Yunhua sensed the tide turning the morning Sairen summoned her to the east wing under the pretense of discussing frostroot trials—and instead unfurled a map of the capital city.
"We depart in three days," Sairen announced, her tone as calm as carved marble. "The Council of Elders has agreed to hear my proposal. You will accompany me—quietly—so they may see what cooperation brings."
Yunhua's first instinct was to refuse. The outpost had been her hidden world, her sanctuary. The very notion of the Citadel's marble halls and watchful courtiers set her heart racing with dread. Yet Sairen's gaze held no invitation for refusal.
"You will travel with my retinue," she said, "and remain under my protection. It is a rare honor—and a necessary one."
---
The Citadel rose from the hills like the crown of a god, sculpted from veined white stone and cold authority. Towers seemed like spears piercing the sky, each one draped in banners of age-old lineage, fluttering without joy in the highland wind. Below, the plaza's polished granite gleamed faintly in the early light, as though polished by centuries of footfalls and whispered intrigues.
The carriage moved beneath the gates without fanfare, escorted only by the imperial guards of the Xuanwu Dominion. Their jet-black banners—edged in blood-red silk—clashed against the western capital's customary white and silver. Even the gates' sentries, armored in the West's polished steel, could not hide their curiosity. Guards and courtiers alike paused to stare, whispers trailing in their wake.
Yunhua said nothing. Her face was half-hidden beneath a sheer veil of sea-glass green, her eyes lowered. She sat across from Lady Sairen, who reclined with absolute composure, utterly unbothered by the stares clinging to their procession like flies to meat.
"This city," Sairen murmured, voice smooth as oiled parchment, "is allergic to anything it can't define."
Yunhua's throat tightened. She already felt defined—by blood, by lineage, by the very drag of her half-elf ears beneath the silver-threaded veil. She did not respond. She could not.
---
The Council of Elders met in the Hall of Silver Flame—an ancient circular chamber capped by a dome of enchanted crystal, its facets catching oil-lamp light and scattering it like fireflies in the night. At its heart the floor was carved into a compass rose, each petal a symbol of an elven domain long since fragmented by time and war. Along the northern arc stood eight high-backed chairs of starwood, etched in runes that pulsed faintly with residual magic.
Seven were occupied.
Lady Sairen entered with the regal assurance of an empress, her black silk sleeves trailing like brush-strokes across the marble floor. Two silent attendants stood behind her, each bearing a lacquered scroll-case. Yunhua followed precisely two steps behind—silent, veiled, unreadable. She had not been announced. It was unnecessary. The Elders' gazes tracked her anyway, curiosity and contempt warring in their silver-flicker eyes.
Elder Vaelor, seated at the center, spoke first: "Lady Sairen of the Xuanwu Dominion," his voice a low chime, "we thank you for gracing us with your presence."
He did not rise. He did not welcome her.
Sairen inclined her head in acknowledgement. "I thank the Council for receiving me."
Her gaze swept the chamber, cool and unhurried: "Though I imagine your gratitude wanes when you see whom I bring."
A murmur rippled through the seven. Elder Merion, the youngest and most impatient, allowed his distaste to show. "A halfbreed, is it?" he muttered, barely audible.
"Do not mistake blood for identity," Sairen replied softly. "She has a name—Yunhua—and a mind sharper than many of your scholars. Would you have her recite the medicinal virtues of lunar moss in all four dialects of Eastern Elvish? Or shall her bloodline speak louder than her skill?"
Vaelor's voice rang cold: "She will remain silent, as will you, should you forget where you stand."
Agreement flickered in the chamber's undercurrents. Yet cracks had formed—cracks not only in the Council's unity, but in the West's façade of purity. It was just that easy to unnerve them, it seemed.
Elder Caelen, silver-haired and measured, folded his hands on his ivory desk. "Let us not waste breath on posturing. You have come to speak of unity."
"Progress," Sairen corrected, stepping forward so her gown's jade sheen caught the lamplight. "Unity is what our ancestors had before the continent shattered. Progress is what you lack now."
Merion leaned back, expression sour. "You advocate alliances with the East: trade, treaties, technology. We have heard this pitch before."
"You have heard it," Sairen said, "but never listened."
She swept her gaze to the ironbound doors. "The Dominion has stabilized five contested territories without a single blade drawn. We opened our academies to half-orcs, gnomes, dwarves. Our grain yields doubled in just a few hundred years. And here, in the West? Your outposts rot. Your mages crumble to dust. Your youth seek answers in foreign lands."
A crack of tension. Vaelor raised a hand: "Careful."
But Sairen's conviction did not waver. "Careful is what you've been for centuries. And it has brought you to the brink of irrelevance. I bring not a sermon, but a proposal."
Caelen's brow rose. "Then speak plainly."
"I propose the West establish a formal cooperative with the Dominion—shared academic and arcane research, open cultural exchanges—and that we discard the fiction that bloodline alone determines worth."
Her hand drifted toward Yunhua. Not to push or claim—but to remind.
"I offer a living example."
---
Yunhua stood motionless, the Council's hundreds of eyes grazing her like blades. No one addressed her. No one needed to. In their silence, she was an argument incarnate—an embodiment of progress they unwillingly acknowledged.
Merion sneered, voice dripping disdain: "Your example is half human. Hardly a beacon of elven excellence."
Sairen's reply was ice: "Her skill outshines her lineage. She speaks of poison lore and frostroot cures in tongues your own physicians abandoned as heresy."
She gave a faint, enigmatic smile. "She is what happens when walls crack enough to let the light in."
But tradition was a tree with roots deep and gnarled.
Merion's voice rose: "We will not transform our ancient seat into a stage for parlor tricks!"
"We are not debating seats," Caelen interjected. "We debate survival."
He turned to Vaelor: "Even if we distrust her, Lady Sairen's diagnosis of our decay is sound. The East thrives while we linger."
An Elder woman with a brittle voice chimed in: "We already trade with the Dominion. This is not new."
Vaelor's silence was the final verdict: "I will consider this. But know this—our values will not be sold for expedience."
Sairen bowed once. "I would expect nothing less."
And with that, the assembly dissolved, leaving Yunhua in a hush that felt colder than any winter.
---
They left the Hall of Silver Flame in near silence. The carriage returned to the embassy wing, but rumors had already spread: half-elf ward, Eastern dominion influence, whispered promises of joint initiatives. The corridors outside the Council were alive with speculation.
Guards stared at Yunhua, as though she bore a contagious affliction. Courtiers bowed stiffly or turned away in open disgust. In every glance, she felt the echo of Merion's sneer.
In the carriage's quiet, she broke her silence at last.
"You brought me to be stared at."
"No," Sairen replied softly. "I brought you to be seen."
Yunhua's mouth tightened. "It's not the same."
Sairen watched her across the lacquered panel. "They do not fear you. They fear what you represent."
"I never asked to represent anything."
"Neither did I," Sairen said, voice untroubled. "But here we stand—symbols of change, not power."
Yunhua's jaw clenched. "Change for whom?"
"For everyone," Sairen said. "Even those who spit at your feet. You will outlast their ivory thrones."
Yunhua said nothing. And Sairen, for once, let the silence speak.