She drank, and her soul sang.

The world was made of brighter, bolder colors. Her body felt light, floating, and her chest throbbed with warmth.

Then she felt four white-hot points sink into her side.

Enraged, she let loose the carcass, spun, slashed, but her enemy spun with her—a giant serpent-demon, she saw now. She slammed over on her side but she only drove its fangs in deeper; she yowled. She couldn’t shrug it off but she had it crushed against the ground. She struck out, snagged hold of its tail, and sank her own fangs in too.

Hers sank deeper. This snake had poor blood. A lot of blood, yes, but it did not take well to essence. It was Late Core. She was Middle. Yet it was her who stole faster. She felt a brick-like thing smash at her head once, twice, she felt claws scrabbling at her arms, sinking into her back, reams of fire and lighting breaking on her skin. Little strikes of little creatures. She paid them no heed; she only had eyes for her prey.

The snake must’ve felt the end coming for it let go. It tried bucking her off—hard to do when half its skeleton was frozen solid—threw acids in her eyes, and they burned her, true, but you could hurt her all you liked. Ruyi was never letting go.

The snake gave one last twitch before it slumped. It still lived, but it couldn’t show it; the ice had it firm in its grip now. Its heart trudged to a halt. Its blood ran dry.

Then Ruyi turned her attention to the few Feral beasts which insisted on battering her. One stork-demon pecked at her. She pecked back, but with her teeth, and snapped the thing’s neck with a bite. Two slashes tore open two humanoids—one, she was satisfied to see, was the creature who’d been drumming at her head, an ape-thing with great big fists. These creatures might be Core, like her, but she was made of different flesh. The thought made her feel a fierce pride.

There were three Core demons harassing Gao and a dozen Feral darting in and out, trying to catch her from behind. She had trapped them in a field of lightning. A dozen charred corpses were laid out in a smoking circle.

Then a massive head burst through the maw where the portcullis had been. A humanoid whose aura blew out from him like a horn of war. A Demon King. He looked like an orc of the legends, studded with steel rings from his nose to his ears, and his forearms were two great plates, honed sharp as battle-axes. Their edges burned wildfire red.

“Gaia,” said the Demon King. “You disappoint me.”

Demons poured out from behind him, a tide of black rushing at Gao. As she turned to face the new threat the old ones leapt for her. They didn’t slash or claw or bite, just clutched at her legs and wings, taking her under. Even shocked senseless they weighed her down. The others leapt over, piling on, and she vanished under a mound of writhing black limbs, and the Demon King advanced, smiling—

A spike of pain took Ruyi in the flank and she yowled, spinning around. That was Gao’s battle to fight. They’d come for Ruyi too, a good half-dozen. The one that’d took her was a late Feral goat-demon but her eyes were on the humanoid one at the front, a giant near ten feet with scales for flesh. Each finger of his was like a knife, and he gave off a Peak Core aura.

She growled, sinking into her haunches, and when she breathed the air frosted around her face. Now that she faced them they seemed scared to attack. As they should.

So she struck first.

She pounced. Then she stared in dumb shock as ten points of pain blossomed in her chest.

The humanoid had gotten his hands up—he’d waited for her to leap, then let her impale herself! Ripping herself away left bloody streaks down her chest. He’d tricked her!

How dare he?

She narrowed her eyes. She needed to get in but he had fast fingers. So how—

A goblin-demon came stabbing at her flank but she ripped it clean in half with a slash. Then, dancing over its spray of blood, she hit its neighbors with a frost-breath so strong it froze their eyes in their sockets.

That taught the little ones to keep to themselves. She was trying to think. Puzzles, like Mother said. How would she solve this one? She was fast, faster than this humanoid, but not faster than his fingers; she remembered what Marcus had done to Sen. Shown her a fake, then hit her with the real.

Ruyi sank down as if to pounce, bounced off the balls of her feet—

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His claws slashed up at her ghost. Then she actually pounced, his arms missed wide, and her mouth opened wide, fangs arching for his throat.

The humanoid moved fast. He pulled back but she still managed to sink her teeth into his arm. Then she anchored herself to his flesh with her claws, one dug into his chest, the other his back, and she climbed up his body and sank her fangs, at last, into neck-flesh.

She liked the neck because it was close to so many important things. Her frost spread fast up to the brain, where it froze the struggling bits. Her frost spread down to the heart, where it seized hold of the muscle. So much blood went through the neck, so much essence, it made for easy drinking.

When she let this corpse fall she was whole. There was nothing human in her anymore.

She lifted her head to the Heavens and roared.

