On the day I was deposed and consigned to the Cold Palace, Yan Yuheng came personally to see me off.
Before the palace gates were locked, he asked whether I hated him.
I touched the old gold hairpin hidden in my sleeve and smiled. For three years as Empress, I learned to speak like her, to carry myself like her, and to love him the way she once had.
But even as I was dying, he never understood: I was never like Shen Zhaotang. I had only acted too well.