The interrogation chamber of the Censorate was a small, windowless room carved from gray stone, its walls slick with the damp of centuries. A single oil lamp burned on a wooden table, casting a pool of yellow light that barely reached the corners. Pei Mingyuan sat across from General Liu Hong, who was bound to a heavy oak chair, his face pale but his eyes defiant.
The night had stretched into the small hours, and Pei Mingyuan's body ached with exhaustion. But he could not sleep. Not while there were still names to be extracted, still traitors to be rooted out. He had brought Liu Hong here on a hunch—a name from the missing page, a general who commanded the eastern gate, a man who had been overlooked in the first wave of arrests. Now he had to make the man talk.
"General Liu," Pei Mingyuan began, his voice calm and measured, "you are charged with conspiracy to aid the rebel Liu Wuzhou. The evidence against you is substantial: your name appears on a list of conspirators recovered from the Chancellor's personal effects. I am not here to torture you or threaten you. I am here to give you a choice."
Liu Hong's jaw tightened. "I have nothing to say. I am a loyal officer of the Tang. I have served the Emperor for twenty years. This is a mistake—a fabrication by my enemies."
Pei Mingyuan slid a piece of paper across the table. It was a copy of the missing page, with Liu Hong's name circled in red ink. "This list was authenticated by Censor Wei Zheng and by the late Emperor himself. Your name is on it. So do not waste my time with protestations of loyalty. Tell me what you know about the conspiracy inside Chang'an, and I will recommend leniency to the new Emperor. Remain silent, and you will be tried for treason and executed before the week is out."
Liu Hong stared at the paper, his face working. He was a soldier, not a politician—trained to fight, not to lie. Pei Mingyuan could see the calculation behind his eyes: the weighing of loyalty against self-preservation, of honor against life.
"The Chancellor promised me a promotion," Liu Hong said finally, his voice low. "A command in the northern army. He said that if I opened the eastern gate on the night of the attack, I would be made a marquis. I knew it was treason. I knew it was wrong. But I had debts—gambling debts, family obligations—and the Chancellor paid them all. I was trapped."
Pei Mingyuan felt a surge of cold anger, but he suppressed it. "Who else is involved? Which officers, which ministers, which guards?"
Liu Hong hesitated. Then he spoke, his words tumbling out in a rush of confession. "There are three others at the gate—sergeants who serve under me. They were paid as well. And there is a clerk in the Ministry of War who was supposed to signal the attack by lighting a beacon on the city wall. I do not know his name, but I know his face. He has a scar on his left cheek, a crescent-shaped scar."
Pei Mingyuan made a note. "And inside the city? Are there men who are planning to open other gates, or to assassinate officials?"
Liu Hong shook his head. "I do not know. The Chancellor kept each of us separate. He told us only what we needed to know. I was responsible for the eastern gate, and nothing else. But I heard a rumor—a whisper—that there was a man in the palace guard, a captain, who was part of the plot. I do not know his name either. Only that he served in the inner courtyard."
Pei Mingyuan rose from his chair, his mind racing. The palace guard. The inner courtyard. That was the heart of the Imperial City, where the new Emperor slept. If there was a traitor among the palace guards, the new Emperor was in grave danger.
He summoned the guards and ordered Liu Hong taken to a secure cell. Then he rode through the dawn-lit streets to the palace, his horse lathered, his heart pounding.
The new Emperor was in his study, reviewing dispatches from the northern front. He looked up as Pei Mingyuan entered, his brow furrowed. "You look like you have seen a ghost."
"Worse, Your Majesty," Pei Mingyuan said. "I have found evidence of a conspiracy within the palace guard. There is a captain—unidentified—who is working for Liu Wuzhou. He may be planning an assassination attempt, or an attempt to open the gates from within. We must investigate every captain in the inner courtyard immediately."
The new Emperor's face went pale. He set down his brush and rose from his desk. "I will order a full inspection of the palace guard. Every man will be questioned, every weapon accounted for. But Pei Mingyuan—if there is a traitor among them, and if he is warned, he will strike before we can catch him. We must be subtle."
Pei Mingyuan nodded. "I agree. We should conduct the investigation in secret, using only men we trust absolutely. I recommend Captain Zhang Yun—he has proven his loyalty in the field."
