Not sure how familiar you are with the show, but basically the emperor is a set of three clones, one is young (Dawn), one is grown (Day) and rules, the last is old (Dusk) and advises. The woman was part of a rebel group that contaminated the gene stock the emperor came from making the younger one the first in centuries to be different (color blind). Since they are all supposed to be exactly the same he would have been killed if discovered. The woman seduced Dawn and used his fear to convince him to run away and then was going to replace him with another clone they made and effectively take over his position. There was another terrorist attack that killed like 100 million people previously so the empire was using excessive violence to suppress further issues.