The sight of her subjects filled her with an expansive tenderness, as of the man who looks down upon the world from a mountain and feels suspended within himself the fragility and potential of all that lies beneath.

exsanguinated,

The body became used to exercise, particular sounds and sensations, or even physical pain. But it was strange how shame was something you never became inured to: each time hurt just as much as the first.

“I might not know your name,” Ma said, taking Zhu’s hand. “But I know who you are.”

acerbically

loess

Fate made the pattern of the world, and Ouyang was nothing more than a thread joining a beginning and an end.

genuflection,

“But you know what’s worse than suffering? Not suffering, because you’re not even alive to feel it.”