The Dragon Republic

by R. F. Kuang

  Her senses came back in blurs. She saw a shape above her, heard a garbled voice shouting her name.

  “Kitay?” she whispered.

  His arms shifted under her midriff. He was trying to lift her up, but the pain of the slightest movement was enormous. She whimpered, shaking.

  “You’re okay,” Kitay said. “I’ve got you.”

  She clutched at his arm, unable to speak. They huddled against each other, watching the planks continue to peel off the Kingfisher. Feylen was stripping the fleet apart, bit by bit.

  Rin could do nothing but convulse with fear. She squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want to see. The panic had taken over, and the same thoughts echoed over and over in her mind. We’re going to drown. He’s going to rip the ships apart and we will fall into the water and we will drown.

  Kitay shook her shoulder. “Rin. Look.”

  She opened her eyes and saw a shock of white hair. Chaghan had climbed out on the broken planks, was teetering wildly on the edge. He looked like a little child dancing on a roof. Somehow, despite the howling winds, he did not fall.

  He lifted his arms above his head.

  Instantly the air felt colder. Thicker, somehow. Just as abruptly, the wind stopped.

  Feylen hung still in the air, as if some invisible force was holding him in place.

  Rin couldn’t tell what Chaghan was doing, but she could feel the power in the air. It seemed as if Chaghan had established some invisible connection to Feylen, some thread that only the two of them could perceive, some psychospiritual plane upon which to wage a battle of wills.

  For a moment it seemed as if Chaghan was winning.

  Feylen’s head jerked back and forth; his legs twitched, as if he were seizing.

  Rin’s grip tightened on Kitay’s arm. A bubble of hope rose in her chest.

  Please. Please let Chaghan win.

  Then she saw Qara hunched over on the deck, rocking back and forth, muttering something over and over under her breath.

  “No,” Qara whispered. “No, no, no!”

  Chaghan’s head jerked to the side. His limbs moved spastically, flailing without purpose or direction, as if someone who had very little knowledge of the human body was controlling him from somewhere far away.

  Qara started to scream.

  Chaghan went limp. Then he flew backward, like a little white flag of surrender, so frail that Rin was afraid the winds themselves might rip him apart.

  “You think you can contain us, little shaman?” The winds resumed, twice as ferocious. Another gust swept both Chaghan and Qara off the ship into the churning waves below.

  Rin saw Nezha watching, horrified, from the Griffon, just close enough to be in earshot.

  “Do something!” she screamed. “You coward! Do something!”

  Nezha stood still, his mouth open, eyes wide as if he were trapped. His expression went slack. He did nothing.

  A gust of wind tore the Kingfisher’s deck in half, ripping the very floorboards from beneath Rin’s feet. She fell through the fragments of wood, bumped and dragged along the rough surface, until she hit the water.

  Kitay landed beside her. His eyes were closed. He sank instantly. She wrapped her arms around his chest, kicking furiously to keep them both afloat, and struggled to swim toward the Kingfisher, but the water kept sweeping them backward.

  Her gut clenched.

  The current.

  Lake Boyang emptied into a waterfall on its southern border. It was a short, narrow drop—small enough that its current had little effect on heavy warships. It was harmless to sailors. Deadly to swimmers.

  The Kingfisher rapidly receded from Rin’s sight as the current dragged them faster and faster to the edge. She saw a rope drifting beside them and grabbed wildly for it, desperate for anything to hang on to.

  Miraculously it was still tethered to the fleet. The line went taut; they stopped drifting. She forced her freezing fingers around the cord against the rushing waters, struggled to wrap it in loops around Kitay’s torso, her wrists.

  Her limbs had gone numb with the cold. She couldn’t move her fingers; they were locked tight around the rope.

  “Help us!” she screamed. “Someone help!”

  Someone stood up from the Kingfisher’s prow.

  Jinzha. Their eyes met across the water. His face was wild, frantic—she wanted to think he had seen her, but maybe his attention was fixed only on his own disappearing chance of survival.

