Twinned Destinies: A Cultivation Progression Fantasy

She bounded through the forest, panting hard, straining to hear her pursuers. But there was only the soft chirping of insects, the shriek of the wind, the crackling as leaves and branches shattered underfoot. Had she lost them? She kept bounding, keeping off the road, not sure if the darkness that edged her vision came from outside or inside. It must’ve been both. Her head felt very light even as her body felt heavy, so heavy she was kept up more by momentum than anything. She couldn’t believe she was still moving. She had to go on, she had to—she held on. She was used to biting down, clinging on, but for some reason it came much harder this time. She didn’t have it. Maybe she was used to clinging on when she had someone else to make her. When she was doing it out of hate for someone else, like Gao or Father or Chen, or out of love, like Jin. But Chen was dead now and Jin probably was too, and that was all she could think of.

What happened to her now wasn’t so important. She just wished she knew what happened to Jin, if he was alright—then she could rest. But she didn’t. Everything she did she needed feeling, especially moments like these, when she asked more of herself than she could give. Right now she could only run on worry, which wasn’t much to run on at all.

She wasn’t sure how long it was before she realized they’d find her regardless. She was bleeding too much—she left a red trail wherever she went, the pools edged bright silver in the moonlight.

She limped over to the White River, plunged into it. It should’ve been piercing cold; patches of frost drifted along its surface, ice webbed the edges of the jutting stones, but it felt warm to her. When she came out, shaking off the wet, she saw where she’d plunged in, where she crossed. Everything after was one long length of dark red floating down the water.

Looking ahead, the mountains seemed familiar. Or maybe she had lost so much blood she was getting delirious. She dragged herself over, fixed one point in her mind, a distant finger of stone, and made herself go on. The heat of the battle was fast leaving her, and now, cold and alone, her wounds flared bright in her mind. She felt each one of them throbbing up and down her legs, her stomach, her back, climbing up her head, making an excruciating map of her body. She was almost grateful for them—if they weren’t there she was sure she would’ve collapsed before she made it to the mouth of her cave.

She was sobbing then, barely upright—not out of feeling, just sheer pain. Her Demon Shards greeted her in the darkness. She curled up around them and let herself go.

***

When she woke it was still dark, and she was in human form again.

Her wounds had gone to a dulled throbbing. She felt like one great scabbed wound, but it barely hurt—that was the first thing. She got to her feet. Where had she put her clothes? Why did she smell like smoke? Then she saw the blood on her, and it all came rushing back. She remembered where she was, what she’d done.

She was alive. Maybe she ought to be grateful, but she couldn’t summon much happiness. She wished she could go back. She had to see if Jin made it out.

But how could she go back? They saw her, all of them. They knew.

What had she done?

She’d just killed the Empress Consort! She’d showed she was a demon—that was it. There was no explaining herself. They’d say of her she was a double agent, that she was a spy. She thought of what Tingting would think when she heard the news, and her heart sank. Tingting would hate her. And Sen, too. Everyone. Even the folk who’d ran her wards and the folk who’d stayed in them.

She’d tried so hard these past few years to get everyone to love her. All gone.

She swallowed. She didn’t regret it, not for Jin, but it still hurt bad. She almost would’ve liked to have died instead; at least then they wouldn’t think of her badly. She’d live as someone good in their minds, someone to be admired, someone they could call a hero. Instead she was here.

Father had been so proud of her, too—she couldn’t think of him. She couldn’t keep doing this. If she did she knew she’d start crying, and she just couldn’t, not right now.

Where could she go? She had to get out of here—to Mother? She was sure Mother would take her. But her clan wouldn’t, no matter how powerful Mother was. Demons and humans were sworn enemies for millennia. It was a fact of life, everyone knew it. The moment she turned demon there was no place this side of the Desolate Mountains that’d take her.

If Ruyi went to Mother now she’d just be a burden. She couldn’t do that to Mother.

Her thoughts were cut up by thirst. She’d healed, but her essence was near empty. How long had it been? She crept outside. The sky gave no answers. It could’ve been a few hours, she could’ve been asleep for a full day. Could she go out like this as a human? She had no clothes, but she couldn’t go out like a demon either—she couldn’t go out as anyone.

