The Poppy War

by R. F. Kuang

  “I’m back.” Altan had awoken beside her. His voice was a dry whisper. “I never thought I’d be back.”

  Rin’s insides twisted with dread. “Where are we?”

  “Please,” Altan said. “Don’t make me explain this to you.”

  She knew, then, exactly where they were.

  Chaghan’s words echoed in her mind.

  After the First Poppy War, the Federation became obsessed with your people . . . They spent the decades in between the Poppy Wars kidnapping Speerlies, experimenting on them, trying to figure out what made them special.

  The Federation soldiers had brought them to that same research facility that Altan had been abducted to as a child. The place that had left him with a crippling addiction to opium. The place that had been liberated by the Hesperians. The place that should have been destroyed after the Second Poppy War.

  Snake Province must have fallen, she realized with a sinking feeling. The Federation had occupied more ground than she’d feared.

  The Hesperians were long gone. The Federation was back. The monsters had returned to their lair.

  “You know the worst part?” Altan said. “We’re so close to home. To Speer. We’re on the coastline. We’re right by the sea. When they first brought us here, there weren’t so many cells . . . they put us in a room with a window facing the water. I could see the constellations. Every night. I saw the star of the Phoenix and thought that if I could just slip away, I could swim and keep swimming and find my way back home.”

  Rin thought of a four-year-old Altan, locked in this place, staring out at the night sky while around him his friends were strapped down and dissected. She wanted to reach out and touch him, but no matter how hard she strained against those straps, she couldn’t move. “Altan . . .”

  “I thought someone would come and get us,” he continued, and Rin didn’t think he was talking to her anymore. He spoke like he was recounting a nightmare to the empty air. “Even when they killed the others, I thought that maybe . . . maybe my parents would still come for me. But when the Hesperian troops liberated me, they told me I could never go back. They told me there was nothing on the island but bones and ash.”

  He fell quiet.

  Rin was at a loss for words. She felt like she needed to say something, something to rouse him, turn his attention to seeking a way out of this place, but anything that came to mind was laughably inadequate. What kind of consolation could she possibly give?

  “Good! You’re awake.”

  A high, tremulous voice interrupted her thoughts. Whoever it was spoke from directly behind her, out of her line of sight. Rin’s eyes bulged and she strained against the straps.

  “Oh, I’m sorry—but of course you cannot see me.”

  The owner of the voice moved to stand directly above her. He was a very thin white-haired man in a doctor’s uniform. His beard was trimmed meticulously to a sharp point ending two inches below his chin. His dark eyes glittered with a bright intelligence.

  “Is this better?” He smiled benignly, as if greeting an old friend. “I am Eyimchi Shiro, chief medical officer of this camp. You may call me Dr. Shiro.”

  He spoke Nikara, not Mugini. He had a very prim Sinegardian accent, as if he’d learned the language fifty years ago. His tone was stilted, artificially cheerful.

  When Rin did not respond, the doctor shrugged and turned to the other table.

  “Oh, Altan,” he said. “I had no idea you’d be coming back. This is a wonderful surprise! I couldn’t believe it when they told me. They said, ‘Dr. Shiro, we’ve found a Speerly!’ And I said, ‘You’ve got to be joking! There are no more Speerlies!’” Shiro chuckled mildly.

  Rin strained to see Altan’s face. He was awake; his eyes were open, but he glared at the ceiling without looking at Shiro.

  “They have been so scared of you, you know,” Shiro continued cheerfully. “What do they call you? The monster of Nikan? The Phoenix incarnate? My countrymen love exaggerations, and they love you Nikara shamans even more. You are a myth, a legend! You are so special! Why do you act so sullen?”

  Altan said nothing.

  Shiro seemed to deflate slightly, but then he grinned and patted Altan on the cheek. “Of course. You must be tired. Do not worry. We will fix you up in just a moment. I have just the thing . . .”

