Ruyi let the sweet sound of their silence wash over her. She loved silences like this in crowds. She liked having everyone in a crowd looking at her regardless, but this was special. When folk talking over each other, you couldn’t always be sure what everyone felt. But here it was obvious.

“You broke your bottleneck?” said Sabina.

Ruyi nodded. She saw Aelia blinking at her, Fausta with her head tilted owlishly. Then Sabina thumped her chest. “Wonderful!”

She dashed over and buried Ruyi in a hug. The spell was broken; cheers and chest thumps burst out across the clearing. Sabina turned to the rest of them, Ruyi’s hand in tow. She raised it.

“Look at her!” she said. “She's hardly been here a moon's time. And look at what she has done!“

She turned to Ruyi. “I am so proud of you.”

Ruyi felt something melt in her chest. She loved Sabina so much. Sabina didn’t have to say any of that—she just went out of her way to be kind.

Next up was Rufus. He came to her with a bashful grin. “Oh, I remember when you came not two moons past, and I thought this little weeping babe, a great power? No, surely not! What a fool I was, then and now! Do not take it easy on me,” he said. “Show me everything!”

She was still hopped up on all their praise, but she twitched when she heard him. It was quite a nice thing he said, but what was that in the middle—he thought she looked a weeping babe? Ruyi remembered when she was a grandmaster of the Alchemist’s Guild. She remembered when silver-haired old masters would treat her like one of their own! Now she felt like the little sister of the whole praetorianus. She liked it, but it also irked her. She always felt like Jin’s little sister too, even though they were twins.

This bout didn't even get to Winter's Wrath. Rufus tried going blow for blow with her. There were maybe two people in all of camp that could have done that and lived. Halfway through Drizzle Steps, he dropped. And that was that. She hardly worked up a sweat.

By the end, Ruyi was feeling pretty good about herself. Sure, her body felt like it had been wrung dry, but in her head she could fight a thousand more bouts if she wanted to. It didn't help that they all cheered after she landed each blow and they all cheered as she did her little victory lap. She could feel herself getting a little tipsy on all of it.

“Who's next?” she cried.

“You have done wonderfully,” said Sabina. “Are you certain you would not like a rest, oh?”

Ruyi shook her head vigorously. “Bring it on!”

Sabina grinned. “Good, in that case, your opponent is me.”

Ruyi froze.

She thought of herself as quite a brave person. She had to be, she was pretty much a hero! But some things still scared her. No, that wasn't quite right—some things still made her body flinch. She never used to flinch, but after the things they did to her on the altar, certain sensations opened up a pit in her belly.

Getting hit in the face by Sabina was one of those sensations. The first time Sabina hit her in the face she'd cried. Also the second time.

But that was a week ago! She shook her head. Now was now. She was a different person now—she'd figured it all out. Now nothing could stop her, not even Sabina and her hammers for fists.

She thrust up her chin. “Bring it!”

“Begin!” shouted Aelia.

Sabina rushed her. In her demon form, she looked much the same, only two feet taller and about twice as broad, and her hands had each grown to the size of Ruyi's head. Ruyi got the feeling if she got them around Ruyi's ears she could squish her head like a rotten fruit. It took all of her mettle not to run screaming. Instead, she started her steps. Stage one. Cold Start!

She stepped once, twice, then Sabina was in her face, and before she could dodge, Sabina ripped her to the belly.

The moment Ruyi felt it hit, felt all the air forced out of her, felt the shock of it jolt her whole body, her face changed. It wasn’t so much the pain of it—though that would be immense, and it would land a second later—it hit her so hard her experience of reality changed. Her vision blurred and tilted. Her ears popped, went silent. She couldn’t seem to put a thought together; she couldn’t breathe.

She was realizing one of her better traits—also one of her worst—was how quickly she could make herself forget things. Something had to be really painful, usually in an emotional way, for it to stick with her; otherwise she was pretty good at moving on. But it was hard to understand in that moment how she could’ve possibly forgotten what this felt like. She remembered it was horrible, but she’d forgotten quite how horrible until now. It made Rufus’s punches seem a caress.

Ruyi didn't stomp so much as stumble into her next few steps, and Sabina was on her again, this time with an uppercut that hit so hard Ruyi was lifted a foot off the ground. The left took but her crashing back to her feet.

