Insistent Tide grudgingly supplied a few sleek green primary feathers. She tucked them into Nothing’s hair in an off-center crest. “Strange,” the old woman said.
“Perfect,” Nothing agreed. She wanted to greet Kirin as prettily as she could, as it would be a pleasant surprise for him after so many weeks alone. He did like pretty things. Her chest felt tight with excitement. She’d missed him so much while he was gone on his summer trip with Sky, aching every day in the littlest ways, and then when the imposter returned, fear and uncertainty had overtaken her longing. But now: she might vibrate herself through the floor with anticipation.
Insistent Tide gave her little black slippers, but as soon as Nothing was in the corridor, she took them off and continued to the geode room barefoot.
Her heart pounded as she entered; she searched every amethyst glimmer and violet shadow for Kirin.
But the geode was empty except for the same low, set table with the same thin golden cushions.
Nothing tapped her fingers against her thighs, wondering how long to wait and what she should do. Certainly not begin eating or drinking. She walked across the clear quartz floor, watching her toes peek out from the hem of her skirts, and imagined walking across the sharp facets of amethyst below instead. At the far edge, she crouched, relishing the slick of silk against her legs, and reached for the nearest spear of amethyst. Her fingers were cool against it! The crystal was warm and humming. And it was no constant hum, but a rhythm like a pulse.
Before she knew it, her own pulse answered, trying to match the slow heartbeat. Nothing closed her eyes, listening. It soothed her, dazed her, like instant meditation.
“Nothing,” Kirin said.
She stood and whirled, nearly tripping on her skirts. There he stood: tall and lean, in a long robe of black and red, his trousers loose, hems falling over bare feet. He smiled at her, and Nothing dashed for him, ready to fling herself into his arms.
But she stopped.
Several feet away, she stood still and stared, pulse pounding, stomach rolling. Cold sweat beaded along her spine.
“Nothing?” He frowned. He stepped toward her.
Nothing parted her lips to say his name but couldn’t.
He was perfect: vivid brown-and-gold eyes held hers, gently curled lashes blinking hardly at all. His skin was healthy, bright moon-white; his brows lifted elegantly; his hair fell over his shoulders in heavy black layers. He was still rather weedy in his height, not entirely grown into it. There was the familiar cock of his shoulders, and he leaned on one hip. His slightly pink lips tilted as he smiled at her.
His hands were relaxed, elegant and strong looking. It was him. Everything about him was him.
Her hair-bracelet wrapped his left wrist, just over the knob of bone.
And still Nothing could not say a thing. She could not take the final steps.
“Nothing?” asked the sorceress softly.
The word tore her eyes from Kirin to the sorceress.
Power radiated from her luminous face, the round prettiness of her copper cheeks and red lips overwhelmed by those monstrous eyes. Her black-brown-red hair was a mass of coils like tentacles snarled around her head. She wore bold green, blue, and black in lustrous layers, and a single fire-red gemstone hung on a chain over her heart, like a crystalized fist of blood.
She was entirely distracting from Kirin. That shouldn’t have been possible.
Nothing forced her attention back to the prince. “Kirin?” she whispered.
“Who else would I be?” He came for her. “Nothing!”
She let him embrace her, flattening her hands on his ribs. He smelled like the mountain, and a sharp tea. His hair brushed her forehead as he curled around her, tightening his hold.
“No,” she whispered against the warm spread of his silk-clad chest.
“No? You found me. You did it. I said Nothing would come for me, and you did.”
Nothing pushed firmly away. The frown he gave her was only slightly confused, married with a growing irritation. Exactly the right reaction. Kirin would be irritated she wasn’t behaving happy or even satisfied to have him again.
Exactly right.
She was still sweating coldly as she backed away and said to the sorceress, “This isn’t him. It’s another imposter!”
The smile that spread across the sorceress’s lips was like an arrow in Nothing’s heart.
“How do you know?” the sorceress asked gently.
Kirin crossed his arms over his chest. “You’re being ridiculous.”
Nothing pursed her lips as her eyes flicked to him again. “I’m sorry, but I know it’s not you.”
“I am perfect.”
“He is perfect,” the sorceress echoed.
“I know,” Nothing said. “But it’s not him.”
“Go sit,” the sorceress commanded.
Kirin immediately went to the table and flung himself down upon a cushion, leaning his long body back to prop on one elbow. He crossed his ankles and watched them arrogantly.
It hurt Nothing to see. But she knew.
The sorceress approached her like a stalking panther. “How do you know?” she asked again.
“I know him better than anybody.” Nothing hugged her stomach as her only defense.
“Explain to me what gave him away.”
“So you can make one to fool even me?”
The sorceress reached for Nothing, and Nothing jerked back just as her fingernails grazed her chin.
“I swear,” the sorceress said, “I will not make another. If you tell me.”
“I…” Nothing licked her lips and stared at Kirin. At the fake Kirin. She couldn’t point to anything in particular. Each detail, as she thought of it, she realized was right. His smile, his attitude, his pose and the way he plucked a blueberry from a shallow bowl upon the table and popped it into his mouth. Everything was exactly as it should be.
Nothing’s eyes pricked with tears. “I just know.”
“It’s because he’s your master,” the sorceress murmured in Nothing’s ear, hovering just behind her: a cool presence, like a shadow blocking the sun.
“What?” Nothing held herself as still as possible. Eyes on the false Kirin, too aware of the sorceress breathing at the nape of her neck.
“You were my lost demon, Nothing, and when you were reborn, Kirin—your Kirin—somehow made you his. Named you, then bound you with the name he gave you. It’s the only explanation for how you know it isn’t him, for why you do not know yourself.”
Nothing realized she was breathing too quickly. “He wouldn’t. He’s my friend.”
“He might not have meant to if he did not know what you are.”
“Only a sorcerer can bind a demon or a great spirit,” Nothing said.
The sorceress laughed. “Kirin, more than anyone but his mother, has a sorcerer’s potential within him. Not only because he is both a prince and the most beautiful maiden, primed to step into the aether between.”
Nothing wanted to argue, but if anyone in the great palace was accidentally a sorcerer, it would be Kirin Dark-Smile. “That shouldn’t be enough.”
“No. But when you consider the Moon, it might have been.”
“The Moon?”
“The great demon of the palace, Nothing. Bound by a powerful amulet to the empress, and to her heir, for generations.”