Chapter Fifty-Five The Dragon and the Phoenix

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

THE DRAGON AND THE PHOENIX

He has the audacity to look surprised. Confused, even. As if he genuinely convinced himself I felt enough for him that he was safe with me.

By the next second, his battle reflexes catch up. A transformative fury sweeps over him. In an instant, he seizes control of the combined spirit metal on us, preventing me from driving my sword deeper.

“ Why? ” he chokes out.

“You know why!” I tug at my sword, yet I can’t break his mental hold. I’m locked in place by my own armor.

Hand digging into my shoulder guard, he winces in concentration. I feel the spirit metal of my blade liquefying in his chest and swirling around his failing heart. Beat by beat, with conscious pulses of the metal, he keeps his blood pumping.

I go cold all over.

This can’t be happening.

He can’t survive even this .

“For…him?” Qin Zheng’s eyes peel open before immediately fluttering near closed again. Sweat beads across his paling skin. Beyond him, Yizhi floats with Helan above their seats, his jaw hanging open.

“For me !” I cry. “Don’t you get it? You are to me what the gods were to you. I can’t breathe freely as long as you live!”

Qin Zheng’s focus lapses. He forgets his next heartbeat.

Through my connection to the hull, I feel for the Stinger Dame and free it from the spirit metal attachments in its dock. Then I split my armor apart and shed it like a husk, kicking out of it. I can’t wear that thing any longer if I want to get away. So long as I have a single stretch of it on me, Qin Zheng could control it with just a thread of contact.

In nothing but my conduction suit, I push away from him and grab Helan. “Get us out of here before he kills us all!”

Helan looks utterly stupefied by this turn of events but taps the heels of their shoes together twice. The boosting power activates in their soles. With me and Yizhi, one in each arm, they haul us to the nearest spiral hatch in the cockpit. A hoarse, incoherent shout drags out from Qin Zheng. Over my shoulder, I see him doubling over in the air, armor wings wavering, before the hatch seals us into a corridor.

He can’t keep his heart beating by willpower alone forever. He can’t .

Helan lets go of Yizhi to hit a red button on a side panel. The hatch makes a hissing noise as it presumably locks against Qin Zheng.

I latch onto Yizhi’s elbow so he doesn’t fall behind when Helan’s shoes blast us onward through the corridor.

“Don’t assume this is forgiveness!” I yell at him.

“ The baby’s not yours! ” Yizhi says in a jumbled rush.

I nearly lose my hold on him. “What?”

“Probably not, anyway! I did my best to sabotage the procedure. If it worked, the baby’s biological mother should be Auntie Wei herself instead of you.” He breathes through his teeth, then releases a tremendous sigh of relief. “Fuck, this is the hardest secret I’ve ever kept!”

My mind spins in the vortex of hatches we’re passing through. “But you said…‘probably’?”

“I can’t guarantee the sabotage worked. I’m not a specialist.” He scrubs his free hand down his face. His voice wobbles. “I’m sorry. I had to betray you in some way to get him to trust me.”

I don’t know how to react to this. I don’t know if this makes what he did okay when he still let doctors do procedures on me without my knowledge.

“Are you bullshitting me again?” I say, colder than I mean to be.

“No,” Yizhi says, a wet shine in his eyes.

“I…” My heart twists at the sincerity in his expression. Yet he can fake it so perfectly when he lies. “I don’t know if I can believe you.”

His throat bobs. “That’s okay. I understand.”

I pry my focus away from him. Now is not the time to get into this. I don’t even know if we’ll survive the next ten minutes.

We take a different route through the corridors than the one we smashed and tore our way through to get in. We lock each hatch after us. The thudding sounds of Qin Zheng slashing at them with his sword travel muffled through the walls. I pray that his lack of functioning heart will slow him down enough for us to escape the Hive Queen.

