It was always in moments like these that Three had to admit to her master’s incredible talent for acting. The woman was still smiling even as her cousins plotted to profit off her beloved mother’s death.

  Regardless, the Fifth Prince certainly didn’t argue with the proposition. He leaned forward, a grin on his face. It split so wide it seemed to lick at his ears. ‘Listen, Third, all you need to do tomorrow is propose for me to take up position as military appointer. The empress and our ministers will do the rest. Got it?’

  ‘I see,’ she said. ‘But is it really only the three of us? My assent… seems a little pointless.’

  ‘Well,’ said the prince, rolling his eyes, ‘you’re quite the useless one. We did invite your brother, but the brat declined, the stupid boy. He’s got no ambition, not a single drop of it running in his veins.’ He sneered, ‘Just like his father, that blind carp fish.’

  ‘Fifth, please.’ The Seventh Princess then turned to her other sister, ‘Don’t mind him. But since our matters are… resolved, I wouldn’t dare to keep you any longer. You must be busy with your estate’s affairs, are you not?’

  The Third Princess stood up. ‘I suppose I am.’ She pushed out the door into the paint-peeling hallway.

  Three followed her.

  At some point, the princess could no longer remember the path, and let the shadow guard lead the way instead.

  Three retraced their steps; her bck boots swept past and found the door. Gravel. A burst of sun on her face, a warmth quickly taken away by the wind.

  She took a breath. Didn’t look back. ‘Your Highness.’

  ‘Yes, Three?’ The princess’s voice glided past her ears, light like swallows’ feathers. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘…Where are we going?’

  ‘Just back to the estate.’ The woman stepped forwards around her. Each step brought a soft crunch. ‘There’s no rush.’

  She had never walked so slowly before.

  It was so quiet.

  When the haitang trees fell back to greet the pergos of jasmine, the soft crunch of gravel turned into gentle, rhythmic taps of shoes on hard earth. The air was cool, almost bitingly so, occasionally cut by a melodious trill of birdsong; the rest of the silence was folded over with quiet breathing and the beat of soft hearts.

  The princess’s back was as tall as it had always been. There was something about her silence, something about her composure that it made seem the woman had softened.

  Or maybe she hadn’t. Perhaps it was only the swing of her bck-silk hair, the rippling shadows, the unforgiving funeral robes that had somehow tricked Three’s eyes.

  She wanted to pin that woman’s shadow in pce, to stop it from sliding away.

  But she quietly followed it, silent.

  Another step forward.

  Her boots would always nd on the shadow’s head; it was like some unspoken game, just chasing after it over the bridges and under the flowers. She followed it —

  And caught something else.

  A low wheeze.

  She grabbed the princess and shoved her aside. A fsh of bck — she raised her arms, spping away a knife-bearing wrist — a foot smmed into her stomach — she tumbled away, breath knocked out of her lungs.

  ‘…Three.’ Tears rolled out from the man’s eyes. They trailed down his face and into his beard. ‘I’m sorry, youngest.’

  Six.

  She leapt away from him, a bde flying past her face. A screech erupted from her — she seized a handful of dirt and threw it into his eyes, a spluttering cough hitting the air.

  ‘Your Highness!’ She yelled at the shocked princess, who scrambled to her feet. ‘Run, Your Highness!’

  Then, she whipped knives out from her boots.

  Her qi strengthening her muscles, she threw the bdes into the cloud of dust — two hisses, and she knew she’d hit her mark. But then, the shadowy figure charged at her — she ducked, rolling away, but a bde lodged into the ground in front of her —

  A leg smmed into her side. She smashed into the wooden pilr of jasmine, mushy brown blossoms raining down her — not even her lifeforce, coiled around her ribs could shield the pain. Her chest heaved, pain sparking along her back and sides, her ribs groaning. She gagged, acid forced from her stomach up and into her throat.

  Jumped — she reached for Six’s head. If she could just touch his head, she could pierce his acupoints, paralyse him, knock him out — but cage-like arms wrapped around her.

  They squeezed.

  Oh, how they squeezed.

  Popping erupted down her spine. She suddenly couldn’t breathe, couldn’t inhale — the air struggled to get into her encaged lungs. Her arms, pinned like butterflies to paper, were trapped by her sides — the crushing force of Six’s arms, his stout torso, dislocated the joints in her body. Two hard points shoved hard into her ribs — the hilts of the knives she’d thrown into Six.

  I’m not built for this.

  I’m not trained for this.

  Pain squeezed out of her eyes, dripping down in a weak, almost vaporous manner to seep into Six’s shoulder. She gasped, wheezing, but each breath that rattled out of her shook something in the man as well.

  ‘I’m sorry, girl.’ Wet — so much wet. On her shoulders. Down her back. Her legs buckled. Bcking out. ‘It was an order.’

  I know, Six.

  Ringing in her ears.

  It’s okay.

  She clenched her teeth.

  But I still don’t want to die!

  A brick smashed into Six’s head, smming him away.

  Three colpsed to the ground, heaving.

  White linen shoes stood before her. Flustered panting. A pale face, one with trembling lips and a shivering pair of eyes, both hands gripping a rge grey stone.

  Three spat out the bile from her throat and choked out, ‘Your Highness.’ Took another ragged breath. ‘You… you didn’t leave.’

  ‘If I did, you would be dead by now.’ The princess had anger flickering on her face, in her fire-red eyes. The heat of it seemed to glow. ‘I thought you were better than that.’

  ‘I’m not, Your Highness.’ Three staggered to her feet. She coughed again, spluttering. ‘Six and One will always be stronger than me.’

  She turned to the unconscious man, but the flickering of his eyes, the breaths that had begun to pick up in pace, told her that he would soon awaken. ‘His order was to kill me, Your Highness.’ She stumbled to him. ‘He won’t stop until I’m dead.’

  Rolling him onto his back, she reached out to grasp the thin handle of the knife sticking out from his chest. Blood trickled down his body, rolling in little red pearls — then those pearls turned into thick, painted lines. She ripped the knife from his body with a wet tear.

  The serrated edge glinted.

  Her breathing sped up.

  The flickering bck wouldn’t leave her sight; even now, the air seemed to evade her, a nauseous spinning rolling in her head. The ringing in her ears returned with greater force, as though wanting her paralysed.

  Breathe, she reminded herself. She had to survive, no matter the cost. She had to reach for that future happiness.

  ‘Your Highness,’ she mumbled, ‘give me an order.’

  Silence.

  ‘An order,’ she begged. ‘Please. Please, please. Your Highness, tell me what to do.’

  A pause. ‘Kill him,’ the princess whispered. ‘So that we can both live.’

  She tore off a strap of bck from her robes. It was so rough, so hurried, so utterly frayed that wrapping it around Six’s closed eyes suddenly became a terrible, terrible thing. She tied the knot with shaking fingers, then lifted the knife, holding it above Six’s throbbing neck. Swallowed. The muscles in her arms trembled.

  ‘Three.’

  She looked up. Her voice couldn’t help but shake. ‘Yes, Your Highness?’

  And on the other’s face was the most pitying look she’d ever seen in her life. ‘Do you want me to do it instead?’

  Those pale fingers, callused but so clean, reached out to her. Opened in offer. She wanted to grab it so badly, to hug that body to her own broken one.

  ‘Your Highness,’ Three said, ‘you gave me an order.’

  Then, she smmed the bde into Six’s neck.