“He forfeited his rights the moment he took it from me,” I replied.

Her mouth drew taut. “Do you know how long I’ve waited for this? Do you think immortal peaches and elixirs grow on trees?”

“Immortal peaches do grow on trees,” Tao interjected.

She glared at him, so ferociously, he shrank back. “I mean growing wild, on trees like those.” She flung her hand out at the forest we were flying over. “My husband and I are on borrowed time.”

“I risked my life for the elixir; I earned it. If you wanted it, you should have gone yourself.” I did not speak unkindly but merely recounted the facts, appealing to her sense of fairness—innate in Liwei, perhaps it lay in her as well.

She bit her lip. “I could not enter the Jade Palace; I am no longer permitted to.”

We stared at each other, unrelentingly—I could be selfish too. After a long silence, she reached into her sleeve, pulling out the white jade bottle. It gleamed in her hand, its gold stopper catching the sunlight. Her jaw clenched as she thrust it at me. “Take it. He will not drink it anyway, not if it was tricked from another. Cursed honor.”

I accepted the bottle, clutching it tight. My spirits lifted, even as a new weight sank over them—a heavy burden to have taken the one thing that could save her beloved. And in truth, she did not have to return it to me. Despite her harsh words, this was a gift.

“Thank you.” My voice was raw with emotion. “My father is dying in the world below, and I am almost out of time.”

“Time,” she repeated, with a trace of sadness. “How strange, that we are fighting over what every immortal is born caring nothing for. While for the mortals, wars are waged, lives lost in the pursuit of eternity. An impossible dream for all except a handful.”

“I wish we could both have the elixir,” I told her honestly.

“I don’t blame you. Make no mistake, if my husband had fewer scruples, that elixir would be gone and I’d have felt little remorse.” Her tone softened. “But he would not be who he is, either, and I have some time yet.”

“I will repay you,” I promised, without having the faintest idea how. “If there is another elixir, I will help you obtain it.”

“Thank you,” she said gravely.

We both knew it was an unlikely pledge, yet I did not mean it any less.

“I must go,” Zhiyi said. “The chickens and cows will not feed themselves. I came because Tao’s sister sent a message that he was in danger.”

“Chickens? Cows?” I had imagined her living in some palace or grand manor as befitted the emperor’s daughter, even one in disfavor.