Page 12

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My strength returns as I follow Yù’chén through the Celestial Gardens, winding through the forest of flowering trees and willows. It occurs to me that I am doing the exact opposite of what my parents and all mortal stories warned me of when I was a little girl: following a demon through the dark of the woods in the night.

But I am no longer a little girl, and the stories are just stories.

With my blades back in my hands, I feel calmer and in control once again—as much as I can be. Yù’chén weaves and ducks through the dove trees and ginkgos, and I keep my gaze pinned on the red of his cloak, which seems to blur into the shadows.

I begin to wonder if this is all a terrible idea. If getting a message to Méi’zi is worth the risk of being found out and potentially expelled from the trials.

“Where are we going?” I whisper.

“To the wards,” Yù’chén says in a low voice. We duck into the shade of the great plum blossom trees that line this part of the gardens: near the front of the grounds but far enough from the Hall of Radiant Sun so we won’t be seen. A river runs behind us, curving to the edge of this garden before plunging off the edge in one of those precarious waterfalls.

I frown. “I don’t want to get in trouble.”

“We’ll be in trouble only if we’re caught,” he replies, and grins as he extends a hand to me.

I dart a glance up at the darkened Hall of Radiant Sun through the branches of the plum blossom tree. Its marble columns and golden roofs rise into the night as if they hold starlight, made ethereal by the way clouds plume around it.

My gaze catches on the glint of a sword, the outlines of the guards between the pillars.

I shake my head. “We’re going to be seen.”

Yù’chén raises an eyebrow. The usual self-assuredness of his voice hardens, and his eyes flick to me, searching mine. “Can you trust me?”

The world peels away as I stare at his outstretched palm. I think of my little sister, the way her brown eyes will light up when she receives my gloves. The way she might cradle them as she sleeps, instead of the sharp crescent blade I left her.

I have no choice.

I angle my gaze to Yù’chén. “No,” I say, and I take his hand.

His fingers wrap around mine and tighten. I suppress a shiver as he draws me forward, in the direction of the winding stream, away from the Hall of Radiant Sun and the guards. Clouds begin to seep into the grass as we near the edge; I hear the roar of a waterfall again, obscured between trees.

We step out, and I inhale sharply.

Ahead of me, plunging from the skies like celestial rivers, are the wards: clear and iridescent and bright, so powerful that I feel the hum of their spirit energies under my skin. I crane my neck, but they shoot into the Heavens like the northern lights at the very edge of our realm. Beyond, the world opens to an expanse of star-strewn night: the mortal realm.

Yù’chén steps into the river. He’s dangerously close to the edge where the waterfall courses past the wards, dipping into the mortal realm below, but he stands steady, up to his waist in the water.

He lifts both hands, and his dark magic blooms like a blossom in the night.

Flowers form from the shadows, crimson petals amidst dark-green vines that twine into the immortals’ wards. Where they take root, the light of the ward dims. The flowers bloom and bloom, and I recognize them as red scorpion lilies: the type Yù’chén gifted me when we first met. A flower for a tragic fate.

When Yù’chén turns to me, the scorpion lilies and vines have braided themselves into an archway, wide enough for one person to slip through. A draft seeps through the opening, bringing with it the briny scent of the sea; the night and the stars within are sharper and brighter. And above him, the light of the wards continues to flow gently, as though nothing has happened.

My heart pounds in my chest. “What is that?” I whisper. “What have you done?”

“A gate,” he replies. He’s breathing hard, and I catch a red hue to his eyes. “A way through the wards.”

I look from him to the gate formed by the scorpion lilies. The rippling light of the wards gives their petals an almost liquid quality, like blood. Impossible, I think.

“I can hold it open long enough for us to get back,” Yù’chén continues. He reaches out a hand to me, but I recoil.

“How were you able to create a way through the wards?” My voice is unsteady. “Even the hellbeasts of the Kingdom of Night haven’t breached them in nine years.”

