Page 47

I didn’t remember the journey home.

Didn’t remember getting in a carriage and falling asleep in Mama’s arms, didn’t remember who carried me up to my room or how Baba’s jacket ended up over my shoulders.

What I did remember was the fireworks at midnight.

They startled me awake, shooting up to the sky in a burst of boisterous joy.

There, before the heavens, they bloomed like fire flowers, in dazzling scarlets and golds to welcome the New Year.

Their smoke clouded the sky, and I couldn’t see the stars.

Go back to sleep, murmured a voice in my head.

I tried to sit up.

“Shani?”

It was the gentlest I’d ever seen her, the way she stroked my hair as she floated over my bed, her ruby eyes blinking in the shadows.

Sleep, she said again.

We’ll speak tomorrow.

She swept her feathers over my face, and her watery softness was an unexpected balm to my grief.

My eyelids grew heavy.

The last thing I saw was the moon, shining high like a dragon’s pearl.

In the morning, there came a knock at my door.

“Go away,” I mumbled, but my throat was swollen from crying and I had no voice.

My visitor entered.

Mailoh had come with a tray.

“Don’t be alarmed, it’s only tea, not sangi.”

I sat up slowly on my bed, rasping, “I’m…I’m not—”

“Lord Elang gave very clear instructions,” the turtle interrupted.

“If you don’t drink it, I’m to wait until you finish the cup.”

I started to protest, but she wasn’t done.

“He left something for you,” Mailoh said.

She drew a long envelope from the pouch over her shoulder and placed it on the tray before she left.

Inside was the drawing I’d sketched before Baba’s last voyage.

I traced the clumsy lines I’d made to illustrate my three sisters, Mama holding hands with Baba in front of hisship.

It was the very drawing Elang had promised to return when our contract was completed.

I set it on my lap, remembering how much I’d loathed him then—for forcing me to marry him, for withholding information about Baba.

He had promised that our marriage would be dissolved once I finished painting the Dragon King.

Never did I think to ask how.

We’ll go our separate ways, he’d said.

You’ll never see me again.

I’d thought that it’d be as easy as cutting the red string around our wrists—I’d never thought that Elang would die.

But that had always been his plan.

From the beginning, he’d known.

The tears welled again.

“Look at you, eyes and face all bloodshot and puffy,” said Shani, who appeared in a swirl of mist.

She crawled out onto my arm.

Her movements were slow, as if she hadn’t recovered from her fight against Nazayun.

She settled on the nook of my elbow, letting her wings fall on either side of my arm.

“Shani,” I said hoarsely, “everything you did. Was it all arranged—”

“I didn’t come to chat,” she said crisply.

“I’m here to give you something.”

What, I meant to ask, but it hurt too much to speak.

“Memories. Some, I stole from you. Some, I stole from him.” Shani sniffed.

“I’ve kept them all these years.” She sent me a pointed look.

“They’re good ones, some might even make you smile.”

“I can’t smile right now.”

“We’ll see.” With that, Shani touched my forehead.

The water demon landed on the roof of the black palanquin with a thump.

She was new to land—unaccustomed to flying.

Only yesterday she’d discarded her fins for wings.

The new form wasn’t all bad: a phoenix with crystalline wings and a long gossamer tail.

Her every feather contained the energy of a cascading waterfall, and her red eyes were brighter than rubies.

A pity no one could see her.

“There she is,” she said to the young half dragon inside the carriage.

She extended a wing toward a girl traversing the market street.

“The Painter, who also happens to be your Heavenly Match.”

Elang held his breath and pinched the curtains to the side, glancing out the window.

The stench of Gangsun assaulted his nostrils.

There were few things he’d appreciated about living in Ai’long; not having to be around humans was one of them.

He looked to where Shani pointed, finding a young girl self-consciously holding a straw hat over her head.

From his investigations, he knew her to be Truyan Saigas.

She was tall and reedy, with dull eyes and a round mole by her mouth.

She looked unexceptional in every way.

“She’s a mercenary,” he said, closing the curtain.

“Her intent is to make money, not cultivate her art.”

“What is your point?”

His expression hardened.

“She won’t do.”

“The fates are already against you. Nazayun has her father, and she has the Sight.”

“I’ll deal with her.” Elang’s tone was cold.

“There are other Painters.”

