Once word spread that he’d ordered the army to prepare to march, it was like everyone lost their minds. The lines of people who thought they needed to speak with Lord Lu had stretched out into the hallways and out of sight. The strangest part for Sen was that many of those people would have been overjoyed to see him dead re weeks earlier. Now, though, his control over the city and nation had been firmly established. He owed the soldiers of the army sothing for that. It had been their restrained behavior, more than anything he did, that had convinced the people that this change in leadership didn’t an utter disaster. Not that everyone was happy with the change. People had died in the battle. There were hard feelings, but not so hard that people were doing stupid things.
With popular support behind his rule, the remaining nobles and bureaucrats had accepted the inevitable. The knowledge that he was leaving soon ant that they all wanted to do anything and everything they could to leave him with a positive impression. It wasn’t working. While the nobles had kept their positions out of necessity, most of the powerful bureaucrats had been removed from their positions. Sen had co to realize that it was powerful, entrenched bureaucrats who were the most likely to start a rebellion. They were so much closer to the chanisms of kingdom-wide power. That made it far easier for them to use those positions to acquire or steal wealth and to hide it. It also allowed them to create chaos very nearly at will.
Many of those bureaucrats, like the one standing directly in front of him, were trying to get their positions back.
“Lord Lu, I assure you that my family has served this kingdom faithfully for generations in this role. There is no one better suited to the role of—”
“Stop,” said Sen. “One more word, and I will order a thorough review of your family finances. If anything untoward is found, anything at all—”
Sen never even got to the threat, because the ghostly pale man who had abruptly started sweating cut him off.
“Forgive , Lord Lu. I will waste no more of your ti,” said the man before all but running for the door.
“Stop him,” commanded Sen.
Guards seized the man by the arms and dragged him back over to the throne. Sen shook his head.
“If you confess your cris now, I will spare your family.”
“Lord Lu, I assure you, we have done nothing wrong!”
“Confine him. Have his family finances reviewed. Anyone that eager to avoid it has probably been stealing from the kingdom.”
As the man was dragged away, yelling about his innocence, Xu Xiao Dan looked at Sen.
“What would you like done?”
“How many is that so far?” asked Sen.
“Six, Lord Lu.”
“What did I order for the others?”
“To reclaim any stolen funds and to execute anyone directly involved, but to spare the families.”
“Then, let’s make that the standard order.”
“As you wish.”
“Who’s next?” asked Sen.
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“I am,” said Misty Peak, stepping into view from her illusion.
“You are? And why is that?” asked Sen.
“You’re getting that impatient look that usually ans you’re going to start ordering draconian punishnts you’ll regret later.”
“You said that like I have other impatient expressions.”
“You do. Several of them. There’s the impatient look that says you’re about to embarrass soone. The impatient look that says you're about to personally kill soone. The impatient look that says you’re going to destroy a sect. The impatient look that says I have too many clothes on.”
“You made that last one up, for sure.”
“I did, which is really sothing you should redy. Oh, and now you’re getting that impatient look that says you’re about to do wicked, wicked—”
“What can I do for you?” asked Sen.
“For once, nothing. I’ve co to do sothing for you.”
“Should I be concerned about this thing you want to do for ?”
She gave him a very inappropriate grin before saying, “Not this ti. I’ve just co to fulfill an old promise.”
With that, she handed him a box. Sen didn’t open the box. Instead, he gave her a long, steady look.
“Is sothing I want to open here?”
“I guess you’ll have to open it and find out,” she said.
Sen looked at her a little longer before, while fearing the worst, he opened the box and looked inside.
“Huh,” he said, reaching in and lifting out a teapot.
It was a nice one, made from what felt like good clay. It had even been given a blue glaze that pretty closely matched his usual robes. It was heavy enough that it would hold and distribute heat well. It was thoughtful, but he was baffled by the gift.
“Why did you give a—” Sen trailed off. “You’ve got to be kidding . After all this ti? You’re finally replacing that teapot you broke?”
Sen had nearly forgotten about it. When he’d first t Misty Peak, she’d been hunting her grandfather, Laughing River. A fight between the two nine-tail foxes had broken his favorite teapot. He’d made a big deal about it then, mostly because both of them had been infuriating him on a daily basis at the ti. So many, so much more important things had happened since then. The loss of that teapot had fallen into a ntal hole of problems that weren’t really problems for him.
“I know it doesn’t really matter,” she said. “You’re the emperor. You can have as many teapots as you want. If you said you wanted one, they’d be marching potters in here by the dozens. But I said I'd get you a new one. So, here it is.”
Sen huffed out a little laugh.
“Why are you laughing?” asked Misty Peak.
“I’m just shocked that you rembered. Hells, I barely rembered that you and your grandfather broke that teapot.”
“Well, you did seem pretty upset at the ti.”
“I was more annoyed than upset. But I was channeling a lot of other unspoken frustration with you both into those complaints.”
“I don’t know what you could have had to complain about. I was a perfect lady. Charming. Gentle. Demure.”
“Demure? Did you forget that you tried to kill and then poisoned ?”
“I didn’t poison you,” said an exasperated Misty Peak. “I sedated you.”
“Oh, because that’s so much better.”
“Your expression when you realized what I did was priceless. Your face was all like, I can’t believe that just happened.”
Xu Xiao Dan let out a few gentle coughs, getting the attention of Sen and Misty Peak.
“Lord Lu, there are many people waiting to see you.”
Sen knew that the forr patriarch of the Clear Spring Sect was trying to be helpful. He supposed the man even was being helpful, in a way. It was just that Xu Xiao Dan was shockingly conservative about many things. The elder cultivator seed to view decorum as deeply important and would frequently remind Sen about it. Maybe it had co from being a patriarch for so long, or maybe it was just the way he’d always been. Sen suspected that it was a combination of both. Not that it was a bad thing to be reminded about decorum. It wasn’t as though Sen had been brought up with etiquette training, so he often trampled all over it without even aning to.
He also had to remind himself that a lot of the people who were waiting were mortals. Standing around for hours at a ti as a mortal was taxing. Sen rembered that from his own childhood. Just as importantly, not everyone in that line was there to waste his ti. Many of them really were there to discuss important matters related to how the city would run after he left. It was just difficult to avoid painting everyone with the sa brush. Still, he had taken a little break. It was ti to get back to work.
“I know. I just wish I wanted to see them,” Sen complained quietly before turning to Misty Peak. “Thank you for the gift. I’ll be sure to put it to good use.”
He gave Xu Xiao Dan a nod.
“Send the next one in,” the forr patriarch commanded the guards at the door.
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