  Then he disappeared. She couldn’t tell if Jinzha had cut the rope or if he’d simply gone down under another burst of Feylen’s attack, but she felt a jerk in the line just before it went slack.

  They spun away from the fleet, hurtling toward the waterfall. There was one second of weightlessness, a confusing and delicious moment of utter disorientation, and then the water claimed them.

  Chapter 21

  Rin ran across a dark field, chasing after a fiery silhouette that she was never going to catch. Her legs moved as if treading water—she was too slow, too clumsy, and the farther back she fell from the silhouette, the more her despair weighed her down, until her legs were so heavy that she couldn’t run any longer.

  “Please,” she cried. “Wait.”

  The silhouette stopped.

  When Altan turned around, she saw he was already burning, his handsome features charred and twisted, blackened skin peeled away to reveal pristine, gleaming bone.

  And then he was looming above her. Somehow he was still magnificent, still beautiful, even when arrested in the moment of his death. He knelt in front of her, took her face in his scorching hands, and brought their foreheads close together.

  “They’re right, you know,” he said.

  “About what?” She saw oceans of fire in his eyes. His grip was hurting her; it always had. She wasn’t sure if she wanted him to let her go or to kiss her.

  His fingers dug into her cheeks. “It should have been you.”

  His face morphed into Qara’s.

  Rin screamed and jerked away.

  “Tiger’s tits. I’m not that ugly.” Qara wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “Welcome to the world of the living.”

  Rin sat up and spat out a mouthful of lake water. She was shivering uncontrollably; it took her a while before she could push words out from between numb, clumsy lips. “Where are we?”

  “Right by the riverbank,” Qara said. “Maybe a mile out of Boyang.”

  “What about the rest?” Rin fought a swell of panic. “Ramsa? Suni? Nezha?”

  Qara didn’t answer, which meant she didn’t know, which meant that the Cike had either gotten away or drowned.

  Rin took several deep breaths to keep from hyperventilating. You don’t know they’re dead, she told herself. And Nezha, if anyone, had to be alive. The water protected him like he was its child. The waves would have shielded him, whether he consciously called them or not.

  And if the others are dead, there’s nothing you can do.

  She forced her mind to compartmentalize, to lock up her concern and shove it away. She could grieve later. First she needed to survive.

  “Kitay’s all right,” Chaghan told her. He looked like a living corpse; his lips were the same dark shade as his fingers, which were blue up to the middle joint. “Just went out to get some firewood.”

  Rin pulled her knees up to her chest, still shaking. “Feylen. That was Feylen.”

  The twins nodded.

  “But why—what was he—” She couldn’t understand why they looked so calm. “What’s he doing with them? What does he want?”

  “Well, Feylen the man probably wants to die,” Chaghan said.

  “Then what does—”

  “The Wind God? Who knows?” He rubbed his hands up and down his arms. “The gods are agents of pure chaos. Behind the veil they’re balanced, each one against the other sixty-three, but if you set them loose in the material world, they’re like water bursting from a broken dam. With no opposing force to check them, they’ll do whateve
r they want. And we never know what the gods want. He’ll create a light breeze one day, and then a typhoon the next. The one thing you can expect is inconsistency.”

  “But then why’s he fighting for them?” Rin asked. Wars took consistency. Unpredictable and uncontrollable soldiers were worse than none.

  “I think he’s scared of someone,” Chaghan said. “Someone who can frighten him into obeying orders.”

  “Daji?”

  “Who else?”

  “Good, you’re awake.” Kitay emerged into the clearing, carrying a bundle of sticks. He was drenched, curly hair plastered to his temples. Rin saw bloody scratches all over his face and arms where he’d hit the rocks, but otherwise he looked unharmed.

  “You’re all right?” she asked.

  “Eh. My bad arm’s feeling a bit off, but I think it’s just the cold.” He tossed the bundle onto the damp dirt. “Are you hurt?”

  She was so cold it was hard to tell. Everything just felt numb. She flexed her arms, wiggled her fingers, and found no trouble. Then she tried to stand up. Her left leg buckled beneath her.