***

The ground was littered with the dead. Only three were left living. Her, Gao, and the Demon King.

Gao and the King were facing each other. Her wing was hanging on by a gristle of flesh, axed clean down the middle, and around her were the smoking remains of a dozen demons; she had roasted them so badly their skin slagged off their bones.

The King was bleeding from a thousand cuts. There were chunks of him torn off where Ruyi could see the tendons.

She stalked for the big man. She feinted high, like she was pouncing for her head. He didn’t bite. She dived low, he swung—at another feint. She went high again and she had him.

Almost had him.

A burning line carved up her face and she went sprawling, howling. But it was enough. Gao had him by the arms. She froze him with lightning, and as he grappled with her Ruyi leapt with a feral roar.

She sank her fangs into his throat.

He struck her so hard she heard cracks spreading up her chest. She felt softnesses burst inside her. But she clung on, forcing the cold inside him, into the nerves. Her own blood burst up her throat, filling her mouth. Still she didn’t let go.

His failing life-force became her own.

He toppled like a great old tree. The crash was spectacular. It raised plumes of dust, sent fractures up the ice-coated ground. And still Ruyi held on. She didn’t stop until he stopped twitching. Only then did she lick her lips.

Then there was the two of them. Her and Gao, and it was hard to say which of them was more injured. Gao was on her knees; somehow the major bones holding up her other wing had been shattered in the chaos.

Gao shrank. Maybe she’d run out of essence; maybe she couldn’t sustain Demonform. As she stood before Ruyi she was a frail old lady, very much like the old lady she’d met eight years ago, searching for a new Alchemy tutor.

It would be so easy to end her.

It had been all Ruyi had been thinking of in that horrible haze. Gao must’ve known what she was thinking; the old lady sighed.

Ruyi saw it so clearly now. Since the start this demon named Gao had played her—she’d known about little Ruyi’s ego. She’d withheld her affection that first meeting, doled it out in little drops so Ruyi kept running after her, begging for more. She’d stretched it out over years. She’d made Ruyi her dog; she’d had her eating out of her palm. It was kind of like Father. Maybe they smelled the same weakness in her.

“I was always proud of you,” said Gao softly. “That, at least, was real.”

Ruyi snarled at her but Gao kept on. “Whatever you wish to do, I understand.”

She closed her eyes, laid out her palms, bared her throat, like she was showing Ruyi where to put her fangs. Like she was daring Ruyi to hurt her. Like she knew Ruyi couldn’t bring herself to do it.

It was as though all you needed to do was show Ruyi a little kindness, just a little, every so often, and you could hurt her all you liked, and she would do nothing. There was a Ruyi like that, a little girl who could hate you, and hate you, and hate you, until you showed her a little love, and then she was yours forever.

Ruyi was trembling.

She had been burning with so much hate when she’d writhed on that altar; hate was all she was, but when she reached for it now it was like grasping at smoke. She wished she could hold onto hate forever and ever. But she just couldn’t. It wasn’t who she was.

It wasn’t with hate that she stalked forward then.

She wasn’t that little girl anymore.

She was just so tired of being hurt.

Gao closed her eyes as Ruyi bit down.

Gao shuddered, gasped, but she held still as the cold spread inside her. She lay there a long time, nearly ten breaths, heart still weakly fluttering, before it gave out and her eyes turned to blue crystals.

Ruyi felt full, stretched with power, on the verge of something, but she was struck by a sudden spell of fatigue; the weight of the day struck her all at once. She had been carrying far more than she’d known. She needed badly to sleep. She stumbled around, the room swimming blurry before her eyes—

—Someone was coming. Shouts—“Rue! Rue?”

Jin?!

Her brother bust into the chamber, saw the blood on the altar and ran for it. “No, no, no!”

She was so relieved at the sight of him she almost passed out. No, she wanted to say. I’m okay. I’m right here. She stumbled towards him. For the first time since she woke, she felt safe. He whirled around, caught sight of her at last, and she felt such an upwelling of joy she nearly broke down. Until that moment she hadn’t registered the things they’d done to her, hadn’t really understood them; she couldn’t afford to. It was crashing on her, all at once. She hadn’t known how badly she’d needed him until he was here.

Jin, she tried to say, but her throat wouldn’t make the noise, just a low whine.

Then she saw the look on his face. There was so much hate there, so much disgust, she recoiled. Jin?

He marched over to her as she stood there, staring, still in shock. It’s me, she wanted to say.

He drew his spear.

She couldn’t believe he’d really hurt her until the moment his spear went through her throat.