It was spring, I saw. It was spring, and the world was weeping.
“I don’t know if I can do this anymore,” I said.
A cold, slender hand slid into mine. Kuro? No.
“Ma?”
She searched my gaze, as I searched hers. How young she looked, younger even than my own reflection. “I don’t know what to do,” I admitted to her. “You know I was searching for the eternal spring. To save myself. To finish what you began.”
She did not speak.
“But now…now I wonder if I shouldn’t go. If I give up my power…who will stop the dragon? Will the world as we know it be forever changed?” I thought of Princess Ruihua dragging her broken nails across a tree, Jinya burying herself deep in the sand. “You can’t go back,” I had told Kuro. Had the rebellion been worth it to him? If he could change the past, would he do it all over again?
“Why did we give up so much for the sake of power? Why did we make such a bargain, thinking it a worthy trade? Why didn’t we suspect we’d lose ourselves in the process? And why must I feel this guilt now—why can’t I run and save myself?”
I was beginning to cry, so I nearly missed her answer. “You could run and save yourself,” she said, voice level, calm. “But what would be the world you returned to?”
I trembled, crying harder.
“You sought the dragon’s power, and the power corrupted you. Now you wish to forsake it, and return to who you once were. But the world itself is irrevocably changed. Even if you find the spring, qinaide, and even if you succeed in relinquishing your powers, do you really think you can go back to the person you once were? You will live with what you have done, for the rest of your life.”
I shook my head in desperation. “All I wanted was power for myself,” I said in a small voice. “Not to hurt others. I just…I didn’t want to be hurt again.”
But my mind, the traitor, conjured memories of irrefutable violence. The way I’d laughed as I’d tortured Red, my own squad member; the way I’d brutalized and maimed a rebel from the Black Scarves, because he’d reminded me of a certain general from the war. The way I’d even tried my best to make Sky suffer.
My mother seemed to read my thoughts. “But then, with yourpower,” she said softly, “you hurt others. You became what you once feared.”
I breathed in the fragrance of plum blossoms as they floated in the air for a few precious seconds before drowning in the water below. For how could a flower petal stand against the river?
How had I ever believed this world would not corrupt me?
“Shh,” she said. “It’s okay. There’s still time. Remember: history is always being rewritten.”
“Ma,” I cried, reaching for her. “I-I need you.”
She did not let me cling to her. She had never been one for physical affection, even when I was a child. Instead, she drew back, disentangling her hand from mine. “You must go,” she said, and I fought against the sharp sting of disappointment. “Why do you think the dragon has not noticed your presence in the spirit realm?”
I hiccupped. If his attention wasn’t on the spirit realm…“He’s found a way into the human realm?” I asked in astonishment. My mother did not answer. The river below stirred with fallen petals, and I was, once again, alone.
Thirty-Two
Where are you? They claim you’ve gone home, but I cannot believe it. You of all people would never abandon our cause. Did you hear me when I called your name in the woods? Did you see me weeping, broken and terrified without you? I’m sorry. It was my damned pride, as you warned me. What I meant to say was, I need you. The rebellion needs you. The Black Scarves follow me in name only. The true leader is you.
—Tan Kuro, in a private missive to Lü Jinya, undated
I burst through the portal gaspingfor breath. All the false calm of the spirit realm deserted me, and in the human realm, I was struck by the full force of my anxiety.
Lei caught me by the shoulders as I started to hyperventilate.
“Kuro—” I choked out, for I could not see his body anywhere.
“He returned already. He…he didn’t want to talk.”
He’d been forced to kill Jinya with his own hands. Would I one day be forced to do the same?
I gasped for breath but couldn’t seem to draw air. The sky was darkening, the air rife with the odor of rotting flesh. A dragonfly buzzed by my ear and I shrieked with alarm.
“Breathe,” said Lei, as he looked me over. “Are you hurt?”
