When Khanujin’s father had died, the entire country had spent a hundred days mourning him. Every shop and home had covered its windows with ivory sheets to honor Emperor Tainujin’s death, and I had tied a white band around my sleeve as a little girl.
Khanujin would have no such honor.
The shansen’s men hoisted the warlord’s banner. “Long live the emperor,” they chanted. “May he live ten thousand years!”
To my surprise, the shansen did not puff up his chest with pride, nor did he spit on the emperor’s corpse, as I half expected him to do. Instead, while his soldiers celebrated his victory, the shansen circled me, his boots leaving indents in the dirt behind him.
Crimson veins glittered across the warlord’s amulet. I wondered how much blood he had promised Gyiu’rak in exchange for her magic.
“For one so devoted to her country, you do not seem to understand that A’landi’s future lies with me. I extend my invitation to you one last time, Maia Tamarin. Accept, and I will spare your family. Refuse, and they will die.”
The ultimatum resounded in my ears.
I did not succumb, but neither did I resist. “Where are they?”
The shansen tilted his head, and my father and brother were brought to the square.
I watched apprehensively. At first glance, I wasn’t sure it was them. All I saw were two men, one younger and one older, chained together, rice sacks over their heads.
“You don’t know them,” observed Gyiu’rak, the words cutting me like a knife. “You’ve already forgotten.”
Anguish gnawed at my heart. I shouldn’t have needed to see my father’s and brother’s faces to recognize them, but she was right. I did not know them.
A guard struck the back of Baba’s legs, and he cried out in pain.
“Do you recognize his scream, Sentur’na?” Gyiu’rak taunted.
I recoiled. I did not know the sound of Baba’s scream because I’d never heard it until now.
But I did know the sound of his voice. “Keton,” he uttered weakly when my brother tried to defend him. Snow-covered boots pinned my father and brother to the ground, and I heard Baba whisper, “Don’t fight.”
Slowly, the memory of Baba came back to me. Even now, under these terrible circumstances, he was calm. He was tender. At last I recognized the slight bend in his frail back, the defined knuckles on his hands—hands that had spent years teaching my own how to sew.
I recognized my brother, too. The way his heels rocked back and forth when he limped forward, the uneven cut of his pants—hemmed awkwardly by himself while he wore them—the elbows that jutted out whenever he was frightened or on edge.
I faced the shansen. “Free my father and my brother.”
Gyiu’rak snorted. “Or else?”
“Or else I’ll kill you,” I said coldly.
Gyiu’rak’s eyes flickered with amusement. Sharp tiger fangs protruded over her bottom lip, and as she stalked toward me, I could see the muscles swelling across her arms and legs. She made a point of dwarfing me. “I’d like to see you make good on that threat.”
“Don’t,” Edan said, touching my arm. “If you go down this path…”
He didn’t need to finish his warning. I knew what he meant. If I let Gyiu’rak goad me, I’d be surrendering to my demon’s desire for vengeance.
I would become like Gyiu’rak.
But how I wanted vengeance.
I whirled toward the shansen, ignoring Gyiu’rak. “Let them go.”
“You try my patience, tailor,” he replied. “I gave you a chance to join us. You were unwise to dismiss it.” He inclined his chin at Gyiu’rak, whose eyes had darkened with bloodlust. “Kill them.”
My heart shot up to my throat, and I choked back a cry, lunging for Gyiu’rak before she could get to Baba and Keton. She blocked me easily with her arm and threw me aside.
I’d never been hit by such strength before, not even from Bandur. All of me folded, nerves wincing from the blow. My knees wouldn’t unbuckle, and she laughed as I struggled to pick myself up.
“Pitiful,” she rasped. “Worry not. I’ll make their deaths quick.”
I closed my eyes, conjuring the image of Emperor Khanujin’s death—the gash Gyiu’rak had drawn across his throat, so swiftly he had not realized what had happened until the broken seam on his neck began to spill blood, draining the color from his face and the life from his body.
I wouldn’t let that happen to Baba and Keton.
Pushing up, I threw myself on the demon, grappling her from behind and wrapping my arms around her neck.
She swerved and twisted, springing into the air to fling me off. I held on tight, digging my nails into her neck and chest. Her flesh was cold, her bones hard as iron. I couldn’t tell if my attacks were having any effect.
When we landed, she rushed into the fire that still blazed in the center of the square, with me hanging on tightly. Over and over, she charged into the flames, trying to drown me in their heat, but I felt nothing. The fire tickled my skin and singed the tunic on my back, but it did little else to me.
I couldn’t say the same for Gyiu’rak. The flames scorched her human skin. I could see the pain register on her face, the way she clamped her mouth tight, her lips pressing against her fangs. Were other demons vulnerable to fire? The realization stunned me; Bandur had often traveled to me through flames, but never in his human form.
Once she realized that her effort had been in vain, she bared her teeth. “Maybe you are more advanced than I thought, changeling.”
She slammed onto her back, forcing me to leap off before she crushed me. I fell hard on my side, my ribs giving under my weight. Gyiu’rak pounced for me, and I rolled away toward the fire, grabbed one of the logs crackling within, and swung it at her face.
Sparks from the sizzling wood spat into her eyes, and she let out a tiger’s roar, her arms shooting out in another attack. I ducked, then pushed her into the fire.
An arc of silvery blue swept past me. Edan, wielding the meteorite dagger. He barreled toward the fire and plunged the blade into the demon’s chest.
Gyiu’rak screamed, her body spasming with pain. In a storm of smoke, she vanished, swirling back inside the shansen’s amulet.
The fight wasn’t over. Hundreds of soldiers surrounded us. Grimly, I turned to face them. Edan and I had no chance of defeating them all, but I would do what I had to—to free Baba and Keton.
“Kill the prisoners!” the shansen shouted at his sons.