by R. F. Kuang
She saw Kitay, dressed in a general’s uniform. His wiry hair was grown long, pulled into a bun at the back of his head. He was deep in conversation with Master Irjah. When he caught her eye, he winked.
“Hello, you,” said a familiar voice.
She turned, and her heart caught in her throat.
Of course it was Altan. It was always Altan, lurking behind every corner of her mind, haunting every decision she made.
But this was an Altan who was alive and whole—not the way she’d known him at Khurdalain, when he’d been burdened by a war that he would kill himself winning. This was the best possible version of him, the way she’d tried to remember him, the way he’d rarely ever been. The scars were still on his face, his hair was still messy and overgrown, tied back in a careless knot, and he still wielded that trident with the casual grace of someone who spent more time on the battlefield than off.
This was an Altan who fought because he adored it and was good at it, and not because it was the only thing he had ever been trained to do.
His eyes were brown. His pupils were not constricted. He did not smell of smoke. When he smiled, he almost looked happy.
“You’re here.” She couldn’t manage anything but a whisper. “It’s you.”
“Of course I am,” he said. “Not even a border skirmish could keep me from you today. Tyr wanted to have my head on a stake, but I don’t think even he could stand up to Mother and Father’s wrath.”
A border skirmish?
Tyr?
Mother and Father?
The confusion lasted for only a moment, and then she understood. Dreams came with their own logic, and this was nothing but a beautiful dream. In this world, Speer had never been destroyed. Tearza had not died and abandoned her people to slavery, and her kin had not been slaughtered overnight on the Dead Island.
She almost laughed out loud. In this illusion, their biggest concern was a fucking border skirmish.
“Are you nervous?” Altan asked.
“Nervous?” she echoed.
“I’d be surprised if you weren’t,” he said. His voice dropped to a conspiring whisper. “Unless you’re having second thoughts. And—I mean, if you are, it’s fine by me. If we’re being honest, I’ve never been too fond of him, either.”
“‘Him’?” Rin echoed.
“He’s just jealous that you’re getting married first while nobody wants him.” Ramsa shouldered his way between them, chewing on a red bean bun. He dipped his head toward Altan. “Hello, Commander.”
Altan rolled his eyes. “Don’t you have fireworks to light?”
“That’s not until later,” said Ramsa. “Your parents said they’ll castrate me if I go near them now. Something about safety hazards.”
“That sounds about right.” Altan ruffled Ramsa’s hair. “Why don’t you scurry along and enjoy the feast?”
“Because this conversation is much more interesting.” Ramsa took a large bite of the bun and spoke with his mouth full. “So what’s it going to be, Rin? Will we have a runaway bride? Because I’d like to finish eating first.”
Rin’s mouth hung open. Her eyes darted between Ramsa and Altan, trying to detect proof that they were illusions—some imperfection, some lack of substance.
But they were so solid, detailed and full of life. And they were so, so happy. How could they be this happy?
“Rin?” Altan nudged her shoulder. “Are you all right?”
She shook her head. “I don’t— This isn’t . . .”
Concern crossed his face. “Do you need to lie down for a moment?”
“No, I just . . .”
He took her arm. “I’m sorry I was making fun of you. Come on, we’ll go find you a bench.”
“No, that’s not what I . . .” She shrugged him off and backed away. She was walking backward, she knew she was, but somehow every time she took a step she ended up no farther from Altan than she had been to begin with.
“Come with me,” Altan repeated, and his voice resonated around the room. The colors of the banquet hall dimmed. The guests’ faces blurred. He was the only defined figure in sight.
He extended his hand toward her. “Quickly now.”
She knew what would happen to her if she obeyed.
Everything would be over. The illusion might last another few minutes, or an hour, or a week. Time worked differently in illusions. She might enjoy this one for a lifetime. But in reality, she would have succumbed to Daji’s poison. Her life would be over. She would never wake up from this spell.
