Or had this been their intention all along? To bide their time until Sky forgot me, until my family forgot me, until I faded into oblivion, an unnamed scratch in the annals of history?
“The might of the sea,” Qinglong had said, “is yours.”
“Where are the remaining black magic practitioners hiding?” Warden Hu asked a third time, his voice as calm as a still lake.
“I know of no others,” I said hoarsely. “But perhaps…there could be minor spirit summoners in the south? They are more open to lixia practitioning in Ximing…”
“Ximing?” He leaned in. “Is that where—”
“Let me through!”
Warden Hu startled at the sounds of a scuffle. A figure clad in white shoved past the stationed guards, striding toward me like a mirage. His complexion was so fair and his robes so clean, he looked like he belonged in a heavenly realm, one set apart from the filth of this place.
“Warden Hu?” Sky’s surprise was evident. “What are you…?”
His eyes flicked to me—and I caught the horror in them. Without meaning to, I shrank from his gaze, as if I had anywhere to hide here. It stung for him to look at me like that, to see me with pity, and beneath it, revulsion.
Sky whirled on the warden. “What are you doing to her?”
Warden Hu straightened his shoulders. “Your Highness—”
“My father strictly forbade torture of any kind!”
“The Imperial Commander authorized me to conduct this interrogation,” Warden Hu said, careful to keep his tone neutral.
Sky glared at him. “Then why sneak around like this—in the middle of the night, as if…” His face changed as the answer came to him. “To keep me from finding out,” he finished flatly.
Sky was always like this, as expressive as an open flame. Itendeared him to me, but also, it made me resentful. Because no woman could live like that. No, what we were trained to do was conceal, conceal, conceal. Every emotion flung far beneath a smiling mask of good humor and grace.
“Your father believes you have more pressing matters to attend to, Your Highness. You need not concern yourself with the welfare of a state traitor.”
Sky ignored him, seizing the bars of my cell. “Meilin,” he said urgently, and up close he was so lovely and clean and pure it was difficult to look at him. He radiated health and vigor, like nothing else in these dungeons. “I’m going to get you out of here. I promise,” he said. “Just—hold on a bit longer. I’m sorry.”
I did not feel any particular emotion, and yet my eyes filled with tears. I did not know why I was crying.
“Meilin,” Sky said again, but his face had become an indistinct blur in my vision.
“Conserve your qi,” the dragon had warned me. “You must learn to harness your power.”
The Azure Dragon had lied about many things, but he had not lied about this. No matter—I had not listened. At first, I’d fled from my power, and when I’d finally embraced it, I’d broken every rule, believing myself the exception. I’d overused my lixia, draining my qi—all to keep going, to keep fighting. For what? To save my family, my kingdom? Yes, I had saved them. Yet still I felt empty. Because all along, what I’d really wanted was to prove myself.
I’d wanted to show everyone that I belonged. No—more than belonged. I’d wanted to become the hero of legend, to have my name whispered through the streets, my deeds etched in the stones of history.
Instead, Warden Hu had informed me I had become a stain inthe war annals, a cautionary tale passed from parent to child. Like my mother before me, my legacy would be one of madness and decay—a rot spreading in dark places, remembered not for what it built but for what it destroyed.
That young girl from a year ago, the one who’d dreamed of adventure, of seeing the world beyond the women’s quarters. She had sought wonder, wildness. She had believed in the world’s capacity for beauty.
Only a year had passed, and yet I could no longer recall what that felt like. To believe in the goodness of people. To seek justice but live with compassion. To hope for better days.
There was no hope for someone like me.
Some time later, I woketo a dark silhouette against my cell, slashing the light of the flickering lantern. His long shadow stretched across the length of the corridor like a grasping hand.
“Did I wake you?” the Ximing prince asked. Against the icy air of my cell, his low baritone felt like the crackle of a warm fire.
I pushed myself upright, wincing as I put weight on my throbbing hands. “I no longer sleep these days.”
“That doesn’t sound healthy,” he said, his tone light and teasing.
