Chapter Twenty-One

I fell against wooden doors, and they opened outward with no resistance, spilling me onto a balcony. My cheek slammed into

warm tiles, the sword clattering beside me, the angle of the setting sun knife-sharp in my eyes.

Voices called out for me, but I couldn't answer at first, too busy reminding myself how it felt to move each finger, to curl

my toes, to draw in air. My skin felt foreign, like I'd pulled on someone else's robes and found the sleeves too short.

Hands closed around my arm and pulled me upright. Yufei was frowning at me as if searching for something in my eyes.

"Is everything all right?" she said.

Wenshu was standing over us, unfurled scroll in both hands as he stared unsubtly at the sword beside me covered in blood.

People murmured in the street below, confused at the delay.

"Have you done it yet?" I said.

Wenshu's gaze snapped back to me. "Not yet."

I rose to my feet, ignoring Yufei as she tried to steady me. My legs felt numb, but I managed to take two steps toward Wenshu, holding out my hands.

"I want to do it," I said. "Please, let me do it."

He raised an eyebrow, scanning me from head to toe. "Are you sure?" he said. "You look a bit..."

I looked down at my robes, which were spattered with blood. One sleeve was torn from the wrist up to my shoulder, fluttering

like a wing behind me. I tasted blood on my lips, and my hair blowing freely around my face told me that all of my hairpins

had fallen out.

But none of it mattered.

There was no longer any reason to hide, or lie, or pretend I was anyone else but a merchant from Guangzhou.

I held out my hands expectantly. Without another word, Wenshu passed me the scroll.

He turned back to the crowd. "Empress Fan Zilan has an announcement to make," he said, before stepping back and nodding to

me.

The crowd murmured uneasily at my title. I couldn't blame them—there had been no wedding or coronation. But far stranger things

had happened in Chang'an than someone like me.

I clutched the scroll tight in my hands, leaving scarlet fingerprints on the fresh paper. As I drew closer to the edge of

the balcony, the vastness of the crowd suddenly overwhelmed me, all their expectant eyes pinning me down.

I had never given any sort of formal speech. I wasn't Zheng Sili, who knew how to speak eloquently. The words on the paper

before me seemed to blur together.

But I didn't need them. I already knew what they said. These were perhaps the most important words I would ever speak in my

life.

Once, only one floor above here, the Empress had stood over me in a room soaked with blood, and told me Hong would be dead within the hour.

What have you done with him? I'd said.

I've been thinking of posthumous names for Hong , she'd said, as if she hadn't heard me. We can call him Emperor Xiaojing, even though he was never really emperor, but I think the people would find it endearing.

I remembered that moment so clearly because the very concept was foreign to someone of my class—merchants had the same name

in death as in life.

But people that would be remembered—like the royal family—received new names after their deaths.

Taizong had been known as Li Shimin when he was alive, and Gaozong had been Li Zhinu. They'd received both posthumous names

and temple names so the people could worship them long after their deaths, and those new names eclipsed their old ones, all

but erasing them. It was disrespectful to call them their common names once their temple names had been established.

Wu Zhao had branded her name onto thousands of people, thinking it guaranteed her safety in the afterlife.

But very soon, Wu Zhao would not be her name anymore.

I took a deep breath and straightened my back.

"As many of you know," I said, my words wavering, "the Perpetual Empress Wu Zhao has passed away. As such, in the tradition

of great rulers before her, we must give her a posthumous title."

The crowd began to whisper, people turning to each other in confusion. In the distance, the corpse that was not Yufei or Wu

Zhao swayed in the wind.

Wenshu had thought all night about the Empress's new name. As funny as it would have been to name her something she would have hated—perhaps a commoner's name, like mine—it would likely confuse the people who had no knowledge of all her treachery. Posthumous titles were signs of respect, and if they felt the name was disrespectful, they might not use it.

"From this day forth," I said, "the name Wu Zhao shall no longer be spoken in this kingdom. From now on, we will remember

her as Empress Consort Wu Zetian."

The characters for Ze Tian meant "Ruler of Heaven," an appropriately pretentious name for someone of her status, though I was secretly thrilled to cement

her title as empress consort rather than empress regnant—she had only ever ruled with power borrowed from the Emperor, not

in her own right. If anyone asked, we'd say that her name was inspired by the Zetian Gate that led to the second palace in

Luoyang, but it had another secret meaning—she would never again rule anything on earth, but she could try her luck in whatever

world awaited her after death.

