The next time Kia Min woke up, Darting Lynx was the one who sat at her bedside with an uncharacteristically solemn stare and wringing her hands in her robes. Darting Lynx noticed Kia Min stirring, and she pushed her stool back an inch as Kia Min sat up.

"Before you say anything—" she started, but Kia Min cut her off with a simple shake of her head and a wave of her hand.

"I... I really wasn't planning on saying anything," said Kia Min. "I just woke up."

Darting Lynx offered an uncomfortable smile. "Dr. An says you'll be fine..."

"I feel fine," said Kia Min. She could not decide if it was because she took care in sitting up that she did not notice the pain in her abdomen or if the doctor had prescribed her something to dull it. Nonetheless, she felt perfectly okay, though she doubted she could do anything too crazy. What was the name of that poultice Wu had bought for her again?

"Good," said Darting Lynx quietly. "I'm... glad."

A heavy silence drifted between the two, and Kia Min watched as Darting Lynx refused to meet her eyes, refused to look anywhere but the floor. The acrobat bit her lip and gripped and caressed the sides of the stool. Kia Min frowned. Why was she acting this way?

"Lynx," said Kia Min slowly, "what happened?"

Darting Lynx flinched and closed her eyes. "With... the farmers?"

Kia Min drew in a sharp breath. The farmers. The Lotus Assassins. How she had nearly died, how she had looked for Darting Lynx and could not find her. How had she wound up in Dr. An's office, alive and in the perfect position to find Wu the Lotus Blossom at long last.

"Yes," said Kia Min, "with the farmers. And after. Did..." And with that, Kia Min took her first real glance around Dr. An's office. There was the incense stick on the desk, burning, and another bed on the other side of the room, empty. Empty. Kia Min saw a woman's heading rolling on the hangar floor, and she reached for Darting Lynx's arm. "Are there other rooms here?"

"No—"

"What happened to the farmers? Where are they?"

Darting Lynx took in a deep breath, and then another, her eyes closed and distressed. "Dead," she said quietly, finally. "They're all dead."

No. No, no, no. Kia Min had already known, had already dreaded, but this... "They're all... but how? Why?"

Darting Lynx smiled ironically. "You know why, Kia Min. The Lotus Assassins saw them as too much trouble. If they ran once, they would have run again, or so the Assassins saw it. They killed them all. There wasn't anything either of us could have done without getting killed ourselves. Which—" She sighed. "—you seemed set on accomplishing. And even then, your death would not have done any good for anybody, either."

"But I should be dead," said Kia Min. "There was no escape for me. How did I survive that? Why did I survive it and no one else did? And how did you survive?"

Darting Lynx turned away. "They left you for dead."

Kia Min stared incredulously. "They left me for dead?"

This wasn't Two Rivers; there was not going to be another swarm of people to 'clean up' after the Lotus Assassins. The Assassins that had surrounded Kia Min back in the hangar had not been careful to make sure her death would be long and painful. She had been a nuisance, she knew, that had to be eliminated immediately, for they had no time to deal with her the way that might have otherwise liked. There had been a handful of them against her, not the customer against Jing Woo in Two Rivers.

"Yes," said Darting Lynx with a nod. She stood. "I'll go get you some tea."

Kia Min narrowed her eyes. Something was wrong. "Lynx," she said firmly, "how did we survive? Honestly."

Darting Lynx stopped halfway to the door, but she did not turn to face Kia Min. "Honestly, they left you for dead. You were passed out, bleeding, and barely breathing. They knew you had only minutes left. Then they focused on the farmers. I was only able to save you."

"But where were you?" Darting Lynx made no sound, no movement. "Lynx..."

"I hid," she said. "I am no warrior. I could not fight them. I could not save the farmers. You are the one who had to survive. So you were the one I saved when I saw the chance to. I picked you up, and I ran, and I found Dr. An's place... I don't even know how... and I thought you were dead until she..."

Darting Lynx spun and faced Kia Min, her face covered in angry shame. "Yes, I let the farmers die to save you. And yes, I hid. What other options did I have other than to die? I didn't come to the Imperial City to be killed, and neither did you! The farmers... they perhaps didn't deserve to but their lives were over anyway. It's like you said. Death is a far sweeter freedom."

"I never said that," Kia Min hissed.

