Awakened by a drop of water hitting her cheek, the girl let her eyes drift open.
“Ugh…”
She felt unusually thirsty. Rubbing at her throat, she sat upright and then frowned in puzzlement at the damp clumps of hair clinging to her face.
I feel gross…
Although she was no stranger to physical discomfort, this particular sensation of stewing in squalor was an unfamiliar one. Brushing her fingers through her disheveled hair, she strained her eyes against the dim light of the room.
“Hm…?”
Her hand stopped moving. What she saw before her was not the familiar sight of her bed and bamboo blinds but a row of crude iron bars.
“Huh?”
As she pushed down the sense of dread creeping over her, her eyes darted around the chamber. There was a stone wall to her right. A stone wall to her left. A stone wall behind her. Laid out over the floor was the shabby straw mat she was lying on. The stone ceiling didn’t let a single sliver of moonlight through, but there came the occasional drop of whatever substance had managed to seep into it.
“Is this…the dungeon?”
The dazed murmur of her voice sounded wrong to her ears. It was slightly too deep to be her own.
She stared down at her hands. Their shape vaguely differed from how she remembered them, and she had no recollection of the bulky, heavy attire she was wearing. It was too dark to tell what color it was, but when she slid her fingers over the cloth, its tightly sewn threads felt hard to the touch. It was almost certainly goldwork.
This was an excessively extravagant garment.
Before this bit of information could lead her to an epiphany, light flooded her cell.
“I see you’re awake.”
It was the voice of whoever was holding the candlestick. A woman, apparently.
Squinting into the bright light, the girl watched as this woman drew closer, her shoes scraping against the floor. Upon seeing that the owner of the candle was someone she knew, she grasped the bars of her cell and leaned toward her, relieved.
“Oh, Tousetsu—”
Yet the woman interrupted her in a voice as cold as ice. “How dare you address me with such familiarity.”
The girl’s eyes went round. Her hands still gripping the iron bars, she stiffened, and Tousetsu—Reirin’s head court lady—stared down at her, narrowing her almond eyes into a glare.
“Because you pushed Lady Reirin from the Seventh Pagoda, she continues to suffer into the morning hours. You hurt the flower of our Maiden Court, and for that you shall pay with your life, Lady Shu Keigetsu.”
“Pardon?”
She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. With the bitter glare of her own court lady turned upon her, Reirin was left wide-eyed with shock.