I haven’t touched this tome since my father died. Now I crack it open.
In the swirl of dust, I find something tucked within the pages that wasn’t there before.
It is a half-sewn silk handkerchief. I recognize the design: pale osmanthus flowers drifting over a sparkling blue sea. Beneath the waves are hints of shimmery scales and a serpentine body—a dragon.
I stare at this handkerchief, trying to remember how I ever could have created such a thing. When I was young, I was fascinated by the stories my mother told me of the realms of this world: besides the mortal and immortal realms, there was the Kingdom of Green Hills, ruled by nine-tailed fox gods; the land of flower spirits; the fiery clouds ruled by the clan of phoenixes; and my favorite, the realm of dragons in the Four Seas.
Though I’d never seen the ocean, I had fervently imagined it: long, rolling currents that the various blues of my silkthreads could never capture. My mother promised me we would travel the kingdom as seamstresses, for how could one hope to capture the beauty of our realm in fabric without having seen it? How could I hope to detail the blush of a fragrant jasmine without ever having seen the way the morning dew clung to its petals?
The memories feel as if they belong to a stranger. It is difficult to believe that I was once a girl who loved flowers and wished to sew oceans. The same night my father handed me my crescent blades, he took my needles and silks and shut them in a cabinet.
Life as we know it is about to end,he told me, eyes black as ink, reflecting mine.Will you give up your dreams to protect our family?
Now I cannot recall my dreams, cannot fathom ever having had any. I know they must have existed, that I must have wanted more than this life. But that was before everything crumbled to dust, dreams became ashes, and the world turned into a living nightmare.
I don’t know how my handkerchief got tucked into this tome, but it doesn’t matter. I left that part of me behind when I made that vow to my father.
I’m about to tuck it back when a piece of parchment falls out. It flutters to the floor like a butterfly’s wings.
A note. I pick it up and hold it to the light.
My dark blossom,
I leave this for you in case I am no longer with you someday soon. I chose to train you for a reason. The truth to everything is at the Temple of Dawn. Find the One of the Vast Sea.
It is written in my father’s hand, the characters falling vertically in that beautiful, scholar-trained way of his.Dark blossom—that’s me, Àn’ying. How many times did he tell us the story of my name, the tree blossoming in the dark?
I frown at the note. My father had many secrets, but I have always assumed that he selectedmeto train in the practitioning arts because I was the eldest, because Méi’zi was barely old enough to run without falling, and that the purpose of my training was solely to protect our family. Yet as I stare at the note that has remained hidden from me for all these years, everything that I believed begins to shift.
I chose to train you for a reason.
My father never spoke of the Temple of Dawn, much less any intention for me to go there. And yet…the truth to everything is at the Temple of Dawn.Was it his plan all along to have me go there? If so, why? What truth will I find there, and who is the One of the Vast Sea?
Questions swirl into my head with a dizzying rush. My father never told many stories of his time in the immortal realm. All I know is that he passed the Temple of Dawn’s trials, but he did not take the pill of immortality and chose to return to the Kingdom of Rivers in pursuit of a mortal life. I do not know why.
I reread his words several times but cannot glean any more meaning from them. The note is intentionally cryptic…as though he was afraid this information might fall into the wrong hands. But who could he have been guarding against?
I hear Méi’zi calling my name from the next room.
I crumple the handkerchief and note in my fist. No time to think about my father’s riddles. Whatever his reasons, I am going to the Kingdom of Sky.
When Méi’zi comes in with my dress freshly cleaned, I slip it over my thin shift. It is easy for me to tuck the handkerchief and note into one of my long, billowing sleeves.
Then I strap on my crescent blades, one by one.
—
I walk the perimeter of the house, checking the protection talismans I’ve freshly drawn in my own blood on the clay and bricks. In the past months, I’ve gone around the periphery of the village, replenishing the old, fading wards from our dead village practitioners. I know mine are nowhere near strong enough to hold off a Higher One, but I can at least keep the lesser demons away until I am back again.
When my work is done, I lean against the trunk of the old plum blossom tree. The sun blazes from behind clouds, igniting the sky in shades of fire. I take in the familiar curves of my town, how the houses wind over hills, the gray tiles oftheir roofs like a dragon’s scales. There used to be willows threading between the buildings, red lanterns hanging from them, and everywhere the cacophony of children’s laughter and street hawkers.
Now the trees are bone-dry and all is eerily silent but for the whistle of wind.
“Àn’ying.”
I turn to see my neighbor, Fú Róng, coming up the path. My father’s senior, she lost her husband to the initial war against the Kingdom of Night, when all able-bodied people were drafted into the imperial army. Fú Róng was pregnant at the time, which is why she stayed behind; as a capable martial artist, she would have made a good fighter.
My father was the one who brought back the ashes of her husband from the war.
