The farewell banquet for Princess Ming was, by every visible measure, a triumph of palace hospitality — lanterns strung between the eaves, musicians tucked into every corner, enough dishes crowding the long tables to feed twice the guests actually seated at them. Yuan hated every second of it before he'd even walked through the doors.
He'd spent the better part of the afternoon trying to talk himself out of the particular dread sitting in his chest — the jade token still hidden in his drawer, the missing clerk still unaccounted for, the storage hall break-in Lei had mentioned only that morning, all of it pressing down on him even as he dressed in his finest robes for an evening that was supposed to be nothing more than a formal, unremarkable send-off. He'd almost hoped the banquet might offer some reprieve, a few hours of noise and music loud enough to drown out his own spiraling thoughts.
