Page 55 of The Blood Orchid

Wenshu and Zheng Sili hurried to catch up to us, watching me with wide eyes.

“I know who you are,” I said.

All of his trembling stilled. He let out a sharp laugh. “That’s impossible,” he said, looking over his shoulder, his comet-bright eyes locking with mine, a dark smile spreading across his face. The timidness of his earlier persona had vanished, his words in crisp Chang’an dialect, each one like a thorn. “I’m no one.”

Then he wrenched himself out of my arms and grabbed my wrist, twisting it backward. The knife slipped from my hands and clattered on the ground, and the man took off running.

I raced after him, clutching my bag to my chest so I wouldn’t shake Durian too much. Wenshu and Zheng Sili quickly caught up, and the three of us chased the man in blue down the road, dodging merchant carts and ducking under camels. The man took a sharp turn down a side street, vaulting over a child playing with chickens in the road.

Wenshu had nearly caught up to him. Of course the prince’s body wasn’t any good at fighting but was fantastic at running for his life.

The man clambered over some abandoned crates, reaching for the rammed dirt wall that separated the city from the desert.

“Don’t let him out of your sight!” I called. But Wenshu was way ahead of me, grabbing hold of the man’s sleeve and yanking him back before he could jump over the wall. Zheng Sili and I made it to the crates and tried to help Wenshu drag him to the ground, but the man was already straddling the wall, and pulled the rest of us over with him.

I hit the ground and something crunched wetly beneath me. Judging by the pained sound Zheng Sili made, I worried I’d cracked his skull open. But as I rolled to my feet, my side plastered with pink fruit, I realized that what I’d actually destroyed was a watermelon.

We’d made it past the city walls and fallen into the gravel fields of watermelon spanning for miles into the horizon, the rocks sharp beneath my thin shoes. Wenshu was sitting in half a smashed watermelon, black seeds stuck to the side of his face. Zheng Sili stumbled to his feet, his skull thankfully not smashedopen, though the watermelon beneath him hadn’t been so fortunate. The man in blue had fallen a few feet away and was hurrying to untangle his ankle from a vine.

I reached for my stones, but Zheng Sili was faster. He seized the nearest watermelon, and alchemy raced through the vine like blue lightning. He was a breath too slow, and the alchemy only singed the man’s fingertips as he freed himself and leaped to his feet.

“There’s nowhere to run from us out here,” I said. “The wall is too high to climb on this side, and we’ll never lose sight of you in a valley like this.”

“We don’t want to hurt you, to be clear,” Wenshu said, wiping sweat from his forehead.

The man rolled his eyes. “I know what you want,” he said. “We’ve already met. That’s how I know I have nothing to say to you.” Then he slammed his palms into the ground.

The gravel, I realized too late. I’d thought the man was helpless with no alchemy stones, but we were standing in a field of rocks.

The world exploded into red.

I held my arm up against the barrage of sticky water and wet fruit. A thick chunk of rind hit me in the chest and knocked the breath from my lungs, but I managed to stay on my feet. My vision cleared, and we were standing in a decimated section of farmland, craters carved into the earth where the watermelons had once sat, the dirt mixed with pink fruit flesh and scraps of rind.

I whirled around, and as expected, the man was running back toward the city walls, probably hoping to loop around to the front gate.

“This is ridiculous,” I said, cuffing watermelon juice from myface. “Hold him down,” I said to Zheng Sili, who was spitting out watermelon seeds behind me.

“With pleasure,” he said, reaching for the vines once more.

This time, four vines lashed out like serpents, each one seizing one of the man’s limbs. He fell to his chin with a yelp, yanking at the vines to no avail.

I stomped toward him and picked up the nearest watermelon, holding it threateningly over his face.

“Quit destroying the watermelons!” I said. “Someone has to sell these, you know!”

“Okay, okay, fine!” the man said, trying to roll out of the watermelon’s looming shadow. I set it down heavily next to me as Zheng Sili and Wenshu approached.

“Now,” I said, “I would introduce myself, but we’ve already met, haven’t we?”

The man shot me a defiant look, then let out a stiff breath and fell limp against the soil. “Look,” he said, “I know you don’t remember, but we’ve already done this part, so allow me to save us all some time. No, I am not best friends or secret lovers with the Empress, and she cannot blackmail me because I have no possessions or loved ones. I’ve never even met her, much less done her any favors, and I intend to keep it that way. She is very much not my type.”

Wenshu opened his mouth as if to argue, but the Arcane Alchemist was faster. “Sorry if we don’t take your word for it,” he said, mocking Wenshu’s voice and rolling his eyes. “Sorry that I don’t carry around proof that Idon’t knowsomeone.”

“You broke my compass, didn’t you?” Zheng Sili said, frowning.

“Oh, your little toy that would lead the police straight to me?” the man said incredulously. “Yes, how cruel of me not to let you keep that. I thought it would at least prevent a repeat ofthis foolish encounter, but it seems today is not my lucky day.”

I rolled my eyes and yanked at his collar, peering down his spine for some sort of soul tag.