The royal procession left the anonymous corpse in the Boking Iri square under the pronouncement that the Water Lily Second Princess belonged now to the citizens she had wronged. The cart containing the pole it hung from was filled with wood, brush, and refuse, and with shouts of acclamation, set alight.

“No Ghost Lilac of the Valley now, is she?”

“Better’n she deserves. In my day, we hung family-killers on the city gates to rot.”

Someone cuffed Raijin on the ear. “They took your eyes too soon, murderer, else you could see how good your high and mighty sensha burns.”

The demon beast in Raijin’s chest clawed at its walls, snapping and snarling, lightning flashing inside his heartcenter in time with the distant rumble of thunder. It didn’t matter that he knew the body they were defiling was not Koida; the woman they slandered was. The proud instincts of the demon refused to allow those insults to his mate to pass unanswered. Even chained as he was, legs shackled and hands locked in the iron yoke that encircled his neck, the demon beast knew they were no match for him. He was a thousand times stronger than they. None of them, the guards standing watch over him included, had cultivated the strength to withstand a bolt of lightning through their heartcenter.

The next one who touches you, the demon ray hissed, readying the lightning. The next one who thinks himself brave enough to strike while you’re chained will learn the truth.

No. Raijin wrestled the Ro back into his heartcenter. These people are not my enemies.

The bloodthirsty demon beast couldn’t understand—its world was divided into rivals and mates only—but the guai-ray senses showed him too clearly that the citizens of Boking Iri were only wounded animals lashing out. They had been loyal unto death to their Exalted Emperor and in love with their First and Second Princesses. Their former warmth for Koida made her perceived betrayal cut that much deeper. In their hearts, she had not only turned on her own family, she had turned on them. With the burning of her body and Raijin’s execution, they believed the final blows of justice would be served and their wounds would be healed.

Perhaps they were not the only ones the Rising Phoenix Emperor had managed to deceive.

Let’s go, Yoichi, she had said. I need to wash the stink of murderer off my boots.

That icy voice had belonged to a Koida that Raijin hadn’t known in their short time together. He did recognize it, however. That had been the voice of the Dark Dragon, the woman who had destroyed the mortal realm over and over again, forcing it through unnatural cycles while she degraded not only her own immortal energy, but the immortal energy of other souls working toward Ascension.

She will not survive another cycle, the Grandfather Spirit had told him.

[]It was why Raijin’s immortal self, Jin-Rammael, had followed the Dragon to this world as soon as he could after the Great Betrayal. His wife was unmaking herself. He could feel the Thunderer’s heartsickness at the thought. His heartsickness.[] Either he would save her, or they would be unmade together.

A shout dragged Raijin back to the present from the dark paths his thoughts traveled.

“Let us throw him on the fire, too!”

The suggestion gained popularity disturbingly fast.

“Bet you a jug of hard wine assassin is just as flammable as Water Lily witch.”

“Go back to your fire.” The captain of the night guard sounded as if he were bored with the proceedings, but his signature coiled like a mountain lion prepared to pounce. “You’ll see his head off tomorrow.”

“Come on now!” someone cajoled. “The Rising Phoenix Emperor won’t mind if we get rid of this trash tonight. It’ll save him and the new First Empress the trouble of waking early.”

Shouts backing the idea rose from the crowd, and bodies pressed in closer, two and three at a time. They put Raijin in mind of the pack hunters in the pit, prey animals frightened alone but brave in a mob.

The Ro weapons of the captain and his men lit the guai-ray senses, sending the closest pack animals scrambling back a step.

“By order of the Rising Phoenix Emperor,” the captain drawled in that same bored voice, “the assassin dies tomorrow. Anyone who decides to hurry his death against the Emperor’s wishes will fill his appointment with the Executioner.”

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Tense silence blanketed the square. The demon beast scoffed within Raijin as it felt the pack-buoyed courage fail one at a time in the signatures surrounding him.

On the fire, a bone from the corpse exploded.

A reveler screamed. Fear and disbelief rippled through the crowd—not only the pack animals, but in the signatures of the guards as well. Their thirst for blood was forgotten in a surge of panic. The square erupted in a mad scramble.

“She’s risen! The []Deathless Dragon has risen!”

“The Water Lily witch has come back for revenge!”

Feet thundered on the cobblestones and bodies slammed into one another and tripped over Raijin. Those too drunk to run fell and were trampled by those who were not yet so insensate.

A sudden loud noise didn’t seem like enough to cause this chaos. Bracing himself against the impacts, Raijin reached out with the guai-ray senses.

The corpse was climbing out of the fire.

Where there had been no signature and no life, there was now a deep festering corruption. Raijin recognized it on two planes: it was the pollution that had turned the Grandfather Spirit into the Great Akane, and it was the oily oozing taint of Water Lily corruption.