But would that be so wrong?
She wanted to go with him. She wanted to go so badly.
“No one has to die,” Altan said, voicing her own thoughts out loud. “The wars never happened in the first place. You can have everything back. Everyone. No one has to go.”
“But they are gone,” she whispered, and the instant she said it, its truth became apparent. The faces in the banquet hall were lies. Her friends were dead. Tutor Feyrik was gone. Master Irjah was gone. Golyn Niis was gone. Speer was gone. Nothing could bring them back. “You can’t tempt me with this.”
“Then you can join them,” Altan said. “Would that be so bad?”
The lights and streamers dimmed. The tables faded to nothing; the guests disappeared. She and Altan were alone, two spots of flame in a dark passage.
“Is this what you want?” His mouth closed over hers before she could speak. Scorching hands moved on her body and trailed downward.
Everything was so terribly hot. She was burning. She’d forgotten how it felt to truly burn—she was immune to her own flame, and she’d never been caught in Altan’s fire, but this . . . this was an old, familiar pain, terrible and delicious all at once.
“No.” She fought to find her voice. “No, I don’t want this—”
Altan’s hands tightened on her waist.
“You did,” he said, pressing closer. “It was written all over your face. Every time.”
“Don’t touch me.” She pressed her hands against his chest and tried to push him away, to no avail.
“Don’t pretend you don’t want this,” said Altan. “You need me.”
She couldn’t breathe. “No, I don’t . . .”
“Don’t you?”
He brought his hand to her cheek. She cringed back, but his burning fingers rested firm on her skin. His hands moved down to her neck. His thumbs stopped where her collarbones met, a familiar resting place. He squeezed. Fire lanced through her throat.
“Come back.” The Sorqan Sira’s voice cut through her mind like a knife, granting her several delicious, cool seconds of lucidity. “Remember yourself. Submit to him and you lose.”
Rin convulsed on the ground.
“I don’t want this,” she moaned. “I don’t want to see this—I want to get out—”
“It’s the poison,” said the Sorqan Sira. “The sweat amplifies it, brings it to a boil. You must purge yourself, or the Seal will kill you.”
Rin whimpered. “Just make it stop.”
“I can’t. It must get worse before it gets better.” The Sorqan Sira seized her hand and squeezed it. “Remember, he exists only in your mind. He only has as much power as you give him. Can you do this?”
Rin nodded and gripped the Sorqan Sira’s arm. She couldn’t find the breath to say the words send me back, but the Sorqan Sira nodded. She threw another ladleful of water onto the rocks.
The heat in the yurt redoubled. Rin choked; her back arched, the material world faded away, and the pain returned. Altan’s fingers were around her neck again, squeezing, choking her.
He leaned down. His lips brushed against hers. “Do you know what I want you to do?”
She shook her head, gasping.
“Kill yourself,” he ordered.
“What?”
“I want you to kill yourself,” he repeated. “Make things right. You should have died on that pier. And I should have lived.”
Was that true?
It must have
been true, if it had lingered so long in her subconscious. And she couldn’t lie to herself; she knew, had always known that if Altan had lived and if she had died then things would have gone much differently. Aratsha would still be alive, the Cike would not have disbanded, they would not have lost to Feylen, and the Republican Fleet might not be in fragments at the bottom of Lake Boyang.
Jinzha had said it first. We should have tried to save the other one.
“You are the reason why I died,” Altan continued, relentless. “Make this right. Kill yourself.”
She swallowed. “No.”
“Why not?” His fingers tightened around her neck. “You’re not particularly useful to anyone alive.”
She reached up for his hands. “Because I’m done taking orders from you.”
He was a product of her own mind. He had only as much power as she gave him.
She pried his fingers off her neck. One by one, they came away. She was nearly free. He squeezed harder but she kicked out, nailed him in the shin, and the moment he let go she scrambled backward away from him and sank into a low crouch, poised to strike.
