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Qiao Yu has never had many friends. It isn’t easy being a princess. It also isn’t easy to be the daughter of the feared general, the bearer of an artifact so powerful that the world’s most powerful man would slaughter thousands in the hopes of getting his hands on it. It isn’t easy being Qiao Yu, and it never has been.
Still, Qiao Yu believes she has never felt the lack of companionship acutely. When she was young, she had her cousins to play with, and her little baby sister, and her mother. Though Qiao Yu’s mother was always tough as nails, preferring action to delicate diplomatic skills like drafting treaties, or making small talk, Qiao Yu still treasured their training sessions together. Her mother always spoke with her body: the pommel of her sword nudging her daughter’s stance into perfection, or the small nod when Qiao Yu finally landed a blow that met her astronomically high standards. Qiao Yu knew her mother loved her. She never doubted the fierce loyalty of anyone in her family, even when her cousins whispered about her behind her back— boorish, more like a battering ram than a princess— or when she overheard her grandfather’s arguments with her mother late at night— marriage alliances are out of the question now, she’s going to be a foot soldier or a spinster queen, are you happy? Qiao Yu would be happy following in her mother’s footsteps, she decided long ago. Power is something you wield or else it wields you. And Qiao Yu refuses to be a crude weapon unless it is absolutely necessary.
So Qiao Yu didn’t need friends. She didn’t need bosom companions to giggle with, didn’t need someone to gab about which of the palace servants were the handsomest, and she definitely didn’t need someone who would tell her how to fix her hair and nails, how to paint her face to become the most beautiful bride, how to wink at suitors when they showed up at the place gates with carriages full of flowers and gifts, hoping to win her heart. Or whatever it was that suitors did. It isn’t like Qiao Yu would know. After her mother died, she didn’t have time to consider things like what color most flattered her skin tone, or what true love might do to the soft, mushy mess of her heart.
Qiao Yu faced hardships as a political prisoner under the Shens of course. She had been beaten down every day by petty cultivators who felt they had something to prove to her and her people, to all the demons they thought were inferior—a lie the cultivators had to believe, or else face the truth that they had chosen again and again to play the role of the villain in the war they were waging. Qiao Yu didn’t care about their insults, or the labor they forced her to perform. Years of training made it easy to haul the sacks of grain, to lift the crates groaning under their own weight, and to offer the smallest glimpse of relief for her fellow prisoners who hadn’t had the strength training that she had. Just keep going and keep your head down. Qiao Yu had figured she would die in this labor camp one way or another, but as day wore into day, she had to face an exhausting truth: her mother’s iron will is inside of her, just like her artifact. Qiao Yu would keep going as long as she could. She could tolerate the hateful stares; she had not been raised to seek out love in the eyes of those around her. She was from the Bull clan, and they would always do what needed to be done.
No, Qiao Yu was not lonely. She could suffer through agony and fury, could endure cruelty and hypocrisy, and could bear insults and sorrow on her broad shoulders and keep moving forward. The pain didn’t stop, and it hadn’t since her mother had fallen in battle; that was fine. Qiao Yu expected it. She had been taught young to expect it, and the scar splashed across her chest was a constant reminder of the expectations carrying her forward. She only needed herself in this life, the only one she could rely on time and again.
Qiao Yu had said as much when the man who claimed to be Chu Tian came to help her escape. She told him again when he had rescued her, the bloody mess of the camp far behind them. He had looked at her with his golden eyes and smiled, had given her his flute and told her to summon him when she had accepted that she was his disciple whether she wanted to be or not. But Qiao Yu is no one’s disciple. Her only true teacher was her mother, and she is gone.
The nights after her escape were cold and long, but Qiao Yu had gone longer without sleep. She has suffered worse than her grandfather’s sad, hard eyes when he told her to run and seek refuge with their branch family in the south. She has endured far crueler than the look on her sister’s face when she told her that it couldn’t be like old times, that she was leaving and could not come back. These things are knives dug into old wounds but they cannot break the skin.
Qiao Yu is not safe now because she is never safe, but she is now surrounded by her kin, deep in the heart of the southern territory. The bulls look to her for direction and guidance. Every night she thinks of her mother and wishes that she were here to guide her, but still, Qiao Yu tells herself that she is not lonely. Deep in her heart, she feels her mother’s influence. Her family inheritance is in her bones. Shen Yitian can no more steal that than he can pull the world inside out, however hard he might try.
