They walked back to the office tower in a strange, charged silence. The city, which had seemed so alien and hostile an hour ago, now felt different to Aylin. The wood, the stone, the glass they were no longer just materials; they were a language, and she had just heard it spoken in a voice she thought was lost to her forever.
Iuno Li, walking beside her, was buzzing with a nervous, creative energy she didn't understand. The world of architecture and material philosophy had opened up a part of her mind she never knew existed, and it was both thrilling and terrifying. "Director, I'm so sorry," she stammered, as they stepped into the sterile, silent cage of the elevator. "I don't know what came over me back there. I just started… talking. I'm an accountant. I have no business discussing design."
"There is no need to apologize, Miss Li," Aylin said, her voice softer than usual. She looked at the flustered, brilliant woman beside her, the woman who held the soul of her soul. "Your insights were… exceptional. It seems you have a hidden talent."
Back in the pristine, minimalist corner office, a place that was beginning to feel more like a monastery than a workplace, Aylin did something unprecedented. Instead of dismissing Iuno back to her paper strewn fortress, she gestured toward the small, elegant lounge area with its low leather sofa.
"Sit, Miss Li. We have more to discuss."
Utterly bewildered, Iuno did as she was told. She watched in stunned silence as Director Moon moved to a small, built in kitchenette and began preparing tea. Not with a cheap kettle, but with a traditional, elegant ceramic pot. She warmed the cups, rinsed the leaves, and poured the water with a grace and a focused, ritualistic reverence that was mesmerizing. She was preparing the Silver Needle White Tea, using the exact, precise method Iuno had described the day before.
The gesture was a powerful, non verbal statement: I was listening. I value your knowledge. I see you.
Aylin placed a steaming, fragrant cup before Iuno and took a seat opposite her. The tableau was surreal: the all powerful Director and the junior accountant, sharing a pot of perfectly brewed tea as the morning sun streamed through the vast window.
"That passion you showed earlier," Aylin began, her gaze intense, "for the nature of design. Have you ever considered it as a career, instead of accounting?"
Iuno was flustered. "Oh! No, I… I wouldn't know where to begin," she stammered. "I've always loved beautiful things. But numbers are… safe. They're logical. I'm good at finding the order in the chaos."
"You speak of materials making a space feel 'safe'," Aylin probed gently. "Is safety something you value highly?"
"Well, yes," Iuno said, looking down into her cup. "The world is… a very chaotic, stressful place. It feels like if you're not constantly vigilant, everything could just fall apart. A safe, orderly space is… a relief."
Aylin decided to take a small, dangerous risk. She had to know how deep the echoes went. "Do you ever have… strange dreams, Miss Li? A feeling of remembering things that have never happened?"
Iuno's head snapped up, her eyes wide with surprise. She hesitated, a blush creeping up her neck. "That's… a very strange question, Director."
"Humor me."
"Well… sometimes," Iuno admitted, her voice dropping to a confidential whisper, as if confessing a secret crime. "I have this recurring dream. I'm in a vast, beautiful palace, but the sky is dark, with two moons. It's not scary, though. In the dream, it feels… like home." She gave a small, embarrassed laugh. "And there's always a little girl there, with white hair, who keeps trying to get me to play a game with her pet dragon. It's a very silly dream."
Aylin's serene mask remained perfectly in place, but behind it, her soul was reeling. The Silent Palace. A child with white hair an echo of her own celestial lineage. A pet dragon. The dream wasn't a memory, she realized with a fresh pang of sorrow. It was a phantom, a ghostly image of a future that had been stolen from them, now bleeding through the cracks in reality.
She looked at Iuno, at this unsuspecting woman describing their lost potential, and asked a question, her voice softer and more personal than Iuno had ever heard it.
"I guess you want children, Ms. Li, since you dreamed about it?"
Iuno let out a short, sad laugh, a sound brittle with old pain. "Oh, no. I mean, yes. I do. More than anything. But… I can't."
The finality in her tone made Aylin's heart ache. "Why can't you?" she pressed gently.
Iuno sighed, a long, weary exhalation. "For… a lot of reasons, Director," she said, her gaze fixed on her cup. "I haven't ever been in a relationship... My life is… this." She gestured vaguely at the office around them. "And even if it did… I'm not stable enough. I've run the numbers. Do you know how much a single cycle of IVF costs? Or the fees for adoption for a single parent? It's astronomical."
Her voice dropped even lower. "And besides… you see, I don't like men." She risked a quick, terrified glance at her boss. "So the… traditional path isn't really an option for me," she finished, her voice barely a whisper. "It's just a silly dream. But if I could have one… a child like the one in my dream… that would be great. It would be everything."
