The stench of smoke and ash smells different here. Not the sharp, biting reek of burning barns, but the heavy, sweet miasma of grief that has settled into the clothing of the refugees from Yulong. Liyen sees them from afar: a huddled group at the well of the village The Little Blossom, and among them—
"Ma!"
The scream tears from her throat before thought can catch it. Liyen leaps from her horse, stumbles, runs. The earth seems to blur beneath her feet.
Lan turns. Her face is more lined, etched by days of fear, but her eyes—the same dark, living eyes as Liyen's—widen. "Little Li?"
Two more steps. Then they collide, an impact of fate and raw emotion. Liyen presses her face against her mother's shoulder, breathes in the scent of lavender and sweat, the scent of home, of being.
"You're alive," Lan whispers. Her hands tremble as they trace Liyen's face, as if fearing this might be yet another of her dreams. "It's really you, my little Li. When I saw the little Qi-Flame, I knew. I knew your path didn't end here."
"I'm back, Ma. I'm here."
But her mother is not the only one who remained. Countless other villagers stayed as well. Constable Hu; the old man from the well, whom she had thought dead; then the husband of Mistress Wang, who had lied to her daughter that her father still lived, and some other survivors from the riverbank.
"They all stayed," says a village woman with disheveled hair, slowly approaching. "The rest departed eastward when the first refugees arrived. But we couldn't move your Ma an inch from this spot. She insisted on being among the last to leave."
Liyen smiles.
Liyen pulls free from the embrace, wipes her eyes with her sleeve. Her gaze drifts across the faces of the survivors—exhausted, hungry, but alive.
A cough behind them. Tessa stands there, arms crossed, her eyes wandering uneasily across the treetops. "Forgive me for disturbing this moment, sister. But the trees have ears, and the night has teeth. We must move on as quickly as possible."
"Then we should join the others soon," Yaoming steps closer. His voice sounds hoarse, not from the ride, but from something else that gnaws within him. He seems older, the scratch on his cheek fresh and red. "East is safe. East is..."
"Yes, we must go east," Liyen says, nodding.
"Good, then we should pack quickly. I'll help with the packing," Yaoming says.
"Yes, we'd be happy to help too," Tessa says. Tarin nods and smiles.
"We can help too!" Elin and Lora call out.
"Then let's go. There's much work waiting for us." Yaoming moves toward the huts. "Wait." Liyen's voice breaks. She grabs Yaoming's arm before he can turn away. Her fingers dig into his sleeve. "I still can't quite believe it. That you're here. That we..." She shakes her head, searches for his eyes. "Don't speak. Not now." He pulls her close, their lips meet again, gently and timelessly. Time stands still for a moment. Yaoming is slightly embarrassed after the kiss and hastily presses Liyen against his chest, even though he is in pain.
"I'm going to change your dressing." Liyen takes off Yaoming's top and begins removing the old bandages to carefully treat the wound.
"This time we'll use more herbs."
"I'm so lucky to know a herbalist," Yaoming smiles.
"Yes, I learned all of this from my Ma," Liyen smiles.
After a while
"We must ride." Tessa's voice cuts through the moment like a knife. She is already mounted, her daughters before her in the saddle. Her eyes are red, but her voice is firm. "The road east is clear. My family and I... we must return to Marenlor. Warn them. Prepare them."
Liyen pulls away from Yaoming. She steps toward Tessa, and the two women look at each other—sisters in spirit, bound by blood and fire.
"I hate farewells," Liyen says.
"Me too." Tessa rides closer, strokes her hand across Liyen's cheek.
Liyen holds Tessa's hand. Tight. As if she might hold it only this one last time. "But Qi connects us. Across distances, across worlds." A tear runs down her face. She cannot stop it. "Or should I ride with you instead, sister? Warn your city?"
"No, sister." Tessa shakes her head. Her eyes grow watery. Her gaze wanders to Lan, to Yaoming, to the survivors of Yulong. "You've already done a thousand times more than anyone would have. You have your duty here. Your village. Your mother."
They embrace, brief and fierce, two warriors who know that their next meeting is not guaranteed.
Then Tessa rides off. Tarin follows, waves one last time, and then they disappear between the trees, eastward.
