Page 96 of The Scarlet Alchemist

“I don’t think we should split up again,” he said.

I laughed sharply into his shoulder. “Yes, you’d be dead without me.”

“I thought you were already dead,” the prince said, finally releasing me. “I saw the monster walk by covered in blood. I was sure that meant it had already found you.”

“You really think that I’m more likely to die first?” I said. “If you believed it was after me, you should have just left it alone. They only attack if you get in the way of their target.”

“You would ask me to walk away from the thing that killed you?” the prince said, eyes narrowing.

“You mean you attacked it first?” I said. “Do you have a death wish? Why would you—”

A drop of blood trickled down his collarbone, into my line of vision. I pulled back.

“You’re hurt,” I said. My hands hovered around his throat, where three parallel claw marks ran from the center of his throat down to his collarbone, shredding through the neckline of his robes.

“It’s not deep,” he said, gently moving my hand away.

Only a little bit deeper and we wouldn’t be sitting here talking about it, I thought, my stomach tight. “I can fix it,” I said, my voice wobbly. “Let’s go back. It’s not safe out here anyway.”

“Zilan, it’s fine. I—”

“Shut up,” I said. I tugged him to his feet and dragged him back through the halls to his room. I locked the door, even though I didn’t know anymore whether something as feeble as a lock could really keep out monsters.

I pushed the prince until he sat down on his bed and kneeled in front of him, my hands tracing over the wounds to get a sense of how deep they were. I peeled back a torn layer of his robe, and it was only then that I realized I didn’t have any moonstone on me, that I had no way of actually healing him and he would have been better off with a palace nurse. He swallowed, and I felt the motion under my fingertips, my gaze drifting up to his eyes. They were burning amber, like the gold flecks had melted away into glowing pools.

My fingers slid down to his bare chest. He shivered, a warm hand tucking my hair behind my ear. I leaned into his touch, my hand rising to his face, mirroring his gesture, my fingers staining his skin with blood.

My mind spun with a thousand reasons this was a bad idea. I thought of my cousins telling me how dangerous it was to be close to the prince, how he’d tried to buy me like a cow back in Guangzhou, and most of all, how this could never last once he became Emperor.

But I wasn’t like the members of the royal court, who ate gold to try to keep the world the same for all of eternity. Nothing would last forever, including me. I didn’t need something to be eternal for it to matter.

I leaned forward, but the prince’s hand on my cheek held me a breath away.

“Zilan,” he whispered, “you don’t have to.”

“I know,” I said, frowning.

He shook his head. “Do you? I would still protect you, even if you didn’t want me.”

“You think I don’t know how to refuse you?” I said, shoving his wrist away. “I’ve done nothing but say no to you since the day we met.”

“I’m serious,” he said. “This can be pretend, if you want it to be. You could still stay here. I would keep you safe no matter what.”

I took his face in my hands. “Li Hong,” I said, “I’m done pretending.”

Then I leaned forward and kissed him.

He held me close, hands ghosting over me with reverence. He was everywhere all at once, his heartbeat singing through my bones, his left hand on the small of my back with exquisite gentleness, his right hand laced with mine, clasped tight in a wordless promise. He pulled me onto his bed and whispered my name, one I’d never before thought was beautiful, unraveling me beneath him like a secret.

He slipped my dress from my shoulders, his bright eyes turning to me for permission before I nodded and helped him slide me out of the bloodied layers of silk. But rather than undressing himself, he pressed a kiss to my palm and ran his hand down my bare arm, mapping my skin. I shivered as his fingers whispered across my collarbone, across the racing pulse at my throat.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“Remembering,” he said, kissing the inside of my elbow. “You don’t eat gold, so every moment, you change just a little bit. You will never look exactly like this again. I want to remember this moment forever.”

My whole body glowed at his words and I turned away, unable to look at him, sure he could feel my quickening heartbeat.

“There is no forever,” I said. “Not in the future we want.”

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