

  Dowager Hiroko’s eyes twinkled. “Some were considering hosting it at a Gem Court property in Taishin City. I believe a friend of mine may have casually mentioned that the Annex was available, and would allow the cloistered dowagers to assist.” She winked. “They just took a load of fresh orchids over an hour ago.”

  Hiroko got to her feet. She brushed dirt off her robes, then bowed to her grandmother. "Excuse me, please, Grandmother. It seems I need to prepare for a party."

  "Indeed, you do," Grandmother said. "Oh, and since we haven't much time left before the wedding, let me give you my gift now."

  She fumbled around by her feet and brought up a small wrapped box. She presented it to Hiroko. "Go ahead and open it."

  Hiroko opened the box and stared down.

  A silver circlet lay inside, made of multiple twisting wires that curved around each other like the branches of a woven bird's nest. In amongst the wires were tiny diamonds, the only gem not reserved for one specific rank of the Gem Court. They twinkled back with every color imaginable.

  "That was my wedding tiara," Dowager Hiroko said softly. "When I was sent from my homeland to marry the Emperor." She sighed. "I think it will become you very nicely. There is more to it than meets the eye."

  Hiroko clutched the precious gift to her. "Thank you, Grandmother," she said. She felt tears springing to her eyes.

  "You have a party to dress for," her grandmother said. "So go."

  Hiroko was just finishing her preparations when the bell in her room rang. She sent one of the two ladies-in-waiting who were helping her with her hair and makeup to answer. A lesser Gem Court functionary stood there, her face stern. "Princess Hiroko. I am Third Chamberwarden Lei. You sent for me?"

  "Yes," Hiroko said, not getting up as her lady put the finishing touches on her hair. "I wished to inform you that I will be attending the Moonlight Revel alongside Morning Mist this evening."

  The woman's frown intensified.

  "I'm afraid that is impossible. You are in seclusion in preparation for your wedding. You will not be permitted to leave the grounds."

  "But the Revel is at the Annex," Hiroko pointed out. "That is considered part of the grounds."

  She knew there was a reason why this party was to be held. She wasn't sure why yet, but she wanted to be on hand to help Morning Mist, whatever came up. "My betrothed is going to be present, is he not?"

  Chamberwarden Lei hesitated. "He was on the invited list," she admitted.

  An invitation for an event like this was more like a command, Hiroko knew. Hopefully someone would tell Joshi that.

  "Then I absolutely must attend," Hiroko said. "It would be inappropriate for my betrothed to be at such an event without me."

  She knew she was right. It was strange that Joshi had even received an invitation.

  "I'll have to clear it with—“

  "With no one," Hiroko snapped. "The matter is settled. Send an escort to take me there at sunset."

  As she spoke, she carefully wove together Blue Lux. She had been storing it up for days now, waiting for an opportunity. She wove the web she'd learned from being under it, thanks to that traitor, Lady Parvah.

  Its fronds caught the Gem Court functionary. She could feel as the weave settled in, as Lei’s eyes went a bit slack, her face easy. "I suppose that’s appropriate?"

  "Of course it is," Hiroko said. "In fact, when your superiors realize the oversight they nearly made, they will congratulate you for your attention to detail. You'll probably get a promotion."

  The chamberwarden laughed. "No chance. Dowagers have it all tightly wrapped up. No one reaches the top posts in the Gem Court without being a Dowager."

  "That's horribly unfair," Hiroko said sympathetically.

  "They’re such hypocrites,” Lei said, almost dreamily. "Especially Dowager Pearl Omada. I still think she's sleeping with Patriarch Ahren. If I could catch them..." She chuckled. "Well, then even the Dowagers couldn't keep me from my proper due. If she keeps sticking her neck out for the Council of Thirteen then someone is going to catch her.”

  Hiroko’s ears pricked up. Joshi had mentioned to her how the Charter Sects were trying to interfere with Morning Mist in various ways. “Wait, the Thirteen are involved in this?”

  “More than likely. Not that they let me into their plans,” the woman said. "But it's alright. We’ll get a few dozen brides placed with the Morning Mist sect. Between the upheaval that will cause and the fees they won't be able to afford for weddings and training, they won't be any more threat to us."

  "To you?" Hiroko asked, suddenly both shocked and alarmed. "What kind of threat can Morning Mist be to the Gem Court?"

  "They make a mockery of everything cultivation has meant for centuries," the woman said. "Bad enough that they have no true heritage, they take riffraff off the street to fill their ranks, but then to refuse to follow custom and arrange proper marriages for their people? All while parading around their marriage to an Indigo Princess? My lady, you deserve better.”

  Hiroko bit back a retort. Enough gossip. It was time to act. She tied off the weave. It would take some time to settle, and with luck would fog Chamberwarden Lei’s memory of this conversation.

  "I look forward to a very exciting evening," Hiroko said pleasantly.

  When Lei had gone, Hiroko dismissed her handmaids and studied herself in the mirror, thinking. There were schemes afoot. Min would have the good sense to suspect them, but she might not be looking in the right places.

  Hiroko would do whatever it took to help protect Morning Mist.

  She might not have yet officially married Joshi, but Morning Mist was her family now, too.

  She picked up her grandmother’s tiara from where it sat on her dressing table and set it on her head.