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Qin Su looks down at her tea and finds herself unable to drink it.
This is not new, or surprising. Ever since A-Song was killed, the easiest things present a challenge. Everything feels hollow; the rich palace of which she is mistress, the legions of servants catering to her every whim, the kindness of her husband's guiding hand at her back whenever she ventures away from their too silent no squeals no joyful laughs no chambers. Especially at the beginning, it was hard to drink, or eat.
But she's better now. It's been months and she's...well. Not okay. She will never be okay. But she has accepted it. Her little one was avenged by her husband she had known, about the bloodlust and rage in his heart, she had known but she had not SEEN it and put to rest properly. Children die often, even if not so violently. She had been prepared for it when he first was born, when he was a sickly little thing and the healers hadn't thought he would make it. But he had, and she had gotten comfortable. She had forgotten how fragile he was, and then he had been taken away.
She shakes her head to vanish her gloomy thoughts. She has to drink her tea. It's important.
She wipes a bit of sweat from her neck with a handkerchief. She feels a bit gross, as she always does after sex. She can't wait until she can sink into the tub that his husband is preparing and cuddle him in the warm water. But to do that, she needs to drink her tea first.
It's the first time they have laid together since the death of A-Song. Neither of them had felt up to it until now. And her husband had been so careful, asking again and again if she was sure, promising that he could wait as long as it took, forever if he must. She has never seen him be so sweet with anyone other than her or A-Song. It's a good look on him. So Qin Su had guided his hand to her sex, and whispered Meimei has missed you. He couldn't control himself after that.
It had been a blow, at first, to find out the man she was hours away from marrying was actually her half-brother. He had come to her in the middle of the night, with tear tracks in his face, to beg for her mercy in having despoiled her so unluckily. She had held his head in her lab as he cried, and she was mostly filled with rage at her mother. For not telling her right when she started showing her favor for him. For telling him now, when they could have been married and blissfully ignorant. Now they knew the sin that hung over their union.
"Does it make you love me any less?" she asked, eyes lost in the distance.
Jin Guangyao's head snapped up in disbelief. "No," he confessed, like it was being torn out of him.
"Then go rest," she suggested, still far away, "tomorrow we shall marry."
And the next day, after unveiling her, he had kneeled before her and promised to be the best companion she could dream of, even if he couldn't fulfill all his marital duties to her. She had opened her red robes, seen the lust in her husband's eyes, and invited him forward.
"The sin has taken root, gege." She could see him shiver at the appellative. "I am with child. Does it matter, what we do now?"
He had grasped her hips and laid a reverent kiss on her belly. "I guess not... meimei."
She had never been so wet in her life. That night, and many others until A-Song was born, were filled with more pleasure than Qin Su knew to do with. And after, her brother had sat her down and given her a bag of tea.
"I love him, I really do.” Did he? Did he really? Or did he think him an abomination? “But we can't have any more children," he explained, and she knew what kind of tea, exactly, she had in her hands.
The mere thought was repulsive. But her husband's pleading face was enough to convince her. She would do anything for that man, she really would. So from then on, after their lovemaking, her husband would make her a cup of tea and leave her alone with it. And she drank it, every time.
She should do the same, now.
But it's harder, somehow. She realizes it doesn't have anything to do with A-Song's death, and everything to do with it. It's not the grief that's stopping her; it's the lack of a child running around. The lack of an heir for Jin Guangyao. She had wanted a gaggle of kids, once upon a time. That wish had been managed, when she had the one, but now...
Is she to remain childless for the rest of her life? She is still in her prime. She can make another.
The tea is getting cold in her hands. Soon, her husband will come asking what's the problem; she shouldn't delay. She should drink it.
She doesn't, still.
There's a bonsai tree in the room. Her robe doesn't make a sound when she stands up and tiptoes towards it, holding her breath. She lifts a decorative rock at the base of the tree and carefully pours the liquid from her cup, then covers the moist patch with the rock. Not even her husband, as observant as he is, will notice anything amiss.
She walks back just as carefully and places the cup back on the table. She breathes deeply several times, until the rapid beating of her heart abates, and then goes to join her husband in the bath.
He will never know. Not until it's too late to end it.