A notice about her new name had already been sent to all the other circuits in China. It would take time for the public to

forget the name Wu Zhao entirely. But, as of this moment, her name had officially and irrevocably changed.

"May her soul rest in peace," I said, because that was something an empress was supposed to say when someone of importance

died. But I knew her soul wasn't resting peacefully because I'd just sliced it to ribbons and hurled it into a river. It wasn't

her physical body, so surely she was already piecing herself back together. But soon, every door she'd built for herself would

slam shut in her face.

I lowered the scroll, and as I looked across the kingdom that now belonged to me, I knew that Wu Zhao was truly gone.

Part of me had always known that her "death" in the throne room hadn't been her end—I had sensed her in every shadow, every

creak of old wood in the ancient palace, every cold and starless night. But this time, as I'd brought my sword down, the look

in her eyes had been different. It was the same expression that the Moon Alchemist wore upon her death—the face of someone

who knew they were about to meet their end.

I looked down at my hand, imagining the red thread of fate that had long tied us together. I could almost see its shorn end

blowing in the wind, the thin string at last severed.

Goodbye, Wu Zetian , I thought, a strange lightness filling my chest. Long ago, I had sworn to myself that I would be the end of her story, that

I would pry her kingdom from her withered hands. At last, I had kept my promise.

The sun sank just beyond the Buddhist temple on the horizon, crossing that thin threshold from afternoon to dusk with a fiery

orange glow, and the crowd began to fall.

The first woman collapsed in the front row, her sun-scorched face suddenly gray, jaw slack as she fell to the dirt. A guard

tried to lift her up, but her limbs had locked tight, as if long dead.

Someone screamed from the middle of the crowd, and the sea of bodies pushed outward, forming a circle around a man collapsed

on top of another.

The crowd began to wilt, people toppling headfirst into each other, tripping others as they tried to flee and found themselves

climbing over bodies. The crowd pushed outward, the street swelling with panicked screams and cries for help as they trampled

each other in their haste to escape.

I turned to Wenshu and Yufei, who stood speechless at the railing beside me.

Was this because we'd changed her name?

I'd assumed that at least a small percentage of the city would be her walking corpses—either bodies that Gaozong had taken

from the stockpiles in the dungeons, or peasants that he'd killed and resurrected with her name carved into them. I'd known

that those people would "die" when I changed Wu Zhao's name, for they would only be empty shells. But I hadn't anticipated

this many.

"Gaozong killed all these people by himself?" I whispered. The guards were trying to control the crowd below, but could do

little to fight the crush of fleeing people.

"The Wei River is just beyond the walls," Yufei said, staring stone-faced at the chaos below. "Maybe she already put chicken-blood

stone in it."

"But she only threatened to do that in Guangzhou because of me," I said, clutching the banister. The crowd had finally begun

to clear, revealing the trampled corpses like squished red grapes in the dirt.

Wenshu shook his head. "She wanted everything, Zilan."

The doors opened behind us, and a flustered looking guard threw himself into a bow at Wenshu's feet.

"Your Highness," he said. "What are your orders?"

Wenshu grimaced. "I'll handle this," he said, waving for the guard to stand up and leading him back into the palace.

I turned back to the street below, the echoes of screams from far away rising to the red sky. This was supposed to feel like

a victory, but even when she was gone, the Empress found a way to destroy.

At least she could never come back, as long as Zheng Sili had taken care of Gaozong...

Zheng Sili.

All at once, I remembered seeing the throne room through the Empress's eyes.

Zheng Sili fighting with Gaozong.

Zheng Sili covered in blood.

Zheng Sili falling from the window.

I shoved away from the railing, tripping over my skirts.

"Zilan?" Yufei said, steadying me.

But I pulled away and ran past her, down the empty hallways. The Empress's path was scored into the soft golden tiles—a thin

scratch where she'd dragged Gaozong's sword.

I burst back into the throne room, but Zheng Sili's body was gone, a pool of dried blood beneath the window.

I drew back at the sight of Gaozong, barely catching myself on the doorframe when Yufei ran into me.

But Gaozong was unconscious, collapsed only a few feet from the window. When he didn't react to the sound of the door slamming

behind us, I drew closer.

