Page 34 of The Nightblood Prince

I arrived at camp just two days before deadline. Most recruits must have stayed home for one last New Year’s meal, because camp was quieter than I’d imagined.

That, or there were more deserters than enlistments—voluntary and forced.

The camp was a stronghold of towers and long fields of tents and barracks, enclosed by enormous fences that reminded me of a cage. My stomach turned.

Absentmindedly, I touched my old hunting bow, bought from the village butcher a year ago, right before I set out to find the stargazer. I nodded greetings to the soldiers standing guard when I approached the imposing gates and offered up my conscription scroll.

“Li Hude?” the soldier asked.

历峰 , Lifeng, was a double-charactered surname, too uncommon to be kept after our exile. It was also not our real surname, but one given to us by the emperor. A signifier of his faith in my prophecy. Li was my family’s ancestral name, the name we reclaimed after we left the capital.

“Li Fei,” I replied. “His son.”

The soldier smiled and patted me on the back. “A lot of sons are signing up in place of their fathers. Our country will remember your courage.”

“Thank you.” I touched the silk headband that covered my phoenix’s mark. Half to make sure it was secure, and half for comfort.

Though I had practice disguising myself as a man during my travels, I had never lived with so many men in close quarters for more than a night or two. Women were not allowed in the army. To be found would mean a certain death.

I wasn’t ready to forfeit my life just yet. Though as I walked through camp, I feared I might have bitten off more than I could chew.

Training hadn’t even begun, yet most of the men were already covered in dirt. And oh, skies, the smell.

If you want to live among clean servant girls and polite eunuchs who only flash gentle smiles and speak with respectful tones, then you should have stayed in that gilded cage, I had to remind myself over and over again on the road.

Palace etiquette was drilled into my head, and it was difficult, adapting to how normal people lived. For not everyone had to grow up bearing the unfathomable weight of an entire empire’s expectations.

I was assigned to the Fourth Company of the Third Battalion.

By the time I found our campsite, there was just one corner bed left in the bunks.

I quickly claimed it by setting my bag down.

The tent was abuzz with sounds. Some men were sitting around the table at the center of the room playing cards and dice, some were introducing themselves, while others were making themselves at home.

Next to me, someone was shaving his dirty and overgrown toenails with a knife, leaving clippings all over the bed.

I nearly gagged.

Hygiene! I heard the furious voices of palace nannies.

Whenever I saw men spit in the open or heard them cough too loudly, I would hear the scoldings I would have received if I did anything similar. So did I hate these men and their behaviors, or did I hate my childhood of being held to impossible standards?

I lowered my gaze so I wouldn’t have to look at any of them and began storing my things under the bed when a familiar voice froze me dead in my steps.

“Fei?”

I turned to find the square face of Luyao, the cowherd from my village, seated at a low table with three other men, holding cards.

I cursed under my breath. Out of all my preparations, I’d failed to predict that I’d run into someone from the village.

There were so many training camps, so many companies to be separated into.

It was just my luck that Fate put us in the same tent in the same camp.

“What are you doing here?” he asked in a low voice.

“The same as you,” I whispered. “Enlisting in the army.”

His eyes darted around and he stepped closer. Then he added in a whisper, “Girls aren’t allowed in the army.”

“Who’s the kid?” one of the other men asked from the table. Everyone was looking at Luyao, waiting for him to introduce me, and he just waved them away. “Da’sha, you can take my turn!”

I hastily pushed a roll of coins into Luyao’s hand. “Keep this a secret. If anyone finds out, my whole family will be implicated.”

“If you know how dangerous it is, why did you enlist in the first place?” he whispered.

“Because if I didn’t, my father would have to. You know him; he teaches your little brother in school. His gets out of breath by walking up the hill by our home. He’d never survive a war.”

Luyao’s face softened. He pushed back the coins. “I’m not going to tell anyone. But the military isn’t a place for girls. My father fought in these wars, and so have my brothers. Forget about the front lines; these training camps are brutal by themselves. A girl like you won’t survive for long.”

I almost smiled. “I think you are forgetting who caught that pheasant for you, Zhangxi, and your soon-to-arrive baby.”

“A good archer does not a good soldier make.”

“Then help me,” I whispered. “Please. Think of it as doing good deeds for your unborn child. Zhangxi would want you to help me if she were here.”

Luyao’s lips twitched at the mention of his wife and unborn child. “Fine, but only because Zhangxi has been craving roasted pheasant all winter, so you did me a big favor.”

I smiled.

“First thing.” He gestured at my bag behind me.

“Keep your bag under your bunk and keep your bed clean. The superiors will check, and you don’t want to be scolded by them.

The rules of the military are cast in iron, and they will not be broken for anyone.

If you step out of line, you will be punished, no matter how scrawny you look. ”

I glanced around. “Does anyone else know that they should keep their beds clean?”

Luyao grimaced. “They will soon enough. And take your bow and arrows to the armory, in case someone tries to steal them when you’re not looking.”

“Luyao?” his friend called again.

Luyao turned back to the table. “He’s just some boy from my village. I didn’t think he would enlist in place of his father. Look at him, a breeze can blow him over.”

The men laughed. “Never underestimate the short ones!” one interjected.

“Odds that he won’t make it through the first battle?”

Another man laughed. “He won’t make it through the first month.”

My lips twitched. All the more reason to survive, then. “I’ll take the bet,” I said, making sure to speak from my chest and forcibly pressing each word down so they sounded lower and manlier. It was exhausting, and my throat always ached at the end of the day when I spoke like this.

Skies, this was going to be a long couple of months.

I walked up to them and dropped the roll of coins on the table. “I bet that not only will I survive the first battle; I will survive the longest out of us.”

The men looked at me dead-faced; then smiles began to crack. “I like you.”

“Fei,” I offered.

“Yangdong,” said the biggest of the men.

“A’du,” offered another.

“Da’sha!”