The grass whipped against their legs as they ran. The blades were taller than they first seemed, brushing against Li Fong's waist and slowing her movement with every step. The moons cast sharp shifting light across the field, bending strangely around patches of shimmering air that wavered like heat.
Li Fong pushed forward, but she grew weak quickly. Running had never been her strength, and the ground felt wrong under her feet. Each step sank slightly, as if the earth was padded with soft moss. Her breaths turned shallow and hot. The metallic tang of the foreign air stung her throat.
Behind them, a distant call rose again. A deep sound that rolled through the ground like a slow churning drumbeat. The soil trembled under their feet in steady pulses.
A'shae glanced toward her.
That was all it took.
He saw her falter, her stride unsteady, her breath catching sharply. Her foot slid against a patch of glowing moss, and her knee buckled.
A'shae reached her in an instant. He caught her by the arm, braced her with his other hand at her waist, and pulled her upright.
"Lean on me," he said, already adjusting his pace and shifting his body to take more of her weight. "Come on."
Li Fong tried to steady herself. "I can keep up," she insisted, breath strained.
Her legs disagreed. Her balance wavered again, weak and unreliable.
A'shae didn't hesitate. He wrapped her arm across his shoulders and tightened his grip around her side, guiding her forward with surprising strength. He kept his steps firm and controlled, matching the rhythm of her stumbling stride before pulling her into a faster pace she couldn't manage alone.
Another rumble shook the ground behind them. A roar burst across the grasslands, low and drawn out. The air vibrated with it. Spiraling glasslike plants ahead of them lit up in response, their surfaces glowing with sharp symbols that pulsed at the sound.
Li Fong forced herself to look around. "The plants react to the noise," she said through rapid breaths. "They are warning each other."
A'shae didn't slow. "Then we're going the right way. Away from the warnings."
The plants continued to flare in sequence, one after another, creating a trail of glowing symbols that spread across the grassland like a chain reaction. Each one lit up brighter when the next roar sounded.
It was getting closer.
Li Fong's legs trembled violently, threatening to collapse again. She clenched her jaw, frustrated by her own limits. "I am slowing you down."
"You're not," A'shae said, even though she clearly was. His voice was steady, not soft. "I've got you."
Another tremor rippled beneath them. The glowing plants bent as if pushed by an unseen force. The grass in the distance parted, and Li Fong caught a glimpse of movement huge, towering above the field. Two long lines of light glowed like eyes in the shifting dark.
Fear clawed up her spine.
A'shae pulled her closer, practically carrying her forward now. "Don't look back."
She focused on his voice. On his warmth. On the strength she often forgot he possessed. He moved with certainty, guiding her through the tall grass, taking each heavy step as if the fear behind them only drove him harder.
Ahead, the land began to change. Faint rocky shapes rose from the ground, jutting from the purple grass like the remnants of ruins or the teeth of some ancient creature. The air hummed louder here, filled with a strange energy that made her skin prickle.
A roar erupted again behind them, so close it rattled her bones.
Li Fong stumbled.
A'shae lifted her arm higher around his shoulders and tightened his hold. "Just a little farther," he said between strained breaths. "We just need somewhere to hide."
The vibrations grew stronger. The ground quaked harder.
A'shae forced out a breath and managed a small smile, even through the fear.
"Trust me, okay?"
Li Fong looked at him, leaning completely into his support.
"I do," she whispered.
And together they pushed themselves toward whatever shelter the strange new world might offer.
A'shae kept his gaze fixed ahead, his breath sharp and controlled, but Li Fong felt the change in his shoulders,the subtle tightening, the shift in his stride. He had looked back.
She did not dare to. His earlier warning still echoed in her mind.
But A'shae's pupils shrank, his jaw locking with quiet dread.
The beast tore through the grass behind them.
Its shape lurched out of the shimmering darkness, wrong and mismatched yet terrifyingly fluid in its movement. A hawk's skull crowned its head, but where a beak should have been, rows upon rows of serrated teeth jutted out like jagged crystal. Its forelegs were massive, striped, and muscled like a tiger's, sinking deep grooves into the earth with each bound. Its scaled serpentine torso rippled with the runic glow of ancient markings, symbols that twitched and shifted as if alive. Its rear limbs were long, taloned, and avian, bending at sharp angles like an ostrich preparing to sprint.
Its aura hit A'shae like a wave, foul and oppressive, heavy enough to make the ground itself recoil.
He knew instantly.
We cannot outrun that.
Just ahead, between jutting rocks, a narrow burrow yawned open like a crack in the earth.
A'shae's grip tightened. "Li Fong. Get in."
She snapped her head toward him. "What?"
"No time. Go."
His voice had no tremor. Firm. Unshaking. The voice he only used when he had already accepted the consequences.
