Chapter 18 Àn’yīng
àn’yīng
Palace of the Aurora, Kingdom of Night
Xisenyin.
My heart races as I press a hand to my throat, remembering her tongue against my skin.
But this time, I am not defenseless.
I slip between two wisteria trees, their hanging flowers shielding me as I weave a talisman of concealment. Then I take out the porcelain shard hidden beneath the bodice of my gown.
I am not prey. I am a scorpion.
All I need to do is get my stinger back.
Between the branches of wisteria, I spot Xisenyin’s unmissable white hair and dress as she steps out from between two of her flowering pear trees onto the balcony.
“Little flower, skin soft as petals, flesh sweet as fruit. Won’t you come out so I can taste you?”
She hasn’t seen me yet; my concealment talisman is working.
For now.
I search her dress for signs of my blades, but as she moves, the snowy fabric shifts and glitters, and it’s impossible to tell. She’s wearing that wicked smile, prowling forward like she’s hunting.
I tighten my grip on my makeshift weapon. Not if I hunt you first, I think.
Adrenaline surges through me, my senses sharpening as I step out and weave through the trees. Everything falls away but the chase; I could be home in the woods outside Xī’lín, stalking a deer.
I’m close enough now to see the intricate patterns in the frost lacing her dress, and I can make out a familiar moon-shaped dagger, gleaming between the folds of fabric—right where I saw it the first time.
Fleet.
My heart lifts at the sight of my crescent blade, just steps out of reach.
The Higher One moves forward—and the fabric of her dress twists to reveal two more hilts: my other crescent blades, Poison and Striker.
“Little flower, little flower, I promise to be gentle when I catch you…I’ll peel your skin like samite, I’ll weave your hair to silk…”
I know I am protected by Yù’chén’s covenant with Sansiran, but Xisenyin’s eerie song sends shivers up my spine.
I dart forward silently, zigzagging between the flowering trees.
Golden light spills from their petals so that it feels like I’m walking among stars in the dark.
Ahead of me, Xisenyin drifts, snow falling and flowers blooming where she steps.
When I’m close enough to make out the strokes of the talisman engraved on Fleet’s hilt, I act.
I dart out from the cover of trees and reach for Fleet.
The moment my fingers close around the handle, the air shifts. Frost crackles up the trees. Their petals turn sharp, the branches extending to form jagged bars of ice. I stumble back behind a tree, biting my tongue as I nearly slip on the now-frozen ground.
In my hand, gripped so hard I can feel the grooves of the engravings in the hilt digging into my palm, is Fleet.
“As the tale goes, the fair maiden beloved by the prince was no flower…” Xisenyin’s voice rings out from all around, amplified and melodious. “…but instead, she was…a scorpion with a stinger.”
Her voice hardens, suddenly coming from behind me in a puff of cold air. Too late, I spin around and look straight into a pair of white eyes.
Xisenyin’s grin exposes rows of teeth, all sharpened to points. Her fingers have transformed to ice, frozen and jagged as they seize my arms in a viselike grip.
“Be still,” she croons, and her dark magic creeps over my body, cold threatening to sink into my bones.
I stop struggling.
Xisenyin leans into me and inhales. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch her mouth widening and her face morphing, saliva dripping down the gleaming points of her teeth…
She bites down, and I swallow a scream as pain sears through my shoulder. But I leverage the distraction to wrench myself free from her, my spirit energies flaring and pouring into my defensive talisman to resist her magic.
I twist and jam my porcelain shard into her eye.
Xisenyin screams, a horrid, inhuman sound, and I snatch the hilt of my second blade from between the folds of her gown: Poison.
I fight another wave of pain as Xisenyin pulls her teeth from my shoulder.
Blood splatters like rose petals on the frost-covered ground, but I follow her as she stumbles back, covering her face with her hands.
Frost snakes up her pale skin, wreathing her wounded eye.
The ichor leaking from it hisses, and my porcelain shard clatters to the icy ground as she begins to grow a new eye.
I leap forward and plunge Poison through her ribs, its spirit energies pulsing between my fingers.
Xisenyin lets out a snarl, and the shock wave of power that explodes from her slams me into the ground.
There’s a ringing in my ears as I crawl unsteadily to my feet. But in my hand, I hold my third—and final—blade: Striker, which I snatched in the moment she was distracted by my attack.
I slip the blade into my sleeve and look up.
Xisenyin has straightened. Ichor leaks from her side, drifting upward like black smoke. Poison will be spreading through her veins now, with the jab I just gave her.
