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“You would need to feed them something other than poison,” the Paper Alchemist said.

I looked up. “What else besides poison would kill them?”

The Paper Alchemist shrugged, but I knew from the tightness in her face that there were words she didn’t want to say. “I thought you said the Moon Alchemist had you studying until your eyes bled. I’m surprised you haven’t found anything useful.”

I clutched my mouse box tighter to my chest, frowning. The Moon Alchemist had me studying stones, not practical alchemy. I was certain I hadn’t come across a stone capable of killing some people but not others.

At the other end of the courtyard, the doors swung open and several alchemists burst inside, one of them on fire, the others laughing while he ran to extinguish his hair in the pond.

The Paper Alchemist sighed, then rose to her feet. “Sorry we can’t be more helpful,” she said. “This has been a fun thought experiment, but you should probably get back to whatever Moon wants you to do.”

“Thanks,” I said, dropping my gaze to my mice. I was certain they knew more than they were letting on but were too worried about getting in trouble to help me. I couldn’t say I blamed them, but it stung to feel so close to the answer yet so far.

The Paper Alchemist strode away, but the River Alchemist lingered a moment longer after rising to her feet, her shadow cast over me, her silhouette backlit by the sun.

“I heard about your final trial,” she said, pointing down at Durian, who was still sleeping beside me. “May I?”

I sighed, scooped up the duck, and held it out to the River Alchemist, who tucked it against her chest and stroked its head. “I’m impressed,” she said. “It’s not easy for an untrained alchemist to make something like this.”

“It’s just a duck,” I said.

The River Alchemist shrugged, moving to give Durian back but hesitating before our hands touched. She leaned forward, the curtain of her hair swinging down, shielding us from the sun. In the darkness, the flecks of amber in her eyes gleamed brighter.

“I don’t mean that the duck is impressive,” she whispered. “I mean, what you did to make it.”

I blinked, my hands frozen in the air, reaching out. “I hardly knew what I was doing.”

“Yes, I know,” she said. “You need to be careful when combining different stone types. You never know what sort of danger you could create.”

Then she passed me the duck and stood up sharply, sunlight spilling between us, and ran after the Paper Alchemist without another word.

Durian shuffled and settled down in my palms. I remembered the burst of light and alchemical sludge that he’d been born from, the uncontrollable reaction that could have ripped a hole in the universe if I’d been just a little less lucky.

All because I’d combined stone types.

I stuffed Durian into my pocket and snatched my mouse box off the ground, jostling all the mice inside, and took off toward my room.

I hadn’t found a single stone that could do what I wanted because none existed.

But multiple stones could.

As long as I could make sure the Empress used a different taste tester for each of her meals, I could put traces of a different stone in each one. The taste testers would be unharmed. But the Empress, once she swallowed both types of stones...

I pictured the burst of light, the hole seared in the table, black sludge and fire and raw, searing power.

I smiled.

The Empress was as good as dead.

The prince did not share my enthusiasm when I presented him with a box of dead mice.

“I would have believed you,” he said as he slammed the lid back on and opened a window. “I didn’t need to see exploded mouse guts. Those poor things.”

“You were going to feed them to your pet snake anyway,” I said, rolling my eyes. “You think that would have been painless?”

I’d spent the afternoon breaking my stones into smaller and smaller pieces and feeding them to the mice until I’d found a combination that worked. In the destruction cycle of the elements, earth soaks up water, water controls fire, fire melts metal, metal cuts wood, and wood breaks earth. I’d focused on the last combination, grinding woodstones and earthstones into fine powder, then activating them with a simple fire transformation that kept the alchemy in them simmering. It turned out that citrine and jade, once they met in the stomach, made the mice bleed from the mouth and fall over dead. Other combinations had caused more...explosive results, but this one was the most consistent.

I thought, fleetingly, how much Wenshu and Yufei would have appreciated my discovery. But I couldn’t think about them right now. I had an Empress to kill.