I knelt down at his side. He had no visible injuries, and his chest rose and fell with slow, deep breaths. I pulled out a

knife and pricked it under his chin, but as a drop of blood rolled across his throat, he didn't so much as twitch. I sheathed

the knife and tugged his eyelid up, examining the vast emptiness in his pupils.

The door opened once more, and I heard Wenshu whisper something to Yufei behind me.

"His soul is loose," I said, frowning and rolling up his sleeves. When I couldn't find a soul tag, I gestured for Yufei to

help me and we rolled him onto his stomach, slicing open the back of his robes. But still, there was no soul tag on his spine.

"Are you sure he's dead?" Wenshu said.

I shook my head. "I didn't think he was, but why else would his soul be loose?"

Wenshu rolled up his sleeve, offering me his wrist with his own soul tag. "Why don't you go find out?"

I jammed a hand into my bag, fishing around for firestones. My gaze lingered at the pool of blood by the window.

"Jiějiě," I said, "can you look for Zheng Sili? Maybe there's enough of him to bring back."

Yufei nodded and tightened her scarf over her face, then took off running.

I turned back to Wenshu as he sat down beside me, digging my last three stones out of my satchel and pressing them to his

arm.

Emperor Gaozong , I thought as the world dissolved and the forest breathed me in.

I landed on all fours at the river where his soul should have been. Only days ago, it had been filled with fish and plants

and racing waters, but now there was nothing but a murky riverbed with dying fish writhing in the mud and river plants lying

in limp green puddles.

What happened to him in the last ten minutes? I thought. Had his soul been reliant on the Empress's in some way? I didn't know any alchemy that would do it, but Gaozong

had already showed me that there was a lot about alchemy I still didn't know.

I walked onward until the riverbed curved sharply to the left, and in the darkness, I could just barely make out a dam.

"What on earth?" I whispered, laying my hand against it.

I had broken through many dams to resurrect people back in Guangzhou, which was how I knew right away that this one was different.

When someone died, a dam of rounded gray stones appeared, cutting off the body's qi. Only chicken-blood stone and alchemy

was powerful enough to break through it.

But this dam was made of dark wood with jagged edges, the same as the trees that had once surrounded the river. I glanced

to the edge of the forest, where only stumps remained.

Someone made their own dam , I realized. Gaozong's life had been cut off from the inside.

"Zilan?" said a voice behind me.

For a moment, I didn't turn around. The river plane was cold and cruel and didn't want me here. This could only be a lie,

something that bloomed from the desire in my heart.

"Zilan?" he said again.

And despite all the reasons I knew I shouldn't, I turned around.

Hong stood on the other side of the riverbank.

I remembered the first time I saw him standing on the Road to Hell back in Guangzhou, so out of place in his clean purple

silk and golden shoes, like he'd stepped out of a fairy tale. Somehow I had known, even then, that my life would forever change

when I spoke to him.

Standing in front of me now, he looked just as lost as he had back then, the same wide and haunted eyes, like a deer that

would lope off if startled. But this time, when his gaze met mine, all the fear vanished. He smiled and stepped down the slope.

I rushed forward and met him halfway. The sticky mud trapped one of my shoes, and I fell forward, but Hong caught me with

a laugh and held me to his chest. I crushed him against me, my heartbeat so loud and fast I was sure he could feel it in his

bones.

"I'm so sorry it took me so long to find you," I whispered into his shoulder. "I looked for you, I swear I tried, but I couldn't—"

"Couldn't find me," he said, pulling away gently, a soft smile on his lips. "I know. I was hiding."

"Hiding?" I frowned, disentangling myself from him. "Didn't the Empress take you?"

He shook his head, his hand sliding down to lace his fingers with mine. He turned around, gesturing to a young girl standing

on the lip of the riverbank.

In the dim light of the forest, it took me a moment to recognize her. The last time I'd seen her had been in the prince's

blood-soaked closet, where she lay limp in my arms, her soul still trapped in the river plane.

"Gao'an?" I whispered.

"Hi, Zilan," she said, smiling.

This was the prince's little sister, the one I'd sworn to bring back once I made it to Penglai Island. I'd tried to revive

her after the Empress's monsters had ripped her throat out, but I'd failed, leaving her soul trapped in this plane. She was

the first in a long line of failures on my part, but at least she didn't seem angry.

