"Shoya."

"That's not my question!" Yuehwa yelled, looking around for something to throw at him. She picked up a bolt of blue cloth lying on one of the lower shelves and used it to smack him on the head.

"Is that how you treat an injured person?" Shoya rolled his eyes. Picking himself up, he hobbled towards the door.

Yuehwa pointed an angry finger at him. "You stop right there! Where do you think you're going? Answer my question! Who exactly are you and what is that sword all about?" She had already begun to formulate her own speculations in her mind, but she wanted him to confirm them once and for all. The Phoenix had never been one to deal well with ambiguity, and she especially didn't like knowing half the story and not being told the rest of it. "If you were going to tell me that much about the pendant, why don't you just tell me everything?"

Seeing that he was continuing to ignore her, Yuehwa chased after him, but by the time she reached the door, he was already nowhere to be seen. Scowling, she turned to Ember and said, "What is wrong with that fellow? Does he have trust issues? Why is it so hard for him to tell me what's going on so that I can help!"

You just hit him on the head. If I were him, I wouldn't tell you anything either, Ember chirped.

Knowing immediately that she was seeking solace in the wrong bird, Yuehwa slipped her sword back into its sheath and headed back towards the princess's quarters. Along the way back, she couldn't stop trying to figure out the mystery that was Shoya.

"If the pendant belongs to his mother's family and Princess Naying has an exact same one, does that mean they're cousins? But that would make Shoya nobility of sorts, or even royalty, but there's no way..."

When she reached the princess's chambers, the first thing she did was to march straight to Naying's bed and shake her awake.

Startled, the princess sat up in alarm, looking around in a frenzy. "What's going on? Is the palace on fire?" she exclaimed.

Yuehwa held up the snowflake pendant in front of the princess's eyes. "I have a question for you. This pendant, you said it belonged to your mother. Where did she get it from?"

"Why do you have that?" The princess's eyes widened when she saw the piece of white jade dangling in front of her. She reached out and grabbed it out of Yuehwa's hand, clutching it tightly to her chest. "This is the only thing my mother left behind."

"Just tell me where she got it from!" Yuehwa repeated herself in exasperation. "Why does no one want to give me a direct answer tonight for goodness sakes!"

Princess Naying's hands trembled in fear.

Yuehwa was the Phoenix, one of the most skilled assassins across the five kingdoms. Even though she had two guards standing outside her door right now, no one even knew that Yuehwa had entered the room. Even if Yuehwa decided to slit her throat right now, perhaps no one would find out till dawn.

Seeing the fear reflected in the princess's eyes, Yuehwa sighed and softened her tact a little. "I just want to know where the pendant came from. Was it something your mother inherited from her family? Where was your mother even from in the first place?"

"The pendant was given to my mother by my grandmother. These jade pendants are given to every female offspring in the family. It's made of a rare type of white jade that you can only find in the mines owned by my mother's family."

"And where's that?"

"In the northern tip of the kingdom of Feng," the princess replied quietly.

"Your mother was from Feng?"

Naying nodded. "My mother was the eldest daughter of the Joo family. My mother's family is one of the wealthiest merchant families in Feng because of the jade business that they run. The king of Feng conferred the status of nobility onto my mother's family because of the sheer amount of donations that my grandfather gave to the royal coffers."

"And your mother had a sister?"

"How did you know that?" Princess Naying looked at Yuehwa curiously. "My mother had two younger sisters. When the present king of Feng was still the crown prince, he had wanted to marry my mother, but at that time word of my mother's beauty had spread across the kingdoms and the king of Dahai, my father, asked for her hand in marriage. For the sake of maintaining good relations between the two kingdoms, the then king of Feng agreed to my father's request. To placate his son, the king decreed that the two younger daughters of the Joo family be betrothed to the crown prince instead—my aunts. I've never actually met them before though."

"Both of them?" Yuehwa snorted. "The king of Feng sure has a big appetite. Two in exchange for one, seems like a good deal to me. Wait a minute," she paused for a second, the gears in her head working overtime, "does that mean that one of your aunts eventually became the queen of Feng? And that the crown prince of Feng who is here is in fact your cousin?"

She was slightly horrified. If that was indeed true, it meant that the king of Feng had sent his own son here to win the hand of his cousin. It was inbreeding at its best, one of the things she absolutely detested about some of the royal families. All at once she felt rather sorry for Naying.

The princess nodded her head slowly, saying, "My youngest aunt is the queen of Feng and the crown prince is her son. Although like I said, I've never seen her before and this is the first time I've ever seen my cousin. Feng is a great distance away from Dahai and it's not often that we have members of royalty make the long journey."