Raging with flame, the body stumbled across the stones of the square. The living scattered before the flaming horror like animals fleeing a burning forest.

The soldier on Raijin’s left, the youngest of the guards on watch that night, bolted.

“Hold your position!” bellowed the captain. “Defending the Center formation!”

The remaining guards surrounded Raijin and closed ranks, Ro weapons leveled. The seasoned Living Blade Masters may be frightened, but they were too disciplined to abandon their post.

The flaming corpse staggered closer, dragging that corruption along like a cloud of noxious fumes. It wheezed and gurgled something through its burning vocal cords.

It sounded like “hungry.”

“Are you the vengeful spirit of the second princess or were you only in a death-sleep?” the captain of the guard demanded.

Raijin shook his head. “That monster is not the princess. Run, all of you.”

“Shut your mouth, assassin scum!” the captain roared. “Any guard who abandons his post will have my Serpentine Spear in his heartcenter before he gets three steps.”

“It is a Water Lily leech,” Raijin continued desperately. “Its name was—”

“Enough of your fear-spreading!” A gauntleted fist crashed into Raijin’s temple.

For a heartbeat there was nothing but thick, black silence. When the world returned, Raijin was hunched awkwardly onto his side with the yoke holding his hands and head off the stone. His head pounded in time with the pulsing of his heart, and his hearing was muffled from the blow. He could feel the heat rolling off of the corpse in waves.

“Now,” ordered the captain.

Roaring out a battle cry, the first line of guards rushed forward.

The burning leech continued its stiff shuffle, uncaring that he was about to be impaled by a half dozen Ro blades. The cloud of corruption reached out like a squid, tentacles grasping heartcenters. Lao ripped out their Ro and pulled it into his scorched body. Soldiers fell dead around him in a crash of armor on stone.

“Hungry,” he gurgled through a healing throat.

Raijin twisted until he was able to get his knees beneath him and pushed to his feet.

The captain of the guard was dead, but a second in command took over the first man’s foolishness, spinning around to press his Dual Swords to Raijin’s throat.

“On your knees, assassin!”

Jade lightning crackled along Raijin’s skin—the man was so close, within striking distance, a kick, a headbutt, an elbow strike—but he held back the demon beast’s attack. These men didn’t understand what they faced.

“I am not your enemy,” Raijin insisted. “I only seek to help you. You cannot defeat this monster. If you attack, you’ll be killed like your superior. Please, allow me to defend you. I will submit to my chains again after he’s dead.”

The guai-ray senses warned Raijin of an incoming strike aimed at the back of his knee. He shifted his feet, avoiding the boot meant to bring him down, then threw a Ro-less backward kick into his attacker’s gut. It crashed into the guard, blasting him backward across the square. Out of Lao’s reach—for the moment.

The second in command’s Dual Swords whistled through the air toward Raijin’s neck. Raijin was stiff from a week on his knees, battered, blind, and exhausted from hardly any true sleep, but as always in his fatigue he fell back on his training. As the blades arced in from either side, he dropped low and spun, sending out a Landslide of Ro and sweeping the second in command from his feet.

The demon beast roared triumphantly within him, sensing impending blood and death.

Raijin wrestled its savagery back as a pair of Serpentine Spears shot toward him from either side. He knocked the first spear off-target with his shin and slipped the other with a twist of his shoulders, his chains rattling.

Lao continued his limping shuffle forward. Raijin could feel the heat waves rolling off the leech’s burning form.

A pair of guards raced toward the flames.

“Leave him!” Raijin shouted. He ducked under a Sword Hand and threw an elbow at the back of his attacker’s head. The impact dropped the man, his signature blinking to unconsciousness. Raijin leapt over his body, ducking under a looping stab of a Long Spear.

The chains yanked him up short. The arrested momentum tripped him, sending him to his knees. He could not reach Lao or the pair of guards.

One guard swung a huge Ro blade for the burning corpse’s throat. The other stabbed low, at Lao’s vitals.

Lao’s signature suffered no sudden spike of fear or realization. There was only a dull sort of animal hunger. As the guards attacked, Lao reached out with his corruption and devoured their Ro.

“Now!” shouted a rough feminine voice.

A flurry of familiar signatures flooded from the alleyways. At the edge of the guai-ray senses, Raijin recognized the proud, damaged heartcenter of Ni the cast-off former warrior artist, the crawling signature of Sin-An, the qajong addict, and the leaping madness of the old grandfather Ni kept watch over. Backing them were multiple others, every signature broken, malnourished, ill, or insane.

Icy fingers raced down Raijin’s spine as he realized what they intended. Armed with bits of crate, poorly manifested weapons, and bare fists, the beggars of Boking Iri attacked the Living Blade Masters who guarded him.

In the confusion, the flaming Lao shuffled away into the night.