The boy with the midnight eyes and silvery-white streaks in his dark hair stared back, his brows meeting in a puzzled line.
“Rui?” he questioned, as though he didn’t know what was happening.
Which, of course he didn’t. He was simply a figment of her wild imagination. Some weird illusion she’d conjured out of a mixture of grief and lack of sleep.
Rui groaned. “I can’t believe I’m actually hallucinating. Did someoneput something in the drinks?” She patted the boy’s chest, laughing at herself. “I have to say my imagination is amazing—you look so handsome, and this suit is gorgeous—” She stopped mid-tap.
The boy wassolid.
Perplexed, she poked him again. He was irrefutably solid. No—this was impossible.
He watched in amusement as she pinched her own cheek.
“Ouch,” she breathed out.
“What are you doing, silly?”
“Checking to see if I’m real,” she said, pinching her arm this time. Ithurt. “Oh my gods, I’m real—you’rereal. You’re real and you’re here!”
Zizi laughed.
It was the same laugh she remembered, the same face, the same everything. Only his eyes were different. They were no longer pale, wintry blue, but dark as the midnight sky.
“What’s going on?” Rui said, trying not to cry and failing. “I saw you—you disintegrated, you—” She threw herself at him, and he held her close. “I missed you so much.”
“Do you... remember?” he asked, sounding confused.
She squeezed him tightly before releasing him to stare at him in wonder. “Everything.” She nodded. “I remember everything; I rememberus. I don’t know what happened, but my memories came back.”
“I did not expect that,” he said, still looking stumped. But he broke into a smile a beat later. “I wasn’t going to reveal myself—I just wanted to see if you were all right. You didn’t seem to recognize me, so I thought it was safe to ask for a dance and I’d leave after that.” His smile turned sheepish. “Didn’t mean to traumatize you by dying in your arms and all.”
Still crying, Rui gave him a half-hearted punch in the arm. “How could you?”
“I’m sorry.” Zizi took her hand, clasping it gently in his. “I figured since you didn’t remember us and what we went through together, it wouldn’t matter if I ceased to exist. Besides, I had realms to save.” He shuddered. “Ididn’t think I would make it when I used the relic. Who knew destroying my mortal body would be the key to restoring the balance?”
“So how did you survive?”
He arched an eyebrow and puffed out his chest. “I’m super special.”
Rui knew he was using humor to disguise whatever terrible ordeal he’d gone through before he revived. “Be serious—”
“Iambeing serious,” Zizi protested, but her glare reprimanded him, and he said, “I finally fulfilled the condition of a deal I made with a mortal long ago, and I think somehow that saved me.”
“A deal with Lei Ying?”
Zizi shook his head, a tender expression of regret blooming on his face. “I did promise her forever, but that wasn’t a deal. The deal I unknowingly struck was withNikai. I told him I would protect Lei Ying with my life, but that didn’t happen. Instead, I fulfilled it when I destroyed the talisman and sacrificed my mortal vessel foryou. A life for a life; I satisfied the terms. Whatever I owe Nikai has been repaid, and the cycle has stopped.” Zizi’s smile flashed again. “I thoughtIwas the one who had bound your soul to mine by making a deal neither of us wished for, but it seems like we are connected by something else. Something even more powerful and unknown.”
“Fate?” Rui teased.
Zizi made a face. “Maybe Two was right about the Divine and all that.”
“Is that the Second King? And what’s the Divine?”
“It’s a long story—”
“I have all the time in the world,” she declared.
“I... don’t.” Zizi seemed reluctant to go on.