Sometimes Ruyi wished she wasn't so good at taking a punch. She’d gone cold; she wasn’t sure where all her confidence went. All she could think about was how much it hurt. It was maybe one of the worst feelings Ruyi had ever felt. Still, she bit down hard; she made herself step. Stage two—Drizzle Steps! She couldn’t touch Sabina like this, as she was building—she dreaded what came next, there was nothing for it; she had to get to Rising Storm as fast as she could. In the meantime...

She tried dodging as she stepped, and the steps went in an awkward enough pattern that she managed to make Sabina whiff a few times. Part of it was she was having a hard time controlling her legs—she accidentally stumbled out of the way. But Sabina just wove back in and hit her again. If she missed, she rebounded. If she landed, she rebounded. It was like she was stuck to Ruyi with some invisible cord, and however Ruyi ran, she was there, clinging onto her, raining fists. Her hands had grown icicles at the knuckles, and when they smashed into Ruyi’s cheeks, the spikes sliced into her face. She could already feel an eye swelling shut. A fist crunched into her nose, and it opened like a faucet. When Sabina hit you, it rattled you through the skin, through to the bone, to the heart; it was a shock to the whole body.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

She had seen Sabina crumple so many of them like this. Just blow after blow after blow until they stood on wobbling legs until her fists tossed them about and their limbs went slack and their eyes rolled back. She saw Sabina put the fear in them.

But Ruyi was different; she believed it with all her heart.

You would never beat her by hitting her hard. She wouldn't allow it. At some point—maybe around the time when her right eye swelled fully shut—she started getting angry.

By the time she hit Rising Storm, she was moving into another state of being. She could tell her body was giving up on her. Sabina hit her so hard she went blind for a full second. But she told herself she couldn't go unconscious; it wasn't possible, she just didn't want to. She wouldn't let go.

Her powers had pooled in her and she struck back. The next time Sabina came for a haymaker, Ruyi hit her twice, once up the face, the other down the chest all the way to the hip. But Sabina gave no ground either. Instead she started laughing. Ruyi hit her again and again, even as two fists dug into Ruyi’s belly. Sabina only seemed to get happier.

It hit her like a slap to the face: Sabina was having fun! She didn't hate Ruyi at all, of course she didn't. She just fought like she hated Ruyi and Ruyi's body couldn't tell the difference. As they tore at each other, as Ruyi's blood boiled hotter and her anger throbbed in her like a second heart, something strange started to happen: her pain ebbed away. Sabina hit her, but her blood was running so hot the sensation of it flickered and numbed in an instant. She was running on a fuel hotter than her body could bear, and her head throbbed with a heady rush.

She started to smile too, to her surprise. She even surprised herself by letting out a breathy laugh. She felt so alive! Was this what it meant to be a berserker? Sabina hit her, and she hit back, and they were both grinning like maniacs. She didn’t know you could be so happy and so angry at once—she loved it!

Ruyi fell into Winter's Wrath. Limping, bloody, so bruised and sore she could hardly bend her legs. Her face was so smashed, and she had to breathe out from her mouth, and only when she wasn't coughing blood. Her one good eye had maybe a few breaths left before it too swelled shut. Her body was sinking.

She gave it all she had.

Sabina was so close there was no escaping the first rush of the avalanche. It hit her, and in that moment, Ruyi gave back to her what she'd felt tenfold. They were tangled together, kicking, punching, clawing, shredding each other, Ruyi bulling into her as they skidded along the snows. The circle of warriors broke; none could stop them. Darkness fringed Ruyi's vision. She had reached a place beyond hurt, beyond thinking. She just had to—

She fell into the darkness, the darkness eating at her vision, closing in from all sides. She fell further and further from herself. She fell into her body, as though down a long dark well; the world receded before her, a circle of mottled lights, then a pinprick, then nothing. She clung on, but there was only so much she could do. She wasn't done, she wanted to scream. But her body was.

***

She knew where she was before she opened her eyes. The shaman's wards were the only place in camp that smelled so sickly sweet, the kind of sweet that stings a little to breathe. Groaning, she propped herself up to an elbow.

“Ru-yi! You wake!” Ruyi blinked. There, shaded in the dark of the tent-flaps, was Sabina. She smiled. “That was the most fun I have had fighting in many moons.”

