Her eyes snapped open, and she gasped, a horrible, choking sound as air rushed back into lungs that had forgotten how to breathe.
"Shuyin!" Lu Yuze's face swam into view above her, tears tracking down his cheeks. "Thank god. Thank god."
But Shuyin couldn't speak. Couldn't move. The cost of what she'd done was catching up to her all at once.
She turned her head weakly toward her mother and saw the lady's chest rising and falling, slowly, but steadily. The color was returning to her face. Her breathing was no longer labored.
Alive.
Her mother was alive.
Relief crashed over Shuyin like a wave, and with it came the final breaking point. Her body, pushed far beyond its limits, finally gave out.
She lurched forward in Lu Yuze's arms and blood erupted from her mouth, not a trickle, but a violent expulsion, dark and thick. It splattered across the floor, across her clothes, seeming endless.
"Shuyin!" Lu Yuze's voice was frantic.
