Page 32 of The Dragon Wakes with Thunder (The Dragon Spirit Duology #2)

Twenty-two

It is a good position—the mistress of the house is kind and generous, and the pay is well above market rate.

Only, take care never to enter the upstairs quarters at the far end of the stairwell.

Other maids have tried, and all have either gone mad or disappeared.

They say the previous mistress of the house lost her mind in those very rooms, and the shadow still lingers.

If you take the job, never open that door.

Time was of the essence; I had to set out immediately, before the ghosts of the night’s events could catch up with me. And yet, though I feared any delay, I could not go without saying goodbye to my family. Not if this was possibly my last night in Chuang Ning.

Following muscle memory, I climbed the low-hanging eaves and ran across the rooftops to Willow District.

The sky was awash with stars, and I had never so dearly missed being alive.

Knowing I would lose myself in six months’ time only intensified the richness of life today: the firecracker ash in the air, the crumpled lanterns colliding in the breeze, the sugary scent of sweet rice cakes and peanut cookies.

Chuang Ning, despite all its flaws, despite how much I had hated living here, was still my home.

The house was dark as I crept inside, stealing in through the upstairs window as I used to long ago.

It felt surreal to be back here, to breathe in these childhood smells, to step on floorboards that still creaked in the same places.

Tiptoeing down the corridor, I avoided Father’s end of the house and instead went to Xiuying’s room, gratified to find candlelight pooling beneath her door.

I knocked once, then entered. Xiuying was sewing by candlelight, repairing a dress that was too big to be worn by Rouha. And then I remembered, Rouha had grown.

“Meilin!” Xiuying gasped, dropping her sewing. “How are you here? Prince Liu said you couldn’t leave the palace until—”

“I wanted to see you,” I choked out. “Sister.”

Her arms came around me and I felt myself shatter, all my carefully maintained armor falling apart at the warmth of her touch.

We cried in each other’s arms, for minutes or hours I couldn’t say.

There were so many things I wanted to tell her, so many ways I wished to say you were right , and thank you , and I’m sorry, I’m sorry a thousand times.

“It’s been…so hard.” I sobbed like a little girl again, like I was twelve and my mother had just left me. “I’ve made so many mistakes. I’ve done—terrible things—”

“Shh…” Xiuying patted the back of my head. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”

The door squealed as it opened a second time. “Jie Jie?”

I dried my eyes as I caught sight of Rouha and Plum by the threshold, staring at me as if they’d seen a ghost. Plum ran toward me first, giggling.

“You’ve gotten so big!” I cried out, lifting him in the air and groaning from the weight of him. Rouha tackled my legs and I nearly fell over, before Xiuying righted us both.

“Your hair!” I exclaimed, looking at Rouha’s shorn braids, which now reached just below her ears.

“The style’s in vogue,” Xiuying said, her eyes twinkling. “Because of a certain woman warrior, the rumors say.”

I shot her an incredulous look before bending down to listen to Plum teach me every new word he’d learned in my absence.

“Why don’t you stay?” Rouha whined, interrupting Plum. “It’s boring without you.”

“Rouha, we talked about this,” Xiuying chided. “Meilin has to attend to her duties in the palace—with the prince, remember? You liked him.”

“He can come live here with us,” Rouha protested. “He can stay in Father’s rooms soon.” To me, she said in a stage whisper, “Father’s dying.”

I glanced questioningly at Xiuying, who gave me a curt nod.

“It’s not proper for the prince to live here,” said Xiuying. “But we can visit Meilin one day in the palace—wouldn’t you like to see the palace?”

“I don’t like the palace,” said Rouha, pouting. “I want to travel the world—like you did, Jie Jie.”

I shot Xiuying a look of horror, and she grimaced in response.

“Me too!” said Plum, before biting into something on my arm. I yelped with surprise before noticing he’d torn my makeshift bandage. Xiuying, noticing the wound, got up to rebind it and assemble an herbal remedy for me. So she was downstairs when a knock sounded at the front door.

My insides writhed with coiling dread. Anything amiss was sure to be because of me. “Stay here,” I ordered Plum and Rouha, my vision tunneling. “No matter what happens, do not leave this room.

“Rouha.” I squeezed her hand, trying to sound calm. “You’re in charge now.” My younger sister was growing up to be a clever child with observation skills well beyond her years. I trusted her to keep Plum hidden in the presence of danger.

With that I hurried down the stairs toward the hushed voices in the entrance, imagining the worst. But as I neared, I recognized the newcomer’s voice and breathed out an immense sigh of relief. It was Sky.

I put a hand against my chest to ease my pounding heart. Never again would I come here and put my family in danger, I decided. Not until I could trust myself again.

He too was relieved to see me, though his relief did not overcome his anger.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” he said lowly.

“I have guards scouring the city as we speak.” He took a breath, trying to calm himself.

“We arrested Zibei, but he killed himself before we could interrogate him. Here,” he said, holding out my irons.

I hesitated, not wanting to give up my power and vitality.

But the threat of the dragon still loomed large, and I did not know when he would try to control me again.

Wordlessly, I held out my wrists as he clasped them around me.

Immediately my senses dulled, the world losing its color and verve and light.

Without my lixia, I was overcome with exhaustion, my limbs like paper fans threatening to fold at any second.

Lightheaded, I swayed before Sky caught me.

He looked me over, taking in my torn nightclothes and the bloody bandage around my arm.

“Who did this to you?” he asked, his voice lethal.

Wearily, I shook my head.

“My apologies for intruding at this hour,” Sky said to Xiuying. “We’ll take our leave now.”

“Wait,” said Xiuying, thrusting a satchel of herbal medicine toward me. “Take this.”

