The Hell Court convened at midnight.
I didn't know it would. I didn't know it could. I was sitting in my office, waiting for something to happen, when the light shifted again. The same soft, old light. The same silence. The same weight of something waiting.
Lin Yue appeared in her chair.
She looked the same as before. Pale. Still. Waiting. Her hands were folded in her lap. Her face was calm. But her eyes — something had changed. She had been waiting three years. She was ready to wait longer. But now, she didn't want to.
And across from her —
Another chair.
It hadn't been there a moment ago. It was the same as ours. Old wood. Deep grain. Patterns that almost moved. But it was empty.
---
He didn't come through the door. The door hadn't opened. He was simply there, standing beside the empty chair, looking at me like he had been here the whole time.
He was young. Younger than me. Dark hair, sharp features, a suit that fit too well to be comfortable. He looked like the kind of lawyer who had never lost a case and expected never to.
He smiled.
It was not a kind smile.
"You're the one," he said. "The lawyer who died in Courtroom 7B."
I didn't answer.
"I heard about you. You were good. Not great. But good."
He sat in the empty chair. It accepted him like it had been waiting.
He leaned back.
"You never lost a case."
"Neither did you."
He tilted his head. "How do you know?"
"I don't. But you act like you haven't."
He laughed. Soft. Controlled. The laugh of someone who had practiced it. The laugh of someone who had used it many times, on many juries, to make them trust him.
"You're observant," he said. "That's good. You'll need it."
I didn't like him. I didn't like the way he smiled. I didn't like the way he sat in that chair like he owned it. I didn't like that he reminded me of someone.
Myself. Ten years ago. Before I learned that being good wasn't enough.
---
The woman in grey appeared between us.
She didn't walk in. She was simply there. Standing at the center of the room, her arms folded, her face unchanged. The light settled around her. The room settled around her. She had been here the whole time.
"The case of Lin Yue," she said. "The accused. The dead. The innocent — if proven."
She looked at the man.
"The prosecutor will present first."
He stood.
---
He didn't move to the center of the room. He didn't need to. His voice carried. It was the voice of someone who had spoken in courtrooms for years. Clear. Measured. Convincing.
"Lin Yue was convicted of murder," he said. "The evidence was clear. Her fingerprints on the knife. Her presence at the scene. Her history of violence with the victim."
He paused. Let the words settle.
"She served three years of her sentence. She died in prison. The case was closed."
He looked at me.
"Now a dead lawyer wants to reopen it."
---
The woman in grey looked at me.
"The defense may respond."
I stood.
"She was convicted on circumstantial evidence," I said. "Her fingerprints were on the knife because she lived there. Her presence at the scene was her home. Her history of violence was a history of abuse."
I looked at Lin Yue.
"She didn't kill her husband. Zhang Feng did."
The prosecutor smiled again.
"Zhang Feng," he said. "The business partner. The man who left the apartment before the police arrived. The man with no motive, no evidence against him, and no connection to the crime."
He turned to the woman in grey.
"The defense has no proof. Only speculation."
---
The room was silent.
The woman in grey looked at me.
"Evidence," she said. "You have it."
I didn't move.
"Ruan Qing," I said.
The prosecutor tilted his head. "The living woman. The one who breaks into apartments."
"She found something. A photo. A note. A phone Zhang Feng kept hidden for three years."
The prosecutor nodded slowly.
"And where is this evidence now?"
"In her hands."
"In a living woman's hands." His voice was almost gentle. "The Court does not accept evidence from the living."
---
The woman in grey said nothing.
I looked at her.
"The rules," I said. "Tell me the rules."
She met my eyes.
"Evidence must be brought by the dead. Witnesses must speak for themselves. The truth must be spoken in this room."
She paused.
"A living woman's observations are not evidence here."
---
The prosecutor sat back.
His smile was gone. His face was calm. He was waiting. He had all the time in the world. He had always had all the time in the world.
Lin Yue hadn't moved. Her hands were folded in her lap. Her face was still. But I could see the tension in her shoulders. The way she held herself together. Like something that had been broken and glued back so many times it no longer remembered its original shape.
I looked at her.
"You testified at your trial," I said.
She nodded.