  He hummed happily as he bustled over to the corner of the operating room. He perused his shelves, plucking out various vials and instruments. Rin heard a popping noise, and then the sound of a candle being lit. She could not see what Shiro was doing with his hands until he returned to stand above Altan.

  “Did you miss me?” he inquired.

  Altan said nothing.

  “Hm.” Shiro lifted a syringe over Altan’s face, tapping the glass so that both of them could see the liquid inside. “Did you miss this?”

  Altan’s eyes bulged.

  Shiro held Altan’s wrist down with a gentle touch, almost as a mother would caress her child. His skilled fingers prodded for a vein. With his other hand he brought the needle to Altan’s arm and pushed.

  Only then did Altan scream.

  “Stop!” Rin shrieked. Spittle flew out the sides of her mouth. “Stop it!”

  “My dear!” Shiro set the empty syringe down and rushed to her side. “Calm! Calm down! He will be fine.”

  “You’re killing him!” She thrashed wildly against her bonds, but they held firm.

  Tears leaked from her eyes. Shiro wiped them meticulously away, keeping his fingers out of reach of her gnashing teeth.

  “Killing? Don’t be dramatic. I just gave him some of his favorite medicine.” Shiro tapped his temple and winked at her. “You know he enjoys it. You traveled with him, didn’t you? This drug is not anything new to him. He will be fine in a few minutes.”

  They both looked to Altan. Altan’s breathing had stabilized, but he certainly did not look fine.

  “Why are you doing this?” Rin choked. She’d thought she understood Federation cruelty by now. She had seen Golyn Niis. She’d seen the evidence of Mugenese scientists’ handiwork. But to look this evil in the eye, to watch Shiro inflict such pain on Altan and smile about it . . . Rin could not comprehend it. “What do you want from us?”

  Shiro sighed. “Is it not obvious?” He patted her cheek. “I want knowledge. Our work here will advance medical technology by decades. When else do you get such a good chance to do research? An endless supply of cadavers! Boundless opportunities for experimentation! I can answer every question I’ve ever had about the human body! I can devise ways to prevent death!”

  Rin gaped at him in disbelief. “You are cutting my people open.”

  “Your people?” Shiro snorted. “Don’t degrade yourself. You’re nothing like those pathetic Nikara. You Speerlies are so fascinating. Composed of such lovely material.” Shiro fondly brushed the hair from Altan’s sweaty forehead. “Such beautiful skin. Such fascinating eyes. The Empress doesn’t know what she has.”

  He pressed two fingers against Rin’s neck to take her pulse. She swallowed down the bile that rose up at his touch.

  “I wonder if you might oblige me,” he said gently. “Show me the fire. I know you can.”

  “What?”

  “You Speerlies are so special,” Shiro confided. His voice had taken on a low, husky tone. He spoke as if to an infant, or a lover. “So strong. So unique. They say you are a god’s chosen people. What makes you this way?”

  Hatred, Rin thought. Hatred, and a history of suffering inflicted by people like you.

  “You know my country has never achieved feats of shamanism,” Shiro said. “Do you have any idea why?”

  “Because the gods wouldn’t bother with scum like you,” Rin spat.

  Shiro brushed at the air, as if swatting the insult away. He must have heard so many Nikara curses by now that they meant nothing to him.

  “We will do it like this,” he said. “I will request you to show me the way to the gods. Each time you refuse, I will give him ano
ther injection of the drug. You know how he will feel it.”

  Altan made a low, guttural noise from his bed. His entire body tensed and spasmed.

  Shiro murmured something into his ear and stroked Altan’s forehead, as tenderly as a mother might comfort an ailing child.

  Hours passed. Shiro posed his questions about shamanism to Rin again and again, but she maintained a stony front. She would not reveal the secrets behind the Pantheon. She would not place yet another weapon in Mugen’s hands.

  Instead she cursed and spat, called him a monster, called him every vile thing she could think of. Jima hadn’t taught them to curse in Mugini, but Shiro caught the gist.

  “Come now,” Shiro said dismissively. “It’s not like you’ve never seen this before.”

