Mama.
A female voice hummed in my ears; I recognized the lullaby my mother used to sing, a song about caterpillars and grapes.
Entranced, I leaned forward again, still staring at Mama’s bloodless face. My fingers whispered against her cold cheek. This wasn’t merely an illusion—it was a memory, one I’d fought so hard to suppress.
“Forgive me, Mama,” I whispered. “I couldn’t save you.”
I jolted as a hand snatched my wrist. The peach staff clattered to the floor. My eyes flicked to Mama’s, now open and glaring. The pressure on my wrist tightened, my bones threatening to snap like twigs.
“You couldn’t save me,” Mama rasped. “So you killed me instead.”
“What? No!” I grabbed my mother’s hand and tried to yank myself free. Pain, hot as heated metal, shot up my arm. “Let me go! Please, Mama!”
“Selfish children must be punished.” My mother rose to a sitting position and swung her legs over the edge of the bed, her grip never loosening. She no longer looked like the woman I’d known. Her cheeks were hollow, her eyes big and bulbous. Grease pressed down on her tangled hair, and a putrid stench fumed from her mouth.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I cried, kneesbuckling. I slowly backed from the bed, but my mother only followed, looming over me with loathing in her eyes.
“You took my life,” Mama hissed, “and you’ll take your father’s too. You are a selfish, selfish child, Siying. How will you pay for your sins?”
“Let go of me!” I screamed through tears. “Please, I beg of you! You’re hurting me!”
“A small price for the suffering you caused me.”
I clawed at my mother’s fingers again. “I’m sorry,” I wept. “I’m so sorry.”
Whatever retort Mama had to give was interrupted by another voice coming from somewhere else in the residence. A frightened male voice.
“Mistress Kang! Where are you? Mistress Kang!”
Distracted, my mother slackened her hold enough for me to wrench back my wrist. I jerked toward the door, grabbing my staff on the way, and stumbled from the room.
“Ren,” I gasped, sprinting in the direction of the temple. Footsteps thumped from behind. I squeezed my staff and ran harder.
“Mistress Kang!” His volume fluctuated, as if he were in motion. He had to be in the front courtyard. “Can you hear me? Kang Siying—”
His voice cut off just as I crossed the prayer hall to the main door. Feet pounding down the stoop, I frantically scanned the open yard for the prince. But no one was there.
“Ren!” I called.
Nothing.
Instead, Mama’s voice sounded from behind. “Kang Siying!”
I yelped as fingers touched my hair. Too terrified to face my mother again, I lunged toward the monastery gate withoutlooking back. At my push, the wooden doors creaked open, and I tumbled not down a forest-flanked flight of stairs but into the inner courtyard of Jing Mansion.
I fell hard on my knees, palms pressed against the polished wood of the veranda facing the courtyard. Still panting from fear and adrenaline, I lifted my eyes to stare at the sight before me. Where it had once been deserted and cloaked in shadow, the courtyard was now illuminated by silk lanterns strung along the walls and in the trees, the latter flourishing with new plums. Braziers fringed the pathways, firelight dancing across the moon-white gravel that lined the veranda.
More stunning than the lights were the people milling about in fine clothing and sparkling ornaments. They chatted and sipped on wine as dancers floating in gossamer performed on a square platform in the courtyard center. Nearby, musicians artfully plucked the strings of their guzhengs, their harmony accompanying the dancers’ graceful movements.
Silk-dressed children played at the edge of the revelry, spinning wooden tops and shoving star-shaped sugars into their mouths. The greasy aroma of braised pork, stir-fried clams, and roasted duck wafted out from an open window, scraping the walls of my empty stomach.
I bit my lip and focused on the lanterns flickering nearest me, the colorful patterns casting kaleidoscopic flowers on the ground. This must be a memory born of Yuyan’s rage. Which meant she was close by.
“Lovely party, isn’t it, Lady Yuyan?”
I jolted, then turned to see the jiangshi herself standing at the edge of the courtyard, observing the festivities with a mixtureof disinterest and scorn. Except she wasn’t a jiangshi, not yet. The cream of her throat was untouched by blood, and she wore a gleaming violet dress that looked newly made. Hovering at her elbow was a younger girl with one too many gold baubles shivering in her hair.
“It’s even gaudier than all the others,” Yuyan said in response to the girl’s comment.
