Page 75 of A Forgery of Fate

But every time I tried, pain shot up to my chest, immobilizing me. I would get as far as his silhouette before my hand would convulse, and I’d make an involuntary sweep with my brush, blotting out Baba’s face with ink.

Leaving me as I’d been before, with only the ghost of his memory imprinted upon my heart.

My Sight could only give me glimpses of what was to come. Rarely had it done any good. Hadn’t warned me about Gaari’s death, hadn’t given me answers about Baba, hadn’t saved my family from losing our house.

But I had to try.

Muttering under my breath, I let my pupils roll back. I inhaled, blanking my thoughts and cutting away each string that tethered me to consciousness.

Once I let go, the glittering sensation in my fingertips rushed up to the backs of my eyes, sweeping them with a warm, hypnotic wash. The edges of the world blurred, and the rattling blasts from the storm became rinses of sound.

It was like painting in a dream. The Dragon King’s head—his hair, his eyes, and his whiskers—flew out of my brush. I painted jagged cliffs and a dense fog that curled around his beard. It was a place that I didn’t recognize, and if I’d been fully awake, I might have asked Shani about it. But I was trapped in a dream, my lips pressed so tight that I couldn’t part them.

Then the tingle behind my eyes flushed away, and slowly I came out of the trance.

There was a lull in the room, an odd silence from the demon that I wasn’t used to.

“Was it real?” I asked. “Did I paint…Nazayun?”

“Come look for yourself.”

It was always a jolt, seeing my vision manifest on physical paper. But there he was, the Dragon King in all his glory, looming before a frosty ridge. Lightning darted from his eyes, and his talons curled into the pallid sand. And his scales! They were like plates of sapphire, crisp and blue.

“He’s beautiful,” I whispered.

“Heisa god,” said Shani, landing on my shoulder. She pinched my bone. “Don’t be too giddy. Good things rarely come from a visit with His Eternal Majesty.”

I wasn’t listening. “Look at the texture of his scales,” I murmured, tracing my fingers over the sketch. “They’re smooth. Translucent.”

“And so?”

“He’ll be an apparition when we meet,” I explained. “Elang said my portrait has to be as accurate as life itself. If I’m going to do that, I’ll need to see him in the flesh.”

“What do you think I’ve been doing?” huffed the demon. “I know Nazayun better than anyone.”

“Do you know how the shadows of his whiskers fall on his scales? Do you know whether light travels into the gaps between his teeth or how his muscles crease when he moves?”

Shani glowered.

“Most portrait artists wouldn’t either,” I allowed. “But I’m a forger, not an artist. I make my living on noticing things. It’s my job.”

“And my job is to keep you alive. You want to parade over to Jinsang to meet the Dragon King? Be my guest. But don’t blame me when you foresee yourself as a puddle of sea foam.”

“You’re being dramatic.”

“You’rebeing naïve. Like I said, I know Nazayun better than anyone.”

I would have rolled my eyes, except that was precisely when I saw the blood.

It was a shallow red pool I’d painted on the ground, obscured by the swirls of ice and debris surrounding King Nazayun. But once I made it out, it was unmistakable.

“Shani,” I whispered, lifting the edge of the painting so she could see too. “Whose blood is that?”

“Yours, I’d guess,” she replied tartly. “Demons don’t bleed red.”

“That isn’t funny. Will you take another look?”

She sizzled with displeasure, but she studied what I’d painted more closely. “Never mind the blood,” she said at last. “The frost is the real clue. There aren’t many places in Ai’longthatcold. Only the Northerly Seas, or maybe the bottom of the Western Fold.”

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