The new Emperor agreed, and within the hour, Zhang Yun was summoned to the palace. The scarred officer listened to the briefing with a grim expression, then saluted and departed to begin his work.
Pei Mingyuan remained in the palace, his nerves frayed, his eyes burning with fatigue. He sat in an antechamber, sipping cold tea, waiting for word from Zhang Yun. The hours crawled. The sun rose higher, and the palace bustled with the normal activity of a court at work, but Pei Mingyuan saw shadows in every corner, heard whispers in every footstep.
At noon, Zhang Yun returned. His face was grave.
"We have found him," Zhang Yun said. "A captain named Feng Xu, who serves in the northern watch of the inner courtyard. He was seen exchanging signals with a civilian outside the palace wall—a man who matched the description of one of Liu Wuzhou's known agents. We arrested him an hour ago. He had a dagger hidden in his sleeve, coated with a fast-acting poison. He was planning to kill the Emperor during the afternoon audience."
Pei Mingyuan's blood ran cold. "Is he talking?"
"He is talking a great deal," Zhang Yun said, a grim smile on his lips. "He has named two more men—a clerk in the Secretariat and a eunuch in the Emperor's personal quarters. We have arrested them both. The conspiracy inside the palace is broken, at least for now."
Pei Mingyuan exhaled slowly, a weight lifting from his shoulders. They had done it. They had stopped the assassination, neutralized the traitors inside the city, and secured the new Emperor's throne.
But the war outside the walls was still raging. He turned to Zhang Yun. "And the army? Have there been any dispatches from the Prince of Qin?"
Zhang Yun handed him a sealed letter. "This arrived an hour ago. It is from the Prince's camp."
Pei Mingyuan broke the seal and read. The letter was brief:
Liu Wuzhou's main force has reached Taiyuan. We are engaging them in a series of skirmishes along the river. Li Yuanji has been sighted in the rebel camp—but he appears to be under close guard, not in command. There may be truth to his claim of being a prisoner. I am attempting to make contact with him through a captured rebel scout. Stand ready to receive further instructions. —Qin.
Pei Mingyuan read the letter twice, his mind churning. Li Yuanji was indeed in the rebel camp, but he was not leading the army—he was being watched, restricted. It was possible that the Chancellor had used him as a puppet, that he had fled to Liu Wuzhou under false promises of power, only to become a hostage.
He thought of the new Emperor's question: was Li Yuanji beyond redemption? The Prince of Qin seemed to believe that there was still a chance—a chance to turn the traitor prince into an ally, to use his knowledge of the rebel camp to strike a decisive blow.
Pei Mingyuan set down the letter and looked at Zhang Yun. "The Prince is considering negotiations with Li Yuanji. He may try to bring him back to our side. If that happens, it could change everything—we could learn Liu Wuzhou's plans, his supply lines, his weaknesses. But it could also be a trap. Li Yuanji may be pretending to be a prisoner in order to lure the Prince into an ambush."
Zhang Yun nodded. "Then we must be prepared for both outcomes. We should send reinforcements to the Prince's position—a reserve force that can intervene if the negotiations go wrong. And we should have a fallback plan if Li Yuanji turns out to be a false ally."
Pei Mingyuan agreed. He drafted orders for a battalion of cavalry to move north, positioned to support the Prince of Qin but hold back until the nature of the negotiations became clear. He also sent a coded message to the Prince, urging caution and recommending that any meeting with Li Yuanji take place on neutral ground, with heavy escort.
The dispatches were sent, and Pei Mingyuan waited. The afternoon passed in a haze of anxiety. He paced the antechamber, reviewed intelligence reports, and met with Wei Zheng to coordinate the ongoing arrests of the remaining conspirators. By evening, the net had closed around a dozen more officials and officers, all of whom had been connected to the Chancellor's network.
But the biggest prize—Li Yuanji himself—remained beyond their grasp, a shadowy figure hovering between betrayal and redemption.
As the sun set, Pei Mingyuan received another dispatch from the Prince of Qin. This one was longer, more detailed.
I have established contact with Li Yuanji through a trusted intermediary. He claims that he is indeed a prisoner of Liu Wuzhou—that he was deceived into fleeing, and that he has been kept under close watch ever since. He has offered to provide us with a detailed map of Liu Wuzhou's encampment, including the locations of supply depots, ammunition stores, and the command tent. In exchange, he asks only for his life and a private meeting with me, to prove his sincerity in person. I am inclined to accept. I will meet him at dawn tomorrow, at a small temple halfway between our lines and the rebel camp. If I do not return, you will assume command of the army's intelligence operations. —Qin.