His face is unreadable. “The immortals’ wards are unbreachable from the outside, but less so from within. Plenty of candidates will be seeking a way out despite the immortals’ warnings.” I think of the candidate with the sweetheart in the mortal realm. When I remain silent, Yù’chén continues: “It’s safe, I promise. We’ll send your gift to your sister, and then we’ll be back as if nothing has happened.” His hand is still outstretched.

I gaze out into the infinite night, the tapestry of stars that the gods wove before they made the realms. There, between the clouds, winds the celestial river that the dragons sculpted, glimmering with the pearl dust of their magic. The sky spins, eternal, a reminder of how ephemeral my own life is.

It’s beautiful, wild, and utterly free—yet it’s terrifying, too.

But there is a part of me that wants to see it.

I step forward, sliding my palm across Yù’chén’s and holding his hand firmly. Then I inhale deeply and step into the river.

I’m nearly immediately knocked off balance as the currents sweep me toward the edge with a vengeance. I grab Yù’chén, desperate not to fall into the river again, and he holds me up, snapping at me to ground my spirit energy.

“It’s not that deep, àn’yīng—find the riverbed and plant your feet—”

“Not that deep my ass— you’re tall enough—”

“Stop and think—you’re panicking—” He curses, then in one motion, he grasps my waist and lifts me out of the water. His hands hook me below my knees so I’m anchored to him, my legs wrapped around his waist and my arms around his neck. In the blink of an eye, we’re suddenly hip to hip, chest to chest, face to face. The waterfall roars behind me, and my heart is hammering wildly.

Yù’chén’s lips part. He’s breathing heavily, too, from our scramble and the exertion of the magic he’s just performed. Sweat glimmers on his brow; a bead of it trickles down his cheek. “You’ll have to try that again,” he says, and a hint of mirth curves his mouth.

I can’t bring myself to think of a good enough response. I’m very conscious of the waterfall plunging into nothingness just steps behind me, of the heat of his body between my thighs, of the grip of his hands against my skin.

Yù’chén takes a step in the wrong direction, to the ledge of the waterfall. The red glow of the scorpion lilies illuminates the sharp edges of his features. My fingers tighten against his shoulders as my heart goes into overdrive.

“Let me go,” I say.

He holds my gaze as his eyes begin to glow crimson. “All right,” he says, and with a vicious tug, he tips us off the ledge.

Then he lets me go.

—

I reach for him. I can’t help it; as he spreads his arms, I wrap mine tighter around him and bury my face in his chest. I’m going to kill you, I think as the thrum of his laughter vibrates in his throat.

A cluster of clouds swallows us, and everything becomes a dizzying tangle of shadows. I close my eyes. Just as my grip slips, I feel pressure around my waist, the warmth of hands encircling the small of my back.

The feeling of uncontrolled free fall shifts, just as the wind changes. When my stomach settles slightly, I crack open an eye.

The world is no longer spinning. Yù’chén holds me gently, as if we are in an embrace, shielding me from the cold. Currents of magic pulse from him, heating the air—not spirit energy but dark magic. He’s manipulating the wind, I realize, calling on it in such a way that it bends its will to him, wrapping around us to steady our descent.

“àn’yīng.” His voice sounds in my ear. “Let go.”

I don’t know why I do. Immediately, I spin away from him—but he grabs my wrists, then slowly slides his fingers down to twine them around mine.

The clouds have ended. The world opens up beneath us, and in that exact moment, the moon comes out from behind the clouds, larger than is possible in the mortal realm. Its light spills onto the unending expanse of sea below, casting silver into the waves so they seem to spark with stars.

My breath catches.

“You wanted to see the ocean,” Yù’chén says. He’s watching me, his crimson eyes burning with otherworldly power and magic. A smile curves his mouth, and his face is alight with a joy I have not seen, a look so different from the cynical smirk with which he beholds the world. No, Yù’chén’s eyes dance over my face as he looks at me.

“How did you know—” My words falter as I remember, in the haze after Qióng’qí, his voice calming me. Think of the one wish you hold in your heart.

