Fox and Phoenix (Lóng City 1)

She pointed upward and to the left, in the direction where Nuó had vanished.

The light was hardly more than a smear of dirty yellow, flickering in and out between the streamers of snow. I rubbed my hands over my eyes. Now I could see another smear of light close to the first one. Could it possibly be a shelter?

A squawking, gabbling noise broke out next to me. It was Lian and the griffin.

Lian cursed and struggled. She looked as though she were wrestling with her clothes.

“Stop it, you wretched little monster—”

Yao-guài broke free and soared after Nuó. Glittering magic trailed behind the griffin, like clouds of golden sun motes. The magic illuminated a series of broad cat-prints in the snow.

Quan and Lian were already trudging ahead, bent against the bone-freezing wind. Yún gripped my arm hard and dragged me after them. But it wasn’t fast enough. My hands were stiff inside my gloves. Pinpricks of fire ran through my veins. I could tell the fire would soon fade into numbness and frostbite. Half a li, I told myself, staring at the beckoning light. Less than that. I ordered my body to keep going, but my feet felt disconnected from my legs, two clumsy lumps of nothing.

With a dozen more painful steps, the blurred lights sharpened into rows of bright squares. Around them, I could make out the outline of a sizeable building.

Relief sent me staggering ahead of the others to the inn’s heavy wooden door. My useless hands fumbled at the latch. No good. Then a warm animal breath curled through my hair and down my neck.

Allow me, said Nuó.

She pressed one great paw against the door. The latch shattered into bits. The door banged open so suddenly I fell into a heap. The next moment Yún, Lian, and Quan spilled over me. We untangled ourselves and crawled toward the stone hearth, snow dripping and melting from our clothes as we went.

“Ai-ya! Who are you? What are you?”

A small round man charged through one of the side doors, waving both hands in circles. He was dressed in a gown and slippers. His hair was gray and pulled back into a tight, old-fashioned queue.

“Out! Out!” he shrieked. “I have no room for beggars!”

Yao-guài swooped in from nowhere. The innkeeper shrieked even louder. He snatched up a fire poker and swung it around his head. Yao-guài dodged the poker. His shrieks were even louder than the innkeeper’s, and the griffin was throwing off sparks of magic. Yún and I dragged each other to our feet.

“Yao-guài! Stop it!”

Yao-guài soared up to the ceiling and clung to a wooden crossbeam, scolding us all furiously.

Quan laid a hand on the innkeeper’s arm. “Honored sir . . .”

The innkeeper shook off his hand and waved the fire poker in our faces. “Hai! Beggars! Thieves! Begone! I have spells against you.”

“But honored sir, the laws of hospitality . . .”

This was going nowhere. Apparently, Lian thought the same thing. She stepped in front of Quan, her expression the same haughty look I remembered from our first meeting. “You will give us shelter,” she said. “Or you will answer to my father the king.”

“Liar,” the man breathed. “Silly wench, to think I’d believe—”

Another door crashed open, and a new person stalked into the room. He was short. Dressed in an extravagant silk robe over an even more extravagant woolen dressing gown. All along the border and hem were stitched spells for warmth and comfort, and as the robe swirled around, magic flux glittered from special threads woven into the cloth. I was so amazed by the man’s clothing, I didn’t even bother to look at his face or really listen to his voice as he delivered a grand tirade about the noise.

“It’s annoying enough that I’m trapped in your miserable inn until the storm breaks. Now you think to entertain me with arguments in your common room. Who these people are—” He swept his arm around, as if to take us all in, and his voice squeaked to a stop. “Kai?” he bleated.

It was the bleat that r

ecalled me.

“Danzu?”

Danzu glanced wildly from me to my companions, from the griffin to Quan to Yún. When he got to Lian, his eyes stretched wide open and he made a noise as though he had rocks in his throat. “Your—I mean—”

“We need a private room,” Lian said calmly.

“Yes. Yes, of course. Right away.” He rounded on the innkeeper, who’d watched this whole exchange with flapping lips. “You. I want a private room with a fire. Hot tea. And I mean scalding. Soup and blankets and dry clothing. And two chambers with hot baths. Right away, or I shall report you to my uncle and the rest of the merchant’s guild.”