Panic clawed up my throat like a frenzied animal. I thrashed, trying desperately to pull myself up, but I couldn’t find my balance. There was only the cold air around me, the river, and this stranger. He had some piece of fabric in his hands—a bag—
No.
No, no, no—
I opened my mouth to scream, but nothing came out. And then the fabric was yanked over my head, covering everything in black. Rough hands gripped my ankles. I knew what was coming before it happened. Every nerve in me burned, recoiling from the very thought. My breaths came out fast and rapid, strained.My thoughts were sensation only: pain and panic. I was running out—of oxygen, of time, of strength. I felt the ropes tighten, the rough cords slicing through my skin, weighed down by something hard and heavy like stone. They were going to drown me. They were going todrown me. I was going to die. It didn’t seem quite real, even as it was happening. Then: the terrible sensation of falling, gravity giving out beneath me.
The water was ice cold.
It poured into my mouth, my lungs. I was sinking, my limbs dead and useless as wood, tied down on either side of me. My chest felt like it would burst at any second. I was stunned—almost too stunned for fear. That came later, when the darkness seeped in fully. There was no way out. No way to live.
Help, I shrieked in my head. Bubbles broke from my mouth.Somebody help.
Please.
Help me.
But no hero emerged to save me. The hero was meant to be me—and now I was utterly powerless, a spirit trapped in a frail, mortal body. The cold was unbearable.
Yet already I could feel myself fading, my skin numbing. In those last moments, as the water rose over me, I saw only one image:
It wasn’t even a notable memory. Just another morning in Riversong Cottage, one of many. Fanli and I were sitting by the pond together, gazing out at the still waters, the lotus flowers floating over the surface. He had bought a pomegranate from the market and was peeling it for me, picking out the pink, gemlike seeds. We had been talking—about what, I don’t remember anymore. Something small, something trivial. But I had laughed and spoken his name, casually, carelessly, and he’d looked over at me with a softness that took my breath away. Again and again, it played overin my mind, until it was the first and last thing I knew. Before the journey down the rivers, before the king’s blood stained my hands, before the kingdom fell. When everything still felt like a story, a romantic myth. When we were together and the air was warm and nothing hurt.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Across the river, Fanli gazes at the moon. Hishair is windswept, his cheeks still slightly flushed from riding fast all throughout the night.
He doesn’t know yet that it’s too late. That if he had come only minutes sooner, he would have seen me, and saved me. But perhaps that is asking too much. He has already saved my life once on those shores. Nobody under Heaven is that fortunate to experience the same miracle twice.
He doesn’t know either that I’m here, mere feet away, watching him while he watches for me. I cannot be sure what I am now, what I’ve become. Perhaps I am a ghost. I’ve heard legends about it: those who die with unfinished business, anger or grief so heavy that it prevents them from floating on to the Yellow Springs of the underworld.
The moon rises higher. A cool wind blows through the trees.
And he waits.
The black veil of the sky has started to lift when he senses that something is wrong.
A twig snaps behind him.
He spins around so fast that all I see is the dark blur of movement, the trees shrinking back from him. His face is half hope, half horror. But it is not me he finds—it’s Luyi.
“Where is she?” Fanli demands.
Luyi shakes his head. He cannot speak. He’s afraid of the raw look in Fanli’s eyes, the sharpness to his tone. Even in battle, Fanli has always been the perfect picture of calm, unfazed in the face of death.
But Fanli steps forward, his gaze pitch-black. “Where is she?” he repeats, louder.
“I—I don’t know,” Luyi gets out. “They saw her head down to the river but—hours have passed by now and…” In a small, frightened voice, he finishes, “I thought she might have gone to you.”
Fanli freezes. He is one of the most intelligent people I’ve met, with a mind that works three times faster than the ordinary man’s, weaving together threads invisible to most. I see him understand before anyone else does. His fingers curl into a fist; when his hands flatten forcibly again, his palm has been dented with small, bloody crescents.
“Search the entire village,” he says, his voice a low rasp, threatening violence. “Search every single corner, every path, every room.”
“It—it might take time,” Luyi stammers. “We don’t have a lot of people—most of the villagers are too old to walk long distances—”
“Use the soldiers.”
Luyi stares at him. After a long beat, he says, “But—I thought they weren’t meant for personal use… Won’t you get into trouble with…” He stops himself at the dark expression on Fanli’s face. It is how a man looks before walking into flame. “Yes, I’ll—I will go do that right now—”
