Chapter 36 Rui
Rui
They locked eyes as her blade ran through him.
In that moment, Rui realized Zizi hadn’t been completely sure if he would survive her attack. She wanted to weep at his daredevil
stupidity, but she held her sword in place, willing him to stay alive.
Behind him, Aloysius convulsed. His flesh was smoking where the blue flames had touched him. But he wouldn’t let go of Zizi.
Somehow, Zizi found the strength to pull away, even as the Hybrid’s spinal blades pierced his arms. Even as Rui kept her sword
firmly in his chest.
“Do it,” Zizi gasped.
Rui saw her angle just over his shoulder, a breath away from his cheek. She reached over with a hand.
Blue fire torched Aloysius’s face. With an anguished roar, he finally released Zizi and turned on his heel.
Rui pulled her sword out and leaped in pursuit. She didn’t have to go far. The flames proved too much for the Hybrid. He collapsed,
making strangled, high-pitched sounds that shook Rui to the bone. The smell of burning flesh tainted the air, and soon, there
was only silence.
Aloysius was wrong. Whatever magic Rui wielded wasn’t from the darkness. It had, after all, killed him.
The taste of victory salted her tongue. But the body on the ground didn’t look like a monster. He looked like a man. Slowly,
he turned gray like a stone statue, features crumbling to fine ash.
Rui dropped her sword, the clang of metal dull against the tarmac. Her blue flames had extinguished as mysteriously as they
had appeared. But the shock of what happened had not worn off.
She stumbled back to the boys, falling to her knees next to Zizi’s prone body.
“Is he . . .” She choked on her words, unable to continue.
Yiran grabbed her arm. “He’s alive. I checked his wounds—I think the bastard tried to heal himself.”
“Zizi?” Rui touched his face.
Zizi inhaled sharply and opened his eyes, like he’d just come back to life. Groaning, he rolled onto his side, spitting out
a black substance.
“Didn’t heal . . . completely,” he wheezed. “But I’ll live.”
Rui wanted to hold him. But she didn’t move. “What were you thinking? How could you gamble your life like that? You didn’t
know for sure if the blue fire was safe, did you? I could’ve killed you.”
“We both took a calculated risk.” Zizi ran the back of his hand over his bloody lips. “You knew it was possible I’d die, and
you still did it.”
His words were a knife. Rui wondered if he’d meant to make the cut.
I did it because I trusted you, she almost said. But that wasn’t it, was it? Deep down she knew that no matter how she felt about him, she would do whatever
it took to kill a Revenant. The moment they shared in the library of The Reverie felt like a lifetime ago. Maybe Madam Meng
was right: Rui was bad news.
Maybe I should stay away from him. “Pull that on me again and you might not live the next time,” she said coldly.
Zizi gave her a bloody grin.
“Where’s Yuki?” she asked, suddenly noticing his absence. It was disturbing to call a Revenant by a human name.
“Never mind him, never mind that freaking Hybrids really do exist,” Yiran said, raising his voice. He was staring at her like
she was an alien. “What the hell was that? I thought you lost your magic!”
“I . . . I don’t know.” Holding out her hands, Rui switched up her breathing pattern, trying to channel her magic, or at least
the blue flames again.
Seconds passed. Nothing happened.
“I can’t summon anything.”
“Which means your magic hasn’t returned, and the blue fire is something else,” Zizi deduced.
“What is it then?” Yiran said. “How did she manage to kill Aloysius?”
That magic can’t hurt us. It draws from the darkness, just like ours.
Aloysius cackled in Rui’s head. But it was Ten’s face she saw. Ten had claimed she’d been touched by death. Was this what
he meant? Was she somehow connected to the darkness because of that? But the blue flames killed Aloysius in the end. Hybrid
or not, he was still a Revenant, a creature of the dark.
Nothing made sense.
Rui stuck her hand into her pocket, fingers closing over Nikai’s mirror. The Reaper might know something, but she had to wait
until she was alone to contact him.
She wished she could tell all her secrets to the two boys in front of her. They were staring, one at the night sky, the other
at the highway. There were lights from vehicles drawing near.
Yiran turned from the road. “Why is it that when something bad happens, it’s always the three of us?”
“The hell would I know,” Zizi muttered. His skin had a sickly tint.
“We need to find out what’s wrong with Rui,” Yiran said to him.
“You’re right, we do.”
Since when did they get along well enough to agree? And since when was she their joint responsibility?
“What we need to know is why the Hybrids tried to kidnap Zizi,” she said. “What if the missing mages were hired by Hybrids
to create the spell and that’s why they’re after you now?”
“The man who hired me wasn’t a Hybrid,” Zizi said.
“And now he’s dead. The Hybrids could’ve used normies to hire the mages, and then killed them to cover their tracks. The other
mages might be missing because they succeeded in creating some type of separation spell like you did, and the Hybrids took
them.”
Zizi shook his head, wincing as he checked his chest wound. “More likely the mages failed and that got them killed. Aloysius was only toying with me. He wanted me alive, and I think I know why—the Hybrids want me to re-create the spell.”
Yiran raised his hand. “Wait a minute, I’m not following any of this.”
