He turned his hollow eyes to his remaining kin, their faces pale and lips bitten raw.
"And Tang Yuze, when you find him, break his legs and drag him here. I will watch him die for betraying his blood. This Tang shame must be buried with him!" How could he play them like that? How could he do that?
A young relative, maybe fifteen, suddenly burst into sobs at the horror of it all.
No one comforted him, they were all too consumed with the knowledge that they had just become prey and their family might vanish with the night.
Outside, thunder rumbled low in the distance, like an omen that the Tang dynasty, once proud and unyielding, had finally been fed to the wolves.
Rain lashed the grand windows now, each drop like a drumbeat to the old patriarch's slow undoing.
The guard, voice trembling, dared to finish the report that would shatter the last illusion of control they thought they had.
