“You go,” he says. “I’ll only pull you down. I don’t belong here.”
“That’s not true.” I rub his back and say to him softly, as if telling him a fable before bed, “Do you remember the story that Nun Hou told us once about the young Shinian courtesan who was skilled as a dancer?”
“I don’t think so.”
“You were really small.”
He casts his gaze down at the word small. I say, carefully, “They called the courtesan Little Pi Bao Gu, even though she was a grown woman. One day, she fled to the island of Pearl. She applied her knowledge of dance by blending kung fu with skating to create the deadliest martial art under heaven.”
He lifts his face toward me as this sinks in.
“All of wu liu comes from her,” I continue. “All of this that Pearlians claim as theirs was invented by a tiny young woman. Who came from Shin. Like you did.”
He blinks to squeeze back the tears.
I take his hand and say, “So you skate with me into that dining hall, and when we do so, you hold your head high. We’re not from here. But that doesn’t mean we don’t belong here. Don’t ever let anyone make you believe that. No one belongs here more than we do.”
CHAPTER
SEVEN
I’m in a nightmare.
“Small hong-fist double toe jump!”
That nightmare that every student knows.
“Yin-yang health-form triple-stamp double jump!”
The one where you are taking an examination on things that you’ve never studied.
“Monkey-fist triple-scissor heel backflip!”
And everyone can see your wrong answers.
Except it’s not a nightmare. It’s wu liu class.
“Thousand Cleaver Goddess Sliding Across a Placid Sea!” shouts Sensei Madame Liao.
As all the girls start doing this move, which I’ve never even heard of before, I’m realizing that the wu liu moves I learned in Shin only constitute a tiny fraction of what most of the students here already know. And Supreme Sensei Master Jio announced that we’ll be doing Lady Ming’s Hand-Mirror. My opponent and I will take turns copying each other’s moves back and forth in an ever-lengthening string of different moves, until one of us makes a mistake. I’m never going to learn all these moves in time. I bow to Sensei Madame Liao to request permission to visit the toilet.
I leave, go in a stall, and close the door.
It’s not just the idea of having to copy moves that I might never have seen before during a Motivation. It’s also the pressure that this training is putting on my skate blades. I run a finger along the edges to check for any damage. Luckily, there aren’t any nicks. I’m relieved to see the spring formed by the dragon tail curling up and under my heel is undamaged. I was worried with all those jumps. Sixty-three jumps this morning! Blades cost as much as three months’ rice. In Shin, we have to make the blades last a year. The rich students here at Pearl Famous never have to worry about such things and learned moves using dozens and dozens of steps each. They didn’t have to limit themselves to moves that emphasize gliding and their own center of gravity to propel them forward to conserve steps.
Suki said I won the first Motivation because I was lucky. And in a way, she was right. It didn’t involve combat, only racing on rails and leaping. Combat is what really eats up steps. And I could use whatever steps I wanted instead of having to copy moves that I’ve never seen before but that everyone else already knows how to do.
How can I face this Motivation? I don’t know if I can even face the rest of today’s class. Maybe if I sit in here long enough, class will end and they’ll all leave without me.
Stop it, Peasprout. I straighten up and collect my emotions. So it’s going to be difficult. That’s nothing new to me. I need to go back and show those Pearlians that Shinians don’t give up.
I reach into the box of paper wipes in the stall to wipe my nose. Instead of squares of white paper, there is a stack of something strangely shaped and colorful. I take one out.
Ten thousand years of stomach gas! It’s one of those paper dolls of me dressed like an assassin with the words Peony-Level Brightstar Chen Peasprout, the Stealthiest Skater in Shin! printed in gold logograms above my head, stamped with the imperial seal. Who put them here? It must have been Suki or one of her friends.
I snatch the papers dolls out of the box, claw them to tatters, and throw them all down the toilet.
As I watch the dolls disappear, I realize just how devious Suki’s stunt is. It’s not just the insult—it’s the implication. Stealthiest Skater in Shin. As stealthy as a spy. Just like Suki accused me of being in front of all the other girls.
I think back to Suki whispering, “It doesn’t have to be true. It just has to look like it’s true.”
I go into the other stalls. Every single one of them is stocked with a thick stack of the paper dolls. She’s probably placed them in the girls’ bathrooms throughout the whole campus.
When I finally come out of the toilet, all the girls are kneeling on the pearl and looking at me.
“Well, hurry along,” says Sensei Madame Liao. “You’re the last one.”
It seems that while I was in the toilet, she tested the girls individually. In front of everyone.
Doi looks at me, expressionless, but Suki smiles her evil smile, her tongue poking into her cheek.
I face Sensei Madame Liao, ready to see what move I have to try to copy. She says, “Open-palm blossom foot single-toe jump.” She performs the move. I’ve never seen it before, but I’m relieved because it’s just a simple half spin with feet together, one skate extended farther than the other, and hands open for balance. She’s being easy on me.
“Use your stealthy powers!” says a girl. A giggle passes
