Threads 164-Dolls 2

“Where else would I be?” Lin Hai beckoned Renxiang out as he straightened up. “You are an odd girl at times, Baroness.”

“She is,” Cai Renxiang agreed. “But if you are here, would you like to attend the fitting? Your perspective may offer valuable critique.”

There was a sinking feeling in Ling Qi’s stomach. She knew—knew for certain—a way to break this fantasy. Cai Renxiang had already been fitted for coronation—and everything else. She had met Liming after all, and she remembered Cai Renxiang’s words regarding the fitting.

To bring it up here though, in this land of memory and dream, would be painful.

Yet it would be certain.

There were other lines of attack, true. She could prod her liege about this coronation. Did Renxiang truly believe her mother would retire when they were both still so young? She could prod her to look outside and see the gaps in the illusion. She could point out to her liege at how easy this all was. That Renxiang had achieved such change in such a short time when they both knew that their path was going to be hard and arduous didn’t make sense.

Yet they were all arguments of logic. And logic was a soft and easy thing to mold and twist into rationalization. All the same, if anyone could be pulled from their dreams by logic, it was Cai Renxiang.

“Ling Qi?” asked Cai Renxiang, raising an eyebrow.

Ling Qi’s hands balled into fists. Her mind spun out a thousand lines of argumentation she could raise, but it all came back to one thing. Their lives were in danger right now. Perhaps Liming would save Cai Renxiang, but what of the rest of them? It would ruin the mission in so many ways if they had to be saved by Liming or whatever other observer the Duchess had sent along. It would end the chance to lessen the impact of war in the south.

She couldn’t imagine Cai Renxiang approving of the decision to risk that if they didn’t have to, especially if it was done just to spare her pain. Yet for Ling Qi deliberately hurting a friend twisted something in her chest.

“Ling Qi, you are beginning to concern me,” Cai Renxiang said, watching her from the doorway. She stood with her arms crossed, frowning faintly. The simulacrum of Lin Hai stood behind her with a look of faint concern as well. “Are you certain you are well?”

“No, I don’t think I am,” Ling Qi said precisely. “I’m sorry for deflecting before, but I am actually here to remind you of something.”

“Are you saying our lady has forgotten something?” Lin Hai made an exaggerated gasp of surprise. He laid a hand on Cai Renxiang’s shoulder. “How scandalous of you, Baroness. We have certainly been busy, but Lady Ren has not been that distracted.”

Cai Renxiang, however, looked disquieted and raised her hand to place over his. “No, Ling Qi has my trust. If she believes I have overlooked something, I will listen.” She paused then and shook her head. “Perhaps it would explain the distraction I have felt today.”

Ling Qi pursed her lips. She wondered if that was a sign of her liege’s mental struggle. “Renxiang, you’ve already had your dress fitting.”

“She most certainly has not,” Lin Hai disagreed immediately. “As her tailor, I think I would recall that.”

Ling Qi ignored him and the glint of blue-white ice in his eyes. She met Renxiang’s gaze steadily. “Renxiang, you only have one dress, and your mother made it. She made it years ago, and you’ve never worn anything else since.”

“Ridiculous!” Cai Renxiang’s frown deepened into a scowl. “My Honored Mother would not waste her craft on a child. That is why she had always refused my childish demands to meet her face-to-face before I achieved the third realm. It would be…” Her face scrunched up in discomfort, and in a disquieting display for the stoic girl, she visibly shook herself. “…pointlessly cruel,” she breathed out.

“Just so,” Lin Hai said, resting his hand on his hip. “Really, Baroness, what has gotten into you, speaking such strange things? Are you ill perhaps? Wading into Dream as you do can befuddle the mind.”

“Yes, that must be so. My apologies for misunderstanding your limits, Ling Qi,” Cai Renxiang said. “I will see a physician brought in at once. Please take the rest of the afternoon to rest.”

She sounded distracted and uncertain, and Ling Qi grimaced, shooting a dark look at the simulacrum behind her liege. Cai Renxiang’s discomfort was already fading. This spirit was laying her thumb on the scale.

Ling Qi stepped forward within arm’s reach of her liege. “Renxiang, listen, you can’t change the past, even if it’s painful, even if it’s awful. You know that. I know that. Isn’t that why you always talk about the future?”

Cai Renxiang narrowed her eyes. “Baroness, you are really being too familiar.”

“Maybe, but how else would you know it’s me?” Ling Qi asked.“I wouldn’t be who I am if I did not know loneliness. If you don’t remember what it is you’re trying to replace, do you think you can really build this?” She gestured to the window through which the image of the idyllic city lay. “Make it more than a dream?”

Cai Renxiang grimaced, pain blooming on her features.

“That is quite enough, Baroness!” the not-Lin Hai snapped. He moved to push her away with all the implacable strength of a higher realm. “I know not what has disturbed your mind so, but Lady Ren does not need—”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

His hand went through her shoulder as Ling Qi took hold of the dream’s fabric and twisted it, stepping closer still to place her hands on Renxiang’s shoulders. When she spoke again, Ling Qi’s words felt sour on her tongue. “Remember Liming.”

The world bent around her as she spoke the spirit’s name, the sound of it distorting the air. Like water into which a stone had been dropped, the dream rippled. She was close enough to see Renxiang’s eyes widen and her pupils shrink in terror.

“Mother… Uncle… Why?” The words that passed Renxiang’s lips were little more than a whisper, but they reverberated through the dream like thunder.

The light of the bright summer’s day outside changed. Warm sunlight became harsh radiance, and the city boiled away into light. The mansion groaned as polished wood split apart, giving way to walls of gleaming metal. The office shuddered, and not-Lin Hai’s expression twisted into a snarl as he dissolved, scoured away like the morning mist at the dawn. But Ling Qi felt the spirit’s lingering malice bloom in the dream.