Nanowrimo 2022 - Day 23 Word Count and Best Bit

Today I added 2,089 words to my project, bringing my total past the 40k mark to 40,726!

Jin Xia attempted to step around the consort and her son, but a hand clawed with finely manicured nails grabbed her like a snake ambushing its prey. Jin Xia's head snapped in Zhi Rong's direction; her eyes wide. Never before had the consorts dared to lay hands upon the imperial children. But, in a competition like this, things changed. Desperation bubbled up like an unattended kettle, and that is what Jin Xia saw in the consort’s eyes as she glared up at the princess. Desperation and hatred to potent Jin Xia could practically taste its bitter flavor on her tongue.

"I was not finished with you!" Consort Zhi Rong hissed, the sound somewhere between a snake and an irate cat. "Don't you turn your back on me when I'm speaking to you, you little brat!"

Jin Xia stared down at the consort, feeling her nails digging deeper into the flesh of her arm. Cold rage flooded her veins like a river in winter. Did this woman really think that she cared about whether or not she was finished? Did this woman think she could lay her hands on her for something so petty and small as her pride?

"That's funny," Jin Xia said, mist and fog flowing from her mouth with each word. "I don't remember giving a shit."

Zhi Rong snatched her hand back, stumbling back as if shocked. And perhaps she was, given the lightning that danced over Jin Xia's skin. Fear had joined the desperation and loathing in the consort's eyes as the wind kicked up, tossing golden hair about as Jin Xia made her rage known.

Jin Xia's smile was not her usual political mask this time, but something wider and crueler. "Despite your inflated sense of worth, Autumn Rain Consort, you are not so important that I, the imperial princess, would need to wait for you to dismiss me. Your expensive silks and swarm of gossipy, brown-nosing servants do not make you empress, nor will it ever. Especially not with Qui Ling's snail's pace in the east. At this rate, you'll be lucky if he even gets that nation under his heel before I swoop in and snatch it up for myself. All your schoolyard gossip and bullying, every attempted assassination against the other consorts, every spy and saboteur you slipped into our palaces...and this is what it gets you. How very sad."

Zhi Rong shivered, a lost lamb before Jin Xia's storm. Jin Xia wondered if she'd always been so small. In her mind, Jin Xia always viewed her as this towering figure, casting her shadow over everyone and everything. Everything Qui Ling did, Jin Xia had to do ten times better to get the barest of praises. For every moment of attention her mother received, there would be a tantrum. Even in the most peaceful of moments, Zhi Rong and Qui Ling had been there, poisoning it.

But now, Jin Xia could not imagine how she'd ever been afraid of the woman in front of her.