“Who?” he demands again. “Is it the Cat Clan? The Hannos? What are they planning?”
I sneer at him. “You’ll be dead before you know.”
This time I’m expecting it, but that doesn’t make it easier. Water rushes up my nose as the King pushes my head down. Something slimy brushes my face as it swims past. He holds me under for longer, until blackness creeps across my brain, a tempting dizziness that tries to spin me to sleep. Part of me is ready to let it take me. But the other part—the stronger part—rallies desperately against it.
This time when the King drags me out, he casts me to the ground. I skid along the grass. The earth is hard, frosted over. My fingers scrabble at the soil, trying to find purchase. Just as I push myself up, he kicks me in my middle.
I collapse, mouth wide in a silent scream. Something cracked; I felt the snap. A rib.
One more stomp and he’ll crush my heart.
Rearing over me, the King pins my arms overhead. “I’ll ask one more time, Lei-zhi.” He speaks slowly, almost calm, though his eyes are wild with fury and something else, that mad look I first saw in him the night of the koyo party and worse each time since, like he’s unraveling from within. His breaths steam in the frozen air. “If you still refuse to answer, I will go back to the ball and drag your father and lynx-woman here and kill them in front of you. Will that be enough incentive for you to speak?”
I growl, jerking underneath him, but he presses his full weight on me and it’s useless, I’m useless, I can’t win. How could I ever have thought I could win, a Paper Girl against her King? And then—
Shouting. The crunch and snap of plants underfoot.
Someone’s coming.
The King looks up.
Just in time for the knife that is whirring through the air to embed itself hilt-deep into his right eye.
THIRTY-SIX
ZELLE CHARGES INTO THE CLEARING AS the King pitches off me, blood streaming down his face.
“Finish it!” she screams.
Behind her—Naja.
The white fox is astonishingly fast. She catches up to Zelle in two bounds, her sari loosened at the front and flaring behind her, and in one swift movement she reaches out, clasping Zelle in her long, clawlike fingernails, and snaps her neck in two.
The sound is awful, a clean, high crunch.
I stagger to my feet. Naja looks up, Zelle discarded in front of her. There are noises in the distance—clashing weapons, screams, something like the deep churn of fire—and I see flames reaching into the sky, lighting the night with streaks of orange and vermilion.
The Floating Hall is on fire. Which means the palace must be under attack.
The knowledge hits me hard.
We failed.
Then I lock eyes with Naja and everything else is whipped from my mind, leaving only the burn of anger, hatred, darkest, deepest pain, and Zelle’s last words to me, so simple, so terrible.
Finish it.
I lurch toward the King. The grass is wet with his blood and my feet skid, but the fall helps me, propels me forward. He sees me coming a second too late. His face contorts. Hands shaking, he reaches for the hilt of the knife embedded in his eye—but I get there first. Letting out a cry, I wrench it out of his blood-drenched socket.
And drive it into his throat.
Surprise. That’s his first expression.
The second is fury.
He jerks under me, but I cling to the hilt, fingers slick with the blood gushing around it. I throw my whole body forward, using my weight to embed the knife deeper. Together we fall. I’m flung forward, sprawled over his chest, but I keep pushing the blade into his neck. The sounds he’s making are horrible—gurgling, babylike. He thrashes. Lashes out. Even though they’re sloppy, there is still power in his blows, and the pain of my broken rib flares with each one. But I grit my teeth against it and hang on.
One of the King’s eyes is blue and piercing. The other is a vivid red mess.
I snarl like a wild thing and jerk the knife side to side. It barely moves, wedged into bone and cartilage, but I force it, feeling things breaking, the snap of living tissue. Over the King’s choked noises, there is an awful keening sound, high-pitched and raw, and I think at first it’s Naja, but of course it’s not.
It’s me.
Then I remember—Naja.
My fight with the King could have only lasted seconds. The fox female is upon me just as I turn to look for her, curved claws breaking skin, drawing blood as they dig into my shoulders. She tosses me to the ground. Kicks me again and again. The blows come too fast for me to escape. I can’t even catch my breath, can barely see. The pain is agonizing, unbearable, the hottest heat and fiercest white, a widening sky opening to swallow me whole. I’m going to die, and the knowledge of it, the searing certainty, is the worst feeling I’ve ever known.
“Get off her, you bitch!”
Wren’s voice rings out, as bright as a dream.
I don’t see her until she tears Naja off me, and even then it takes me a moment to recognize her. She’s wearing battle clothes, leather armor over a midnight-blue tunic and trousers, and her eyes blaze with the white of a Xia warrior, the same as that night under the theater. She draws two swords from the sheaths crossed at her back. Some unfelt wind moves the hair around her face, making her seem eerie, like some dark goddess, and even I get an instinctive lurch of awe.
Naja falters, just for a moment. Then she shakes herself. Draws tall. “I told the King it was you,” she snarls, and lunges.
They fight viciously. Instinct overpowering form. Naja’s all animal, the wildness of her demon form taking over. Gone is the composed court guard standing always at the King’s side. The cool, still gaze. She doesn’t even have a weapon because her body is the weapon. Hunched over in a crouchlike stance, she fights with spins and jabs, slashes and bites.
They move so quickly it’s hard to follow. The clearing is a whir of limbs and blood sprays, the thud of bone on flesh.
“He defended you,” Naja spits. Her mouth is foaming, blood turning it pink where it runs from a gash in her cheek. She blocks a parry from Wren and swipes a leg in a low sweep, which Wren jumps to avoid. “Even though you betrayed him by sleeping with that little golden-eyed slut, he said he couldn’t punish you yet because the Hannos have done so much for him. He had his suspicions, but he still hoped. That’s why he sent you home when he heard of your mother’s death. He was showing your clan the loyalty he deserved.”
Wren’s knuckles are white where they grip her swords. “Loyalty?” she says with a disbelieving laugh. She lurches forward, arms arc overhead as she leaps, bringing down the two blades together as one.
Naja dances back just in time.
“He doesn’t know the meaning of the word,” Wren spits.
“And your people do?”
“They thought they did. They learned the hard way that it’s a rare thing in this world.”
“Ironic, isn’t it? How now they’re the ones teaching others that same truth. Tell me, how does it feel to betray the demon who has been unfailingly dedicated to your worthless keeda clan all these years?”
Wren ducks a blow. Naja recovers quickly, and this time her elbow catches Wren in the side, causing her to stumble.
“Bitch,” Wren pants.
Naja laughs. “Manners, Paper whore.” But I catch her barely veiled awed look again as she appraises Wren’s unnatural appearance.