The voice she hated.
She felt him shift his weight, practically shoving her toward the gap.
"A'shae"
"Trust me." he said again, but softer this time. Almost gentle.
Before she could protest, he guided her down, forcing her into the narrow burrow. The stone scraped her shoulders, the space was far too tight for her tall frame, but she managed to twist inside.
Then she realized.
He was not following.
"A'shae!" She scrambled backward, forcing her shoulders against jagged rock, frantic. But he was already turning away, sprinting out from the shelter.
She squeezed out with a violent shove, ignoring the sting of torn skin. "A'shae, no!"
Too late.
The beast streaked past her like a streak of darkness.
And the next time she saw A'shae
He was in its claws.
His body hung limply, blood dripping in long arcs. His clothes were shredded, his ribs visible through deep gouges carved across his chest. His left eye was gone, emptied. His right hand dangled with two fingers missing, bone exposed.
Her heart fractured.
Something inside her, cold and precise and ruthlessly controlled, finally snapped.
"A'shae," she whispered, the name trembling from her lips.
A single breath later, her grief erupted.
Her scream tore through the air, splitting the clouds, cracking open the heavens. The world shuddered as if the sky itself bowed before her agony. Streams of energy, pure and starlit and cosmic, rushed to her, spiraling upward like rivers of light. They danced across her skin, into her bones, then up into the night sky until the entire horizon glowed with brilliant, impossible colors.
The grass flattened. The stones vibrated. The air hummed with ancient resonance.
The beast froze.
Then its head snapped toward her, teeth clicking hungrily.
It lunged.
She met it this time, not gracefully or skillfully, but with raw, overwhelming power surging through her veins. Energy coiled around her arms, clumsy and unstable, yet potent enough to blast the creature back with each strike.
The ground cratered beneath her feet.
She fought with grief, not technique, and each exchange pushed her further to the edge. Her limbs shook. Her vision blurred. The beast's claws raked her side, drawing blood. It slammed her into the shattered earth. Her bones screamed.
It pinned her down.
Its maw opened, teeth unfolding like a horrific flower.
Her voice cracked.
"Die. You monster."
The universe listened.
A jagged tear of power ripped into existence and slammed into the beast's shoulder, leaving a charred, smoking wound. It screeched, angry and wounded but not defeated. It staggered, then realigned itself, hatred burning in its eerie glowing eyes.
It lunged again.
A beam of radiant energy descended from the heavens and erased the creature from existence.
No sound. No struggle.
It simply vanished.
A man drifted down with the starlight.
Silver white hair flowed like liquid moonlight, and his robes shimmered with constellations that shifted and rearranged themselves as he moved. His presence bent the air, ancient and whimsical and unfathomably powerful.
He looked at Li Fong as one might gaze upon a miracle.
"So this is the one destined to rule the heavens." he murmured, wonder curling his lips.
Li Fong ignored him completely.
She stumbled to A'shae's side, her hands shaking uncontrollably as she touched his face. His remaining eye was half open, unfocused. His breaths were shallow, fading.
"A'shae. A'shae stay with me, please."
Tears spilled freely, dripping onto his ruined skin.
The white haired man appeared beside her in an instant, floating lazily above the ground.
"Come now," he said, tone light and almost playful. "He IS dying. Best to leave him behind. Mortals do this constantly."
Li Fong's voice sharpened into ice. "I would rather die a thousand deaths."
He sighed, genuinely disappointed.
"Such devotion. Tiresome, but admirable." He flicked his fingers, and a small pill crystalline and glowing with the essence of life itself materialized between them. "Very well. A waste, truly, but I suppose even the heavens indulge sentiment once every few millennia."
She did not care.
The moment the pill touched A'shae's tongue, light flooded his body. His wounds sealed before her eyes, skin knitting back together, organs mending, bone reshaping. His breaths steadied. His color returned.
But the missing fingers remained gone.
And a thin scar cut vertically across his ruined left eye.
Li Fong exhaled a shuddering breath of relief.
The white haired man clicked his tongue. "There. Now come along. You have much to learn."
Li Fong slid her arms under A'shae, trying to lift him. He was shorter but solid, dense with muscle and heavier than he appeared. Her legs trembled. She could not budge him.
The man sighed loudly.
"Oh for stars' sake."
Cosmic energy swept around them, lifting both her and A'shae effortlessly into the air. The world fell away beneath them as they ascended into the shimmering sky.
The man floated above them, muttering to himself.
"Mortals. Forever inconvenient. Forever fragile. Honestly, the things I do."
Li Fong barely heard him.
Her eyes never left A'shae's face.
Her heart still trembled, fear and relief and fury all churning inside her.
She held him close as the heavens swallowed them whole.