Once she got over the her moment of revelation, Yuehwa remembered Shoya and the pendant that he had in his hand. "What about your other aunt, the second daughter?" she asked.

"I think my mother once mentioned that she was only given the rank of an ordinary concubine, but I don't know much about that either. I'm not even sure if she's still alive. The last I heard was that she had a miscarriage and was in extremely poor health. I remember that because my mother spent an entire night crying to herself when she received the letter from Feng telling her about this."

Could it be that Shoya and the crown prince are brothers?

Technically it was plausible. Shoya had said that his mother sent him away from the family when he was an infant because the soothsayers predicted that he would bring about misfortune to the kingdom, which would make sense if he had been born into the royal family. There was no reason why a soothsayer's words would need to be taken so seriously otherwise.

"Do you happen to know if the king and queen of Feng have any other children besides the crown prince?" she asked.

"They have two princesses, also born to the queen."

"That's all? No other sons?"

Naying shook her head. "Not that I'm aware of. It's odd, but the crown prince of Feng is the only son that the king has. He has ten daughters but only one son, what are the odds of that?"

Well maybe he actually has two sons, except he had to let one go for the sake of protecting his precious kingdom, Yuehwa thought to herself. The more she thought about it, the more confident she was that her conjecture was the truth. Shoya's mother probably gave her family pendant to her child in hope that one day it would help her identify him again when enough time had come to pass and the prophecy expired. She wondered exactly how long more it was before Shoya would reach the age of twenty-five and the soothsayer's words could officially be discarded.

"But what about the sword?" she asked out loud.

"What sword?"

"Nothing, I was just talking to myself," Yuehwa said quickly. "Sorry to have woken you up, I was just curious that's all. Go back to sleep, It's still a couple more hours before the sun rises." Straightening herself up, she headed for the open window.

"Where are you going? The door is that way," the princess said, pointing the opposite direction.

"You know I don't like entering through doors." Giving the princess a quick wave, she leapt onto the window sill and in the blink of an eye, she was gone.

#

At the break of dawn on the final day of the tournament, Yuehwa tried her best to remain still as she allowed the princess's trusted maids to put the dress of liquid gold onto her slender frame. The inner layers of the dress were made of the smoothest silk, but the shimmering layer of gold on the surface was what transformed it from any other into one that was fit for the most beautiful woman across the five kingdoms.

Still, the outfit felt more like a burden on her shoulders.

"How is it that you can wear such clothes on a daily basis?" she asked, letting out a huge yawn in the process.

"You look beautiful," princess Naying exclaimed, studying Yuehwa carefully from head to toe.

Under the rays of the rising sun that had begun streaming in through the open windows, Yuehwa's cheeks took on a soft glow, her jet black hair that was usually hanging loosely round her shoulders pulled back into a regal up-do at the back of her head. The palace maids were putting the finishing touches to her hair, the crowning jewel being a golden hairpin lined entirely with pearls, which had been given to the princess by her father on her eighteenth birthday. When the work was done, everyone sucked in their breaths, staring in disbelief at the girl standing before their eyes.

"What? Does it look terrible?" Yuehwa frowned, inching over towards the mirror. The dress was so heavy that it was limiting her movements, and it was beginning to get on her nerves.

The reflection in the mirror was someone she almost couldn't recognise. "Oh my goodness," she exclaimed, slapping her hands on her cheeks. "What the hell have you done to me! This is ridiculous. Am I still human?"

"You look absolutely stunning," the princess said. She walked over and handed a golden mask to Yuehwa, watching as the latter slowly hooked it around her ears. With the mask obscuring half her face, no one would be able to tell whether or not the girl standing before them was truly the princess or someone else altogether. "No one will ever be able to tell."

Yuehwa flapped her arms in the air, marvelling at the weight of those sleeves. "This is the first and last time I'm doing something like this," she declared. "The next time some princess is being forced into marriage, I'm just going to walk away and pretend I didn't see anything. So, have you decided who you want to marry? Gi, Feng or neither of the above?"

Princess Naying sighed, collapsing down onto a nearby chair. No matter what, her father would have her betrothed to someone by the end of today and none of her options would be the one man that she was willing to marry.

Walking over to her, Yuehwa gave her a comforting pat on the shoulder. "Chin up, I said I was going to help you and I always keep my promises. If none of them catch your fancy then that's that. You can always stay here and keep your father company for another year."

"You really have a way out of this?" Naying looked up expectantly.

