Dense forestry rushed past the windows in a blur, the trees turning all- consuming the farther out they went on rural land. They had only left the scene moments ago and had quickly exited the town, but Rosalind didn’t feel like they had made a getaway.
It didn’t help that Alisa was… not a great driver. On the third time Rosalind got tossed around in the back seat, she realized with rather decisive certainty that Alisa didn’t actually know how to drive.
“So I have bad news and good news,” Rosalind said, recovering from the rough bump and glancing out the rear windshield. As long as they didn’t crash, she supposed she didn’t need to be fussy.
“Good news 1rst,” Alisa said from the front.
“I’m bleeding at a rather steady rate, so I’m not dying for another half hour, give or take.”
Alisa turned around at once. Rosalind yelped, her hand Aailing to clutch the seat while the car almost pivoted oP the dirt road. Her life Aashed before her eyes.
“Sorry, sorry!” Alisa took control of the wheel again. “That’s the good news?”
“The bad news is that we’re being pursued.”
“What? But there’s no car—” Alisa squinted into her rearview mirror. Rosalind caught the moment Alisa spotted them too: 1ve, maybe six soldiers. Running. They had to be enhanced by Lady Hong’s experiments in some manner or other, else it would be impossible to keep pace with the car. And they were keeping pace very closely. “Oh, surely you jest.”
“I don’t think they jest. Can we lose them?”
Alisa shook her head. “Not here. There’s no path anywhere but forward.”
The trees were too dense on either side of the dirt road. Their only alternative was going by foot too, and they most de1nitely did not have the means to outrun the soldiers, especially with Orion knocked out.
Rosalind inched closer to him. She was afraid he would bolt awake when she touched his face, her every paltry movement ginger as if she were treating a wild animal. There were multiple bruises where his neck met his shoulders. Too many to have been caused by her one hairpin, and besides, she had stabbed into muscle to avoid harming him. These were older. Her 1nger traced the edges of the purple mottling, her inhale held inside her lungs. She could feel his heartbeat thrumming directly under his skin, soft and wild.
His mother was still experimenting on him. That was all Rosalind could conclude in a red-hot 1t of rage, but how did this make any sense? Lady Hong had been present at the scene herself. She could have easily issued her instructions there, commanded that her soldiers haul Orion back the moment he collapsed under the sedative. Instead, she had disappeared into the smoke, no one had come to combat Rosalind, and the thick of the battle had been with the Kuomintang in a whole diPerent section of the gardens. Now there were soldiers running after them, but why send people after the fact? Why let them have him at all?
“The nearest township from here,” Rosalind said, “is it Zhouzhuang?”
The car jerked again. Alisa’s eyes Aashed fast to the rearview mirror, catching Rosalind’s gaze for a brief moment before she course-corrected. It had been too fast to determine, but Rosalind swore she caught surprise in Alisa’s expression.
“No. That’s slightly farther out,” Alisa said. “Why?” “Celia said it’s the nearest hospital.”
“Celia?”
“Oh, you didn’t notice her in the smoke?”
Alisa removed one hand from the wheel to pinch the bridge of her nose. They started to veer left. “What the hell is she talking about? There’s no hospital in Zhouzhuang.”
Rosalind frowned. “I don’t suppose she’s just trying to kill me. She’s had nineteen years in the same household as me and 1ve years with an enemy faction to try.”
The car veered even farther. Noticing their diagonal driving, Alisa quickly adjusted the wheel again, her attention Aicking up to check on their pursuers.
“Tell it to me straight,” she said. “Do you need medical attention right now?” Rosalind hesitated. “No.”
“Miss Lang.”
“No. I told you, I’ll be 1ne.”
For half an hour. If the poison didn’t take her out 1rst.
It was as if Alisa could hear that silent addition. She raised her brow into the rearview, and Rosalind stared back.
“We’re stopping,” Alisa decided. “Celia probably knows better than I do.” “What?” Rosalind exclaimed. “They’ll catch up the moment we stop.” “You can’t argue with me on this. It’ll do no good if you end up dead.” “I’m not going to end up dead.”
“Do you see how much you’re bleeding?”
“Yes, Alisa, I clearly see it when it’s my own blood.”
The car fell silent. Her tone had sliced forward razor-sharp, weighted with every bit of panic in her stomach. Alisa Ainched, drawing her shoulders up to her ears. Rosalind felt her tongue curdle in her mouth.
“Wait, sorry,” she hurried to say, her volume lowering. For most of her life she had trained as a dancer, and yet she still seemed to walk through the world with horrendously clumsy feet, stomping on the toes of every person she passed. “I didn’t mean to sound like that.”
“It’s 1ne.” Alisa scrunched her nose. Her tone genuinely matched her response, brushing oP the matter without any hint of bitterness. “You have to admit that I’m right, though. We can’t keep driving into oblivion. We’re more likely to run out of fuel before these soldiers get tired.”
Another bump in the road sent the car Aying for a Aash of a second. Rosalind tightened her grip on Orion’s arm, a lump building in her throat. If Jiemin had anything to do with that note from JM, stopping in Zhouzhuang wouldn’t bode well. There might be an ambush waiting. She might be walking right back into Nationalist hands.
Yet Alisa was right—what was the alternative? The back seat reeked of a metallic smell. She was keeping her shoulder as still as she could, but even with
the blade plugging up its wound, small rivulets streamed nonstop from either side of it.
“Drive faster,” Rosalind said. “They’re catching up.”
“They only build engines that go so fast,” Alisa muttered. She made a hard right at an upcoming bend, then stomped harder on the accelerator. When her gaze returned to the rearview this time, it only inspected their pursuers for a moment before lowering onto Orion. “Should we tie him up?”
