The Four Gifts of Empress Lessa
ShortStory 1,529 words Recommended by 1 award/anthology source
"I remember the night I became a ghost. My husband, the Emperor, served the tainted tea himself; my punishment for giving him yet another girl-child. I was not the first Empress to drink from this cup. My newborn daughter lay on my bed, wailing. The Emperor would surely execute her next."
Content warnings 2
deathviolence
Quasar links out; the story lives on BCS, where the author gets the click.