"Miss! Wake!" Xia Zhu's hand crushed my shoulder so hard I tasted metal.
"I am awake," I said, and my voice surprised meâyoung, hoarse, not the voice I'd remembered from the end. Xia Zhu's eyes were huge and wet. She kept one hand on my shoulder as if I might float away.
"You're burning up," she whispered. "You were muttering in your sleep. I thoughtâ" She swallowed and shook her head. "Miss, you called for Brother. You called him by his childhood name."
"Say it again," I ordered. I sat up. The room tilted, but I forced my knees under me. Xia Zhu moved to the little table and fetched water. Two other maids hovered in the doorway like anxious birds.
"Jiang Yu," I said. The name fell into the air like a stone. The maids blinked. Xia Zhu exhaled a laugh that was almost a sob.
"Miss?" she asked, steadying the cup.
"I remember his study on the second floor. The craquelure on the inkstone. The place he hid the flute from Father." I named small things, brittle toys of memory. "Who sewed the sleeve tear on his winter robe?"
"Old nurse in the east wing, Madam Liu," Xia Zhu answered, quickly. "You mended it for him last winter."
"Good." I drank the water. It tasted of mint and something sweet. The mint flicked a memory: cold hands, an embroidered phoenix, a funeral banner. I kept my face blank. I had no right to
