As he spoke, the surface of Crescent Spring began to peel back, revealing an arched stone bridge at its bottom. Green moss slicked the sides of the bridge, and kelp draped over its handrails, which bore swirls of gold that hadn’t faded withtime or wear. The waters of the spring parted, and this bridge connected with one on the other side.
It was as though they were being welcomed into the Forgotten City.
“I thought the palace would be in ruins,” Dilaya said, turning to Tai. Her tone was flat, but Lan knew it was the clan matriarch’s way of suppressing her uncertainty. Perhaps even fear. “Why are there lights?”
Lan glanced at Tai. His gold-rimmed eyes flashed as they caught the light of the distant lanterns, the light of a city that seemed to fall upon them from another world. “Don’t know,” he muttered, half to himself. “Don’t know. But…to find theGodslayer, that is where we must start.”
Dilaya’s mouth tightened. She and Lan were bound by the same oath to their mothers, both of whom had served in the Order of Ten Thousand Flowers: find the Godslayer, destroy the Demon Gods, and bring peace to the people of the Last Kingdom.
But Lan flicked a gaze up to the sky and voiced the thought that had gripped her since the stars had begun to burn. “The Godslayer is not all we will find in the Forgotten City,” she said. “Did you both see the Crimson Phoenix’s star map from earlier?”
They nodded, but only Tai’s expression lit up with the shock of understanding. “It matched,” he said hoarsely. “Itmatchedthe sky. The Crimson Phoenix…”
Dilaya’s eye widened. No doubt she had studied star maps with the Master of Geomancy back at the School of the White Pines. When a star map matched the night sky overhead, it meant one stood at or close to the location delineated by the map itself.
Lan hitched the sash over her waist, placing one hand on That Which Cuts Stars and the other on her ocarina.
“If I’m not wrong,” she said quietly, “it seems a Demon God lies in wait in the city we are about to enter.”
The three of them gazed into the mirage of the golden palace in silence. There was no telling what other dangers awaited them across the bridge, on the other side of the spring.
Lan curled her fingers around the bulge of the amulet that rested beneath her páo. It had become a habit of sorts—a talisman, nearly. A way to remember the life she fought for: the first rays of sun threading through misty mountains, the chime of a school bell and the clear voices of disciples, the promises of a boy who’d loved her. Memories that had faded to ash, a past that she would never resurrect—but perhaps a future that she could build for what remained of her people by destroying the sources of chaos that had gripped their land throughout history.
Sòng Lián stepped onto the arched stone bridge and began to walk toward the light of Shaklahira, the Forgotten City.
An imperial supper must be served in fifteen-part, to include the five flavors of sweet, sour, salty, spicy, and bitter, representing the harmony of the five elements. Balance must be sought by an even number of cold and hot dishes, of raw and cooked platters, of meats and vegetables and cereals. An example below.
—Records of Hin Imperial Cuisine,Chapter Four, “On Suppers”
The waters on this side of the world reflected the same stars. The glow from the palace rendered the sky a crystalline shade of amethyst. As Lan walked, she noticed shapes beneath the surface of the spring: carp, their pale bellies flashing and scales gleaming like jewels as they darted away from her shadow.
The entire place was a scene plucked from the fingers of time—as though the events of the past twelve cycles had never happened and Lan walked through an imperial palace that still reigned over the Last Kingdom. The gardens were lush with flowers of all kinds: osmanthus, narcissus, begonias, and azaleas; well-tended pines were spaced evenly throughout. The palace was freshly painted in vibrant shades of vermilion patterned with deep greens and golds, gleaming beneath the lantern light.
“Something feels off.” Dilaya’s voice was low as she kept close behind Lan, her arm gripping the hilt of Falcon’s Claw, her gray eye constantly searching for danger.
“People.” Tai’s deep tone was tight with urgency. “There are people.”
Light gilded silhouettes standing at the other end of the bridge. As Lan drew closer, she could make them out: two people with shaved heads, dressed in sand-colored warrior’s robes. One had a two-pronged spear, its tips curving in a crescent moon. The other had no apparent regalia but for a set of wooden prayer beads.
“Impossible,” Dilaya muttered. “They resemble Táng monks. A clan of warrior monks,” she added, catching Lan’s confusion. “That clan vanished sometime in the late Middle Kingdom era.”
Between the two figures was a diminutive girl. At first, Lan thought she was a ghostly apparition, for her shoulder-length hair fell in a cascade of pure white and her face was as smooth and colorless as pale jade. She had a delicate nose and cherry-blossom lips, but most intriguing was the cloth tied over her eyes, embroidered with the same designs as the páo she wore, a pale brocade in patterns of bronze and violet. She held a fan in her right hand, its twin in her left, though the night was cool.
Her lips parted as Lan and her companions drew closer, and Lan had the strange feeling that the girl could see them even with the blindfold on.
“You have traveled far.” Her voice was faint and sweet. “Please, this way.”
Lan was unsettled. There was an entire, functioningpalacein the midst of the Emaran Desert. And there were people of a vanished clan here.
How was that possible?
She brushed her fingers against the pouch with her ocarina as she followed the blindfolded girl.
Lan and her companions were led up a set of steps carvedfrom a white stone that Lan recognized as marble: a most coveted material, traded at the Jade Trail markets and originating in a kingdom by a temperate sea in the distant west. The steps glittered as though they were encrusted with broken stars.
She’d thought the Rose Pavilion Teahouse back in Haak’gong was ostentatious—but Lan realized she had never seen true luxury until the great red gates of the palace lost to time swept open and she looked into its golden interior.
Jade, sapphire, lapis lazuli, and a hundred other gemstones dripped from the walls and ceilings. Gilded motifs of the Four Demon Gods, along with other gods of the Hin pantheon, gleamed in the cornices. Vermilion pillars plunged skyward like the fingers of titans.
