At sixteen, Shen Zhao was sent from Anyang to the capital to ascend the throne. Five bodyguards were killed in an ambush at a post station along the three-thousand-li journey. Pei Yan arrived with troops, killed all the assassins, and burned their bodies. He told Shen Zhao, “Your Highness doesn't need to know.”
From that night on, Pei Yan took control of his life.
The enthronement, the empress's appointment, reviewing memorials, allocating military funds: Pei Yan arranged everything. Shen Zhao was shut away in an invisible cage. His letters were intercepted, the court was run in his stead, and Pei Yan's men even stood outside his sleeping quarters. He hated Pei Yan for five years.
Until the campaign in the northern frontier, when Pei Yan took a blade for him and lost the use of his right arm. After they returned to the capital, Shen Zhao found a stack of old memorials: eleven petitions requesting a title, troops, and an investigation. Every one had been marked, “Not submitted.” Pei Yan had written them, but never submitted them. It wasn't that he didn't want to save Shen Zhao. He couldn't.
Then Shen Zhao pushed open Pei Yan's door. The walls were covered with a single carved character: “Protect.” Beside twenty-five instances of “Protect,” one character had been carved: “Zhao.” Blood and plaster dust were mixed together, impossible to tell whose blood it was.
He understood Pei Yan's predicament.
Then he realized that understanding made no difference. The hurt had already become part of who he was. His caution had been given to him by protection, his isolation had been given to him by protection, even his inability to reach out, his instinct only to grasp, had been given to him by protection. To undo the hurt would mean undoing himself. It was impossible.
Pei Yan left and returned to Anyang. Shen Zhao stayed in the capital and continued to be emperor. His right hand clutched the past, too crooked to straighten. His left hand was empty, not yet bent.
“I have arrived. But I don't know if the one who arrived is really me.”
