The Witch in the Woods: The Transmigration of Hazel-Anne Davis

The palace never truly slept.

Even long after the coronation feast had ended, after the last of the lanterns had burned low and the courtyards had fallen quiet, the hum of servants and the rustle of robes continued somewhere beyond the walls.

I could hear it if I listened hard enough—the soft scrape of shoes in the far corridor, the whispered report of a eunuch, the faint clatter of a tea tray being carried where it did not belong.

I didn't want to listen.

I wanted silence. Just silence.

So I slipped out of the chamber I shared with Mingyu, careful not to wake him.

His steadiness had carried me through the endless ceremonies and bows and gifts. His hand had never once let go of mine. But I knew his responsibilities were only beginning. Tomorrow there would be proclamations, meetings, the press of every official eager to test the strength of their new Emperor.

I couldn't breathe in that room, not with the weight of what tomorrow meant pressing against the walls.

Yaozu was already waiting in the shadows of the outer hall. Of course he was.

"You shouldn't be awake," I told him quietly.

He smiled faintly, that unshakable calm written in every line of his face. "And yet here we both are."

I exhaled, a little of the tightness in my chest loosening. "Come with me."

He didn't ask where. He never did. That was part of his gift. Mingyu wanted reasons, Deming wanted strategies, Longzi wanted calculations. Yaozu wanted only to be there.

We walked together through the quieter passages, my bare feet soundless against the cool stone. The palace was still too polished, too gilded to feel like home to me, but Yaozu's presence steadied the strangeness.

We ended up in one of the side courtyards, the kind that had been left untended during the war.

The moonlight revealed weeds pushing up between cracked stones, a crooked tree bending toward the roofline. It was imperfect. Which made it perfect for me.

I sat down on the low step of the veranda, gathering my robes around me. Yaozu lowered himself beside me, not close enough to crowd, but close enough that the heat of him reached me. For a long while, neither of us spoke.

The night smelled of earth and damp stone, sharper than the perfumed incense of the inner halls. I breathed it in until I felt something unclench deep in my chest.

"You hate it here," Yaozu said finally, his tone quiet, observational.

"I don't hate it." My voice came softer than I expected. "I just… don't know how to live in it. I know how to fight. How to kill. How to survive. But this—" I gestured vaguely toward the painted corridors, the silken hangings, the carved dragons glaring down from the roof beams. "This feels like wearing someone else's skin."

Yaozu's smile was small, knowing. "Then don't wear it. Let it wear you."

I frowned. "That doesn't make sense."

"It does," he countered gently. "Clothes don't make you. Rooms don't make you. Titles don't make you. You can sit in gold or in mud and still be the same woman who broke more than one kingdom in half. You don't have to change who you are at your core just because the walls had a bit more gold to them."

I let the words sit for a while. The moon shifted behind a bank of clouds, shadows softening around us. "It's not the walls that I am worried about. They know their purpose and will never deviate. It's more. It's the people, and the whispers, and the constantly moving… doing something… and never being enough."

"Then the people can learn to bend," he said. "Or I'll break them for you. If you don't want to move, then don't. If you don't want to be doing something, then don't. I will tell you that you are more than enough. And those who think otherwise don't deserve a moment of your time."

I turned to look at him, startled by the quiet ferocity in his tone. Yaozu rarely raised his voice, rarely threatened. But when he did, it wasn't bluster. It was certainty.

Something inside me eased further. I leaned back until my shoulder brushed his. He didn't move, didn't even breathe differently. He just stayed exactly where he was, the steady ground I hadn't realized I needed.

"You know," I said slowly, "the others all want something of me. Mingyu wants my strength beside his. Deming wants my fire pointed where he chooses. Longzi wants my insight or my healing, I'm not sure. Even Yan Luo wants me for something, even if I don't know exactly what that is."

"And me?" Yaozu asked, his tone more curious than teasing.

"You don't want anything."

"Wrong." He shifted slightly so our arms touched more firmly. "I want you to breathe. To sleep. To laugh when you feel like it. That's all."

My throat tightened. I stared down at my hands, flexing them slowly as if they could hold onto the strange gentleness of this moment. "That feels… impossible most days."

"Then I'll make it possible," he said simply.

The words hit me harder than I expected. My eyes stung, and I blinked fiercely, refusing to let tears slip free. I didn't cry in front of anyone. I hadn't in years. But Yaozu made it feel less like weakness and more like release.

He didn't push. He didn't reach for me. He just let the silence stretch, steady and sure, until I found myself leaning into him fully, my head against his shoulder. His arm lifted, wrapping around me without hesitation.

Warmth. Safety. Shelter.

That was Yaozu. Always had been.

We stayed like that for a long time. The ministers could argue themselves hoarse, the generals could plot their lines on maps, the court could whisper about my every breath—but here, with Yaozu's heartbeat steady against my ear, none of it mattered.

When he finally spoke again, his voice was low enough that it might have been the night air itself. "You don't have to be Empress here. Not with me. You can just be Xinying."

And for the first time since the war ended and I started to relearn who I was again, I let myself believe him.