With a final nervous look, Fredrick obeyed, slicing his Fang through the water under their feet. Since he’d done it right beneath them, they didn’t even have to step through this time. They simply fell from one place to another, dropping out—along with several gallons of icy river water—onto the pristine, still-untouched dirt directly behind the Golden Emperor, and directly in front of his mother. Her red eyes were still widening in surprise when Chelsie lunged forward, arms shooting out to snatch her daughter away from the old dragoness.
It happened so quickly, the Empress Mother had no chance to dodge. Or at least, that was what Julius assumed when she failed to move. As Chelsie’s arms extended, though, he realized that he was wrong. The Empress Mother hadn’t failed to dodge. She hadn’t needed to, because the moment Chelsie reached out, a car had slipped off the collapsed road above them, and was now plummeting straight down toward her head.
If Chelsie had been alone, that would have been the end. It took more than a car to kill a dragon even in human form, but it would definitely have knocked her out. Probably worse with the Qilin’s terrible luck making everything go so catastrophically wrong. For once, though, Chelsiewasn’talone. Fredrick was right behind her, and he yanked her out of the way at the last second, spinning them both to the side as the car plummeted past. Unfortunately, this put the two of them directly in the path of the truck that fell immediately after, crushing both dragons into the mud.
“No!” Julius screamed, rushing forward. He was trying desperately to push the truck over when it moved on its own, quivering and then launching out of the way entirely as Chelsie tossed it aside. She was muddy and bloody but alive. So was Fredrick, though he looked decidedly more shaken. The Empress Mother just looked smug, smiling at the two of them with the insufferable confidence of someone who knows they’ve won.
“Care to try again?” she said, beckoning them closer to her safe position beside the silent, kneeling Qilin. “Charge me all you like. The end will always be the same for the emperor’s enemies.”
“How are we his enemies?” Julius said angrily. “You’re the one who did this!”
“I did nothing but tell him the truth,” she said, glaring at him. “I am his mother and his empress. It is my duty to tell him what he needs to know when he needs to know it. Xian understands and respects that. The duty he owes me has been drilled into him since birth. I could spit in his face, and his magic still wouldn’t allow me to be harmed, but you’re another matter entirely.”
Her red eyes flicked to Chelsie. “You are the source of his suffering, and your children are living proof of his greatest failure. Now that he knows, his luck will correct the problem, and none of you will leave this city alive.”
Chelsie’s face was ashen by the time she finished, and for once in his life, Julius knew exactly why. What the empress described was exactly what Chelsie had been afraid of all this time. But while everyone else seemed convinced this was the only end, Julius refused to give up.
“He won’t kill them.”
The Empress Mother snorted and looked pointedly at the truck that had nearly crushed Chelsie and Fredrick. “Don’t be delusional.”
“You’re the one who’s delusional,” Julius growled. “You might not care about your son, but I know you need your emperor. You want to talk about ruining him? How do you think he’s going to react when he snaps out of this and realizes you let his luck kill Chelsie and his son?”
“Nothing worse than what’s already happened,” the empress said with a shrug. “But you misunderstand what’s happening here, whelp. I’m not doing this. He is. Look.”
She bent over, reaching down to brush the Qilin’s long, dark hair aside. When she lifted the curtain, though, the emperor’s face was a stranger’s. His beautiful features were completely slack, as though he were asleep, but his golden eyes were wide open and terrifyingly blank.
“And now you know the truth,” she said, letting the emperor’s hair fall back into place. “The Qilin’s magic has never been controllable, and my son is the strongest yet. He can rein it in to a point, but when he encounters something that goes too far, breaks too sharply, the luck takes over. Once that happens, he’s as good as gone, and he won’t come back until his magic has eliminated everything that makes him unhappy.”
“You mean eliminated everythingperiod,” Julius said, voice shaking.
The empress shrugged. “It’s not a precision tool, but one suffers the bad to enjoy the good, and who knows?” She flashed Julius a cruel smile. “Maybe when your hateful sister finally dies, he’ll get over her at last.”
“Or he could break entirely.”
“She saw to that already,” the empress growled, turning to glare hatefully at Chelsie’s bloody face. “But no matter what comes of this, I won’t let the Heartstrikers win. By breaking him here, I’ve snatched a measure of success from our clan’s greatest disaster. My son may never be the same, but at least he’ll have destroyed you, this city, and all of Algonquin’s lands in the process. When this is over, the world will be a better, safer place for our empire, which, if Xian were aware, he would agree is the only thing that matters.” She laid a proud hand on the emperor’s motionless shoulder. “I raised him well.”
“No, he came out welldespiteyou,” Chelsie snarled, her eyes locked on the little girl clutched in the crook of the empress’s arm. “What about our daughter? Will you sacrifice her, too?”
“Of course not,” the empress said. “You ruined the line of the Golden Empire forever. We are owed recompense, and Brohomir has informed me that this little urchin is the next seer. A fortune teller who reeks of Bethesda is no replacement for a Qilin, of course, but in times of trial, one must take what one can get.”
Chelsie growled low in her throat. Julius felt the same way. He had no idea what game Bob was playing here, but he’d never felt more betrayed in his life. Working with the Empress Mother was bad enough, but to give her hisniece—their niece, because as Chelsie’s daughter, she was Julius’s niece as well—it was unforgivable. He was as bad as Bethesda, throwing away his family like pawns for his end game, and now, as always, Julius had hadenough.
“She doesn’t belong to you,” he snarled, taking a menacing step forward. “She’s a Heartstriker. One of us. She’s notrecompense.”
“I won’t let you have anything,” Chelsie said at the same time, reaching down to snatch a broken length of steel rebar off the ground. “My children, Xian, they’remine. I won’t let you touch them!”
“Then you should have thought about that before you carelessly destroyed what wasmine,” the empress snarled back, moving closer to the emperor. “But what’s done is done. Everything is already broken beyond repair. All I can do now is try to make something out of the ashes.”
“Or save it before it becomes ashes.”
Julius and Chelsie both jumped. The growling voice had come from behind them, but it was so angry, Julius didn’t even recognize it as Fredrick’s until he stepped forward, sword in hand.
“You did this to us,” he growled, the words so low and bloody that even the empress stepped back. “You are a terrible empress and a worse mother, but awful as you are, it doesn’t have to end this way. The Qilin’s line is broken, but we’re still here. Our two clans, the biggest in the world, are united by blood now. We have a seer and a Qilin who’s still alive. I don’t care what Brohomir told you—we can still change our future if we work together.” He narrowed his golden eyes at her. “Grandmother.”
“You have no right to call me by that name!” she roared, crouching over her son. “You’re an embarrassment! Your mother and the Broodmare who bore her were both grasping, selfish harlots, and you’re just more of the same. The only blood of yours I’m interested in is when it’s spilled on the ground.”
She spat at his feet as she finished, and Fredrick growled menacingly, but it was too late. The empress had already reached down to grab the Qilin’s motionless shoulders, clutching him like a rock in the sea as she cried, “Save me, Xian!”
