Layin had never learned how to wait.

Confinement had been delivered with cold efficiency, guards stationed at his doors as if he were a criminal instead of a favored concubine. He had shattered porcelain in fury, silk sleeves trembling as anger bled into panic. Being punished was tolerable. Being ignored was not.

So he forced his way out.

Now he knelt on the lacquered floor of the audience hall, knees aching, hair fallen loose from its careful styling. The memory of steam lingered—the scream, the spilled tea, skin reddening where it should not have. He had called it an accident. No one else had.

The Empress did not look at him.

Time stretched cruelly. Courtiers averted their eyes. Layin lifted his chin, instinctively proud even now, and delivered the apology he had rehearsed, voice tight and brittle. “I was imprudent,” he said. “I beg Your Majesty’s forgiveness for my moment of—”

Silence.

Something inside him fractured. His posture collapsed, palms striking the floor as he bowed too low, too desperate. Pride dissolved, leaving only fear.

“Please,” he whispered, voice shaking. “I didn’t mean for it to go that far. I only wanted—” His breath hitched. “Don’t turn away from me. Don’t cast me aside. I’ll be better. I swear it.”

His forehead pressed to the floor, shoulders trembling as he waited.