  “Fuck.” She ran her fingers over her ankle. It was painfully tender to the touch, throbbing wherever she pressed it.

  Kitay knelt down beside her. “Can you wiggle your toes?”

  She tried, and they obeyed. That was a minor relief. This wasn’t a break, then, just a sprain. She was used to sprains. They’d been common for students at Sinegard; she’d learned how to deal with them years ago. She just needed something like cloth for compression.

  “Does anyone have a knife?” she asked.

  “I’ve got one.” Qara fished around in her pockets and tossed a small hunting knife in her direction.

  Rin unsheathed it, held her trouser leg taut, and cut off a strip at the ankle. She ripped that longways into two pieces and wrapped them tightly around her ankle.

  “At least you don’t have to worry about keeping it cool,” said Kitay.

  She didn’t have the energy to laugh. She flexed her ankle, and another tremor of pain shot up her leg. She winced. “Are we the only ones who made it out?”

  “If only. We’ve got a bit of company.” He nodded to his left.

  She followed his line of sight and saw a cluster of bodies—maybe seven, eight—huddled together a little ways up the riverbank. Gray cassocks, light hair. No army uniforms. They were all from the Gray Company.

  She could recognize Augus. She wouldn’t have been able to pick the rest out of a line—Hesperian faces looked so similar to her, all pale and sparse. She noticed with relief that Sister Petra was not among them.

  They looked miserable. They were breathing and blinking—moving just enough that Rin could tell they were alive, but otherwise they seemed frozen stiff. Their skin was pale as snow; their lips were turning blue.

  Rin waved at them and pointed to the bundle of sticks. “Come over here. We’ll build a fire.”

  She may as well try to be kind. If she could save some of the Gray Company from freezing to death, they might win her some political capital with the Hesperians when—if—they made it back to Arlong.

  The missionaries made no move to get up.

  She tried again in slow, deliberate Hesperian. “Come on, Augus. You’re going to freeze.”

  Augus registered no recognition when she called his name. She might not have been speaking Hesperian at all. The others had either blank stares or vaguely frightened expressions on their faces. She shuffled toward them, and several scuttled backward as if scared she might bite them.

  “Forget it,” Kitay said. “I’ve been trying to talk to them for the last hour, and my Hesperian is better than yours. I think they’re in shock.”

  “They’ll die if they don’t warm up.” Rin raised her voice. “Hey! Get over here!”

  More scared looks. Three of them leveled their weapons at her.

  Shit. Rin stumbled back.

  They had arquebuses.

  “Just leave them,” Chaghan muttered. “I’m in no mood to be shot.”

  “We can’t,” she said. “The Hesperians will blame us if they die.”

  He rolled his eyes. “They don’t have to know.”

  “They’ll find out if even one of those idiots ever finds their way back.”

  “They won’t.”

  “But we don’t know that. And I’m not killing them to make sure.”

  If it weren’t for Augus, she wouldn’t have cared. But blue-eyed devil or not, she couldn’t let him freeze to death. He’d been kind to her on the Kingfisher when he hadn’t needed to be. She felt obligated to return the favor.

  Chaghan sighed. “Then leave them a fire. And then we’ll move far enough that they’ll feel safe to approach it.”

  That wasn’t a bad idea. Kitay had a small flame going within minutes, and Rin waved toward the Hesperians. “We’re going to sit over there,” she called. “You can use this one.”

  Again, no response.

  But once she’d moved farther down the bank, she saw the Hesperians inching slowly toward the fire. Augus stretched his hands out over the flame. That was a small relief. At least they wouldn’t die of sheer idiocy.

  Once Kitay had built a second fire, all four of them stripped their uniforms off without self-consciousness. The air was icy around them, but they were colder in their drenched clothes than without. Naked, they huddled together over the flames, holding their hands as close to the fire as they could get without burning their skin. They squatted in silence for what seemed like hours. Nobody wanted to expend the energy to talk.

