From an inner pocket, she palmed something. It took Zen a moment to recognize it. It was the butterknife from the Teahouse—the one she’d held when he’d first found her in the Peach Blossom Room, a dead Angel on the floor. She’d raised it with full conviction on her face, as though her entire life were staked upon the little piece of glass. It was with the same expression that she turned to face the direction of the approaching Elantians—only he saw the full truth of it now: not the courage of a warrior who would go down fighting, but the desperation of a girl with nowhere to run, nowhere to
...more