“What?” Rosalind curled her hand around Orion’s arm, holding him steady against the rocking car. “Why would we do that?”
“He’s the one who stabbed you.” “It’s 1ne.”
Something had gotten through. Whether it was memory or not, it had changed the direction of his attack, even if he couldn’t stop himself entirely.
“I’m not even going to pretend to understand,” Alisa muttered. The sunset had almost disappeared over the horizon. It would be pitch-black in a few minutes, which wasn’t great when there weren’t any streetlights on these rural routes. “The exit to Zhouzhuang is coming up.”
Rosalind turned to investigate the rear window again. “The moment we stop, I’d give it twenty seconds before they’re on us.”
“Then we’d better move fast.” Alisa swerved a fast left. Suddenly, she was on a proper paved road, driving toward a set of town gates with lights shining at their base. “You keep them back; I’ll shoot.”
Rosalind blinked. “Don’t you know hand-to-hand combat?”
“Miss Lang, please.” Alisa started to press on the brake. “My side has a resource shortage. Covert agents go into the 1eld untrained. Or bringing whatever skills they already possess.”
“I mean, I knew that.” Rosalind shifted in her seat, pressing closer to the
door in preparation. “I just thought, with the way you grew up…” “The gangs dissolved when I was thirteen.”
“All right, all right.” The car skidded against gravel, joining two other vehicles parked by the gate. “That’s my mistake.”
At once, Rosalind and Alisa pushed out into the night, meeting a 1erce gust of wind. Their doors slammed closed. An unconscious Orion remained inside.
With the light around the gate, it was harder to see movement coming by the tree line, but Rosalind knew they would be approaching.
Alisa clambered onto the top of the car. Her gun clicked with the sound of the safety coming oP.
“There they are.”
Quicker than Rosalind could have imagined, the soldiers arrived. “I’d better not regret this.”
Rosalind yanked the knife out of her shoulder for a weapon, then used it on the 1rst soldier lunging at her. She turned to the next immediately, moving on after one deep slash. Alisa’s gunshots were terribly loud. Though Rosalind winced with apprehension that it would draw out the townspeople living in Zhouzhuang, there was no time to dwell on the matter: three new soldiers were on her at once. And despite Rosalind aiming well when she made her next slash, her knee grew weak when she pivoted, sending her oP-balance. The knife skittered to the gravel. She was empty-handed.
Rosalind could ignore the pain, push her shoulder wound to the recesses of her attention. But she couldn’t ignore her rapid blood loss once she’d pulled the blade out, her vision spinning faster and faster. White dots danced in her periphery. Loomed larger.
When the soldier grabbed her, she barely had time to take a breath before he was trying to drag her away. They must have been instructed to take their subjects alive, or this would hardly be a 1ght. The soldiers weren’t trying to kill; they were trying to capture.
“Christ.” Rosalind kicked. It did nothing. She dug her heels into the ground.
Still nothing.
“Rosalind, do something!” Alisa screamed. With one yank, she was hauled oP the top of the car and roughly onto the gravel. “I’m out of bullets!”
“I’m”—Rosalind grasped frantically through her hair—“trying!” “Try harder!”
“Alisa, that is so unhelpful!”
Rosalind 1nally released herself, stabbing her last hairpin into the soldier’s wrist. Even with that momentary freedom, another had ahold of her in an instant, an ironclad grip around her upper arm. She wheezed, making a count of
their opponents. No one was going for Orion in the car. Why wasn’t anyone going for Orion in the car?
There was no way Rosalind was getting out of this. Whatever Lady Hong’s intention was sending these soldiers after them, she must have wanted Rosalind captured. It was over.
Then a sudden gunshot tore through the night. Rosalind pivoted fast, still Aailing in protest, eyes searching for Alisa. The soldier that had been holding Alisa collapsed on the ground, a bullet in his forehead.
“How did you do that?”
Alisa looked up with a start. “That wasn’t me.” “What? Who would—”
The night came alive in a Aurry of motion. Before Rosalind could scream in fright, another 1gure was on the scene, leaping onto the soldier holding her and slashing his throat. A woman—clothed in black with fabric pulled across her face. As soon as she was on the move, she threw something to the side, and then a man was there too, catching the knife she had passed on. He was dressed the same.
And he was just as fast, two bullets to weaken another soldier before his blade slashed into a rib cage.
Who are these people?
Rosalind scrambled to steady herself. She yanked her hairpin out from the body on the ground to keep the last soldier back, but the woman was on it before she could do much. Though the soldier landed a punch, the woman smoothly took the attention and absorbed the attack while the man 1nished the killing blow on the soldier’s back. Down he went.
The night 1nally exhaled.
The two strangers exchanged a glance. Turned around.
Rosalind’s hand went up to clutch her shoulder. In the silence that followed, she was trying to stay vigilant despite being close to passing out, because if the purpose of this rescue was to intercept the asset in the car and take it for themselves…
Alisa let out a shriek. Rosalind stiPened, except when Alisa ran forward and launched herself at the stranger, she realized it wasn’t a sound of alarm but sheer
delight.
“Oh my God,” the man said. He wrapped his arms around Alisa tightly, holding her up. “Oh my God, Alisa, you’re so big now.”
He was speaking Russian. And his voice sounded… familiar. Slowly, Rosalind turned to the woman.
Holy shit.
She was seeing ghosts.
The woman yanked the square of fabric oP her face.
“Biǎojiě,” Juliette Cai said, grinning. “Don’t you recognize me anymore?”
Rosalind released her shoulder, losing all feeling in her 1ngers. Before she could say a thing in reply, she crumpled to the ground.