Silence returns. Heavy, oppressive silence.
"Then we are ready too," Lan says. She has packed her bundle, stands there with straight back. "Eastward."
But suddenly, as if from nowhere, the little Qi-Flame appears again and flies southward.
"Looks like we're supposed to go south too. Couldn't you have said that right away, Chiu Chiu? Now I've cried so much and left my dignity in the dust before everyone else." And everyone laughs.
"Well then, I suppose our journey goes south as well," Mother Lan says.
"No, Ma." Liyen shakes her head. "We must go south. You must go east. You'll be safe there. The Dark King..."
"The Dark King can wait," Lan interrupts sharply. Her hand clamps around Liyen's forearm like a vice. "You just returned. You will not ride toward death again." Her voice trembles, grows hard. "I won't let you go again. I won't have to say goodbye to you once more. I simply cannot. Not again. Do you understand me, little Li!"
Silence settles over the village square.
"This journey is no path you can walk, Ma. The Dark King..."
"Is my enemy too!"
"And that is precisely why," Yaoming interrupts. He steps between the two women, his voice deep and calm as the river on that night. "I will protect her."
He kneels before Lan, laying his sword—a new one, borrowed from the smiths of The Little Blossom—crosswise on the ground before him. "I swear by my breath, by my Qi, by the blood the forest spirit shed for me: I will bring her back. Or I will die trying. But I will never leave her alone."
Yan steps forward, still pale, his hand on his belly where the scar throbs. "I vow as well," he says grinning, that old, mad grin from back then at the riverbank. "Someone has to make sure the hero here doesn't pray instead of fighting."
"Me too." Zuo emerges from the shadow of the hut, leading two horses by the reins. His eyes are serious. "As a family. Like back then. Only this time we make the promise to return."
Lan looks from one to the other. Her hands tremble. Then, slowly, she nods. Just once.
"Then ride," she whispers. "Ride fast."
The little Qi-Flame whirls back, circles Liyen's head, then southward, then back again, impatient, twitching like a dog pulling at the leash.
"Look at that," Liyen murmurs dryly, tears still on her cheeks but a smile on her lips. "Chiu Chiu grows impatient."
"South then," Yaoming says. He mounts.
Liyen embraces her mother one last time, tight, breathes in her scent, stores it somewhere deep in her heart. Then she pulls away, swings into the saddle.
The four riders—Liyen, Yaoming, Yan, Zuo—look back once at the village, at the survivors, at Lan, who remains standing, small and upright as an immovable post that does not break in the wind. She raises her hand, not waving, but simply holding it aloft. Then they turn their horses and gallop into the forest, toward the gold of the tiger, toward the light of the flame, toward fate.
Behind them, The Little Blossom sinks into the morning light, and the world holds its breath.
In Some Dream
In some dream, a woman runs in a copper-colored nightgown through the halls of a palace. Her entire body is slick with sweat. Her heart pounds and pounds, as if there were no tomorrow. This woman… this woman is Althena, the Queen of Melandor.
Everything seems so surreal to her, yet at the same time as if there were no other reality. The entire reality crushes her bodily.
Her palace burns. Everywhere, only smoke and ash. She runs from exhaustion. Her breath catches. She searches for something. But she does not find it.
She calls for her guards… yet no voice sounds… the guards do not perceive her, neither acoustically nor visually.
But then she runs to the balcony and looks down into the abyss… there she beholds her little daughter in the river… pale and lifeless… Her lungs press together, grow tighter and tighter… she gasps desperately for air… but then she sinks slowly to the ground, her eyes slowly closing.
And then—
—Althena awakens.
Her fingers claw into the silk sheets. Her breath comes in gasps, as if she had truly been suffocating. Morning light falls through the tall windows of Melandor, golden yet cool. She smells something, something sweet, but also something like old stone. Everything seems too peaceful.
She has won. She knows it. The spies have confirmed it: Kaelon lies in ruins. Elandor is shattered, destroyed, forgotten.
But why?
Why does her chest still ache? Why does victory taste of ash?
Althena stares at the ceiling, where golden vines intertwine, and whispers into the silence:
"Why do I still have this nightmare?"