The air in the Grand Council chamber was not just tense; it was crystalline, so fragile it felt as though a single raised voice might shatter it into a thousand pieces. The highest officials of the Qing Empire stood in rigid, silent rows, their faces a mixture of fear, anticipation, and morbid curiosity. They knew something momentous was about to occur. The very guards at the doors were different—not the usual palace sentries, but the grim, hard-faced Bannermen personally loyal to Prince Gong. They held their halberds at a ready angle. The chamber was not just secured; it was sealed.
Empress Dowager Ci'an was already seated on her throne on the raised dais. Her gentle face was pale but serene, her expression one of solemn, immovable resolve. The throne beside hers, Cixi's throne, was empty.
Cixi arrived late, a deliberate display of her own importance. She swept into the hall, flanked by Li Lianying and her personal contingent of eunuchs. Her face was a mask of cold, imperious fury. She had been urgently summoned, not requested, and the insult simmered in her dark eyes. She expected another tedious political debate, another attempt by Prince Gong to chip away at her authority. She was prepared for a fight. She was not prepared for a judgment.
She took her seat without acknowledging Ci'an or the Prince. As she did, Prince Gong stepped forward into the center of the hall. He did not bow or offer the usual honorifics. He held a massive, imperial yellow scroll in his hands.
"By the authority of the Regency and for the preservation of the throne," he began, his voice a powerful, resonant boom that filled every corner of the vast chamber, "a formal edict has been prepared and sealed."
Before Cixi could interrupt, before she could unleash the furious tirade that was building behind her lips, he began to read. He did not read a proposal or a petition. He read an indictment.
"The Empress Dowager Cixi," he declared, his voice ringing with the force of a prosecutor laying out his case, "is hereby charged with four grave offenses against the state and the sacred trust of the regency."
A collective gasp went through the assembled ministers. This was not a political attack. This was a coup.
"First," Prince Gong thundered, "she is charged with Gross Financial Mismanagement and the Embezzlement of State Funds!" He paused, and at his signal, two aides stepped forward. They unrolled a massive architectural drawing for all to see. It was the beautiful, damning rendering of the new Summer Palace's Marble Boat.
"While the empire groans under the weight of foreign indemnities and our own armies lack for basic supplies, she has knowingly and willfully diverted millions of taels of silver—funds allocated for the defense of our nation's coast—to the construction of a private, extravagant pleasure palace. The proof of this betrayal is here, for all to see: a useless boat, carved from solid stone, paid for with the silver that should have bought us a warship."
Cixi leaped to her feet. "Lies! These are forgeries! Slander!"
Prince Gong ignored her, his voice reading over her frantic cries. "Second, she is charged with Willfully Endangering the State!" Again, an aide stepped forward, this time displaying a large, copied page of the suppressed military memorial from the Governor-General of Xinjiang.
"She did deliberately conceal urgent intelligence of a Russian military incursion on our western frontier, leaving our borders vulnerable and our soldiers unprepared! Her fear of political embarrassment was placed above the territorial integrity of the Great Qing itself! She chose to hide the threat rather than confront it, a dereliction of her most sacred duty!"
"This is treason!" Cixi shrieked, her voice now shrill with a mixture of rage and dawning panic. "You are the traitor, Prince Gong!"
"Third," the Prince continued, his voice like a hammer striking an anvil, "she is charged with Fostering Illicit Factions and a Treasonous Conspiracy against the Throne!"
Another aide stepped forward, this time holding up a single, enlarged page copied from the stolen green-bound ledger. The elegant calligraphy detailed the budget for an entity known only as "The Hidden Valley."
"She did, in secret and with malice aforethought, establish, fund, and operate a private school for the training of spies, assassins, and political infiltrators! She has cultivated a secret army, a force of agents loyal only to her person, not to the throne! This is an act of treason, an unforgivable preparation for a potential usurpation of power!"
The councillors and princes stared at the document, their faces turning pale. A private school for assassins? This went beyond corruption. This was the stuff of nightmares, of dynastic collapse.
"And fourth," Prince Gong said, his voice softening with a carefully calculated sorrow, "she is charged with Undermining the Sacred Person and Health of the Emperor." An aide presented a sworn statement, signed and sealed by the translator who had been present during the French doctor's visit.
"She did conspire to use a foreign doctor to falsely declare the Son of Heaven mentally unfit for rule, a vile attempt to permanently discredit him and cement her own power. And she did, through her agents, attempt to assassinate the Emperor's most loyal and effective personal bodyguard. She has placed her own ambition above the very life and well-being of the boy she swore to protect."
He finished reading the charges and fell silent. The evidence, presented so systematically, so publicly, was overwhelming. It was a mountain of irrefutable proof. Cixi stood beside her throne, trembling, her face a ghastly shade of white. Her supporters in the council, the men who had built their careers on her patronage, looked away, their faces a mixture of fear and dawning betrayal. They could not defend this. They could not defend her. She was politically toxic, a drowning woman they could not afford to be tied to.
The chamber was utterly silent, the weight of the accusations hanging in the air like a thick, suffocating smoke. Cixi had been tried and convicted in front of the entire court. All that remained was the sentence.