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Lian · (This post was last modified: 8/15/2026, 8:45 PM by Lian.)

DAY 1 | following the feast

Her stomach clenches with nerves. A thousand and one stranger's scents, faces, bodies milling among the crowds as they gather in honor of Tianlong. Lian is not a girl anymore; not yet a wife and not associated with childhood enough for leniency in the eyes of those who have come to stare, awe-struck, at Heaven's chosen. There is no room for mistakes for the next four days. At the Egyptian's celebration, she was a guest and it was simple enough to play polite trophy drifting in her father's wake.

There are more stakes to this. Lian sweeps her gaze across the feast, the smiling faces, the chatter that rises and swirls and she can only pick out snippets of words from. East and oh, lovely and I haven't seen you in ages!

Lian eats little. Her stomach churns. Her smile is carved into the porcelain of her face, and does not move. She is energized after the safe return of her people, the avoidance of bloodshed, even if Baihe's bloom must be postponed. For now, Lian feels as if she stands on the cusp of a precipice yet feels no terror, only apprehension. There is great opportunity here.

But there has been already, flowering tentatively among the Emperor's gardens. This celebration is for Ye Lanyi, and there is a quieter exaltation among the festivities for Yue and her hard-won brood. But Lian watches the woman of the court with care and caution, and the cornflower blue of Lihua catches her eye from among the gilded nobility. Lian picks her way over to the woman with care, an effort made to make the approach appear accidental to an observer. Concubine Lihua. She greets, warm, welcoming. The woman is colored like the rain, and stands shyly as if the chill can still be felt. The food is to your liking, I hope? I should have asked what a favorite of yours was - time has been a difficult catch for me lately.

Lihua

Welcome Back!

Greetings Stranger!

Verdant's Grace

princess of the tianlong