Yuehwa simply laughed in response. "Come on, it's time," she said. Hitching up her long skirt slightly, she started walking towards the door. "Stupid skirt, people really need to wear more comfortable clothes."

#

The flags of the five kingdoms were flying high in the wind on the final day of the tournament, with a crowd gathered at the spectators' stands, eager to catch a glimpse of the renowned Rose Princess and the lucky man who would have her as his bride. There was not an empty seat in the house, and everywhere the sounds of gregarious laughter and chatter filled the air as people eagerly anticipated the arrival of the princess.

Today, the king had granted special permission for the princess to be shown to the rest of the world, the precious jewel that he had protected so well all these years, in anticipation of this day when he would finally place her in the safe hands of another. In exchange, he would not have lost a daughter, but gained a son. As such, the king of Dahai was in especially high spirits, especially considering that the champions of his two ideal candidates had successfully managed to make it to the final round. No matter who won the tournament today, he would leave as the ultimate winner.

The two champions who would be contesting the final round were already standing in front of the stands, quietly facing each other across the courtyard—Shoya, entirely in white, and Baixun, in the contrasting shade of black.

"Announcing the arrival of Her Royal Highness, Princess Naying of Dahai!" the king's attendant declared to the crowd. Immediately, a hushed silence fell across the stands as everyone strained their necks eagerly to catch the first glimpse.

The moment the princess rounded the corner and appeared in full view, there was an audible exclamation of awe that went around the spectators' stands. There she stood in her regal gown of liquid gold and her golden mask, looking as if she had just descended from the heavens upon the rays of the sun. There was not a single person present who was able to tear his or her eyes away from the princess.

Rouge-tinted lips curling upwards in a reluctant smile, Yuehwa continued walking, trying her best not to swear because of the amount of effort it took to make each step. Beside her were two palace maids dressed in their sea blue, both of whom also wore veils that hid the lower halves of their faces; one of them was the real princess, shakily following behind Yuehwa.

The king smiled broadly when he saw his daughter approach, saying, "Ah there she is! I was beginning to wonder what was taking so long. She takes after her mother, does she not? Back in the day, everyone said that my queen was the fairest across all the lands!"

The rest of the royal guests nodded in agreement, with the exception of Lady Kang who was seated to the king's left. She looked as though she was smiling as she listened to his words, but those who were observant might have noticed the slight twitch of displeasure at the left corner of her lips when she heard him.

Yuehwa took her seat up on the royal grandstand, on the other side of the king. The minute she sat down, she immediately spotted Shoya standing at the left side of the courtyard, no longer with bloodstains on his clothes but still looking paler than he should.

Idiot, he already got what he came here for, why's he still going through with this?

For all his supposed cleverness, Shoya was probably the biggest numbskull she had ever known. In his current condition, she wasn't even sure if he would last ten moves against Baixun.

She glanced quickly to her left, where the crown prince of Feng was seated. He was engaged in casual conversation with one of the king's ministers, as if the match that was about to take place had nothing to do with him whatsoever. When he caught her looking his way, he lifted his cup in the air and subtly tilted his head in acknowledgement, his thin lips curving upwards in a confident smirk.

Yuehwa scowled and immediately turned the other way.

Further down the right side, she saw Maroo looking pallid, his hands wringing his clothes so tightly that the whites of his knuckles were showing. "I'll bet all the gold in the royal coffers that Park Maroo isn't the crown prince of Gi," she muttered under her breath. There was nothing about him that suggested that he was a prince, with the exception of the clothes on his back.

On the contrary, there was one person that she increasingly felt could be the real deal.

Tracing the trajectory of Maroo's intense gaze, she found herself looking at Baixun, who was standing on the right side of the courtyard flippantly tossing his sword from one hand to the next. That handsome guard who always seemed to be freely roaming the palace, appearing at all the wrong times with his easy demeanour and lackadaisical ways. She always had the niggling feeling that something didn't quite meet the eye when it came to Baixun, but she was never quite sure what it was.

Today, she finally had it figured out.

Her fingers toyed with the tiny bottle of poison she was hiding in the palm of her hand. She would have slipped this into the congratulatory toast that the princess was to personally offer the victorious prince at the end of the tournament. Nothing fatal, but it would leave the world believing that the prince had a chronic, debilitating ailment, and convince the king of Dahai to retract his promise of betrothal.

But if the Prince of Gi won, then perhaps she needn't use it after all.

Turning to girl standing on her left, she whispered, "You fancy Baixun, don't you? How would you like it if he were the one that you were to marry?"