The Forbidden City loomed before them, long before they reached it. Mulan kept her eyes fixed on it as they marched. Fireworks bloomed above the city with subdued pops. Festivities were underway as the Chinese prematurely celebrated their victory over the Huns. Sham Yu stopped them just after midday and sent scouts ahead. There was nothing left to do but wait.

"What are we waiting for?" Mulan asked. But Shan Yu did not answer.

"Surely we're not going to walk in the front gate," Mulan said.

Shan Yu nodded slowly.

"You're not serious," Mulan said. "I thought you had a plan! If I'd known you were going to waltz right into the city I'd have taken my chances on my own."

"Bankhar," Shan Yu said thinly, "be silent, before I cut out your tongue."

Steaming, Mulan said nothing more.

The scouts returned shortly before dusk with folds of golden fabric and the massive face of a dragon.

"Where did you get those?" Mulan asked, before she remembered Shan Yu's earlier threat.

One of the scouts smiled at her. "They won't be missed," he said.

"Bankhar," Shan Yu said, gesturing her towards him. "Join me." He tipped the dragon head over his own like an ostentatious hood.

Mulan hurried forwards. She felt the bulk of Shan Yu at her back like the solid comfort of a mountain.

The Huns rippled into formation behind them, falling into line under the heavy fabric of the dragon's body.

"Forward!" Shan Yu cried hoarsely, and they shuffled forward.

"Routine inspection," barked the lieutenant. With every guard's bow and blade trained on the dragon, there was little they could do. They were overpowered. The guard nearest ripped the gaudy dragon head off to reveal Shan Yu himself.

"Arrest them all," commanded the lieutenant. "Except her." He pointed at Mulan. "Captain Li requested to speak with her directly."

"What about her weapon, sir?"

"Take it from her," he said. "A woman does not need a weapon."

Mulan scowled but said nothing as they unbuckled her belt and confiscated her sword. Shan Yu's dagger was a comforting secret strapped against her thigh.

Mulan was led through the crowd, which parted for the Imperial guards. She held her head high as wide eyes watched and whispers started. They did not know anything about her. Mere words and stares could not pierce her armor. She had made it to the Forbidden City, and she was that much closer to fulfilling her promise.

The guards brought her into a chamber inside the inner fortress and dumped her onto the floor. She looked up as they shut the door behind them. Black boots and a familiar scarlet cloak loomed before her as Shang turned to face her. She got to her feet. She would not give him the satisfaction of seeing her on her knees.

Her large eyes, sunken in her gaunt face, had a gleam of wildness in them, framed by lank strands of dark oily hair.

Shang barely recognized her.

"Mulan," he said. "Your guardian said you would come."

So that was where Mushu had gone. Somehow, the betrayal hardly stung. "Then you know why I'm here."

"You should have gone home, Mulan," Shang spat her name like it was ash on his tongue. "A war is no place for a woman."

"It's no place for a coward, either, but somehow you're still here."

"I've already given you two chances to leave with your life. I won't give you another."

"You mean you've insulted my honor twice," Mulan said, "and I won't let you do it a third time."

"If this is what it's come to, then you have no honor left."

"This is what you made me," Mulan said, spreading her hands. "A survivor. You should be proud."

"Proud?" Shang scoffed. "A woman aside—yes, I was proud. You were a promising recruit. You had the potential to achieve greatness. But this? There's no honor in this. If you would throw all of that away just to take my life, then you never had it in you to begin with."

Mulan felt a certain serenity seep through her body, saturating her limbs. She had come too far to turn away now. She'd stared too long into the eyes of monsters to become anything other than a monster. The darkness inside her was an abyss in which she had lost herself, and from which there could be no redemption.

Mulan hiked up her skirt and drew the dagger. Shang heard the whisper of her blade against its scabbard and unsheathed his own by instinct.

"Please," Shang said. Don't make me do this.

Mulan lunged forward. Shang brought his sword up to parry. The clash of steel echoed through the emperor's chamber. It was a seamless dance, both of them light on their feet like they'd been born to battle each other, he the master and she the precocious student. There was a rhythm to their movements that grew sloppy, each more taxing than the last. It was nearly identical to practice, when Shang had knocked her to the ground before extending a hand to help her up—and then it wasn't. Mulan went in for the killing blow, but her movement showed her tiles before she was ready to play them. Shang brought up his sword, hilt perpendicular to his abdomen, and Mulan stumbled forward onto his blade. Her momentum faded as her body met resistance, but it was enough. Too much.

Shang pulled back. "Why?" he said, half a breath before she went down.

Shang dropped to his knees at her side, applying pressure to the wound, but Mulan batted his hands away with a whimper.

She grasped his wrist in her small, bloody fingers and pulled him down to whisper in his ear. Blood trickled down her chin. Shang watched tears leak from the corners of her eyes and disappear into the loose hair at her temples.

"Thank you," she whispered. Her grip on his arm loosened and fell away.

Shang tasted bitterness in the back of his throat. He swept his crimson cloak back, his sword still slick with her blood. It sluiced down the blade, slowly, onto the floor.

What a waste, Shang thought.

Chien-Po carried Mulan's body out of the room to prepare for burial. Yao howled like a wounded dog when he saw her.

The Huns were sentenced to death. Shan Yu died with a smile on his lips. Some of the more superstitious say his spirit still resides in his falcon, who was never captured.

Shang made the journey to Mulan's hometown to return her effects to her parents. It was the least he could do.

"She died like a soldier," he said. "With honor. And she didn't die alone."

Fa Li wept, clinging to the helmet like she was holding her daughter in her arms, an infant again. Shang remembered the makeshift marker he'd erected for his own father, and understood what cold comfort it was to hold a helmet where your child should be.

"Thank you, Captain," Fa Zhou said. Shang turned away.

It ate at him, long after her mother's wails faded from his ears. Could he have done anything differently? Would she still be alive?

All he knew was in war, nobody wins.

Shang turned his horse and headed home.