Qiao Yu had been able to keep on believing that she was not lonely up until she met the huli jing girl with big, golden eyes whose smile lingers like the aftershock of lightning, whose laughter echoes and echoes back through all the years Qiao Yu has lived in the silence of duty and promises. A girl who risked her life and her secrets to rescue a stranger—one of Qiao Yu’s people. When Qiao Yu met her gaze in the darkness, something long-dormant stirred in her chest.
The bulls aren’t happy when Qiao Yu brings the girl back—they don’t like to have a stranger in their midst. But Qiao Yu knows she can trust Kaikai because there is a light in her eyes that burns when she thinks no one is looking. There is a fire inside of her, a passion that lights her up from the inside. Qiao Yu saw it that night when they rescued the prisoner from the Shens, and she sees it again when they fight the yaoguai in the river. Qiao Yu saw that same light in her mother’s eyes. She knows that they will not win the war against Shen Yitian without that passion.
And then, just as quickly as she came, Kaikai is gone. The tentacles wrap around her waist, and Qiao Yu only has enough time to see the panic in her eyes before Kaikai is dragged into the water, vanishing with hardly a ripple. The villagers are concerned at first, and they help to search the riverbed, the downstream areas, and the woods, but soon—far too soon—they break off and return to their families, their meager dinners, and their own worries. Only Qiao Yu keeps searching far into the evening, until an old man limps out to the river to place a soft arm on her shoulder.
“Princess,” he murmurs, “do you understand why you are looking so hard?”
Of course Qiao Yu understands. Kaikai is a hero. If there is any hope of finding and helping her—
“She is a huli jing,” the old man says, and his eyes are far away and still somehow locked on Qiao Yu’s face. “It’s okay to let her go. They have their tricks in the ways of love.”
Qiao Yu cannot sleep that night. She hears the old man’s voice again and again, layered over Kaikai’s smile. Her soft little blush. The way her ears twitched when she said “You were amazing!” Qiao Yu curls in on herself and tries not to think too hard about why it matters to her that Kaikai thought she was amazing.
In the early dawn, Qiao Yu rises and makes her way back to the river with a scrap of Kaikai’s clothing that had washed ashore after the fight. Maybe some smell would linger to attract any beast that captured her—maybe Qiao Yu could somehow trace it—maybe, maybe—
The sunlight slants through the leaves as the day moves on. Qiao Yu takes breaks to mingle with the bulls, checks to see if everyone is okay after the fight yesterday, and tries to smile like nothing else matters. She skips lunch and returns to the water. If there is any hope of finding a trace, it is better to look sooner rather than later, in case the trails are washed clean. There’s got to be a trace.
“Erm,” says a familiar voice, and Qiao Yu’s head shoots up, hand grasping for the spear she carries with her. “Hi again.”
The relief that breaks over Qiao Yu is so dazzling, she can almost ignore what it means. “Kaikai!” she gasps, and sloshes towards the shore even as Kaikai wades into the river to meet her halfway. “I thought you died!”
Kaikai smiles. It strikes Qiao Yu like a bolt through the heart. “It’ll take more than water to kill me! I wrestled my way out. Turned out that yaoguai had some fight left, but—”
Qiao Yu’s hand moves before she can think about it, grasping Kaikai’s shoulder. She feels solid and warm. Real. Alive. Kaikai’s blush does not escape her.
“You’re safe now,” Qiao Yu says and means it with all her heart. Kaikai looks adorably startled. “Your help was paramount yesterday. I can’t imagine what would have happened if you weren’t there.” She pauses. The debt she owes this girl truly is staggering. “ Twice you saved us. I…”
There are too many things Qiao Yu wants to say. She can feel them fighting for attention, each eager to leap off her tongue, but dazzling speeches have never been Qiao Yu’s strong suit so she swallows them all down and instead says, “Come! A hero’s welcome awaits you!”
Kaikai’s hand is soft and warm against Qiao Yu’s palm as she ushers her towards the riverbank, and the beginnings of a smile tug at Kaikai’s lips. Just for the moment, Qiao Yu tells herself, maybe it’s okay to believe everything will one day be close to fine.