“Really?” he scoffed. “You’re going to fight me?”
“I won’t surrender to you anymore.”
“‘Surrender’?” he repeated, like it was such a ludicrous word. “Is that how you’ve thought of it? Oh, Rin, it was never about that. I didn’t want surrender from you. I had to manage you. Control you. You’re so fucking stupid, you had to be told what to do.”
“I’m not stupid,” she said.
“Yes, you are.” He smiled, patronizing and handsome and hateful all at once. “You’re nothing. You’re useless. Compared to me you’re—”
“I’m nothing at all,” she interrupted. “I was a terrible commander. I couldn’t function without opium. I still can’t call the fire. You can tell me everything I hate about myself, but I already know. You can’t say anything to hurt me more.”
“Oh, I doubt that.” Suddenly his trident was in his hand, spinning as he advanced. “How’s this, then? You wanted me dead.”
She flinched. “No. I never.”
“You hated me. You were afraid of me, you couldn’t wait to be rid of me. Admit it, when I died you laughed.”
“No, I wept,” she said. “I wept for days, until I couldn’t breathe anymore, and then I tried to stop breathing, but every time, Enki brought me back to life, and then I hated myself because you said that I had to keep living, and I hated living because you’re the one who said I had to—”
“Why would you mourn me?” he asked quietly. “You barely even knew me.”
“You’re right,” she said. “I loved an idea of you. I was infatuated with you. I wanted to be you. But I didn’t know you then, and I’ll never really know what you were. I’m finished wondering now, Altan. I’m ready to kill you.”
The trident materialized in her hands.
She had a weapon now. She wasn’t defenseless against him. She’d never been defenseless. She had just never thought to look.
Altan’s eyes flickered to the prongs. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“You are not real,” she said calmly. “He’s dead, and I can’t hurt him anymore.”
“Look at me,” he said. “Look at my eyes. Tell me I’m not real.”
She lunged. He parried. She disentangled their prongs and advanced again.
He raised his voice. “Look at me.”
“I am,” she said softly. “I see everything.”
He faltered.
She stabbed him through the chest.
His eyes bulged open, but otherwise he didn’t move. A slow trickle of blood spilled out the side of his mouth. A red circle blossomed on his chest.
It wasn’t a fatal blow. She’d stabbed him just under the sternum. She had missed his heart. Eventually he might bleed to death, but she didn’t want him gone just yet. She needed him alive and conscious.
She still needed absolution.
Altan peered down at the prongs emerging from his chest. “Would you like to kill me?”
She withdrew her trident. Blood spilled out faster onto his uniform. “I’ve done it before.”
“But could you do it now?” he inquired. “Could you end me? If you kill me here, Rin, I’ll go.”
“I don’t want that.”
“Then you still need me.”
“Not the way I did.”
She’d realized, finally realized, that chasing the legacy of Altan Trengsin would give her no truth. She couldn’t replicate him in her mind, no matter how many times she tortured herself going over the memories. She could only inherit his pain.
And what was there to replicate? Who was Altan, really?
A scared boy from Speer who just wanted to go home, a broken boy who had learned that there was no home to return to, and a soldier who stayed alive just to spite everyone who thought he should be dead. A commander with no purpose, nothing to fight for, and nothing to care about except burning down the world.
Altan was no hero. That was so clear to her now, so stunningly clear that she felt as if she’d been doused in ice water, submerged and reborn.
She didn’t owe him her guilt.
She didn’t owe him anything.
“I still love you,” she said, because she had to be honest.
“I know. You’re a fool for it,” he said. He stepped forward, reached for her hand, and entwined his fingers in hers. “Kiss me. I know you’ve wanted to.”
She touched his blood-soaked fingers against her cheek. She closed her eyes, just for a moment, and thought about what might have been.
“I loved you, too,” he said. “Do you believe that?”
“No, I don’t,” she said, and pressed her trident into his chest once more.