She fell silent, her confession hanging in the sunlit air between them.
Aylin listened to this quiet, heartbreaking confession, and the irony was so cruel, so perfectly designed by a torturous Author, that it almost took her breath away. She was listening to the soul of her wife mourn the impossibility of having a child, a dream child that was a perfect, ghostly echo of the family they were supposed to have.
"There is nothing silly about wanting a family, Iuno," she said, her voice soft and steady, using her first name for the first time. "The worthiness of that desire is not measured by one's relationship status or their income. It is a fundamental truth of the heart. Do not let the world's logistical difficulties convince you that your own heart is wrong."
Iuno stared at her, her eyes wide and glistening, moved by the unexpected, profound validation. "Thank you… Director," she whispered.
The moment of shared vulnerability was too much. The description of the dream child, combined with the raw, sad truth of Iuno's own longing for her, coalesced into an unbearable weight in Aylin's chest.
She looked at Iuno, at this kind, nervous woman who spoke of their potential child as a "silly dream," who had just confessed her own deep, impossible desire for that same child. And her mind, for a moment, left the sterile office and drifted into a painful, beautiful fantasy of a life that should have been.
Oh, Lian, her soul wept in a silent, desperate cry to the woman sitting opposite her. The girl from your dream… I can see her so clearly. Our daughter.
Lost in her thoughts, her control wavered. Her gaze softened, the cool mask of the Director melting away to reveal the raw, ancient grief of the Saint. Her eyes traced the lines of Iuno's face, a face so different, yet housing the only soul that mattered.
Wouldn't it be cute, though, if she would look like you? the silent monologue continued, a torrent of love and pain. I thought she'd have a temper like you, and run around like you... Jumping in the pool at the summer palace, like you...
I always imagined I would teach her to sing to all her pets, in the way someone did… the way you did, Lian. But I imagine my voice would be all wrong. It wouldn't have your warmth.
I hope she'd be sensitive like you. I always prayed she would have your strength.
The sheer, overwhelming force of this lost future, the pain of mourning a child that never was while her other mother sat here, a stranger, so close and yet so infinitely far away, was too much to contain. The iron walls of her composure, fortified by a celestial will and a decade of loss, finally cracked.
A single, perfect tear welled in her left eye, shimmering like a captured star for a moment before breaking free. It traced a slow, silent path down her cheek.
Iuno, still reeling from their personal conversation, saw it. The Director… was crying. The sight was so impossible, so fundamentally wrong, that her brain momentarily refused to process it.
"Director?!" she blurted out, her voice sharp with alarm. "A are you alright? Oh my god, did I say something wrong? I'm so sorry, I overshared do you need some water? Should I call someone?" She started to rise from her seat, her hands fluttering uselessly.
With a swift, subtle movement, Aylin brushed the tear away, her expression instantly resetting. "Sit down, Miss Li," she commanded softly.
"But but you were "
"Sometimes," Aylin said, her gaze distant, "a beautiful concept, a powerful memory, can be so overwhelming it elicits a… physical response. It is nothing."
She reached for the teapot to refill Iuno's cup, her control reasserted but still shaken. Her will was answered by a flicker of her innate celestial energy. The heavy ceramic pot levitated a half inch from the table. She caught herself instantly, setting it back down with a slightly too loud clatter.
Iuno stared, her eyes wide as saucers, her panic about the tear instantly replaced by a new, more profound bewilderment. "Did that… did that teapot just…?"
Aylin met her gaze with a perfect, unwavering deadpan. "The table is uneven," she stated. "The magnetic stabilizers in this building are notoriously unreliable. I will have maintenance look at it. Drink your tea, Miss Li."
Iuno, completely adrift, just nodded and took a nervous sip.
Aylin ended the strange, revelatory meeting, but with a new, unexpected directive. "Miss Li," she said, standing. "Your insights have been valuable. In addition to your comptroller duties, I am assigning you to a new, ongoing special project. You will work with me directly to review the aesthetic and philosophical principles of all our major ongoing designs. I require your… unique perspective."
Iuno was speechless. She had walked into the office as an accountant. She was now leaving as some kind of… part time corporate design philosopher who had just come out to her boss, made her cry, and watched her levitate a teapot.
"Y yes, Director," she stammered.
As Iuno left, her mind reeling, Aylin stood by the window, a small, hopeful, and deeply pained smile on her face. The path ahead was long and dangerous. But she had a plan. The slow, secret, and painstaking work of rebuilding an Empress, one cup of tea and one design meeting at a time, had officially begun.