Sky frowned at the offending object but said nothing as I looped the strings around my arm. “Sister,” I said, a lump in my throat. I don’t know if I’ll ever see you again.

She nodded, understanding me.

“When I look at the moon,” she whispered, “I think of you.”

Sky was silent as we left, but I could feel the simmering resentment in his bearing. He helped me onto his steed, then swung up behind me, urging his horse into a slow walk.

“When I saw your empty bed,” he said at last, “I assumed the worst. I imagined you dead—or captured—or—” He broke off, breathing hard. In a strained voice, he continued, “Only to find you at your family’s house, though you were explicitly forbidden from leaving the palace—”

“Why didn’t you tell me, Sky?” I interrupted. “Why didn’t you tell me I only had six months left to live?”

He froze. “He told you, didn’t he?” he said tightly.

“If by ‘he’ you mean Lei—”

“I’m going to kill that bastard.” The lack of bluster in his voice frightened me.

“It’s not his fault!” I said, twisting in the saddle. “You should’ve been the one to tell me, Sky, not keep me in the dark like a child—”

“You act like a child sometimes!” Sky burst out. “You know why I didn’t tell you? Because I was afraid of what you’d do.”

Infuriated, I swung off the moving horse, landing badly on my knees. Sky’s steed nickered, confused, before Sky comforted him and dismounted, facing me in the darkened alleyway. I will not go with you , I decided then.

“You’ve grown increasingly unstable as of late,” said Sky. “I was afraid you’d hurt yourself, or—”

“Or hurt others?” I asked, my chest aching as if someone had tried to split it open. “So what, you wanted me to just go quietly?”

“I am doing everything in my power to save you,” he said. “But sometimes I think you don’t want to be saved.”

My eyes burned with unshed tears. He had no idea what I went through in the palace every day: surrounded by people who wished to see me fail, constantly second-guessing myself, forcing a false smile despite the pain. Every moment was a violent struggle. And he thought I didn’t want to live?

“You never understood me,” I said quietly. “Sometimes I think it was a mistake for us to be together.”

Sky sucked in a breath as if I’d just struck him. He raked a distracted hand through his hair, looking away from me, then back. When he spoke, his face was violence. “Is this because of him ?”

“Who?” I asked, before bursting into cold laughter. “This has nothing to do with Lei.”

Sky’s voice was soft, but it pierced through the night. “You don’t think I’ve seen the way you look at him?”

My laughter died on my lips as I met his wretched eyes.

“Do you even love me, Meilin? Look at you.” Now it was his turn to laugh. “You can’t say it, can you?”

My eyes narrowed as I strode toward him, my anger rising with every step.

“Everything I have ever done in that cursed place was for you,” I spat out, pointing at the high gates guarding the Forbidden City.

“I foiled your brother’s schemes for you.

I kowtowed before your father for you. I stayed away from my family for months for you. ”

How much of it was the dragon’s doing, I wondered, and how much of it was my own inherent ambition?

Was it possible to divorce the two anymore?

Did I truly love Sky, or had Qinglong been manipulating my affection for him in order to drive me toward the throne?

As a sovereign, I could do so much more for the dragon than as a lowly foot soldier.

That had always been his aim, I recalled now, to get me into a position of power in the world of men.

Why was I so easily manipulated? What was it about me that longed to trust—like a bird seeking a cage for comfort? How could I have ended up here, once again, caught in a snare of my own making?

“I never told you I loved you because the truth is, I don’t know if I’m capable of love anymore.

But I’ll be damned if I let you say I didn’t do everything for you—that I didn’t lay my life down for you—” My voice shattered in a soundless sob.

I expelled a breath before choking out, “I’ve made up my mind.

I’m not going back with you.” I swallowed my tears. “I’m leaving Chuang Ning.”

His eyes bulged as he realized I was serious. He shook his head, his mouth flattening. “No.”

“Sky,” I continued, as if he hadn’t spoken, “this is goodbye.”

“No,” he said again. “You’re not going.”

“I wasn’t asking for your permission—I’ve made my decision.”

“It’s not your decision to make,” he said hotly.

Heat flooded my body at his arrogant presumption. “Is that an order, Sky?”

His eyes turned to slits; neither of us would back down now. “It’s my prerogative,” he answered.

I felt fury swallow me whole, changing me into a different creature, one unrecognizable to myself.

I tore my engagement string from my wrist and ground it beneath my shoe.

“The wedding’s off,” I said, trying to cut him where it hurt most. “Do you know—I never wanted to marry you?” My parting smile was full of disdain. “You have no claim over me.”

An animal sound ripped from his throat. I turned to go, but he closed the distance between us and seized my shoulder, his grip rough enough to bruise. I leaned forward and sank my teeth into his hand, and when his fingers slackened I twisted out of his grasp.

“Are you going to drag me back as your captive?” I asked. “Is that what this has come to?”

“I’ll do whatever’s necessary,” he said, eyes flinty and unyielding. “You’re mine.”

I leapt toward him with a spinning roundhouse kick.

He dodged and feinted left before catching me in my blind spot and slamming me to the ground with enough force that we both went rolling.

I scrambled to gain the upper hand, but his strength far surpassed mine, and in seconds he had me pinned beneath him, his hands like manacles around my wrists.

His cruel smirk clouded my vision with senseless rage, and I reared up and head-butted him, feeling my forehead split from the impact.

His hold loosened and I kneed him, hard enough that he gasped in pain.

Then I saw the hidden knife glinting in his boot, and I reached for it, desperate and unthinking with fury.

He read my intent and slammed me back into the dirt, then wrapped his hands around my throat, choking me.

I scrabbled at his hands, gasping for breath, but it was no use.

He was too strong, and I could not escape him.

As my breath thinned and my hands grew limp, the last thing I saw was his eyes, dilated with rage, before my vision went black.