"Didn't you?" Darting Lynx sighed. "Kia Min, I—I did try to get them out of there. To the very end, I tried, but when everyone I tried to lead to safety were quickly cut down... what other choice did I have? I... I don't want to die. Not yet. I'm not ready for that."

Kia Min gritted her teeth and climbed out of the bed. "And you think the farmers were?"

"They were before we showed up in that flyer."

"That was your idea."

"I didn't know that the Lotus Assassin would have kept slaves in his flyer for transportation. But that doesn't matter now. We're in the Imperial City. Alive. So you can follow the Lotus Blossom on whatever adventure she takes to save the Jade Empire next. Are you saying you would rather be dead, killed so close to achieving your goal at long last?"

"I—" Kia Min started. So that was how she survived. Darting Lynx had sacrificed the farmers to save her. Innocents had died so she could live. Innocents who did not need to be dead, who could still be alive and possible to rescue, so she could find the senior student and save the Jade Empire from the Lotus Assassins and their slaving ways? So she could feel like her survival in Two Rivers meant something?

Surely the gods intended for her to be in this room, now, alive and breathing and in the Imperial City, and surely that was why they had led her to Darting Lynx. But did the farmers had to have died? Was that a necessary sacrifice? A dozen people for one life.

Was that any better than an entire village for one man?

That had been the Lotus Assassins' call. And so had this been Darting Lynx's. No one else had had any say in the matter. Master Li had given himself up to the Lotus Assassins for the hope that the village would be spared, but everyone had been killed anyway. How many lives is the life of one person worth, and how dare anyone make that decision for the ones who would live and for the ones who would die?

"I should be dead," said Kia Min quietly.

"You should be alive," said Darting Lynx.

"Dead," said Kia Min. "I survived that, and many others did not. You made that decision for me, and for them."

Darting Lynx narrowed her eyes. "You say that like you would have preferred I left you for dead. I had no reason to have been successful in rescuing just you alone. Yes, I'm quick and nimble, but I did not do this behind the Lotus Assassins' backs. They saw me come retrieve you, and they reacted. The farmers were all dead or dying by then anyway. I had no reason to run out of there with as few injuries as I did—I had no reason to run out of there at all. It's nothing short of miraculous. This clearly was not just my decision."

Kia Min sighed. "If you say it was fate..."

"I'm not saying it is, but I'm not saying it isn't. Think about it, Kia Min. Your entire journey has been accidental so far. You've been in the right place at the right time. And the one time you were in the wrong place at the wrong time, you survived when everyone involved should have died. Two of us lived. And now you're where you need to be. Maybe it's fate. Maybe it's the gods. But don't tell me you're going to waste this opportunity because you lived and others did not. Make some good out of this. Make their deaths not in vain."

Kia Min growled, "I already am. Lynx, I'm already living when others have died unnecessarily. I'm already trying to make some good out of my survival. And as for their deaths not being in vain, well. That's what I'm out here to do. That's why I'm looking for Wu, and that's why I'm here."

A thought hit Kia Min then—would her death in the hangar have meant that Ni Joh, and Jing Woo, and all the students and all the villagers would have died in vain? No. That wasn't right. Wu. Wu was the reason for all of this. Wu lived. Wu had been away at the time Two Rivers was burning, been away to track down the kidnapped Dawn Star—the fates served her, like Master Li always said.

So if the fates served Wu the Lotus Blossom, and if Kia Min was meant to be at her side, did that mean...?

"I'm supposed to be alive," Kia Min said quietly. "But not for me. I have to find Wu."

Kia Min searched the room for her clothing. She was in the Imperial City; she could not waste anymore time. The senior student was here, and Kia Min needed to go to her. She was not sure why she was needed, but she knew that she was, and the quicker she found Wu the better.

Still, Darting Lynx stood in the doorway, and she said, "Kia Min, what happened when you left Two Rivers?"

"What?" Kia Min glanced up at the acrobat but kept rummaging through Dr. An's office.

"What happened at Two Rivers? Or after, or before? You make it seem like something with the farmers has happened before. If I had to hazard a guess, I'm guessing it happened at Two Rivers."

Kia Min paused for a moment, and she shook her head. No. Darting Lynx had no reason to know. There was no purpose in telling her. She didn't deserve it.

"It's—" she started, but a loud and clear voice resounded from outside the window that stopped Kia Min and Darting Lynx from any further discussion.

"Sun Li the Glorious Strategist is dead. Long live Empress Sun Lian the Heavenly Lily!"