LILITH

"I am sending you to America"

"Father?" Lilith Liu looked at the back of an impeccable gray suit. YongHe Liu turned, closing the automated curtains with the press of a button and concealing the view of Shanghai's skylight from ceiling-to-floor glass panes. The city lights at night were Lilith's favorite sights of the city. Her father was responsible for building many of them himself; Liu Enterprises, for all your infrastructural needs. Sweeping skyscrapers; modern; artistic buildings; company offices; anything you could dream up--and afford.

They reminded her of stars.

Her father was a man who could build stars on earth if so he wished.

"I am sending you and Willow to the US," he clarified, looking at her with glittering black eyes that didn't betray any emotions, "to forge some alliances. Have you heard of the Great Houses?"

Lilith nodded. Brittersby, Davis, Trent--American royalty. The elite among the elite, monarchs of the American socioeconomic scene, they had been part of her lessons to prepare her for taking over Liu Enterprises someday.

"But I heard, that the head of one of the them—Lennox Trent—was murdered," she said. "I understand that I need to go to forge alliances, but my sister is still young and inexperienced." and vulnerable, she added silently. But she kept that to herself. Her father despised weaknesses and Willow was hers.

YongHe smiled, his lips slicing through the loose skin of his jowls. In the dim light, he looked more hungry predator than human, sniffing for a scent of fear. "Lennox Trent's murder, while unfortunate, provides me with an excellent opportunity. The great houses are shaken up, and what better time than to insert one of my own amongst them? Davis is clinging on to scraps of power and Trent's fate is uncertain now that their head is dead. Those Regents like to boast of power, when in reality, it only takes the tiniest of pushes to upset their little hierarchy. We are well known in this country; countless powerful families here would come running at the slightest beckoni of our hands. However, internationally, we are nothing but a passing mention. A potential ally among many. Old Trent has a son your age I believe, the eldest. Seize the heart of the beast, and you shall control its jaws. Do you understand what I'm saying, dear?"

Lilith stared in shock. "But what about Liu enterprises?"

YongHe's eyes turned hard. Lilith internally gulped.

"And what about it? The way I see it, you, my dear daughter, have yet to prove yourself worthy of such a prize. Your foster brother, Liang, has already married into the Qian family and thus obtained a valuable alliance. He is willing to make sacrifices for the better of the company. You have yet to prove yourself outside of your studies. Theory is one thing, practice is another. Liu Enterprises would do just as well, if perhaps not better in the hands of Liang."

Lilith set her face in a determined expression and gave a nod. "I understand, father."

"In that case, tell your sister to pack her suitcase. You'll be leaving in a fortnight."

"Yes, father."

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Lilith's hands shook as she watched Willow polish the gleaming rapier. She flipped another page of her book, eyes fixed on the words, unable to retain their meaning for longer than a second. That sword, with it's silver lattice handle...medieval sword...collector's set from Spain...that sharp edge...

She remembered it very well...

•━━✦❘༻♜༺❘✦━━•

She was sixteen again, and she had just spoken up in one of her father's meetings with something the older men did not agree with. YongHe had smiled through it with gritted teeth, but after the meeting was over, he had pulled her into this very room.

"What have I told you?" he said silkily, a deadly calm spreading over his features.

Lilith gulped. "Control, constraint, responsibility," she recited nervously.

"I have been waiting for you to grow up, but it seems that I have gotten this all wrong. Your mother implored me to be gentle on you, to protect you from the harshness and brutality in this world. But she is no longer here, and I must adapt. Time waits for no one, least of all the heir of a multi-million business. Sooner or later, it will be you sitting in that room, talking to your employees and commanding their attention, if not their loyalties." His voice grew louder and louder, going from the quietest brush of silk to filling the whole room. As he talked, he walked over to the far wall, where a collection of swords hung.

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"France...Portugal...Italy...ah, Spain."

He carefully ran his index finger down the blade of a short rapier with a handle meshed by intricately interwoven silver filaments. The sword stood out among the others, being no longer than a forearm. It looked delicate, its blade honed to such a fine tip that a slight movement might cause it to snap. However, appearances were deceiving, and the slightest brush of YongHe's finger left scarlet droplets in its wake.

He removed the sword from its holster, and held it towards Lilith for inspection. Lilith flinched, but took it in her hands anyways. Obedience. Courage. She held it up to the light, and noticed a character carved on it.

Yong. Bravery.

"Sit up straight," YongHe instructed. She hadn't even realized she was slouching. "A lady cannot slouch."

