Dragon Rising

Chapter 1-2

“Hua.” Her mother’s bark snapped her out of the daze.

She turned to find her parents crossing the square toward them. Fa Minglan was a small woman engulfed by her yellow robe. She wore her hair like Luna’s, but a less kind expression flashed across her face.

“You found your sister.” Her mother crossed her arms.

Finishing her conversation and wishing the people well, Luna turned to her parents with a smile. “Mama.” She rushed into their mother’s arms before hugging their father as well.

“Why didn’t you bring Ru?” Luna asked, her lips forming a pout. “I’d have liked to see my brother.”

Their father smiled indulgently. “It was a five-day journey for us to reach Dasha. Ru is only four years old. We had to leave him with my mother.”

Luna’s shoulders slumped.

Their mother eyed her servants lingering next to them. “I am glad you’re happy, Luna.” She didn’t bother to actually ask if Luna was happy. She only assumed.

“Are you safe?” their father asked.

From the smile spreading across Luna’s face, Hua knew the answer to that. “This is… more than I could have imagined.” She reached for Hua’s hand and squeezed.

A uniformed man approached, and all Hua could do was stare. Clear eyes found her, and a smile lit up the stranger’s beautiful face. He ran a hand down the front of his pressed military uniform, pushing any lingering wrinkles from the fabric, before turning to her father and bowing. “Gen Minglan.”

Hua’s father stared for a moment before recognition lit in his eyes. “Luca Kai. I haven’t seen you since you were a teenager.”

He laughed. “I’ve done some growing up since then.”

“Your father told me you earned yourself a military rank.”

“I imagine he told you a lot about me.” He turned his smile on Hua’s mother. “Taitai Minglan. It is a pleasure.”

“General.” She smiled.

Luna and Hua exchanged a suspicious look. Calling their mother taitai was a sign of respect, but also a way to earn her favor, and it wasn’t often their mother softened her countenance.

Hua’s father put a hand on her back and pulled her forward. “Hua, this is General Luca Kai. His father and I are old friends.”

Luca bowed. “You are as beautiful as I’ve been led to believe, Hua Minglan.”

She couldn’t stop the scowl from forming on her face. “Why would you need to be told of my looks?”

Her mother clucked her tongue in disapproval, but Luca’s grin widened. “I look forward to knowing you.”

“Too bad you won’t get the chance.” She crossed her arms over her chest.

“Hua,” her father snapped, leaning close. “Luca’s father and I have spoken of arrangements.”

“Arrangements?” She didn’t like the sound of that.

“He is a suitable suitor who can provide certain… protections.”

Hua froze. Suitor? Her gaze slid over the man before her. Tall. Lean muscles. Smug grin.

“He has a good position in the emperor’s army, and I trust his family.”

Luca nodded. “Second in command to General Li himself.”

General Li? Hua knew the stories of the young general who’d already made a name for himself. They spoke of him in the villages in hushed tones. He was said to have an unrivaled ruthlessness.

But she refused to fear this man her father wanted to tie her to. Lifting her chin, she met his eyes. “No matter what my parents decide, I will marry you if I deem you are worthy.”

Her mother gasped, but to her relief, Luca laughed. “As you wish. In the coming weeks, I will leave with General Li on a march to the border. May I write to you while I’m away?”

“You may.”

He shook her father’s hand once more and bowed to her before sauntering away. Hua watched him for a moment before turning hard eyes on her parents. They met her gaze. It was well within their rights to ambush her this way and negotiate her future with anyone they pleased.

That didn’t mean she’d make it easy on them.

Luna, ever the peacemaker, stepped in. “Can Hua spend the rest of the festival with me? I promise she’ll be safe.” She gestured to two of her eunuchs and the daos that hung at their waists.

Fa opened her mouth to say something, but Gen cut her off. “Yes. We have some business to attend to in the meantime.”

Their father couldn’t go anywhere without trying to make deals for the yields of their crops, even when a threat hung over his head. Everyone within a week’s journey of Dasha was at the festival. It was the best place for negotiations and provided Hua the escape she needed.

Luna pulled Hua away from their parents and giggled like a girl much younger than her twenty years. “Come with me.”

She led her weaving through the crowd toward a row of columns near the enormous palace steps. The palace sat on a raised platform faced with dark stone. Almost black wooden walls rose toward a sloped tile roof. Balconies spanned the upper floors. Hua had never seen an emperor’s speech before, but she could imagine the young emperor standing high above the crowd, his enchanting eyes peering over them.

Luna directed Hua through an open plaza to the side of the steps where two stone pillars sat, dragons snaking up their sides as if they could protect the city.

Luna’s servants gave them a bit of space but stayed within eyesight. Luna sat with her back against the pillar and her body shielded from view. Hua followed suit. Someone would have to know they were there in order to find them.

“I can’t believe they let me walk into that.” Hua groaned.

“Walk into what?” Luna lifted her face, settling her eyes on the stars above as her voice took on a wistful tone. “That man was perfect.”