  She paused, spittle dripping from her mouth. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Shiro touched his fingers to Altan’s neck to feel his pulse, pulled his eyelids back and pursed his lips as if confirming something. “His tolerance is astounding. Inhuman. He’s been smoking opium for years.”

  “Because of what you did to him,” she screeched.

  “And afterward? After he was liberated?” Shiro sounded like a disappointed teacher. “They had the last Speerly in their hands, and they never tried to wean him off the drug? It’s obvious—someone’s been feeding it to him for years. Clever of them. Oh, don’t look at me like that. The Federation weren’t the first to use opium to control a population. The Nikara originated this technique.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “They didn’t teach you?” Shiro looked amused. “But of course. Of course they wouldn’t. Nikan likes to scrub out all that is embarrassing about its past.”

  He crossed the room to stand over her, brushing his fingers along the shelves as he walked. “How do you think the Red Emperor kept the Speerlies on their leash? Use your head, my dear. When Speer lost its independence, the Red Emperor sent crates of opium over to the Speerlies as an offering. A gift, from the colonizing state to the tributary. This was deliberate. Previously the Speerlies had only ever ingested their local bark in their ceremonies. They were used to such mild hallucinogens that to them, smoking opium was like drinking wood alcohol. When they tried it, they immediately became addicted. They did anything they could to get more of it. They were slaves to the opium just as much as they were slaves to the Emperor.”

  Rin’s mind reeled. She could not think of any response.

  She wanted to call Shiro a liar. She wanted to scream at him to stop. But it made sense.

  It made so much sense.

  “So you see, our countries are not so different after all,” Shiro said smugly. “The only difference is that we revere shamans, we desire to learn from them, while your Empire is terrified and paranoid about the power it possesses. Your Empire has culled you and exploited you and made you eliminate each other. I will unleash you. I will grant you freedom to call the god as you have never been allowed to before.”

  “If you give me freedom,” she snarled, “the first thing I will do is burn you alive.”

  Her connection to the Phoenix was the last advantage she had. The Federation had raped and burned her country. The Federation had destroyed her school and killed her friends. By now they had mostly likely razed her hometown to the ground. Only the Pantheon remained sacred, the one thing in the universe that Mugen still had no access to.

  Rin had been tortured, bound, beaten, and starved, but her mind was her own. Her god was her own. She would die before she betrayed it.

  Eventually, Shiro grew bored of her. He summoned the guards to drag the prisoners into a cell. “I will see you both tomorrow,” he said cheerfully. “And we will try this again.”

  Rin spat on his coat as the guards marched her out. Another guard followed with Altan’s inert form thrown over his shoulder like an animal carcass.

  One guard chained Rin’s leg to the wall and slammed the cell door shut on them. Beside her Altan jerked and moaned, muttering incoherently under his breath. Rin cradled his head in her lap and kept a miserable vigil over her fallen commander.

  Altan did not come to his senses for hours. Many times he cried out, spoke words in the Speerly language that she didn’t understand.

  Then he moaned her name. “Rin.”

  “I’m here,” she said, stroking his forehead.

  “Did he hurt you?” he demanded.

  She choked back a sob. “No. No—he wanted me to talk, teach him about the Pantheon. I didn’t, but he said he’d just keep hurting you . . .”

  “It’s not the drug that hurts,” he said. “It’s when it wears off.”

  Then, with a sickening pang in her stomach, she understood.

  Altan was not lapsing when he smoked opium. No—smoking opium was the only time when he was not in pain. He had lived his entire life in perpetual pain, always longing to have another dose.

  She had never understood how horrendously difficult it was to be Altan Trengsin, to live under the strain of a furious god constantly screaming for destruction in the back of his mind, while an indifferent narcotic deity whispered promises in his blood.

  That’s why the Speerlies became addicted to opium so easily, she realized. Not because they needed it for their fire. Because for some of them, it was the only time they could get away from their horrible god.

  Deep down, she had known this, had suspected this ever since she’d learned that Altan didn’t need drugs like the rest of the Cike did, that Altan’s eyes were perpetually bright like poppy flowers.

