If I could see his serpent-shadow, I imagined it would not even be with Rin, but coiled around Deja’s heart.
Tora, your hairstylist came because of you and now. . .she has transformed my hardest Fang.
After Rin left, I sat alone in my office for a long time.
The book stayed closed on my desk. My hand rested on top of it. The leather was warm where his fingers had been.
The sunlight shifted across the floor.
I did not move.
I simply thought about how the whole island was changing due to my Tiger’s presence. Hiro spoke of killing our father with focus now, not rage. He had been a man who killed for sport once. Now he killed for purpose, and the difference sat in his shoulders.
Reo had climbed a dragon's claw for joy. My Roar, who had spent his entire life being strategic and not taking risks, had thrown his body up a thirty-foot claw for the thrill of the moment.
The Claws had fucked themselves stupid the night before a war and woken up hungover and smiling. Men who once carried grief like a second skin had let pleasure scrape some of it off.
And my Tora had walked into my life as a journalist with a notebook and would walk into a hole in the earth tonight to bleed for my bloodline, threading her soul with mine.
The Dragon I had been six months ago would not have recognized the man sitting at this desk. And the man at this desk did not want to be recognized by him.
None of us were who we had been a season ago.
Whatever rose on the other side of this war would not be what had entered.
Now, hours later, I stood at the edge of the burial pit and watched the sun lower itself toward the sea.
The sky was bleeding. The horizon had cracked open and poured out blackening gold. It was now a deep arterial red along the underside of the clouds. The light moved across the water in a long shimmering road, and the road pointed east, toward where the full moon would rise.
Will this Burial Ritual work? Am I doing the right thing?
I studied the sky.
In an hour, silver would meet gold and the full moon would crest above the trees.
Tonight, sunset would be death, and the moonrise would be rebirth. And perhaps, the seam between them was where a soul could be magically braided to another soul.
How much will this change us?
I lowered my view.
Below me, the Scales were finishing the pit. Twelve of them worked the soil with shovels.
Reo had set them to digging this morning. The hole was nearly deep enough now—wide enough for two bodies, deep enough that when we lay down inside it, the lip of the earth would riseabove us like a cradle. The walls were clean. The corners were rounded. The dirt at the bottom had been combed smooth.
I turned to the left. Two Scales carried out a long table, placed it by the pit, and dressed it in white linen. The cloth rippled in the cool breeze.
Two other Scales set candles down, but didn’t light them. A few more put down the place settings—gold and black plates, crystal glasses, a silver bucket of ice for the plum wine.
I turned to the right where the other table held the ceremonial items. Two knives lay side by side on a black silk cloth. The blades were thin, curved, and no longer than my palm. The handles were wrapped in dark indigo cord.
Beside the knives, a shallow stone bowl held lotus blossoms. They were white at the base, deepening to a soft blush at the tips, with golden centers that glowed in the slanting light. Their stems had been trimmed clean. Their petals had been left wide open.
Past the lotus bowl, two robes lay folded—deep red silk for Nyomi, deep black for me. Each had a dragon embroidered along the back in gold thread.
And beyond all of that, near a smaller table set up close to where the path met the clearing, Chef Bunzo tended a charcoal grill.
The fire glowed soft orange under the dimming sky.