“You think it’ll be that easy to kill her?”

“She’s been doomed ever since Grandfather hid my pearl in her heart.”

“That’s not what I meant,” said the demon.

Her smirk grew when Elang raised an eyebrow.

“Go ahead, then, and try. I’ll be watching.”

He decided on poison.

It wasn’t easy preparing one that’d kill instantly and with minimal pain—but the girl was innocent.

At the very least, he owed her the extra effort.

A few weeks later, he was ready.

He put on a mask, donned the robes of a fourth-rank magistrate, and set out into the heart of Gangsun.

“Your Heavenly Match is on Dattu Street,” reported Shani, sitting invisibly on his shoulder.

“She just left the bakery. She should be heading home, but it looks like she’s got an entourage.”

That wouldn’t do.

He needed to catch her alone.

Wordlessly he followed her as she made a sharp turn down an alley.

Shani was right, Truyan wasn’t alone.

Five young women had indeed followed her, but from the stench radiating off of their spirits, he could tell they were up to no good.

They surrounded her, tittering in high-pitched laughs that made his ears ring.

“What’s the rush?” said a girl who smelled like rotten lilies.

She knocked the hat off Truyan’s head so her hair came loose, blue and bright for all to see.

“Just as I thought. Balardan filth.”

Truyan ignored her and continued forward.

The end of the alley was steps away.

Run, he thought, even though she couldn’t hear.

Don’t keep walking.

From behind, the girls yanked on Truyan’s tunic, hard.

She fell, and they grabbed the basket out of her arms.

“The bandit’s got stolen bread!”

A slew of steamed buns tumbled to the ground.

Unfazed, Truyan began picking them up.

Her composure rattled the girls, who made a game of kicking the buns toward the nearby canal.

“Hungry?” they taunted.

“Blue-haired scum. Go back where you came from.”

“This is where I came from.” Truyan rose to her feet, her eyes shining with irritation.

“I was born here, idiots.”

“Idiots?” Rotten Lily sneered.

“Girls, hold her down.”

Her friends restrained Truyan’s arms, and Lily struck a match, intent on setting her hair on fire.

Looks like the dirty work is being done for you, Shani remarked to Elang.

Shall we leave, or should we make sure she dies?

There was an odd and unfamiliar pressure in Elang’s chest.

“She needs help.”

He reached into his pocket, skipping over the vial of poison for a changing potion.

He drank it quickly, gritting his teeth as his face spasmed, dragon half contorting to match the human one.

At the last minute, he turned his mask into a pair of spectacles.

He stole out of his hiding place, only to witness firsthand Truyan’s ferocity.

She butted her head into Lily’s and slammed her hip into another girl, effectively shoving her into the canal.

Then, as she wrested a hand free, she punched Lily in the nose.

Shani watched, amused.

I like her more when she’s angry.

Elang wasn’t listening.

Truyan’s actions were only making the bullies angrier.

They surrounded her again, this time with rocks in their fists.

He stepped into the alleyway, wearing his harshest, most authoritative scowl.

“What goes on here?” he demanded.

“A magistrate!” cried the girls when an errant rock flew at his face.

With startled shrieks, they fled.

Truyan ought to have fled too, but she remained.

As if he didn’t exist, she stooped to pick up the steamed buns, counting them under her breath.

When he approached, she barely spared him a glance.

“Your spectacles are broken,” she merely said.

“I hope you’re not expecting me to pay for them.”

This disarmed Elang, if only momentarily.

“Is that how you speak to a magistrate of this county?”

“I know the face of every lizard around here,” she replied matter-of-factly.

She blew at her bangs.

“You’re not one.”

“Lizard?”

“Magistrate, I mean. They’re all the same. Beady eyes, lumpy skin, mouths pressed tight like it costs them coin to smile. Lizards.”

“I see.” Elang’s lips twitched with amusement as he helped her pick up a steamed bun.

He wondered what she’d think of his real face.

“Are you hurt?”

“No.” She took the bun from him, wiping dirt off its surface with her sleeve.

“Just a bunch of girls who don’t like my hair. It happens.”

Her face was swollen in spots, and bruises were already blooming on her arms where the stones had hit her.

Yet she acted as if the greater crime was that her lunch had gotten spoiled.

“I know what it’s like,” Elang started.

“My face—my real face—has earned me many enemies.”