  Altan should have been locked into the Chuluu Korikh himself a long time ago.

  But she hadn’t wanted to believe, because she needed to trust that her commander was sane.

  Because without Altan, what was she?

  In the hours that followed, when the drug seeped out of his bloodstream, Altan suffered. He sweated. He writhed. He seized so violently that Rin had to restrain him to keep him from hurting himself. He screamed. He begged for Shiro to come back. He begged for Rin to help him die.

  “You can’t,” she said, panicking. “We have to escape here. We have to get out.”

  His eyes were blank, defeated. “Resistance here means suffering, Rin. There is no escape. There is no future. The best you can hope for is that Shiro gets bored and grants you a painless death.”

  She almost did it then.

  She wanted to end his misery. She couldn’t see him tortured like this anymore, couldn’t watch the man she had admired since she set eyes on him reduced to this.

  She found herself kneeling over his inert torso, hands around his neck. All she had to do was put pressure into her arms. Force the air out of his throat. Choke the life out of him.

  He would hardly feel it. He could hardly feel anything anymore.

  Even as her fingers grasped his skin, he did not resist. He wanted it to end.

  She had done this once before. She had killed the likeness of him in the guise of the chimei.

  But Altan had been fighting then. Then, Altan had been a threat. He was not a threat now, only the tragic, glaring proof that her heroes inevitably let her down.

  Altan Trengsin was not invincible after all.

  He had been so good at following orders. They told him to jump and he flew. They told him to fight and he destroyed.

  But here at the end, without a purpose and without a ruler, Altan Trengsin was broken.

  Rin’s fingers tensed, but then she trembled and pushed his limp form violently away from her.

  “How are my darling Speerlies doing? Ready for another round?”

  Shiro approached their cell, beaming. He was coming from the lab at the opposite end of the hallway. He held several round metallic containers in his arms.

  They didn’t respond.

  “Would you like to know what those canisters are for?” Shiro asked. His voice remained artificially bright. “Any guesses? Here’s a hint. It’s a weapon.”

  Rin glowered at the doctor. Altan stared a
t the floor.

  Shiro continued, unfazed. “It’s the plague, children. Surely you know what the plague does? First your nose begins to run, and then great welts start growing on your arms, your legs, between your legs . . . you die from shock when the wounds rupture, or from your own poisoned blood. It takes quite a long time to die down, once it’s caught on. But perhaps that was before your time. Nikan has been plague free for a while now, hasn’t it?”

  Shiro tapped the metal bars. “It took us a devilishly long time to figure out how it spread. Fleas, can you believe that? Fleas, that latch onto rats, and then spread their little plague particles over everything they touch. Of course, now that we know how it spreads, it’s only a hop step to turning it into a weapon. Obviously it will not do to have the weapon run around without control—we do plan to inhabit your country one day—but when released in some densely populated areas, with the right critical mass . . . well, this war will be over much sooner than we anticipated, won’t it?”

  Shiro leaned forward, head resting against the bars. “You have nothing to fight for anymore,” he said quietly. “Your country is lost. Why do you hold your silence? You have an easy way out of this place. Just cooperate with me. Tell me how you summon the fire.”

  “I’ll die first,” Rin spat.

  “What are you defending?” Shiro asked. “You owe Nikan nothing. What were you to them? What were the Speerlies to them, ever? Freaks! Outcasts!”

  Rin stood up. “We fight for the Empress,” she said. “I’m a Militia soldier until the day I die.”

  “The Empress?” Shiro looked faintly puzzled. “Have you really not figured it out?”

  “Figured what out?” Rin snapped, even as Altan silently mouthed no.

  But she had taken the bait, she had risen to the doctor’s provocation, and she could tell from the way Shiro’s eyes gleamed that he had been waiting for this moment.

  “Have you even asked how we knew you were at the Chuluu Korikh?” Shiro asked. “Who must have given us that information? Who was the only other person who knew of that wonderful mountain?”