Fox and Phoenix (Lóng City 1)

Wencheng Li’s eyes fluttered open. “My friend. You saved my life.”

Hardly. The dragon’s lips curled back in a soundless laugh. I sent minions. Those two. He pointed a claw at me and Yún. Your daughter brought the man who saved you. But until they could breach the many obstacles set by the Phoenix emperor, I asked a great favor of my other old friend.

His jaws stretched open. A silvery mist flowed out—a cloud of magic flux that slowly resolved into a very familiar figure—a small slight figure, with bright black eyes and a fierce gaze.

“Ma mi?” I croaked.

And fainted.

19

“YOUR MOTHER IS THE MOST ASTONISHING PERSON I know,” Lian said.

“All demons are astonishing,” I muttered.

Lian merely smiled and poured out two cups of smoke-gray tea. “You must learn to see her as others do.”

“As what? A half-demon?”

“Ah, now you are being deliberately obtuse, my friend.”

I scowled, but said nothing. It was all part of a grand ceremony, where we sipped our tea, delicately and formally, and kept our voices pitched low, in what the nobles called Everlasting Tranquility. We also wore our stiffest, most elaborate costumes. Lian, with her crown and jewels, could have challenged anyone in the Phoenix Court. Me, I wore a newly tailored shirt and trousers, and a short-sleeved robe decorated with silver threads and golden magic. That was because ours was more than a meeting between two almost-old friends. Today was for the royal princess and one of her trusted advisors.

Oh, yeah, me.

Two weeks had passed since we smuggled Lian into the palace and Quan rescued her father from a slow, miserable death. I’d thought our troubles were over, but I was wrong again. First, Lian had to summon the Guild Council and the king’s ministers to explain what had happened in the Phoenix Empire. Yún, Quan, and I served as witnesses. My mother, too, came forward and gave her account. She knew magic was involved, she explained, but she didn’t have the key to its power. She and the ghost dragon king had conferred, and agreed that she would remain behind, working spell after spell to sustain the king’s life, while her worthless son and her most valuable assistant traveled to the Phoenix Empire to fetch the princess.

“There were plots underway,” she’d said, in her driest voice. “And so the ghost dragon king agreed to shelter me from view until the matter was resolved.”

Only Ma mi, I thought, could call two months in the ghost dragon king’s belly shelter.

After the ministers and Guild finished with her, or my mother with them, the court interrogated the false physician. They confirmed what I could have guessed in two seconds—that the man was a spy and agent for the Phoenix emperor, sent to disrupt Lóng City’s government, so that Lian would have no choice but to marry the emperor’s son. But I guess the muckety-mucks like to have all kinds of ceremony, so they dragged out the interrogation for three days, then opened another session with the ministers and the Guild to report their findings.

Speaking of ceremony, this was another one.

“You have saved my father’s life,” Lian said.

“Quan did that.”

She smiled, a more secretive smile. “True. And he will receive his reward. If he wishes it.”

I’d guessed that much, too. “When’s the wedding?”

Her gaze, as sharp as a knife, flicked up to mine. “When I ask and if he accepts.”

“Oh, he will. He’s not that stupid.”

For a moment, I thought I’d gone too far, because Lian’s face scrunched into a very odd expression, as though she couldn’t make up her mind whether to laugh, or snort, or order me executed by Death of a Thousand Cuts. She settled on merely exasperated. “Never mind about Quan. You are the reason for this meeting.”

She touched her palm to a polished silver square set into the tabletop. A servant entered carrying a velvet cushion. On it was a small leather cylinder, with brass caps at both ends. The caps were engraved with dozens of tiny symbols. More symbols were burnt into the leather. Recognizing the official seals of the kings of Lóng City, I nearly whistled.

“Your reward,” Lian said, presenting me with the cylinder. “With my word and this device, you are given freedom from all taxes and fees within the kingdom, for your life, the lives of your children, and so unto the distant future. You are named Friend of the Throne, and Brother of My Heart. Your debts are mine. Your sustenance shall be paid from my purse. My faith and loyalty are yours forever.”

My hand shook as I accepted the cylinder. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Try, ‘You’re welcome, Princess.’”

I regarded her suspiciously. “Isn’t that supposed to be ‘Thank you’?”