Pei Mingyuan read the dispatch with a sense of dread. The Prince of Qin was walking into a potential trap—but he was also taking a calculated risk that could end the war with a single stroke. If Li Yuanji's information was genuine, the Prince could destroy Liu Wuzhou's supply lines and force the rebels to retreat. If it was a trap, the Prince might be captured or killed, leaving the empire without its greatest general.
Pei Mingyuan wrote a reply, urging the Prince to take every precaution: to wear armor, to bring a strong escort, to verify Li Yuanji's identity and the map's authenticity before entering into any agreement. He sent the letter with a fast rider, praying that it would reach the Prince before dawn.
He spent the night in the palace, unable to sleep, his mind spinning with possibilities. At the first light of dawn, he stood on the palace's eastern wall, looking north toward the distant mountains, waiting for a signal, a messenger, any word from the Prince.
The morning passed. No word came.
At noon, a rider approached the gate, his horse exhausted, his face caked with dust. Pei Mingyuan rushed down to meet him.
The rider dismounted and handed him a dispatch. Pei Mingyuan's hands trembled as he broke the seal.
The message was brief, written in the Prince of Qin's own hand:
The meeting was a trap. Li Yuanji betrayed me. He had a dozen assassins hidden in the temple. I escaped, but I was wounded. Liu Shiran is dead—killed defending me. My army is falling back to a defensive position. Liu Wuzhou is advancing. I need reinforcements immediately. Send everything you have. —Qin.
Pei Mingyuan's heart stopped. Liu Shiran was dead. The Prince was wounded. The army was retreating. And Li Yuanji had shown his true colors: he was not a prisoner, not a victim—he was a traitor through and through, willing to sacrifice his own brother for the sake of rebel gold.
Pei Mingyuan crumpled the dispatch in his fist and turned to the palace. He had to inform the new Emperor. He had to order the reinforcements. He had to save the Prince of Qin—and the empire.
As he ran through the corridors, his mind raced with a desperate plan. He would send every available cavalry unit north, strip the capital of its defenses if necessary, and hope that they arrived in time to turn the tide.
But even as he gave the orders, a cold voice in his mind whispered a grim truth: Li Yuanji had outmaneuvered them all. He had used the negotiation as a decoy, drawn the Prince of Qin into a vulnerable position, and struck at the heart of the imperial army. The war was not going to be won easily. It was going to be a brutal, bloody struggle, fought on the borderlands where the law had no power and only the sword could speak.
Pei Mingyuan arrived at the throne room, his breath ragged, and knelt before the new Emperor.
"Your Majesty," he said, his voice raw, "the Prince of Qin has been ambushed. Liu Shiran is dead. The army is in retreat. We must send reinforcements immediately—every man we can spare."
The new Emperor rose from his throne, his face pale but resolute. "Then we will send them. We will empty the capital if we must. And we will not stop until my brother is safe and Li Yuanji is brought to justice."
Pei Mingyuan looked up, meeting the Emperor's gaze.
"Your Majesty," he said, "I must go with the reinforcements. I am the only one who knows the intelligence network, the only one who can coordinate with the Prince's surviving officers. I have to be there."
The Emperor hesitated, then nodded. "Go. But Pei Mingyuan—you must return. The empire needs your voice, your honesty. Do not die in the borderlands."
Pei Mingyuan bowed, rose, and left the throne room. He mounted his mare, joined the column of cavalry that was already forming, and rode through the eastern gate, toward the smoke and chaos of the northern frontier.
The sun was setting, painting the sky in shades of blood and fire. The borderlands were calling him again—the lawless, savage places where empires were made and unmade. And this time, Pei Mingyuan was not just a witness. He was a participant, a warrior, a man who had chosen to stand for the truth even when the truth led to war.
He rode into the darkness, his heart full of grief for Liu Shiran, fear for the Prince of Qin, and a cold, burning determination to see Li Yuanji brought to heel. The final chapter of the conspiracy was about to be written—and Pei Mingyuan would be the one holding the brush.
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