I wanted to see the ocean, but I always imagined it as it was in Mā’s tapestries: in the daylight, with rays of sun lancing off white-capped waves, filling the waters with every color of blue imaginable.

I never expected my first look of the sea—my first true look—to be at night.

And I never expected to love it.

There is something haunting about the darkness that weaves between the waters, but the way the moonlight threads through it in a delicate dance is nothing short of magic. I inhale the briny scent carried by the wind and find that I am smiling.

We slow, and Yù’chén pulls me to him again, wrapping his arms around me. As he lands, the waves seem to swell to catch each of his footsteps. Around us, there is nothing but ocean; in the distance, the columns of rock that are the Immortals’ Steps rise into the sky.

I place my feet on the surface of the sea. Immediately, the energies of the waves scatter beneath my toes, and I sink inelegantly into the water.

“Ah.” Yù’chén lifts me by my waist, drawing me close so that I’m standing on his feet. By instinct, I wrap my arms around his shoulders. I hear his sharp intake of breath as the fabric of his collar slips and the inside of my wrist brushes against the warmth of his skin. Pressed this close to him, I am afraid he’ll feel the frantic beat of my heart.

Yù’chén shoots me a smile that scatters every thought I have. Searching desperately for signs of land beyond us, I dip my head away as my cheeks heat.

“Hmm,” Yù’chén muses, casting his gaze around. “The way I imagined it, my companion in a midnight escapade would have mastered the art of qīng’gōng to walk on water.”

I cast him a scathing look. “I am not your companion in a midnight escapade.”

That wicked grin again. “No? Then what would you call this?” His eyes narrow as his thumb traces a stroke against my waist. He is distracting me, I realize.

“An unfortunate situation,” I reply, and stamp hard on his feet. That wipes the smirk off his face. “I need to get to land.” I dislike how helpless I sound. I can’t do this without him, and we both know it. “I have to find a messenger dove.”

“Or,” Yù’chén says, “one could summon a messenger spirit in the middle of the ocean.”

I stare at him. “Can you?”

He tilts his head and casts me a sly look. “Perhaps. For a price.”

I roll my eyes. “What do you want?”

His palms are very warm against my waist, his gaze even more so as it lingers on my face. “What can you offer me, little scorpion?”

I remember when we first met, I wondered how far I would go to get what I want. It has been only one week, but I am a different person. I have seen the deaths of innocents. I have associated with yāo’jīng. I have told myself I am willing to beat out and kill other practitioners to win this tournament if I must.

What shifting line of moral righteousness am I holding myself to?

None, I think, my eyes flicking to his mouth. Nothing matters anymore, not when I have vowed to kill for my own gain. If there is a price to get a message through to my sister, I will pay it.

I swallow, steadying my heartbeat. “Whatever you ask of me,” I say quietly.

Yù’chén’s eyes lock on mine. He is no longer smiling. His fingers tighten a fraction against my waist, and as his gaze roams to my lips, I find myself unable to turn away.

“I think I’ll save my price for later.” His eyes begin to glow again as he reaches out his hand. Ahead of us, the night seems to darken. From that pocket of shadows comes the flutter of wings as something approaches us.

It’s a crane. Its snowy feathers flit between darkness and light like an illusion. When it lands beside us with a gust from its wings, I make out the red of its eyes.

It’s from the demon realm.

“A shadowcrane,” Yù’chén says. “It’ll carry the message to your sister.”

I study the creature. I thought all beings from the Kingdom of Night were flesh-eating monsters, but the bird only studies me back. It ruffles its feathers and clacks its beak, exceedingly normal in every way but for its flickering form.

“She heeds my word,” Yù’chén continues, seeing my hesitation. “She’s conjured of shadows and feeds on starlight. I promise she’s not like any of those other creatures we encountered.”

The shadowcrane watches me with intelligent eyes. Slowly, I reach into my bodice and draw out Méi’zi’s gloves. I hold them out to the crane. She blinks and clasps them in her beak with practiced care, then dips her red-crowned head to me.

