Title: loom
Fandom: Rise of the Phoenixes (generic Cdrama tag)
Length: 150 words
Contents: no warnings, takes place during episode 3

Summary: Feng Zhiwei sneaks around the palace.



Zhiwei darts into a darkened room and presses her face into the doorframe, heart pounding. If they saw her! But there's no outcry behind her, only steady footsteps; she's safe, for the moment.

She turns to survey the empty room, and her breath stutters. Light glimmers on a million silk threads stretched taut around wooden wings, gold inlay on every curving guide --

The prince's loom, surely. She'd heard rumors of his brocades, seen the covetous admiration of the Lanxiang girls. What a strange prince, to sit in this empty room and spin such beauty!

Zhiwei pictures it: a noble shadow in vivid robes arched over the beam, delicate fingers plucking the shuttle back and forth like a kingfisher darting at a lake.

With a sigh, she pushes her curiosity -- and the image -- aside. She isn't here to admire the prince. She just has to convince him not to marry her.