And as I have done countless times, the Queen obeys him.
She slips her nightdress to her waist, then takes my hand. Unlike the King’s touch, hers is gentle. She guides my fingers to her belly. Knowing the King is watching closely, and anticipating what’s expected of us, I turn my hand to press the gingko leaf to her bump. The Queen lays her hand atop mine. I feel a heartbeat, but I don’t know if it’s the Queen’s own pulse or that of the child. Judging by the size of her bump, she can’t be much more than three or four months along. Surely it’d be too soon to notice anything?
The thought brings the reality of the situation crashing down on me.
A child.
The King’s heir.
“You will bless this child, Moonchosen,” the King says over the rush of blood in my ears. “Bless my son. Bless him to be healthy, and strong, and powerful, so he will grow up to be just like his father.”
I meet the Queen’s eyes, which still burn with a look I’m struggling to read. I force out a few mumbled prayers. When I draw away, the leaf remains pressed to the Queen’s belly. The King reaches out, and it disappears beneath his own, much larger hand. He tells me that from the angle of the Queen’s swell, the doctors are sure it’s a boy.
“My heir,” the King breathes, reverent.
The Queen and I wince.
The King gives a resentful snort. “My fortune-tellers and diviners attribute this luck to you, Lei-zhi. Well, if this is what the gods needed to be appeased, so be it. They’ve seen how hard I’ve been trying to do right by Ikhara. They have finally been moved by my fealty—and this is only the beginning. More rewards for my hard work and sacrifice are to come. I am certain.” His stare is piercing. “Well, Lei-zhi? What do you say to an expecting parent?”
Parent. Not parents.
Something flares across the Demon Queen’s face, and I understand perfectly then what she’s been trying to tell me.
The King must not have his heir.
I keep my eyes on the Queen as I clear my throat and say, “Eight thousand congratulations.”
My pulse doesn’t stop racing even once we’re back in the palanquin. The King sits closer this time, and I sense the confidence rolling off him, his old swagger restored by our visit. On the way to the Queen’s quarters, he only touched me in ire or force. Now, as the carriage glides on invisible shoulders back to Royal Court, he leans in, brushing a finger along my cheekbone.
“You think you are so strong,” he drawls. His tone and touch ignite my memory, making me recall all the times he was easy and calm around me, sure I could never hurt him. “You think your lover and her pitiful father are going to rescue you again, don’t you? That they’ll overcome my demons and take this land from me.”
The King goes to laugh, but the noise hitches in his ruined throat.
“I warned you, Lei-zhi,” he continues after a pause. “You are powerless—and so are they. I have already crushed Nantanna and taken Ketai Hanno’s right-hand man down, along with half his strongest warriors and allies. The White Wing have pledged their allegiance to me. It’s only a matter of time before the rest of the Hannos’ pathetic uprising falls. Once it does, I will restore this kingdom to its former glory and rule over it with my son at my side.”
I want to scream. Thrash out and smother him right here and now. I could—and maybe I would, were it not for the band on Aoki’s wrist and the rest of the Paper Girls, sleeping soundly in my room, and the message in the Demon Queen’s eyes.
Killing the King is not enough. Not now that I have the girls to save—and especially not now that he has an heir to take on his poisoned throne.
Love. Fear. Maybe both the King and I are right: they are the two most powerful emotions for your enemy to exploit.
I think of the Queen’s burgeoning bump beneath my fingers and the pulse I felt there. I know what Wren would do in this situation. What her father would have prepared her for. What they would tell me now to do. But the Demon Queen’s look bared what she wants, and regarding this, hers is the only opinion that counts.
She was telling me the King must not have his heir.
So instead, I need to make sure the Queen will have hers.
TWELVE
LEI
THE NEXT MORNING, THE KING HOLDS an announcement ceremony for court officials. By sunset, the news is all over the palace. Though no Demon King has ever officially broadcast a Queen’s pregnancy, rumors—like blood—have always run easily within these walls. I didn’t tell the girls about my midnight excursion, yet by the time I return from the celebratory meetings and banquets I was forced to attend, they’d overheard the news from loose-tongued demons gossiping in the corridor outside. The instant I walked into our room, I knew that they knew.
They only looked at me, all of us silent for a long while. Then Blue barked, with an impatient flap of a hand, “Well? Is it true?”
“Yes.”
Though all the girls were staring at me, it was Aoki my eyes locked on. Her hair was mussed, her eyes red from crying. At my answer, anguish wrecked her face. She crumpled to the floor and burst into wails.
I moved, wanting to comfort her, to reassure my best friend in the way I used to. In the way she used to do for me. But Chenna stopped me. So I hung back as Zhen and Zhin went to her instead.
Not now, Chenna’s look told me.
Not ever, a dark voice in my mind amended.
Later, when the room is finally quiet, Zhen and Zhin cradling a spent, blank-eyed Aoki and Blue picking at the frayed rattan mat in her usual corner, Chenna finally broaches the subject.
“You knew, didn’t you?”
We’re perched on my bed. It’s become a nightly routine. After the others retire to their mats, Chenna keeps me company, and together we pick apart fragments of conversations for clues as to what’s going on in the war.
I’m not surprised by Chenna’s astuteness. She’s always been shrewd, understanding more than she lets on.
She gives me her trademark dry smile. “Your clothes and hair and makeup,” she explains. “Everything is still perfect. If you’d only just found out, you’d never remain so calm as to not get even one wrinkle in your hanfu.”
I almost laugh. “The King brought me to the Demon Queen last night,” I reveal in a whisper.
Chenna’s face blanches.
“I know,” I say. “I still can’t quite believe she’s real.”
“Where?”
“A building in the southern loop of the river.”
She sucks in a breath. “So close. All this time, she’s been so close, and we never knew.” Her eyes are wide. “What is she like?”
“Incredible. She’s incredible, Chenna. Strong. Resolute. Kind. Even after all these years, cooped up in that house, basically alone apart from when the King—” I shake my head. “She’s incredible.”
“Did you get a chance to talk to her?”