Empire Rising

PROLOGUE

It would have been perfect.

Bai Jiao’s pulse raced as she stood stiffly under the bright lights, her cold hands gripping the bouquet of flowers as tightly as the white gown squeezed her waist. The veil across her eyes partially obscured her vision, but she could see enough to make out the cavernous Grand Ballroom of the Pangu Hotel, an immense chandelier suspended from the center of the thirty-foot-high ceiling. The white carpet runway beneath her feet, passing by row after row of guests, stretched to infinity.

Feeling a nudge on her right arm, Jiao remembered she wasn’t standing alone; she felt her father’s arm intertwined with hers. Turning her head, she sought his wizened face. Tao was looking down at her. He smiled, and for a moment she was a little girl again, sitting in her father’s lap as he imparted words of wisdom to his precious qianjin. He patted her arm, conveying his love and support. She knew that, even now, she could call it off. Even though the arrangements had cost over two million yuan, Tao would not think twice about the loss. The shame he would endure, however, if his daughter backed out on her wedding day …

It was just nerves, after all. She loved Huang, and was ready to begin their life together. She forced a weak smile and nodded her head.

Slowly, in rhythm to the music that began with her first step, Jiao and her father proceeded down the center aisle of the ballroom, passing the four hundred guests turned out in tuxedos freshly pressed and formal evening gowns sparkling under the ballroom lights. Jiao kept her eyes focused at the end of the long white carpet where Huang waited, standing at attention in his maroon and pine-green military uniform.

Along the perimeter of the room, men in black suits, with a coiled cord hanging from one ear and tucked inside the collar of their jackets, cast a watchful eye over every entrance to the ballroom as well as the guests. For as long as Jiao could remember, men like these had guarded her family. It wasn’t until her teenage years that she gained an appreciation for the power her father wielded as one of the Party’s nine Politburo members and now as China’s prime minister.

As China’s economic czar, Tao was charged with infusing capitalistic traits into the country’s socialist economy, so Jiao was not surprised when her father requested her wedding be a blend of Western and traditional Chinese ceremonies. As Jiao proceeded down the aisle in her white wedding gown, she looked forward to the Tea Ceremony that would follow in the adjacent ballroom. She would change into the traditional qi pao dress, its red color symbolizing good luck, warding off evil spirits.

At the end of the white runway, her father released her arm. Jiao stepped up to the altar, turning toward Huang. As she looked into his eyes, a warm glow spread through her body, chasing away the nervous chill. The day she had dreamt of as a young girl had finally arrived. She knew with certainty they would spend the rest of their lives together. Nothing could tear them apart.

As Huang lifted the veil from her face, a flash of movement distracted her. Men in black suits were sprinting down the sides of the ballroom, headed behind a beige curtain that hung from the ceiling, forming the backdrop of the altar. Over Huang’s shoulder, she spotted Feng Dai, her personal bodyguard since she was a child, racing toward her. A commotion penetrated the curtain, accompanied by a mosaic of dark shapes shifting behind the sheer fabric. She turned back toward Huang, and as she met his questioning eyes, there was a deafening boom.

Jiao was buffeted by a blast of hot air and she had the odd sensation she was flying through the air. Her vision clouded in an orange, blossoming haze, and white-hot pain stabbed into her body as her limbs bent in directions they weren’t designed for. There was a vague feeling of her back hitting something hard and sharp, the pain piercing through her stomach. Her vision slowly cleared and a thousand yellow lights came into focus, swaying above her.

She was lying on the floor somewhere, gazing at beautiful lights swirling above. It was peacefully quiet at first, but then faint sounds greeted her ears, growing gradually louder until they coalesced into a dissonance of high-pitched screams of terror mingled with low moans of pain. As if responding to the sound, her mind was reminded of the sensations slicing through her body. The slightest attempt to move — breathe, even — magnified the excruciating pain.

Jiao turned her head slowly to the side. She was surrounded by a nightmarish collage of sight and smell. Bodies strewn across a red-streaked floor. Bloodied hands reaching toward heaven, splayed fingers clawing the air. Men and women wreathed in fire were dancing under the ballroom lights, collapsing onto the floor, their charred features shrouded in an orange, flickering haze. The scent assailing her nostrils was foreign but unmistakable: the stench of burning flesh.

A few feet away, Jiao’s father lay on his back, his neck at an awkward angle, his eyes frozen open. Just out of reach, Huang was facedown, a dark stain spreading out from under him across the white carpet. Jiao felt warmth ooze across her stomach, moving up her chest and down her legs as liquid saturated her wedding gown. She looked down at her tattered garment, and as her thoughts faded into darkness, Jiao wondered when she had changed into her red dress.