She did as he had instructed. He slid the blade down the front of her dress. She shivered as the cold metal touched her skin; goosebumps erupted in flurries. The blade settled against her stomach like a poisonous snake waiting to strike. There was a hyper awareness where the tip of the blade touched her lower ribs.. She dared not move, for fear of pricking herself, and the parts of her skin that were in contact with the blade buzzed like her nerves had decided all to migrate to cold touch.

"This is your homework for tomorrow" said YongHe. "Profiles on all the men who were in the meeting with me today. If you need any additional resources, don't hesitate to ring for the maid. By tomorrow, I will expect you to know what today's meeting was about."

A test, then. And a punishment.

The moment the last of her father's polished shoes vanished behind a closed door, Lilith slumped in relief, then stifled a shriek. She had forgotten about the rapier. Cautiously, she felt for it, but a glance towards the hidden camera she knew was positioned in a shadowy corner kept her from removing it. She knew without a doubt that her father would be perusing the footage later. So she kept her back ramrod straight and turned to the first of the papers.

"Zhang YiLong, fifty-one, successful businessman and entrepreneur. Quite successful lately, blooming deals after he started associating with father. He has a son my age, and he's on his fifth wife and is rumored to have fertility problems..."

An hour later, eyes bleary and back aching though she did not dare remove her father's punishment, she still had not found what she was looking for. The men, all moderately successful on their own, were all indebted to her father after he took them under his wing and gave them a foothold in certain circles they would not have had access to otherwise. But she doubted her father would hold a meeting for that reason... She flipped through the pages again...the pages all blurred into one another...she was so tired

"Ouch!" her hand shot to the place where the blade had pierced her skin, and to her horror, inspected her hand to find deep, crimson on her fingers, not the vibrant red from a shallow cut. But she dared not remove the sword, the surveillance camera an ever-lurking presence in the periphery of her vision. She moved to rearrange the papers, then stared in dismay as her bloody hand left a streak of red upon the paper. She hoped she didn't need to return the profiles in pristine condition, if at all. The slash of scarlet stretched from the man's name all the way to that of his wife's and son's. Wait--wife...and son. Realization dawned. She flipped open the other files, and sure enough, the link lay there as clear as daylight. She could feel her stomach sinking. Surely her father didn't have this in mind...but the connection was too obvious to ignore, and just as two plus two always equalled four, there was but this solution for the problem. Hesitantly, she rang the bell thrice. Once was for the maid. Three times, well, three times was the secret ring for her father. The tolling sound sounded a lot like the cuckoos that her mother had loved. Her father would know what it meant. Nobody used thrice in this household but for the Liu's.

Sure enough, within a minute or two, the doors swept open and he fixed his eyes upon hers. "I take it to mean you've understood what I'm trying to say?"

She nodded mutely. All of the men profiled had been indebted to her father in one way or another. And all of them had single sons her age...

She could already see herself in red, peering through a bridal veil. Lilith Liu, she could imagine the papers saying, heiress of not one but two great fortunes...the journalists screaming questions...the cameras clicking...

•━━✦❘༻♜༺❘✦━━•

She could still hear them clicking.

With a jolt, she snapped back to reality to find Willow walking towards her, shiny heels clicking with each step.

"I've finished packing" she announced. "You did it! I can't believe it, but you did it. How did you manage to convince father?"

Lilith allowed a wane smile. She embraced her sister, all too aware of the camera in the corner, and whispered in her ear, "not so much convinced as hoodwinked. There's a camera in here. The footage has no sound though."

Willow kept her face neutral as she pulled back. "Father's a very hard man to fool. How'd you manage it?" although she uttered the words, her lips remained fixed. Ventriloquism was a useful skill the Liu sisters had picked up. It allowed them to communicate without their father catching wind of their conversation.

"A few suggestions here and there, especially on his social media feed, that the great houses of America were weak and of course, of the eligibility status of their children."

At this, Willow nodded. Their father was like a shark who scented blood when he caught wind of weaknesses that he could exploit. A foothold in any one of the great houses would be profitable...especially after what had happened to Lilith's fiancée.

Lilith's resolve hardened. Soon, if she played her cards right, she and Willow would be out of their father's reaches. America would be a new beginning, a rebound from which she could start accumulating power from outside her father's grasp. A fresh start in which she could completely reinvent herself, and make a better future for Willow.

She smiled. You've made your move, father, she thought.

My turn.