Cover

Dedication

To Renee, my college roommate and dearest friend—

for taking my hand that first night of freshman year to make me run across campus with the infamous Stanford Band,

and for never letting go of me since

and

To Tom and Reese—

this book and every book

Map

Chapter One

Empress Aki woke up completely disoriented and with a skull-hammering headache.

She opened her eyes slowly, because even that movement hurt her head. There was dirt beneath her, and the air here was sharp and sour, as if a crate of cleaning solution had been left open and undiluted. Her throat ached from breathing it.

What is this place? Aki certainly wasn’t in the Imperial City anymore.

The last thing she remembered was her brother, Gin, taking control of her mind and forcing her to abdicate the throne in his favor and then one of his ryuu turning everything in the world green and knocking her unconscious.

Carefully, the former empress rose, bracing herself against a wall. She was still in the taiga uniform she’d donned before the battle with Gin, and now her sleeves caught on the jagged rock walls.

Aki was in a grotto of some sort. A waterfall crashed twenty yards away from her, and a pool of churning water spanned the short distance between the grotto floor and the base of the falls.

She crept along the narrow ledge of rock around the edge of the pool. Surely this was more than a mere grotto. Gin wouldn’t leave her alone if she could simply swim her way out.

She approached the underside of the waterfall and stretched her hand toward it.

The droplets burned her fingers, and Aki jerked her arm away. “Nines!” she cursed, falling backward onto the ground. Wisps of smoke rose from her fingertips.

Acid.

Instinctively, she began to plunge her hand into the pool to cool it down, but she caught herself at the last moment. The pool might be filled with the same thing.

Aki cradled her hand and gaped at the torrent of acid raining down in front of her. Was this a fabricated prison that the ryuu had created? Or was this a real waterfall, and they’d somehow transformed the water into something deadly? In either case, it was terrifying.

A girl laughed from the other side of the grotto. Aki startled but didn’t see anyone there. She scurried back to the opposite part of the cave.

Out of thin air, the girl materialized.

Virtuoso. Aki gritted her teeth from both the pain of the acid burn and seeing the ryuu who had knocked her out during the battle at Rose Palace.

The girl didn’t even bother with a greeting before she stalked over, kneed Aki in the stomach, and shoved her onto the slick ground.

Tears stung Aki’s eyes. “Please. You have to let me go,” she said.

“No,” Virtuoso said curtly.

“I demand it.”

Virtuoso shrugged.