In the cargo hold we find the Stinger Dame free-floating. I mentally thank my foresight for uncoupling it when I had the chance. Once we make our way into its cockpit and plug into its pilot seats, I use the spirit metal connection to help Helan remove the clamp around their mouth. They cough, rubbing the weeping red outline on their pale skin. They aim a pained look at Yizhi, but they activate the ship without delay.

We ram our way out of the Hive Queen through the thinly patched hole we blasted to get in.

With my spirit sense reestablished via my pilot seat, I feel for Qin Zheng’s location. He has reversed direction, heading back toward the Hive Queen’s cockpit. Once he gets there, he’ll be able to control the Stinger Dame if he makes even the slightest contact with us.

“Go, go, go!” I lean into my steering handles, pulling as much distance from him as possible.

As I scan the star-strewn void of space, considering our next move, I sense a faint trace of Shimin’s signature again—from the trade station’s dispersing wreckage.

Many thoughts streak through my head at once.

“Give me full direction control!” I slap my steering handles. “We need to get to the shards of the Vermilion Bird! If I put on Shimin’s spinal brace, I might be able to pull them together again!”

Yizhi makes a choked noise. I’m not sure if he’s horrified or awed at the idea, but neither he nor Helan objects. I orient the Stinger Dame with both its steering system and my mind. A muscle jumps under my eye from the exertion. Human bodies weren’t built to do this much in one day.

I don’t open my eyes more than I have to while we zoom toward the expanding cloud of destruction. The clear cells holding the Hundun husks swivel like dice among the explosion of matter. Chunks of debris enlarge in our view, going from small as toys to larger than buildings when we fly closer. Whole sections of the habitat rings spin in the form of metal and glass ruins, scattering dirt, vegetation, and globules of water in scrawling trails. Colliding pieces shatter each other into smaller fragments. Many plunge in blazing arcs toward our planet like meteors, streaking smoke above the oceans and landmasses as they disintegrate.

Some of the evacuation ships pass us, giving us a wide berth. Judging by their silver gleams, their hulls are regular metal, more similar to Helan’s civilian ship than anything dangerous. I don’t bother shooting at them. It takes all my concentration to navigate through the debris field. Random objects bombard our ship with unexpected force, jostling us this way and that. I think of nothing but reaching Shimin’s signature. It’s so close…

“There!” I pinpoint it. “The one with more scattered fragments than others!”

Helan shouts a command at the dashboard. A tether shoots out from the front of the Stinger Dame and attaches to the cell. The tether retracts, pulling the cell toward us. I grimace as the silhouette of Shimin’s body becomes visible, tiny compared to the Vermilion Bird fragments. Unconsciously, I reach out.

A blast of qì hits our ship from the side. I feel it like a psychic scorch. Our screams warp as we go spiraling. Warning noises blare from the ship’s systems.

Around and around, we spin out of control, the planet and the universe blurring in the cockpit’s display. Our ship and the cell holding the Vermilion Bird swing each other down, down, down, as counterweights. We plunge through clouds and increasingly brighter surroundings. Helan shrieks out desperate commands, but red flashes persist across the dashboard. The ship gets so hot in my senses that I thrash and yell like I’ve been set ablaze. Then my connection needles retract on their own from my spine, breaking my awareness of the hull. It makes things only marginally better. Heat rises even in the cockpit. Its view display flickers around us. The scent of smoke reaches my nostrils. Our tether to the Vermilion Bird snaps.

“Shimin!” I scream as the sudden release flings the cell away, molten-red and orange against blue skies. Its glass walls burn up, fleeing like radiant sand in the wind. The last thing I see is its blaze flaring like wings before our view display sizzles out completely.

“The ship’s too damaged!” Helan cries in the sweltering dark, translation trailing their words. “Brace yourselves! Stinger Dame, eject for emergency atmospheric reentry! Eject! Eject!”

“Got it,” the system chirps in Hanyu.

Our seats slide together. The cockpit walls cram inward. Wide bands clamp around our upper arms.