"Gao'an is very good at hiding here," Hong said. "She found me and helped me hide when she saw the Empress drawing closer,

but unfortunately that meant hiding from you as well. I didn't mean to deceive you, but it seemed preferable to letting the

Empress capture me."

"She never had you," I said, shaking my head in disbelief. I was a fool to believe anything the Empress said. Hong must have

been long gone by the time she'd found his tree and hidden there.

I turned to Gao'an. "How did you know to hide here?"

She frowned, crossing her arms. "Well, I didn't exactly want to wander into the afterlife."

I glanced at Hong. "I mean, it's very difficult for people to not do that," I said delicately. "Unless they're trained alchemists."

Gao'an raised an eyebrow, her frown deepening.

" You? " I said. "You're an alchemist? Just how old are you?"

"Ah, Zilan," Hong said quickly, taking my hand. "Apologies, I don't think I ever fully explained this to you. Yiyang and Gao'an

are not as young as they appear. They are actually my older sisters."

I sighed, closing my eyes. I should have guessed—the royal court already had a laundry list of morally questionable practices.

Feeding little girls life gold to keep them young and cute for decades wasn't uncommon among rich families.

"I'm not quite at the level of a royal alchemist," Gao'an said, uncrossing her arms, "but my mind is disciplined enough to

stay grounded in a place like this, and to look out for others."

For others?

I remembered Zheng Sili and Yufei disappearing into the darkness when we'd come here together, the forest that had called

my name and reached for me just before I'd fallen into Gaozong's river.

"Were you the one who hid Yufei and Zheng Sili?" I said.

She nodded, smiling proudly. "I tried to help you too, but you ran away from me and fell in the river."

I laughed, shaking my head in disbelief. "Well, thank you for trying," I said. "And for protecting Hong when I couldn't."

Hong smiled and ruffled her hair, but she quickly swatted his hand away.

I glanced back at the dam. "And I suppose both of you did this?"

Hong nodded proudly. "Gao'an used metals in the earth to bring the trees down with alchemy. It took a bit longer than we hoped."

"It's impressive," I said. "I never thought to do this. I didn't know you even knew he was alive."

"He came here often to visit the Empress," Gao'an said, wrinkling her nose. The fact that Gaozong had ordered her mother—Consort

Xiao—executed probably had something to do with it.

I looked to Hong. Though he'd never been that close to his father, he hadn't wanted to leave the palace without him. Surely

he still cared for him.

As if reading my thoughts, he shook his head. "It's all right, Zilan," he said quietly. "When I was hiding with Gao'an, I

heard my parents talking. He knew that the Empress had killed me, but he didn't..." He paused, as if selecting his next

words carefully. "He never asked why, or how, or where I was. He was never upset with her for it."

"Hong," I said gently, squeezing his hand.

"It's fine," he said, as if trying to convince himself. "I knew what our family was like, Zilan. I've always known. It was

foolish of me to think my father was any different."

"You're not foolish for hoping there is good in people," I said. If Hong had been as cynical as me, if he'd looked at me and

seen nothing but a brash merchant girl, then we would have been strangers forever.

The prince adjusted his grip on my hand to hold it tighter, and at once I felt the cold press of his rings on my skin. I pulled

back and took his hand, my gaze falling to his red diamond ring, wrapped in the wings of a golden phoenix.

"This is it," I said, squeezing his hand. "This is the last ring, Hong."

His eyes went wide, then he pulled away and tore the ring off like it was on fire, setting it in my palm.

"This is the last piece?" he said, the words so quiet, as if afraid to be wrong.

"Yes," I said. "The next time I see you, we'll be in the palace together."

My words sounded more confident than I felt—after all, I still hadn't tried the transformation to bring me to Penglai Island,

but I could give him nothing else but hope. He pulled me close, tight against his chest.

"We'll be home," he whispered into my hair.

For a moment I said nothing. I had never considered home to be anywhere but Guangzhou. But here and now, with Hong's arms

wrapped around me and the word home echoing across the darkness, I realized it had never felt more true. This was my home—with Hong, with my family.

I took a steadying breath and pulled back gently.

"I have to go help Zheng Sili," I said.

"Of course," Hong said, releasing me. "See you soon?"

I nodded, taking a step back that felt like a thousand miles, and opened my eyes.