“Touch her head and think of the destination,” Yù’chén tells me. He’s watching the exchange with an inscrutable expression, his eyes lingering on the gloves and the clouds and temples of the Kingdom of Sky I’ve sewn onto them.

I do, picturing Xī’lín, the faded words on the old pái’fāng, the dusty roads that lead to the old plum blossom tree bent over our house. I think of Méi’zi’s large brown eyes and easy laughter.

I do not want her to see this creature.

The thought leaps into my mind before I can stop it. The crane draws back. She blinks at me, then dips her head.

“She won’t be seen by your sister,” Yù’chén says quietly as the shadowcrane takes wing. We watch her rise into the skies, breaking nary a ripple in the ocean. “But she’s not a monster, you know.”

I tear my gaze from the shadowcrane’s flight and find Yù’chén’s gaze on me, dark and heady.

“She’s a demonic being.” My voice sounds uncertain, my words half-hearted even to me.

He’s no longer smiling. “Now my price,” he says. He is still looking at me, the moonlight bringing out the red of his eyes.

His earlier reference to a midnight escapade takes on a darker meaning as I remember what the mó tend to do to pleasure themselves with mortal bodies. I try to keep my tone light, but I cannot help the fear that colors my words. “Never a favor without something in exchange?”

“I’ll let you decide on the charitableness of my nature,” he replies. “I want you to walk on water.”

My heart stutters as I gape at him, wondering if I heard wrong.

“Go on.” He smirks, but there is a touch of frost to his tone now. “For my entertainment this evening, as you haven’t much else to contribute.”

“Here?” I say. I can’t even do it on a still pond, let alone a sea writhing with currents.

“Learning to walk on water is the best way to elevate your qīng’gōng skills, which, if I wasn’t clear enough, are terrible. You won’t survive the trials without more practice.”

“Why do you care?” I say, stung.

“Just try.”

I glance at the shifting waves and swallow. They’re tumultuous, crisscrossing in every direction possible. “I can’t. I know the theory, but with water…the currents of energy…they’re like threads that are all tangled up.”

“Threads that are all tangled up,” he repeats, then raises an eyebrow. “You’re a seamstress. Can you think of it as sewing? Each current of energy is a thread being stitched, and you simply have to stitch the opposite way, in tune.”

I look back down at the shifting water, and this time, I latch onto the thought. If I can think of each flow of qì as a thread, perhaps I can learn their magic.

Between one blink and another, the world seems to click into place. I begin to see them all now, the crisscrossing currents of energy, only this time, they’re no longer a messy whorl that I can’t decipher.

This time, they’re threads. Living, moving threads I’m trying to pull together. I follow one, then another, and concentrate on one spot.

I lean out with my foot and tap the wave.

It taps back.

“Did you see that?” Excitement bubbles in my chest.

“Honestly, no,” Yù’chén says flatly.

But I feel like a child who’s discovered the use of my limbs. I poke my foot out again, and this time, I manage to stand on a wave for one heartbeat.

Yù’chén straightens slightly. “Good. Now move with it. Water is always changing, and so must you. Here.” He lets me spin around so my back is pressed to his chest and my heels sit on his toes. His hands fall against my body, one at my hip, the other on my rib cage, holding me steady. When he speaks again, his voice is in my ear: “Read the way the currents flow; you have to always be preparing for the next wave. Try.”

I focus on one spot, watching how the waves swell, one after another after another. I strike out with my foot and manage to stand for a breath before my concentration breaks.

Yù’chén’s laugh rumbles low in his chest. “Don’t strike out like you’re spearing fish. Think of yourself as a drifting leaf, riding the wave.”

This time, I place one foot on the water, then another, and suddenly I’m balancing on the surface of the ocean as in the paintings of practitioners in all the legends, just as I’ve read in all my childhood stories. I am walking on water.