“For you, maybe.”

“Hua, when will you start to take your future seriously? You cannot live with Mother and Father your entire life. When next spring comes, you’ll be of age to leave home. And did you even see that Luca man? If I wasn’t pledged to the emperor, I’d be insanely jealous. And a soldier! Is there anything more attractive?”

Hua covered her face with her hands so her sister couldn’t see her burning cheeks. “He was okay.” In truth, men were a mystery to her. Even before becoming a consort, her sister knew how to speak to them, how to make them fall in love with her, a skill Hua could never hope to master.

“If father trusts him, then so do I. Our lives will never be peaceful, Hua. Not with the threat of discovery hanging over us.”

“Can we talk about something else?” She lowered her hands. “Please?”

Luna smiled, her white teeth flashing in the night. “I love festivals.”

Hua snorted. For reasons of safety, she’d never been to a festival or even visited the capital before. And now that she had, all she wanted was to go home to her wide-open fields. She smoothed her robe around her legs, concealing the pants underneath.

Luna’s lips tipped up into a smile. “Rest easy, Hua. You’re not in danger here. I know father has trained you your entire life to look over your shoulder for enemies, but maybe it’s time you tried to be normal.” She laughed. “Then you can be happy too.”

Sometimes her sister was ridiculous. What was normal? Falling all over yourself to look perfect and act like everyone else?

“I think I’m in love with the emperor.” Luna’s voice was so soft Hua, thought she’d misheard her.

“You’re not,” Hua scoffed.

“What would you know?” she snapped. “I’m his favored consort.”

“Luna, don’t be ridiculous. The emperor will choose an empress soon, and it’ll be someone with a much higher status than the daughter of the Minglans of Zhouchang, a family with little history because we didn’t exist before father created the name.” Luna was the only consort whose father held no title. Sure, there would be a ceremony and a competition to choose the empress, but the daughter of an army general turned farmer would never be allowed to win.

Luna huffed. “It isn’t up to the emperor to choose. I will carve my golden statue and prove that I have heaven’s mandate to be the empress just as Bo Xu has it to be the emperor. He wasn’t the oldest nor the strongest of the old emperor’s children, yet his father recognized heaven choosing him.”

Hua hadn’t seen her sister in so long and didn’t want to make her mad on their one night together. She wasn’t a fighter and wouldn’t win an argument with Luna. “I hope you’re right.”

Luna leaned her head on Hua’s shoulder. “Can I tell you a secret?”

Hua nodded. “You’ve always been able to.”

“I’m pregnant.” Her smile widened. “I will have the first of the emperor’s children.”

A child of the emperor with dragon blood? Hua wanted to be happy for her sister. She didn’t want to be the girl who questioned everything. But what kind of life would Luna have when she had to keep such a secret from the people she supposedly loved? If she told the emperor of their child’s blood, he’d know about the rest of the Minglans and have no choice but to hunt them down just like the emperors before him. Dragon blood was a direct threat to their power. It was said to be royal, giving a person the right to rule.

Hua wanted better for the sister she loved more than life itself.

But honesty wasn’t what her sister needed in that moment. Hua brushed a hand over Luna’s soft hair. “I love you, Jiejie.” She smiled at the old term for older sister.

Her joyful laugh filled the night around them. “And I love you, Meimei.” Little sister. They’d been calling each other by those terms since they knew how to talk, and there was a comfort in the familiarity.

They sat in silence for a long while, just enjoying being around each other again. They were young, and that night felt like the beginning of their lives. Luna would be a mother to a prince, and who knew where Hua was headed? Into a marriage with the handsome general?

The sisters weren’t ready to be separated yet.

It wasn’t until shouting from the square reached their sanctuary that Luna sat up. Her servants ran toward them. The two men had their daos drawn.

“Madam,” one of the women yelled. “There has been an attack.”

“An attack?” Luna shot to her feet.

“It’s the Kou.”

The name sent a chill through Hua. Nomads to the north of Piao, the Kou had been terrorizing the border for a decade, forcing a mass migration of people to the central cities.

And now they’d come to Dasha. Luna and Hua huddled together as they rounded the pillars, searching for any sign of the attack. Shadows ran the lengths of the buildings towering over the square where only moments before, the people of Piao had been celebrating.

Now, the citizens scrambled for cover as arrows rained down from above.

“We need to make it up the palace steps,” one of the eunuchs said. “We have no choice but to run.”

“But Hua…” Luna’s panicked eyes met hers. Those not of the court could not enter the palace.

“She will have to find her own way to safety.” The man kept his eyes trained on the archers. “Consort Luna is my only concern.”

Luna shook her head violently, and Hua gripped her hands. “I can’t leave you.”

“Yes, you can.” Hua tried to infuse acceptance into her gaze. All she wanted was her sister to be safe. The only place for that was the palace. A tear leaked from Hua’s eyes. “I need to find Mama and Ba. I also need you to be safe. Promise me as soon as you start running, you won’t look back.”