“Projected impact surface will be open ocean,” the system continues over the cacophony of noises. “Atmosphere breathable without filtration. Temperature within human tolerance. Gravity one point one times galactic standard. Please follow basic aquatic evacuation procedures. Good luck, and so long.”

With a loud hiss, the cockpit pops free from the ship.

There’s no other explanation for the sensation. We suddenly tumble faster, and sound roars outside the cockpit. Bile churns in my stomach, yet I can’t defy the pressure on my body to lift my hand and clamp my mouth. Every breath is an effort, as if I’m stuck between two walls.

I black out. I don’t know for how long.

I’m shocked alert again when a hefty force tugs the cockpit upward. A parachute deployed? We fall differently afterwards, swaying drastically from side to side instead of spinning like mad. Several more jolts rock us, rattling panels in the cockpit, before we slow into a steady descent. One we might actually survive.

My relief doesn’t last more than a few seconds. I failed to kill Qin Zheng. I lost the Vermilion Bird. Even if I live, what do I do?

Before I reach an answer, we hit what must be the ocean. It pushes back at us, buoying the cockpit up and down. With a groan, Helan unbuckles from their seat and manually opens a hatch. Spurts of seawater spill in, accompanied by the overwhelming smell of salt.

We help each other out of the cockpit. The moment we splash into the ocean, the bands placed around our arms inflate, keeping us afloat. Gasping for breaths of natural air, I survey our surroundings. It’s so surreal to see colors stretch on for infinity back in an open world.

Too open.

All around us are nothing but waves upon waves upon waves. No land. A large parachute pools beside the bobbling cockpit. The sun sits low on the horizon, beginning to set.

“Where are we?” I ask, voice raspy. I can’t tell if we dropped into an ocean that borders Huaxia. For all I know, we could be on the other side of the planet.

Yizhi, Helan, and I gawk at each other. None of us have anything more to say. Helan’s gaze darts around our world, their breaths coming faster. Yizhi reaches for them. Helan flinches, kicking away in the undulating water. After the concentrated amount of betrayal they witnessed within a few minutes, I don’t blame them.

The incongruous sight of their pink-and-blue hair spears me into my new reality. I really did just go to the stars and back. Burning debris continues to streak across the sky. A meteor shower. I saw a few with Big Sister in our village, but none so stunning. None I personally caused.

I’m watching in a daze when one meteor curves in its path and heads right for us.

Every muscle in my face goes stiff.

“Go!” I push Yizhi and Helan, arms splashing. “Go, go, go!”

We swim as fast as we can, but our efforts are pathetic. The thing grows larger as it approaches us, shiny and golden in the setting sun.

The Hive Queen.

A thunderous rumbling sound comes ahead of it, vibrating through the air. Pulsing winds churn the waves higher and shove us without mercy. Several times, the water closes above my head. The flotation devices on my arms keep me from sinking deeper, but at this point, drowning might be the better fate. I spit out mouthfuls of seawater, my nostrils stinging.

When the Hive Queen gets close, so large it blocks out the sun, the waves intensify. The pressure ahead of the ship punches a wide dent in the water beneath. The Hive Queen rights itself and makes a smooth descent onto the roiling waves a short distance in front of us. Ice crystallizes across the ocean surface, freezing it mid-motion and trapping our heads and arms above our bodies.

As I cry out from the cold that stabs through my bones like needles, the ship’s roar quiets to a persistent hum. I can hear whimpering, from either Yizhi or Helan, but I can’t see them. I’m frozen in the middle of a sloping wave.

The platform of ice bobbles in deceptive peace. My teeth chatter, and darkness pulls at my mind. I wish I could sink into it and be free of this agony, yet my body refuses to give out.

Metallic noises emerge from the top of the Hive Queen’s at least twelve-story height. My last hopes are extinguished when a fully armored figure slides down its curve on a fluid piece of its surface.