“I did it!” In my elation, I half turn. “I did—”

My focus slips, and my word becomes a sharp gasp as the water gives way and my foot splashes in. Yù’chén easily lifts me back up, setting me onto his boots. I’m giddy with my success, and he’s smiling, too. It lights up his face, softens his mouth, curves his dark eyes. I’m dipping back, his hands on my hips, and he’s leaning forward slightly, looking at me in a way that shouldn’t be right.

The air between us heats. Yù’chén’s smile flickers as he senses it, too. His gaze darkens as he reaches a hand up and brushes a lock of hair from my eyes. His fingers linger on my cheek.

I tense. This is all wrong. No matter how his heart beats, no matter how red his blood runs, he is half a mó. Half of one of those monsters that destroyed my family and my realm.

I am certain he can feel the beat of my heart through my chest as he holds me. Watches me, eyes narrowed, mouth tightening as he feels my hands shift into a position where I can easily access my blades.

But I do not reach for them. Instead, I say, “Why are you here, Yù’chén?”

“Here, in the middle of the ocean at night, with you, àn’yīng?” The way he speaks my name sends a shiver up my spine.

“Here, as in the trials.”

“Same reason you and the other forty-two candidates are here.”

“But you’re”—I suck in a breath, stopping myself sharply as Yù’chén’s expression flickers—“different.”

Yù’chén draws back slightly, cold air swirling between us. “Because I’m half-mó?” There is frost to his tone once again. “Because I’m not meant to be the same as you? Because I’m incapable of desiring a better life, one away from bloodshed and violence?” His grip is tight on my waist now, in a way that almost hurts.

“I—”

“Say what you mean, àn’yīng.” His eyes are glowing again, and I feel his dark magic stirring. “You think me incapable of wanting what you and other full humans want.”

“I don’t know what you want,” I say quietly. “Yù’chén, I’ve spent half my life fearing the kingdom that is at war with mine, the beings that…killed my parents.” I swallow, for it is the first time I’ve confided this to him. “I can’t simply undo that just because you’ve…helped me.”

“ Helped you,” he repeats, and before I can do anything, he takes my jaw in his hand and angles my face to his, fingers digging into the soft curves of my throat. “Am I too charitable to fit your image of mó, àn’yīng?” His thumb traces the curve to my lower lip. “Should I wish to drink your soul, demand that you use your body to serve me in exchange for my help ?” His other hand begins to roam up my rib cage as he lowers his mouth to within inches of my neck. His breath is hot against my skin as he whispers, “Should I be the monster you want to see?”

I can’t move, can’t speak. My heart slams against my chest, and I can’t stop the tremor that goes through my body. I will not be prey, I think, a desperate prayer, a litany. My blades slide into my palms. I will not be prey.

Yù’chén draws back. The red in his eyes is fading, transforming back to an impenetrable black. He looks down at my blades, breathing hard. It’s a few moments before he speaks again. “My shadowcrane will inform me when she reaches your sister,” he says roughly.

I nod, though I’m trying to stop my teeth from chattering. The hard grooves of my crescent blades dig into my palms, grounding me. “Take me back,” I whisper. “Please.”

In spite of his anger, he is gentle as he draws me close and calls on his wind again. I hold tightly to him, uncertain whether it is fear or something else that makes my pulse race and my breathing tight.

As soon as we land back in the Celestial Gardens, I push away from him. I hear him call after me, but I don’t stop as I make my way toward the Candidates’ Courtyard. He follows me in silence, through the moongates and across the open-air hallways, until we approach the steps that lead to my door. The spirit energy of my talismans rush over me as I cross the threshold, and for the first time, my breathing steadies.

“àn’yīng.” Yù’chén’s voice is quiet behind me. “I—”

“Yù’chén,” I say, spinning around. He’s stopped beneath the old willow tree that leans over the pond. Overhead, clouds race over the moon, and I can barely make out his expression. “Don’t help me again.”

He lifts his gaze to mine, darker than the night. His lips part, but I don’t let him speak.

“I don’t want to think of you as anything more than a monster,” I finish. Then I enter my chamber and slide the doors shut behind me, leaving him standing outside in the shadows.