It slid smoothly in with no resistance. Rin didn’t know if that was because the vision of Altan was already fading, immaterial, or if Altan within this dream space was deliberately aiding her, sinking the three prongs neatly into that space in his rib cage that stood just over his heart.
When Rin breathed again it was a new and frightening sensation, at once mechanical and also terribly confusing. Was this her body, this mortal and clumsy vessel? One finger at a time she learned the inner workings of her body again. Learned the way air moved through her lungs. Learned to hear the sound of her heart pumping inside her.
She saw light all around her and above her, a perfect circle of blue. It took her a moment to realize that it was the roof of the yurt, pulled open to let the steam escape.
“Don’t move,” said the Sorqan Sira.
The Sorqan Sira placed a hand over Rin’s chest, clenched her fingers, and started to chant. Sharp nails dug into Rin’s skin.
Rin screamed.
It wasn’t over. She felt a terrible pulling sensation, as if the Sorqan Sira had wrapped her fingers around Rin’s heart and wrenched it out of her rib cage.
She looked down. The Sorqan Sira’s fingers hadn’t broken skin. The tugging came from something within; something sharp and jagged inside her, something that didn’t want to let go.
The Sorqan Sira’s chanting grew louder. Rin felt an immense pressure, so great she was sure that her lungs were bursting. It grew and grew—and then something gave. The pressure disappeared.
For a moment all she could do was lie flat and breathe, eyes fixed on the blue circle above.
“Look.” The Sorqan Sira opened her palm toward Rin. Inside was a clot of blood the size of her fist, mottled black and rotten. It smelled putrid.
Rin shrank instinctively away. “Is that . . . ?”
“Daji’s venom.” The Sorqan Sira made a fist over the clot and squeezed. Black blood oozed through the cracks between her fingers and dripped onto the glowing rocks. The Sorqan Sira peered curiously at her stained fingers, then shook the last few drops onto the rocks, where they hissed loudly and disappeared. “It’s gone now. You’re free.”
Rin stared at the stained rocks, at a loss for words. “I don’t . . .” She
choked before she could finish. Then it happened all at once. Her entire body shook, racked with a grief she hadn’t even known was there. She buried her head in her hands, whimpering incoherently, fingers thick with tears and snot.
“It’s all right to cry,” the Sorqan Sira said quietly. “I know what you saw.”
“Then fuck you,” Rin choked. “Fuck you.”
Her chest heaved. She lurched forward and vomited over the stones. Her knees shook, her ankle throbbed, and she collapsed onto herself, face inches from her vomit, eyes squeezed shut to stem the tide of tears.
Her heart slammed against her rib cage. She tried to focus on her pulse, counting her heartbeats with every passing second to calm down.
He’s gone.
He’s dead.
He can’t hurt me anymore.
She reached for her anger, the anger that had always served as her shield, and couldn’t find it. Her emotions had burned her out from the inside; the raging flames had died out because they had nothing left to consume. She felt drained, hollowed out and empty. The only things that remained were exhaustion and the dry ache of loss in her throat.
“You are allowed to feel,” the Sorqan Sira murmured.
Rin sniffled and wiped her nose with her sleeve.
“But don’t feel bad for him,” said the Sorqan Sira. “That was never him. The man you know has gone somewhere he’ll be at peace. Life and death, they’re equal to this cosmos. We enter the material world and we go away again, reincarnated into something better. That boy was miserable. You let him go.”
Yes, Rin knew; in the abstract she knew this truth, that to the cosmos they were fundamentally irrelevant, that they came from dust and returned to dust and ash.
And she should have taken comfort in that, but in that moment she didn’t want to be temporary and immaterial; she wanted to be forever preserved in the material world in a moment with Altan, their foreheads pressed together, eyes meeting, arms touching and interlacing, trying to meld into the pure physicality of the other.
She wanted to be alive and mortal and eternally temporary with him, and that was why she cried.