At least he doesn’t land gracefully. He tumbles over when he reaches the ice, grasping his chest. It takes him quite the effort to get up. A line of spirit metal connects him to the ship. I don’t know how he managed to fly it down so precisely, but it makes me feel a little better about failing to kill him. There was no beating him. His existence is a force of nature. If a god of war really exists somewhere, he has its blessing. I did my best.

Step by struggling step, he staggers toward me. The cold numbs even my dread. I simply stare at him when he stops in front of me, the frozen wave holding me at his chest level.

He stares back, breathing laboriously. He looks as half dead as he biologically should be, all the color gone from his face. How long will he outlast me?

“Let Yizhi and Helan go,” I say through my chattering teeth. “If we all die, there’ll be no one to warn Huaxia about the retaliation.”

“That is not for you to worry about,” he rasps out, wincing as though the mere act of speaking is too much. “A ship full of our tributes surrendered to me.”

“Oh.”

So that’s how he got down. He had help.

The relief of our girls making it out is a good enough feeling to take with me to the beyond.

“Kill me then,” I say, refusing him the satisfaction of seeing me afraid. “You were going to do it the moment we got back to Huaxia, anyway.”

“No.” He shakes his head slowly, gazing at me with a weariness deeper than physical. He clutches his chest tighter. “No, empress. I loved you.”

A surge of unwelcome emotions shatters the perfectly fine peace I was ready to die with.

“No, you didn’t!” I scream. “You didn’t love me! You loved the fantasy version of me in your head, who resists you enough to be exciting but will always bend to your will in the end, and will forgive you no matter how you hurt or control me!”

Hot tears spill from my eyes, running over the frozen water on my cheeks. Great. Leave it to him to ruin my last moments.

I choke down air to catch my breath. “Now your fantasy ends.”

The rage I expected from the beginning reanimates over him. The ice bobbles in greater swells and dips. I see it: the change in his eyes, the moment I become dead to him. I don’t look away. May I haunt him for however much longer he keeps himself alive.

His hand goes to his sword.

Cracks split across the ice on a rising tide. He stumbles backward. The water doesn’t stop swelling. A red glow brightens through the breaking ice.

Something shatters out from beneath us.

I fall loose from the ice and slip down a hot surface. Grappling for purchase among pouring water, I feel the texture of Fire-type spirit metal. A bird cry pieces the air.

I grasp an edge with my stiff hands. A wing edge. It spans out to my side, Fire-red qì seeping beneath its metal feathers. The heat stings like static against my numb flesh. Steam rises everywhere. When the wing tilts higher, I shimmy down its edge until I’m on its body.

The Vermilion Bird’s body.

It’s about ten times smaller, but undoubtedly the same shape as the Vermilion Bird’s Standard Form. My mind stutters, trying to process what’s happening.

How…?

The memory of the clear cell burning up as it plunged through the skies flashes in my mind.

The heat of the reentry. It melted the pieces back together.

“Shimin?” I ask, not believing what’s happening.

There’s no response, but when I grab hold of two feathers, the Bird swoops down again, skimming its other wing through the ocean. Yizhi and Helan appear when the water spills off, looking just as befuddled as me. Helan slips down the wing. Yizhi catches them by the waist. I stretch to seize Yizhi’s hand and pull him more securely onto the Bird’s back.

Our eyes meet.

Before either of us can muster a reaction, more large things bobble out of the ocean. Bright bolts of red and green fire at the Hive Queen.

Hunduns.

What in the skies is going on?

The chaos of the battle recedes as the Bird flaps its wings, flying up and away. I think I see Qin Zheng dodging the blasts while reeling himself back into the Hive Queen. Rage and relief bloom in me in unison. Which makes no sense. I press my throbbing head into the crook of my arm.

I don’t know if I’m dreaming, because this can’t be real. I don’t know what exactly just happened and what it means. The only thing I’m sure of is how good the heat beneath me feels. I rest my cheek against the warm metal feathers. Slowly, my body stops shivering. The darkness takes me.