"You told them everything. The abuse. The fear. The night he died."
"Yes."
"They didn't believe you."
"No."
---
The prosecutor leaned forward.
"Because there was no evidence of abuse. No police reports. No hospital records. No witnesses."
"There were witnesses," Lin Yue said. Her voice was quiet. Not weak. Quiet. "They saw the bruises. They heard him scream at me. They knew."
"But they didn't testify."
"They were afraid."
The prosecutor smiled. "Of what?"
Lin Yue didn't answer.
---
I stepped forward.
"Zhang Feng had a second phone. A broken phone. Hidden in his closet. It contains messages. Threats. Evidence of what really happened that night."
The prosecutor turned to me.
"You assume."
"He kept it."
"He kept a broken phone. That's not proof."
"He couldn't throw it away."
"Or he forgot about it. Or it broke before the murder. Or —"
"He wrote 'I'm sorry' on the back of her photo."
The room went quiet.
The prosecutor's smile faded.
---
I looked at the woman in grey.
"A living woman saw it. I saw it. He wrote 'I'm sorry' on the back of Lin Yue's photo. He kept it hidden. He kept the phone hidden. He knew what he did."
The woman in grey didn't respond.
She looked at Lin Yue.
"Three years ago, you testified," she said. "You told the living court your story. They did not believe you."
Lin Yue didn't move.
"Now you are dead. The living cannot see you. The living cannot hear you. The living cannot speak for you."
She paused.
"Why should this Court believe you now?"
---
Lin Yue was silent for a long moment.
Then she stood.
Her hands were still. Her face was still. Her voice was steady.
"I stayed silent," she said.
The room stilled.
"At my trial. When they asked me why I didn't leave. When they asked me why I stayed with a man who hurt me."
She looked at the prosecutor.
"I didn't answer."
---
She looked at me.
"Zhang Feng came to the apartment that night. He wanted to talk to my husband about money. About the deals they were hiding. About the people who would come for them if they didn't pay."
She paused.
"My husband was already drunk. He was angry. He started screaming. Zhang Feng tried to calm him. He pushed me out of the way."
Her hand moved to her throat.
"That's when my husband grabbed me."
---
She stopped.
The silence stretched.
"The knife was on the counter. I don't remember picking it up. I don't remember —" She stopped again. "He was on top of me. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think. I just..."
She looked at her hands.
"Zhang Feng pulled him off me. My husband fell. He hit his head on the table."
She closed her eyes.
"I was holding the knife. I was standing over him. Zhang Feng took it from me. He cleaned it. He put it in my hand again."
She opened her eyes.
"He told me to stay quiet. He told me if I said anything, if I told anyone he was there, he would find my sister. He would make sure she never saw her next birthday."
---
The prosecutor was very still.
"Three years," Lin Yue said. "I kept quiet. I went to prison. I stayed quiet. I thought if I did what he said, my sister would be safe."
Her voice broke.
"I died in prison. I don't know if she's safe. I don't know if he kept his promise. I don't know anything. Even when I die, I can't find my sister."
She looked at the woman in grey.
"But I know he wrote 'I'm sorry' on the back of my photo. I know he kept the phone. I know he couldn't forget what he did."
Her voice steadied.
"That's not proof. That's not evidence. But it's the truth."
---
The room was silent.
The prosecutor didn't speak. He was looking at Lin Yue. His face was still. His hands were still. But something behind his eyes had changed. Something that might have been recognition.
The woman in grey looked at me.
"Your client has spoken," she said.
She looked at Lin Yue.
"The Court has heard your truth. Now we do things the court way."
She waved her hand.
A mirror appeared.
---
It stood in the center of the room. Tall. Ancient. Facing east. The frame was dark wood, carved with symbols I didn't recognize. The surface was dark — not reflecting anything. Just... waiting.
I stared at it. First a door to Hell Court. Now a mirror that shows the truth. What next? Ox-Head and Horse-Face showing up with tea?
"The Mirror of Retribution," the woman in grey said. "Some call it the Mirror of the Wicked. The Nieh-ching-t'ai. It shows what you really are. What you really did. What you tried to forget."
She looked at Lin Yue.
"Stand before it."