Page 94 of Two Thousand Blades

Xiang stood near the back, his arms folded over his chest, glaring daggers at Huli, who had no problem ignoring him. Kai snagged a shaobing?1 from a plate and wandered to his mate. Slipping one arm across his waist to hold him close, he brushed the flatbread bun against Xiang’s flattened lips until he took a bite. The vampire instantly relaxed and let out a happy hum.

“You got a red bean one,” Xiang murmured. Kai swooped in and kissed away a sesame seed that had gotten stuck to his lip.

Do you want me to kill the huli jing? Kai asked using his magic since there was no way he could whisper it in a room filled with vampires.

Xiang jerked in his arms, his eyes wide as they locked on Kai’s face in silent question.

He was very good at protecting Xiao Dan from the fae, but you don’t like him. I will remove this threat from our clan for you.

His lover relaxed in his arms, even resting his head on Kai’s shoulder. “No,” he answered with a sigh.

Kai smiled to himself as he pressed a kiss to the top of Xiang’s head, secretly amused. He didn’t know the full story of why he was so distrustful of the fox spirit, but Huli didn’t seem all bad. Selfish, impulsive, and utterly reckless, but he was dedicated to the safety and happiness of Xiao Dan. For that alone, he should be allowed to remain close to the Zhangs.

“Chen has never told me much about Jiang Chong, other than that this guy turned him and all the clan into vampires. Also, he’s an asshole,” Moon began, talking with a mouthful of stinky tofu.

The Zhang vampires fell silent. Their eyes all dropped to their cups or the food in their hands. Kai could almost feel the swirl of bad memories filling the room with its dark and heavy weight.

“When we first met him, he served as the head of secret intelligence for Emperor Wu during the Han Dynasty.” Each word Xiao Dan spoke was soft and somewhat slow, as if he were still waking from the old nightmare. “He changed Chen and myself in Chang’An before we traveled home to Luoyang, where the clan lived. There, he slaughtered roughly half of the people and changed the rest.”

“We were trapped under his control for several decades,” Chen continued the tale. “He’d been a vampire for more than a hundred years already. He was faster and stronger than all of us combined, so we had no hope of fighting back.”

“And then there was his vampiric power,” Meimei whispered with a shudder.

Xiao Dan grunted. “Like Winter Varik, Jiang Chong can pierce the veil that separates the living world from a type of limbo where ghosts exist prior to moving on to the underworld. It took us a very long time to figure out a way to track his movements when he disappears, and even that’s not much of a warning. Less than a second sometimes.”

“How did you escape him the first time?” Kai inquired. He didn’t want them lingering on these old memories, but focusing on their escape. If they did it once, they could do it again.

A derisive noise escaped Xiang. “It wasn’t even planned. Not really. We all wanted away from him, though we were scared to talk about it for fear of him overhearing. It was one day near sunset that I lost my temper and attacked him.”

“And I jumped in to help,” Junjie added.

“In the blink of an eye, we were all fighting him, most of us getting scorched by the sun,” Ming Yu murmured. “But after so long, it was better to be dead than serve him.”

“Jun-Jun nearly cut out his heart,” Chen stated. “That was what we thought was the killing blow. He staggered back, falling into the dead realm. He closed the door before we could follow.”

“The nights passed, and he didn’t return. The weeks turned to months and then years. We all assumed he’d died from his injury in the dead realm,” Xiao Dan murmured.

“But he escaped and went off to cause trouble somewhere else.” Rei huffed a bitter laugh. “No wonder he’s teamed up with Trin. Sounds like a very fae thing to do.”

“That does lead to a very sticky predicament,” Chen stated, as he lifted his teacup to his lips for a small sip of the steaming liquid.

“I’m sorry,” Rei whispered. “I feel like this is all my fault.”

Yichen grabbed Rei’s slumped shoulders and forced him to face his mate. “What the hell are you talking about? How is any of this your fault?”

Rei lifted his empty hands and stared at them as if he were expecting to find the answer there. “I should have seen it coming. Maybe not Jiang Chong, but I never thought Trin would follow in my parents’ footsteps. I don’t know him well, but he’s never given me any sign that he was power hungry. I was sure he would take our people home. Instead, he chooses the madness of the king and queen.”

“So, he had you fooled. He had us all fooled,” Yichen snapped. “That doesn’t make any of this your fault. We took our shot, and it didn’t quite work out how we wanted.”

“The queen is dead, and Kai got his sword back. They no longer have any chance of sending a dragon to kill us. That’s fucking progress!” Xiang chimed in. Rei’s head lifted, and the faintest smile lifted one corner of his mouth.

“The wall will continue to protect us from the fae. Or at the very least, warn us when they get too close,” Moon said. He paused and tapped his lips with one finger. “The problem is keeping Jiang Chong out. Or some kind of warning system.”

“And it can’t be blood based,” Chen pointed out. “Since his blood runs in all the Zhang vampires.”

Moon gulped. “Even me?”

“No,” Xiao Dan stated firmly. “The line breaks there. You mark the start of Chen’s individual bloodline and family.”

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