I raised my head and met the smiling gaze of Princess Yifeng.Of course.The Anlai messenger had even warned me at the trading post, but distracted as I’d been, I had ignored the threat.
“Hello again, Lady Hai.”
“Come to finish the job?” I rasped, remembering the last time she’d tried to kill me. I squinted at her. “Why are you even here? Were you banished from the Forbidden City?”
“Of course not,” she scoffed, though I could tell I’d offended herat the suggestion. “The crown prince is sick. I was simply accompanying him to the treaty signing to ensure his health and well-being.”
“If you’re speaking of your husband, you know he’s no longer the crown prince.”
Her neck flushed. “He will be once I bring your severed head to the Imperial Commander!”
I was so tired. “And how will that help anything?”
“You are a black magic practitioner,” she spat. “There’s no point in denying it. I have proof.”
And then, to my utter horror, she beckoned forward none other than Luo Tao, Sky’s former personal guard. I remembered glimpsing his face amid the wreckage after the veil’s collapse, and it struck me—he must have been spying on me for days.
“Your prince banished him under threat of death, but he returned after recognizing the danger your existence posed.”
Looking into the familiar lines of his face brought memories of the war flooding back to me. I recalled the sheer dread I’d felt, kneeling before the Imperial Commander’s throne as I awaited my sentence. I recalled guards dragging me below ground into the dungeons, losing the warmth of sun on my skin, the scent of pine trees, the song of morning larks. Losing my sense of self, my will to live.
“If only I had killed you at the end of the war—instead of leaving you to the justice of the throne,” Tao spat. “But now I see that you are too dangerous to be left to live.”
I was struck by the force of his animosity. It was true that if he had killed me then, perhaps the veil between realms never would have torn. And yet I had tried to save the Three Kingdoms then, just as I was trying to now. I hadalwaysbeen trying to save the Three Kingdoms. Couldn’t they see that? Was intention not worth something? Or was it only the echoes of your mistakes that history remembered?
I drew a ragged breath, trying for calm. “If you kill me now, you are ruining our last chance at closing the spirit gates,” I said. “I am trying torestorethe veil.”
“The audacity of your lies,” he snarled. “You were the one who opened the gates in the first place.”
Desperate, I shifted tactics, appealing to his sense of duty as a soldier. “Do you think Sky will forgive you for this?” I asked.
“That boy is lost in his romantic delusions,” Princess Yifeng interrupted. “But he will understand and step aside when the Imperial Commander selects Keyan as his successor.” Her expression was one of pride. “My heroism will ensure that.”
Tao had backed away in disgust, but Princess Yifeng, conversely, drew near, lowering her voice as if sharing a juicy morsel of gossip. “You know, Lady Hai, asdeviantas it is, I think I rather understand you. We women do tend to draw the short end of the stick, do we not? We do all the dirty work, and the men get to claim the reward. But you know what your mistake was? You got too greedy. You should’ve learned from me and pulled the strings backstage.” She clucked her tongue like a scolding schoolteacher. “You could’ve had a good thing going. And we could’ve been friends.” She shook her head. “But that time has passed now.”
Thirty-Eight
Humble apologies for the sudden inquiry, but might you know the current residence of Yu Xiuying? I heard she moved to the capital, and was hoping to pay her a visit before I left town for good.
—Private correspondence from Wang Sparrow, 924
“Wait,” I said, struggling againstmy chains. Surely Kuro had read my note by now, and figured out where I’d gone. Were they on their way? I had to stall Princess Yifeng. But the sun had already set, and she too was anxious to be gone.
The princess gestured for Tao, who drew his sword.
Qinglong, I thought.Please. Help me. Lei? Can you hear me? Please. Anyone! Can anyone help me?
“I have a secret,” I said. “A secret you should know.”
The princess frowned. “What is it now?”
I reached for something clever to say, but my body ached with pain, and my mind, craving lixia, refused to cooperate. “Prince Keyan,” I began. “He has an illegitimate child.”
Princess Yifeng threw her head back with laughter. “Is that all?”
“No,” I said. “The prince—”
The sun was gone, the only light emanating from the lit torches the soldiers carried. So we all recoiled as a shadow moved and a guard came sprinting inside. He whispered something to Tao, whoscowled in consternation and followed him out of the caves, his strides long and urgent.
