Fake Eunuch: I Slept With Wu Zetian for Thirty Years

My name is Yang Yin, Assistant Director of the Court of Palace Attendants in the Great Tang, and the person the Empress of Wu Zhou trusts most.

But no one knows I'm a eunuch in name only.

Even fewer know that our relationship goes beyond sovereign and subject.

The first time she summoned me to her bed was in the third year of Yonghui. After that night, she gave birth to Li Hong.

The last time she saw me was in the first year of Shenlong. Before that night, she had not let me touch her for thirty years.

Over those thirty years, she became an empress, and I became the trusted eunuch who wielded power on her behalf. At court, we were sovereign and subject. In the dead of night, we were... I couldn't say what.

When she killed Li Hong, I knelt outside the Hall of Harmony. When she killed Li Xian, I received a letter.

As she lay dying, she held my hand and said, “Yang Yin, I hate you.”

I froze.

She said, “I hate you for making it impossible for me to leave you. I hate you for making me kill my own sons. I hate you for making you the only one I will remember at the end of my life.”

She closed her eyes, and a tear slipped from the corner of one eye.

I held her hand from deep into the night until dawn.

By sunrise, she was cold.