  “We’ll get back to the Murui.” Rin finally spoke as she pulled her dry uniform back on. It felt good to say the words out loud. It was something pragmatic, a step toward solid action, and it quelled the panic building in her stomach. “There’s plenty of loose driftwood around here. We could make a raft and just float downstream through the minor tributaries until we hit the main river, and if we’re careful and only move at night, then—”

  Chaghan didn’t let her finish. “That’s a terrible idea.”

  “And why’s that?”

  “Because there’s nothing to go back to. The Republic’s finished. Your friends are dead. Their bodies are probably lining the bottom of Lake Boyang.”

  “You don’t know that,” she said.

  He shrugged.

  “They’re not dead,” she insisted.

  “So run back to Arlong, then.” He shrugged again. “Crawl into Vaisra’s arms and hide as long as you can before the Empress comes for you.”

  “That’s not what I—”

  “That’s exactly what you want. You can’t wait to go groveling to his feet, waiting for your next command like some trained dog.”

  “I’m not a fucking dog.”

  “Aren’t you?” Chaghan raised his voice. “Did you even put up a fight when they stripped you of command? Or were you glad? Can’t give orders for shit, but you love taking them. Speerlies ought to know what it’s like to be slaves, but I never imagined you’d enjoy it.”

  “I was never a slave,” Rin snarled.

  “Oh, you were, you just didn’t know it. You bow down to anyone who will give you orders. Altan pulled on your fucking heartstrings, played you like a lute—he just had to say the right words, make you think he loved you, and you’d run after him to the Chuluu Korikh like an idiot.”

  “Shut up,” she said in a low voice.

  But then she saw what this was all about now. This wasn’t about Vaisra. This wasn’t about the Republic at all. This was about Altan. All these months later, after everything they’d been through, everything was still about Altan.

  She could give Chaghan that fight. He’d fucking had it coming.

  “Like you didn’t worship him,” she hissed. “I’m not the one who was obsessed with him. You dropped everything to do whatever he asked you to—”

  “But I didn’t go with him to the Chuluu Korikh,” he said. “You did.”

  “You’re blaming me for that?”r />
  She knew where this was going. She understood now what Chaghan had been too cowardly to say to her face all these months—that he blamed Altan’s death on her.

  No wonder he hated her.

  Qara put a hand on her brother’s arm. “Chaghan, don’t.”

  Chaghan shook her off. “Someone let Feylen loose. Someone got Altan captured. It wasn’t me.”

  “And someone told him where the Chuluu Korikh was in the first place,” Rin shouted. “Why? Why would you do that? You knew what was in there!”

  “Because Altan thought he could raise an army.” Chaghan spoke in a loud, flat voice. “Because Altan thought he could reset the course of history to before the Red Emperor and bring the world back to a time when Speer was free and the shamans were at the height of their power. Because for a time that vision was so beautiful that even I believed it. But I stopped. I realized that he’d gone crazy and that something had broken and that that path was just going to lead to his death.

  “But you? You followed him right to the very end. You let them capture him on that mountain, and you let him die on that pier.”

  Guilt coiled tightly in Rin’s gut, wrenching and horrible. She had nothing to say. Chaghan was right; she’d known he was right, she just hadn’t wanted to admit it.

  He cocked his head to the side. “Did you think he’d fall in love with you if you just did what he asked?”

  “Shut up.”

  His expression turned vicious. “Is that why you’re in love with Vaisra? Do you think he’s Altan’s replacement?”

  She rammed her fist into his mouth.

  Her knuckles met his jaw with a crack so satisfying she didn’t even feel where his teeth punctured her skin. She’d broken something, and that felt marvelous. Chaghan toppled over like a straw target. She lunged forward, reaching for his neck, but Kitay grabbed her from behind.

  She flailed in his grasp. “Let me go!”

  His grip tightened. “Calm down.”

  Chaghan pulled himself to a sitting position and spat a tooth onto the ground. “And she says she’s not a dog.”

  Rin lunged to hit him again, but Kitay yanked her back.