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Thap.
So this was how it ended.
Thap thap—
He was Xiao Jingyan, a Prince of the blood royal—sharp of sense, swift of foot. Xiao Jingyan, who could outpace anyone his age and plenty older—on any field, any board. Xiao Jingyan, who saw the fattest winter in thirty years (or so the greybeards said) and charged it head-on, day after day, until its worst howls and slashes faded to nothing.
—thap—
He was Xiao Jingyan, a prisoner in his own front yard, struggling like a newborn hare as a fresh shot skirted his ear—then two, then three.
Taunts, all of them. He'd taken five vital hits already. Number six would finish him, and a blind man could land it. Oh, how his brothers would laugh to see him now, laugh with every slow, sadistic crunch sounding over the white.
He should've taken more allies. He should've triple-checked the terrain. He should've—should've—should've—
No.
Children and commoners agonized over things like those. A prince would not. A prince met defeat with the same dignity he did victory, and understood there was only the Enemy to blame.
Five paces away, the last crunch fell. There, the Enemy straightened, with eyes like arrowheads and lips like garrote-wire. Exactly as much mercy as he'd come to expect.
"Last words? Say them now."
From left to right he looked, committing one more memory of their crisp, flawless battlefield. Then he drew all the breath left in his lungs, prayed that his mother couldn't hear, and told the Enemy where his ancestors could go.
Thap.
And Xiao Jingyan, seventh scion to the Imperial House of Liang, fell. Fell with eyes widening, hands clenching, a new set of Last Words flying from his lips as the white and the cold rose up to claim him.
"Nihaung, you snake! Backshots don't count!"
When the battlefield had been cleared—when the doors were long-shut, the brazier long-lit, the tea and dumplings long-gulped—Nihaung still hadn't stopped laughing.
"But seriously—" She was trying her very best not to snort, and failing miserably at it. "—you spent a whole night digging up Jingyan's—"
On the other side of the brazier, Lin Shu shrugged, an equally miserable failure at keeping the smirk off his lips. "Only in five or six places. The earth can be remarkably soft if you know—"
Jingyan rolled his eyes. "Yujin and Jingrui. What did you promise them?"
Faster than a paper-fan, Lin Shu's face became a doughy little portrait of purest Innocence. "Promise?"
Nihuang swung her face away, half-successful at smothering her giggles. Jingyan flattened his gaze and tapped his fingers on the table, one-two-three.
"The two most eager to join these things simultaneously catch cold on the morning after a blizzard. While you, the undisputed—"
"I dispute."
"—planner of these pits, remain in perfect health. Not man enough for the work, were you?"
And just like that, the dough was stone. Somehow, the voice that emerged from it was clearer and smoother than ever.
"Your Highness may wish to train his deflection technique. Off and on the field."
It occurred to Jingyan, then, that the length of little Shu's throat looked very soft, and very seizable. Approximately one heartbeat later, it also occurred to him that someone new was entering the room.
Someone wearing a crisp white robe and a crisper smile.
"Jingyan."
If he had any doubts about the smile, the Tone put them to rest. A certain memory of last Equinox fought its way to the surface, threatening more. Somewhere else on the physical plane—probably—little Shu and Nihuang were rising, making excuses, looking to keep an appointment with the Marquis of Anywherebuthere.
"Mother."
She approached as she always did: gracefully, patiently, without the slightest wisp of temper. And for a moment, he would've given anything to be back outside, taking a hundred shots to the face.
But—no.
He was a prince, still. He would meet this as a prince met victory. And defeat.
"I am told that you did something… unbecoming, for one your age…"
(For better or worse, it was the last time he said anything of that kind about anyone's ancestors. And to little Shu's credit, he did bring a state-of-the-art ointment for rear-pain the next day.)
(But as one year became five, and five became fifteen, he still couldn't find just how Mother had heard.)
"Really." Mei Changsu's voice betrayed almost two hairs' worth of surprise. "He dug pitfalls on these grounds to win a snowball fight?"
"Mm." Jingyan considered the last of his tea, suddenly bored by the thought of finishing it. "Coaxed his friends to, anyway. Good ones, too—big enough to swallow half your shin, plus they tapered the bottoms, or something like that. Had to pull my foot with both hands."
"The more I hear of this Lin Shu…" Mei Changsu shook his head. "Did he really hate to lose that badly?"
Without quite knowing why, Jingyan found half his mouth trying to frown, the other half trying a smirk. With a small effort, he shrugged them both away.
"Ever fought one yourself? Snow-wars, I mean."
Mei Changsu shook his head slowly, eyes fixed on his cup. "Never had much use for the cold, I'm afraid. Even before my… condition."
His next cough was his stagiest one yet, but Jingyan was in the mood to let it pass. Outside, Fei Liu thoughtfully supplied them with all the nostalgia they wanted, in tandem with a lesson on aerial ballistics for a select few Jiangzou men.
(In time—longer than hoped-for, but shorter than feared—the Kirin Scholar would sweep his favored prince in a different sort of white.)
(Again.)
(And again.)