He stirs only when I tap him on the shoulder. His eyes flare crimson, and I have never seen them this unfocused.
“Why are you out here?” I ask. “You’ll catch cold.”
His lips part; he glances at the door, then back at me. His voice is hoarse when he speaks. “I didn’t think you’d want me inside.”
He thought I wouldn’t want a mó in my house.
Even after he saved my sister’s life.
I want you to look at me and seeme.
Wordlessly, I extend a hand to him.
Wordlessly, he takes it and follows me back into my house.
—
I suddenly feel self-conscious as we stand in my living room. Yù’chén is tall, and his head nearly scrapes the ceiling as he walks. Nothing about him looks as though it belongs in my small, earthly house, cracked and breaking at the seams, paint peeling and furniture chipped.
He looks around with a cautious curiosity and…a semblance of wonder.
“You can wait in the kitchen,” I tell him. “I need a few minutes to take care of Ma.” Fú’yí has taken good care of my family in my absence: my mother’s nails are trimmed, her hair is freshly washed, and her nightgown still smells of soap. But I won’t leave without caring for my mother. I don’t know the next time I’ll get to do this.
Yù’chén folds himself into a tiny kitchen chair and leans on the counter; even this doesn’t rob him of his unnaturalgrace. I don’t miss how his eyes roam our house, taking in the details, the spiderwebs in the corner, the shutters that have broken in storms and I’ve attempted to mend with oiled paper of my own making.
“It’s nothing like the Kingdom of Sky,” I say as I set a bucket of fresh well water next to my mother’s bed. I’m curt, if only because I’m trying to preserve my dignity. “Not much to see.”
“No,” he says. “It’s…real.”
Real.I try to decide how I feel about that word as I dip an old towel into the bucket to wet it.
“I’ve not been in many mortal homes,” he continues.
I wring out the towel and look sharply at him. “Were you raised in the Kingdom of Night?” There they are again, those threads of caution tugging at me, tightening. Being with him is like walking a never-ending cliff’s edge. I never know when I will fall.
“No,” Yù’chén says. “I was born in this kingdom. My father was mortal.”
Was.
He’s picked up a little teacup I made out of the clay mud I found down at the stream. I etched oceans and dragons into it with my needle. “My mother wished for me to be raised in the ways of the mortals, so I spent time with him,” he continues, studying the little engravings. “Not a lot, and always in secret, stolen moments, because my mother was his mistress. When he found out what she was—and what I was—he tried to have us killed. My mother fought him off, and we escaped.”
I process this as I gently guide Ma into a seated position. She leans against the wall, staring at a blank space somewhere between the front door and the window shutter. It’s betterthis way. I don’t want her to see me, or Yù’chén, in case she starts screaming again. Her cheeks are hollowing, I notice as I wipe sweat from her skin. Her bones are brittle.
She is dying.
“Àn’ying,” Yù’chén says quietly. “I’m sorry about your mother.”
I focus on cleaning her face, her arms, each of her long, slender fingers, which are now swollen from lying on her back all day. I remember how nimble and clever they once were; how they embroidered chrysanthemums and orchids, mountains and rivers and oceans that made up my world when I was small. I remember her quick smile, the warmth of her eyes and the ring of her laughter, all of which she passed on to Méi’zi.
My eyes sting, and I reach for my mother’s other arm. I try to keep my voice steady as I reply, “There’s nothing for you to be sorry for. It’s not like you drank half her soul and killed my father.”
He’s silent for a moment. His tone is low when he says, “I can understand why you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you.” I pause, tasting the words on my tongue, then I reconsider, moving to wipe down my mother’s legs and feet. “I don’t hate…all of you. I hate half of what you are. But…” I draw a short breath. “I don’t hate who you are.”
A heavy pause stretches between us, and I feel Yù’chén’s gaze burning into my back. I don’t know what the point of all this is—whatever we have between us is a madness that will lead nowhere. And because the certainty of that settles like an anchor in my heart, I speak. One confession for one of his.
“My mother is the reason I’m doing the trials.” I drop thewashcloth into the bucket of water, then pick up the wooden comb to tend to my mother’s hair. It’s her favorite, one her mother handed down to her, which she used to comb my sister’s and my hair. I take my mother’s thinning white locks and run the comb down them. “I learned a few years ago that the pill of immortality could heal her soul.WhenI win”—Iemphasize the wordwhen—“I don’t plan to take it. I plan to give it to her.”