“A man came to my shop asking for a spell that could split a Revenant’s spiritual energy from itself,” Zizi said. “I told
him it wasn’t possible, but he said to try anyway, that he’d double the price if it worked for even a few seconds. I took
the job as a challenge, thinking I would fail. But I succeeded, and now you and Rui have proven the separation can last longer,
that it could be permanent. The Hybrids must want to exploit this somehow.”
“Yuki said something about creating a new world for Hybrids,” Yiran recalled with a shudder. “A world without Exorcists—”
“Where Hybrids and Revenants can feed on humans freely,” Rui finished. “What else did Yuki say?”
“Not much.” Yiran touched his cheek gingerly. The patch of skin was raw and red.
“You warned me, Zizi,” said Rui, nauseated by the thought that came to her. “You said if I touched a Revenant after casting
the spell, its qi might affect me, and the hunger will possess me. What if the Hybrids want your spell so they can create
more of them?”
Yiran blanched. “Is that even possible?”
“Maybe,” Zizi said. “These Hybrids want to survive, like any other living organism. If the spell works the way they want it
to, they don’t have to wait for the Blight to randomly infect humans. They can make it happen themselves. And if there’re
more of them, they can overpower the Exorcists. Take over the city. Feed on anyone they want.”
Yiran pinched the bridge of his nose. “We have to tell the Guild—we have to tell them everything.”
“We can’t tell them everything,” Zizi said.
“Then what do you propose?” Yiran shouted. “That we do nothing about the Hybrids? Should we wait until they have a chance to kidnap you again?”
“They can’t force me to do anything,” Zizi insisted stubbornly.
“You don’t know that,” said Rui.
“Whatever it is, we shouldn’t tell the Guild about the blue fire. We don’t know what they might do to you.”
Even though he was seriously injured, Zizi was only worried about her. The guilt Rui felt for risking his life gnawed at her
and she broke his gaze.
Yiran glared at the both of them. “At the very least, we should get back to the Academy and tell the Guild about the spell
and what it can do.”
“If we do that, your grandfather will know how you got your magic,” Rui said quietly. “Are you ready for that?”
“I don’t know.” Yiran punched the tarmac. “But we should tell them about the Hybrids.”
“The Guild says Hybrids don’t exist, remember?” Zizi mocked.
“That’s because they didn’t know—” Yiran began.
Rui cut him off. “How can you still believe that?”
The sound of approaching car engines was growing loud. They’d been too busy arguing to notice three black SUVs drawing closer
to them.
Zizi squinted. “Well, look who’s here.”
“Exorcists,” Rui said, recognizing the hood ornament on the cars. “How did they find us?”
“They must’ve tracked Mochi’s phone.”
Yiran scrambled up. “At least we’re getting help.”
The SUVs stopped. The doors opened and an Exorcist stepped out from each car while the drivers remained seated. The two men
and lone woman were dressed in the signature black trench coats of the Guild. One of the men wore his hair in a ponytail while
the woman had a bleached-blond buzz cut and heavy eyeliner. She and the other man had the Captain’s lapel pin on their coats.
Rui didn’t recognize them.
“I’m so glad you guys found us,” Yiran said. “We were just—whoa!” The blond Exorcist grabbed his arms, twisting them behind him, securing his wrists together with a zip tie. “What’s going on? Why do I feel like I’m being arrested? Not that I’ve ever had the pleasure of that experience.”
The Exorcist looked unamused.
“I don’t think my grandfather would appreciate me being manhandled this way.” He continued, “Could you maybe lay off the zip
tie? It’s cutting into my wrists.”
The Exorcist didn’t reply, and she didn’t loosen his restraints.
If this was how they were going to treat Song Wei’s grandson, it was best not to protest.
Rui pointed to Zizi. “He’s injured and needs a healer.” She offered both her wrists to the ponytailed Exorcist.
After securing her, he walked over to Zizi and lifted his T-shirt. Zizi looked on unhappily as the Exorcist examined his wounds.
“This one has magic too.” The Exorcist added, “He’s human.”
Rui exchanged a look with Yiran. She wondered who or what they’d expected to find here.
Slinging one of Zizi’s arms over his shoulder, the ponytailed Exorcist got Zizi to his feet. He wasn’t bothering to be gentle
or careful. Zizi said nothing, allowing himself to be led to one of the cars.
“Get in.” The blond Exorcist nudged Yiran toward another vehicle.
“Where are you taking us?” Yiran demanded.
She shoved him into the back seat in reply, then motioned Rui to the third SUV.
“Why are you separating us?” Rui said as she got into the car.
The young woman surprised Rui by answering, “We need to question you.”
Of course. The three of them had to be questioned to see if their stories matched up.
“You’ll heal my friend, right?”
“Sure.”
The answer didn’t inspire confidence, but there was nothing Rui could do. She wondered what other unwanted surprises the night might have in store.
The door slammed shut. The divider between the back seat and the front seats rolled up. Something misted onto her face.
“What was that?” She coughed and waved the air. “Hello? Hey!”
When no one answered, she banged on the plastic divider. But quickly, she felt her limbs relaxing. It was getting hard to
stay awake. She heard the hiss of the mist again and held her breath as best as she could.
But soon, everything went dark.