Page 27 of A Forgery of Fate

“I wasn’t stealing a rose,” I countered. “I fell onto them.”

“While trespassing.”

“I wasn’t trespassing. The spirits of the Ghost Festival possessed my scroll.” I brandished it with a quick wave. “That’s why it landed in your garden.”

“The spirits of the Ghost Festival possessed your scroll,” he repeated. He leaned on his umbrella with a sneer. “Does that explain why you were sneaking off into the mansion as well?”

My cheeks grew hot. “I was looking for the exit.”

EvenIdidn’t believe me.

“You trampled my rosebushes,” he thundered. “You dragged your filthy shoes across my shrubs and befouled the air with your presence. If you think you can trespass onto my property, destroy my roses, and simply walk free”—he drew tall, blocking me from the path—“you are mistaken, krill.”

“Krill?” I echoed.

“That’s what you’ll soon be, for stealing.”

First fertilizer, now food for his turtle. This Demon Prince was delusional.

I shouldered past him, intent on leaving. A mistake.

He sprang in front of me and emitted a beastly roar that boomed across the garden. The earth shuddered, the pond went still. Any other day, I might have had the sense to feel afraid, but not today. Not today.

“If you’re going to kill me,” I said, “just do it already. I’m in a bit of a hurry.”

His eyes pierced through the mask, startling me. How hadn’t I noticed them? They were mismatched, unlike any I’d seen before. One as black as the rose in my hand—so liquid and dark I couldn’t make out his pupil. The other yellow like the sulfur powder I’d ground to paint fire once.

The Demon Prince, he was called. But his eyes weren’t those of a demon. Not quite human either.

“You really have a death wish, don’t you?”

“No, I simply don’t understand why you care so much about a single rose. You have so many. And, to settle the matter, it was your flower that tore into my painting.” I raised my ruined scroll to view. “If anything, you should be payingme.”

“I assure you, that flower is worth far more than anything you might possess.”

“Are you out of your mind? It’s a flower.” I shook my scroll. “This is an original masterpiece.”

“We shall see,” he said. Too swiftly he plucked it from me, undoing the cord with ease. My dragon scroll came unbound, his tail winding to the ground.

“You say my flower tore into your scroll?” said the Demon Prince. “I see no disrepair.”

“Then you must be…” The words died on my lips. He was right; the rip was no more. Vanished, as if it’d never been.

He lifted the painting so it was level with his gaze. Then, suddenly, his yellow eye glowed with vehemence. “From where did you steal this?”

“I didn’t steal it.” I stood on my toes, reaching for the edges of my parchment. “It’s mine.”

“Your life depends on the truth, krill.” The Demon Prince held the scroll higher. “How did you come about this painting?”

“I drew it.”

“Youdrew this.”

Again that mixture of disdain and disbelief.

“With ink and a brush,” I snapped. “Is that so hard to believe?”

His attention didn’t waver from my painting. “Countless artists have tried to paint dragons in their lifetimes, but it is impossible to capture their spirit without having seen one.”

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