Soon she was beyond caring. She crept outside. The sun had risen then, just barely, a pinprick of brilliant light in the far horizon; the rest of the land was still drenched in darkness. She picked her way down the rocky slope, trying to make out shapes in the dark. They all seemed men to her until she got close and saw they were rocks. No one was here, she’d be fine, she just had to find a deer—

She hunched behind a rock, pressed up against it, and listened. She thought she was hearing things at first. Maybe it was the wind. But no, it was too deep for wind. Those were voices. Low voices, punctured by a high laugh, then a round of shushes. If she strained she could barely make out the leaves crackling under them as they came.

They’d come for her, but she had nowhere to go. They were swarming up the mountain. She was at its peak. Maybe she could sneak around them down the mountain’s other side. It was a cheer cliff, but if she picked the right spots, maybe—

She turned, looked up, then froze.

A plump man was staring at her not twenty paces off. He didn’t wear the white cloak of the guard, but instead the dark blue leathers of the army. She was shocked twice—first at the sight of him. And then, more powerfully, by what it meant.

Father must’ve sent him.

Father must have heard about her. He must’ve gotten an order from the Emperor. He was the General; it was his duty to obey, but somehow she’d hoped… somehow…

She felt the hurt coming on but she tried to force it down. She just couldn’t.

She rose slowly, trying to speak to the man with her eyes—begging for him not to scream.

He hesitated. Maybe it was how hunched she was, or how disheveled she looked, or maybe it was the tears in her eyes, but something stayed him. She supposed she did look pretty pathetic. She didn’t look like a threat. She looked like she needed help, and badly.

She crept along the rock, making a wide arc until she was clear of him on the other side. He watched her go wide-eyed, then, slowly, nodded.

She ran, bolting down the side of the mountain, waiting to hear his him cry out. But there was no cry. Letting him go had been a mistake—he’d just report back to his superiors, back to Father, and he’d send stronger folk after her, folk who could finish her off for good, but she didn’t regret it. She just kept running, faster and faster. She saw tendrils of smoke curling over the forest. No hunters came this far, certainly not in packs like these. There must be a lot more after her. Father must really want her dead.

She kept running. She tried keeping clear of the smoke and, by some miracle, she didn’t run into any hunting parties, though when she passed the main roads she saw the hoofprints, the clean lines of their wagon-wheels frozen hard in the muddy ground. She didn’t dare stop, not even to feed off a stag.

When she first came upon the places the demons had run through she’d thought they were an army camp. Then she realized there was far too much smoke for that. Smoke lingered all over, still, clinging together, making a bleaker expanse of black-gray clouds which crowded out the white ones. There were no trees to hide behind, but there was so many hills of ash, so many towers of smoke, they made for even better cover. So she ran there, and was surprised to find the ground was warm. She didn’t feel it on her skin, but inside—it had essence. It was like her cave. A little weaker, but it filled her up as she ran. For the first time since she fled she felt she could take a breath.

She came across the burnt-out husks of towns, half-finished blackened outlines of buildings that once were, each with its own mound of dust. She came across bones—skulls, thighs, little nobs that could only be finger-bones. Some of the skulls were quite small. She gasped when she came across them. She wished she could do something for them, but she couldn’t stay. She just kept going.

She wasn’t sure where she was running to, where she was running from, even, but she could keep this up for a long time. Maybe if she just kept running nothing and no-one would catch up to her. It was easier not to think when she ran; she sank into the nothing that was running, the easy rhythm of the breaths, the steps one after another, over and over, and stayed there. It was nice here. It didn’t hurt.

But eventually she couldn’t hold on anymore. She had to stop. Her chest had gotten so tight it was hard to breathe. The next burnt-out husk of a town she found herself in, she plopped herself down by a temple. Just one cry, she told herself, a good cry to get it all out, just a few minutes and then she’d keep going. It didn’t end up being a few minutes. An hour later she was still there, not sobbing anymore but still hugging herself in a ball, arms around her knees, rocking slowly, sniffling. She tried to make herself move but she couldn’t seem to do anything. She was useless. She was even finding it hard to get angry at how useless she was being, which usually helped her get out of it. She started telling herself to get up, and when that didn’t work she started calling herself awful things, which didn’t help either.

A shadow darkened the doorway. So they’d found her. She felt a strange sense of relief. Maybe it would all be over soon, one way or another. Slowly, she looked up.

There was a boy there, his head a field of dark tousled locks. His skin was quite pale, and his eyes glowed startling red. He smiled impishly at her.

“Hey there. You look like you could use some help.”