“Just that you can rest easy for now. No official proclamation has been issued regarding the attack on your home—if the Celestial Kingdom wanted their allies’ support, they would have sent word by now. Nevertheless I wanted to ensure Queen Suihe had not tossed you into prison upon a whim; she will not hesitate upon the slightest whiff of suspicion. There are many cells hidden within this palace, impervious to magic, impossible to escape from.”

“I trust you know such places well,” I remarked.

He smiled. “Well enough to know that you’d find my home far more comfortable, and infinitely safer.”

“I will not go to the Cloud Wall,” I told him bluntly. “I do not trust your kin.”

“Neither do I,” he agreed. “But an enemy in the open is safer than a friend who might turn on you at any moment.”

“The Cloud Wall?” My mother repeated in a dazed voice. “Where is that?”

“The Demon Realm,” I said.

My mother recoiled. All she knew of the Demons was how they were depicted in the tales—as evil, vicious, hideous creatures who feasted on the flesh and suffering of others. In my childhood, it had been a comfort to believe such monsters were tucked away on the outskirts of the realm, where only the overly brave and foolhardy ventured. I now knew that was an illusion. Demons were everywhere, by deed if not by name, and they did not wait for you to seek them out.

“The Demon Realm used to be called the Cloud Wall, part of the Celestial Kingdom. They were exiled for their magic, which the emperor had decreed forbidden. They are … just like other immortals,” I explained.

I had not told my mother much of my time there, eager to forget it myself. Moreover, few spoke of this, particularly in the Celestial Kingdom. History was rewritten as it pleased the victor or buried when it was an inconvenient truth. Those of the Cloud Wall had done terrible things; they had destroyed and hurt others—but who had not in a war? The Celestial Kingdom was not blameless either, and fighting for one’s home was something I could comprehend.

“Was this magic so dangerous?” my mother asked.

“All magic is dangerous, particularly when wielded as a weapon,” Wenzhi said.

“Though some can cause far greater hurt.” I repressed a shiver as I recalled Liwei’s blank gaze, the moment he had thrust his sword into my heart.

No, I could not forget what Wenzhi had done, these unseen wounds he had inflicted—the fruits of his devious schemes. A fragile truce was the only thing I would allow us, as far as forgiveness went on my part. I would trust him only when our interests were aligned, and I would not hesitate to use him to our advantage just as he had used me before. And if he was to turn on me again … this time my arrow would find its mark.