“Who won?”

“Call it a draw.” Sabina sat by her cot and ran a hand through Ruyi’s hair. “I remember when you first came to us. You said you did not belong. What nonsense! You are a born fighter; never doubt it again. It is unseemly.”

Ruyi sighed happily. She loved it when Sabina patted her head or ran her hand through her hair, or hugged her. Usually, she was the one who had to initiate all these things.

“I never doubted I was a fighter,” said Ruyi. It was true. She had no doubt when she set her mind to something, when she fought with all she had, there was nothing in this world that could defeat her. Was that what Sabina thought troubled her? “I guess I just needed something to fight for.”

Slowly, Sabina nodded. “You will fight for me, and I will fight for you. Yes?”

“I like it,” said Ruyi.

“Wonderful.”

She closed her eyes and leaned in and put her head against Sabina's chest. It was one of Ruyi’s favorite chests, all big and fluffy, like a pillow. She wanted to stay here forever, with Sabina stroking her hair, murmuring softly in her ear.

“It is strange,” said Sabina, “we have only just met, but I feel I have known you a long time.”

“I guess I'm easy to read, huh.”

“It is not only that,” mused Sabina. There was a pause. “Perhaps it is like you are the little sister I never had. Is that strange?”

For a few breaths, Ruyi was silent. “It’s weird… I was just thinking about that. Earlier, I mean.”

“Oh?”

Ruyi pulled away. “I'm not a little girl, you know.”

“Of course you are not! A child could never fight as fiercely as that.” Sabina ruffled Ruyi's hair affectionately, but this time Ruyi took no joy in it.

“I'm serious,” she insisted.

She wasn't sure why it bothered her so much. Maybe because she’d been thinking about it, and now Sabina said it, so now she knew everyone must be thinking about it too; it wasn’t just her. She supposed that really was how they saw her.

She wanted to say more, but before she could, the least welcome person in the world walked through the tent flaps. It was Titus, the pretty boy shaman. Sabina gave a little gasp when she saw him, and Ruyi gave a little groan. Then Sabina came up to him and, as though she was doing it on purpose, planted a big, fat, awfully long kiss on his lips. And the whole time, Ruyi sat there thinking it really ought to be her. Why was she just a kid, but he wasn't? As far as she could tell, he was just as petulant as she was.

She wasn't even sure why she cared. She'd already sorted it out after Darius: she wasn't ready for this sort of thing, not right now. It still bothered her.

***

That night, talking to Dow, she related the whole incident. She could tell Dow found it as foul as she did; she could swear he grunted a little when she got to the kiss. “Can you believe it?”

She liked talking to Dow because he was such a good listener. He never interrupted. She used to think she liked talking to people, but maybe she really just liked hearing herself talk and having someone listen. They spoke, she lying on his back staring at the stars, him lying on his belly staring at the ground.

“I remember what Gao used to say,” she said. “If you don't want to get treated like a child, stop acting like one. I didn't really know what that meant at the time. I thought it meant acting like all the adults acted, and shutting off all my feelings, and being too cool for everyone else. And I was so good at it they put me on the board of the Alchemists' Guild! Can you believe? But I don't think I was ever mature, not really. I think I was pretending to be mature, which isn't really the same thing. I'm just so sick of pretending. You know what I mean?”

She sighed. What did maturity even mean? Maybe it meant having control over your feelings, really thinking them through—she was thinking of her mother now, patient, kind, someone who really thought about her words and her actions. Mother didn't get rid of her feelings. Maybe Mother’s way was right. Or maybe it just seemed that way because mother was so stable, so balanced, like a well-made sword. Ruyi was tired of pretending, and she was tired of trying to be stable too. She wrinkled her nose. “I don't know, I can't figure it out.” She talked so much she confused herself. She wasn't even sure what she wanted anymore.

“Goodnight!” She said to Dow. She patted him on the head. Sometimes she felt only he really understood her. She wasn't sure how she’d gone 17 years without him. She flipped over onto her belly, buried her face in his fluffy back, and tried to fall asleep.

It took a while. There were just too many things to worry about. Tomorrow they entered the springs. She was as strong as she could get; she hoped it would be enough.