“Your real face?” She looked up at him, eyes bright with curiosity.

“What are you, a demon?”

“No—” He started to laugh, but Shani, who had turned invisible, flitted to his side.

This would be a good time to kill her, the demon reminded him.

Not yet.

He wouldn’t admit it, but now that he’d met his match, he was curious about her.

She wasn’t anything like what he’d expected.

You only have a minute left until your potion wears out.

Still he hesitated.

Truyan was eyeing his silence.

He could tell her the truth, let her see his face.

But then what?

She’d run in terror.

She’d never want to speak to him again.

There came a twinge in his chest that he’d never felt before.

The stirrings of a pulse.

He clutched at it, letting out a gasp.

Your heart is your home, his mother used to say.

Until you understand that, you belong nowhere.

Finally, after all these years, he knew where he belonged.

Truyan had observed how pale he’d gone.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

He inhaled a deep breath, noticing for the first time that unlike other humans, her presence didn’t make the air reek.

She brought a freshness to the air, like a garden in spring.

“I have to go,” he said.

For the first time he could remember, a smile slid onto his lips.

“Try not to forget my face.”

But I had forgotten his face.

Shani’d made sure of that, at least until today.

Scene after scene from my own past—and Elang’s—flashed by.

I saw him during the ensuing months, finding excuses to meet me.

Never as the same person.

Sometimes he was a peddler on the street who gave me an extra-large bowl of the noodles I liked so much; others he was a street musician or a government prefect.

Often he sent Shani to leave gifts for me and my family.

Silver coins that my sisters might find on the street, a pair of winter boots along the gutters of their room, a box of oranges under our blankets.

As the memories continued to unspool, one in particular snagged at my heart:

“It’s been a year,” said Shani one day, confronting Elang in his garden.

“I take it you’ve decided to let the krill live.”

He sliced off a sanheia thorn with his nail.

“I won’t kill her.”

“So you’ll let Nazayun win?”

“He won’t.” Elang took another flower.

“Her art is improving, and she’s been learning to trust her visions. I have faith that she’ll be ready for the Scroll soon.”

“I’m not talking about the Scroll,” said the demon tartly.

“You seem to forget that if the curse isn’t broken—”

“I don’t care about the curse anymore.”

“Because you care for her. ”

“Yes.” He resented the stumble in his breath.

“Something she must never know.”

For her sake, it was best if Truyan didn’t even like him.

Better, if she despised him.

He’d make sure of that when she met him as his true self.

Shani hopped onto his arm, curling her talons against the trim on his robes.

“You surprise me, Your Highness. I never would have taken you to be a romantic.”

Ordinarily Elang would have chided her for her insolence, but today he was quiet.

“Can I count on you when the time comes, to do what must be done?”

“You mean, can you count on me to carry on with the mission if you falter?” Shani didn’t bother mincing her words.

“What? Look at how you’ve lapsed already, whenever you’re with that blue-haired thief. Grinning and telling jokes and acting like a madcap fool. It’s not a blight on you, Elang’anmi. You’re half-human, after all.”

“Can I count on you?” he repeated.

Shani folded her wings.

“You have my demon’s honor. I will not fail.”

Elang expelled a breath.

“Then we can begin with theplan.”

Shani lifted her wing from my forehead.

I was crying.

Fresh tears brimmed in my eyes, and every new breath I drew was sodden.

But she was right, the memories did make me smile.

“I always wondered when we first met,” I said.

“Thank you for showing me.”

“I warned you not to fall in love with him,” Shani said quietly.

She tucked her wings to her sides.

“The last thing Elang’anmi told me was to take care of myself. Now I say it to you, take care of yourself. If… if there is still a chance for him, you will be the torch that brings him out of the darkness.”

I touched her wing, unable to speak.

To my surprise, she swept a gentle wing across my cheek, drying my tears.

“I’ll only say this once—you grew on metoo.”

No words from the demon could have moved me more.

I raised my hand to hold her wing against my cheek, but she dissolved into the air.

Without a word of farewell, she slipped through the cracks in the window, disappearing beyond thetrees.

When I closed my eyes, I could feel her dipping into the ocean, on her way to where she belonged.

I reached for my tea, taking a long and bittersweet sip.

May the tides bring you home, I thought.

May the sea watch over you, until we meet again.