Fox and Phoenix (Lóng City 1)

“She will,” I insisted. “You know Lian. She’s probably on her way now.”

Again, their gazes swerved up at the same time. Gan glanced at Jing-mei, then said, “Didn’t you hear? Lian hasn’t answered her talk-phone, or the letters, or—”

“—it’s like she’s vanished,” Jing-mei said. “And that’s why the nobles are, well—”

“—plotting,” Gan finished for her. “There’s talk about problems with the magic flux, or the empire being so far away, but the royal wizards have private lines for urgent communications. Besides, we haven’t had any trouble with magic since the Interregnum Wars, and those were three hundred years ago.”

My mouth went dry. I knew Lian. She’d never run away from her duties, no matter how terrible. Sure, she had fought her father to study at the Phoenix University, but that was only so she could learn how to rule properly. Remembering her face as she stared down the king of the ghost dragons, I shivered.

“Have you talked to her?” Jing-mei asked me.

“No. I thought she’d be too busy.”

Too busy for a street rat who failed advanced calculus. Maybe Gan could read my thoughts, or Chen had a word with Tao, because he shook his head. “Never mind all that. Call her. Just in case. She’d want to hear from her friends.”

Hü. I found that hard to believe. Still, I tapped Lian’s private number into my talk-phone.

Click-click-tick-a-tick.

The magic flux hissed loudly as it switched over to connect-mode. Then a flat, mechanical voice announced, “Sorry. No such number.”

OUR PARTY BROKE up quickly after that. No one wanted to speculate about Lian or why her number no longer worked. We paid our bill from Danzu’s stash, including a hefty tip for Deming, and silently scattered our separate ways. Me, I took the long route home, walking instead of taking the wind-and-magic lifts, and arrived just as the tower bells chimed half past three o’clock.

Yún waited for me behind the front counter. Hsin the queen and one of her sisters dozed off to one side. A thick book lay open in front of Yún. Its pages were crammed full of old-fashioned, hand-brushed characters—one of the ancient histories Ma mi had special-ordered from a northern university. One of our assignments?

“You’re late,” Yún said. “And I thought you had homework.”

I was still scared about Lian and wanted to yell that my homework was none of Yún’s business. But Yún looked cranky and tired, so I swallowed hard and shook my head. “Sorry. Any new business?”

“Two astrology readings and one Elixir of Eternal Happiness.” She shuddered. “I don’t know why anyone would order something that nasty.”

The Elixir of Eternal Happiness was our shop’s best-selling product, brewed from licorice, black pepper, and fermented rice—plus whatever magic kick Ma mi added that week. Like Yún said, it was nasty stuff.

“People are strange, that’s all I know,” I said. “Is my mother back yet?”

Yún frowned. “No. She said something about visiting the herb markets. Here.” She handed me a sheaf of papers. “Tell your mother I finished the inventory. Here’s what we need for restocking. I’ve marked the items we can buy in the city markets. The rest we need to order special from merchants up north or from the Phoenix Empire.”

I scanned the top sheet. Lots of items had checkmarks, but lots more had none. “We need all that?”

Yún rolled her eyes. “What do you think? I have better things to do than make these things up.”

“It was just a question.”

“So nicely asked, too. By the way, I hope you had fun with Gan and Jing-mei and Danzu. Thank you so very much for inviting me.”

“You were busy.”

“And no one can ever change their plans to later.”

“They might if you—”

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I stopped myself before I said anything truly unforgive-able. Yún still carried her knife from our gang days, and she knew how to use it. Besides, her eyes were shining. If she didn’t stab me, she might start crying.

We both glared at each other instead.

“I have to get home,” Yún said. “Auntie needs me.”