“How—” Xisenyin’s face is twisted in the first genuine surprise I’ve seen her display as she realizes I’ve slipped through her magic.
I turn and sprint for the pear trees. Blood, hot and thick, wells up in the wound on my shoulder, soaking into my dress. Behind me, Xisenyin shrieks commands; her dark magic sinks into my limbs, pulling me back.
I channel more of my spirit energies into my shield talismans and barrel into the maze of pear trees standing between me and the alcove where Yù’chén should be waiting.
Their lights blur as Fleet pushes me forward faster than humanly possible—yet still not fast enough.
Ice crackles beneath my feet as Xisenyin’s voice rings out:
“Little flower, skin soft as petals, flesh sweet as fruit…Won’t you slow down so I can taste you?”
I run out of the maze of trees, and for a moment, I’m disoriented: Colors and lights swirl around me, movement and motion in flurries of silk and skin, music and drums thrumming through the night.
I’m not back where I left Yù’chén, I realize with horror. Xisenyin conjured a passageway of flowers and altered the path, dropping me somewhere in the middle of the revelry. As I stumble through the crowd, blood soaking my sleeve and dripping onto the ground, the mó begin to take notice of me.
I grip my blades and slow, lowering my stance into a defensive crouch. I’m growing lightheaded from blood loss, and I’ve exhausted all my spirit energies fighting Xisenyin.
But I have my blades, and I will go down fighting on my own two feet.
I will not be prey.
When the first mó springs at me, I’m ready. One slash of Poison opens a wound in their neck. With the next, a gash on their ribs. And a third, a stab to their shoulder.
I feel myself slowing with each strike. More come at me, crowding closer, either at the scent of blood or to watch the spectacle.
At one point, I miss. And a mó’s teeth sink into my arm, bringing me to my knees.
An explosion of dark magic ripples across the glade. The mó on my back shrieks and disintegrates in a cloud of ichor.
Scorpion lilies bloom. The air fills with their petals, drifting downward to land on the ground, on my skin and in my hair—and where they touch me, I feel his magic. Soothing, familiar, and healing. The pain in my shoulder dulls; my heartbeat calms.
Footsteps sound, echoing in the sudden silence. Then the mó crowding me begin to scurry away. The area clears.
A long shadow falls over me. When I look up, Yù’chén is there. In his flowing black robes, his face utterly expressionless, he looks every bit the heir to the Kingdom of Night.
“This mortal is claimed by your crown prince and protected by order of your empress.” Yù’chén’s voice rings out, low and terrifying, across the revelry.
The glade is completely quiet now, performers still.
Only the aurora overhead dances, spilling an eerie green light over the scene.
“Anyone who so much as lays a finger on her will be served the direst of punishments. I will see to it personally.”
He bends, effortlessly graceful as he scoops me into his arms. I hold tightly to my two blades, tensed, adrenaline pulsing with every beat of my heart.
I wrap my arms around Yù’chén’s neck, holding him tightly as we wind through the crowd.
The flower passage of scorpion lilies forms before us.
“One moment, Your Highness,” a voice calls out.
Xisenyin appears seemingly out of nowhere.
Behind her is Niefuzan, and I suddenly notice several of his subordinates scattered in the crowd.
I search Xisenyin for signs of Poison’s talisman working through her body but find none.
The spell is probably too weak to cause any lasting damage to a Higher One.
Yù’chén’s grasp tightens around me, but his expression remains the same: cold, arrogant, his mouth twisted in disdain as he beholds the two members of his mother’s court.
I raise my blades, and Xisenyin lets out a peal of laughter. “Princeling, it would seem you’ve been tricked,” she purrs. “The little flower you chose is, instead, a scorpion with a sharp stinger.”
“She is the mortal I’ve claimed, stinger and all,” Yù’chén replies. “If there’s nothing else, Xisenyin, I’ll be retiring now. Count yourself lucky I won’t retaliate for hurting her.”
“Oh, but there is something else.” Xisenyin’s eyes flash. “Your mortal has caused harm to the Kingdom of Night and our people. She attempted to poison me; she has slain four of our court members. Punishment must be dealt.”
“Her life is protected by the empress’s decree,” Yù’chén replies drily, turning to leave.
“We are sworn by our empress’s orders not to hurt her. But the same does not apply to you, Princeling.”
Yù’chén stops. Over his shoulder, I can make out the smile twisting Xisenyin’s lips as she continues: “The laws of this court apply to you, Princeling. You have brought a mortal to a public event without the use of oleander nectar to pacify her, and in doing so, you have endangered your mother’s court members. ”